Drupal performance optimization. Testing VPS and Cloud VPS from Infobox
Drupal is the third most popular site management system (CMS) in the world, after Wordpress and Joomla.
In previous articles, we have already reviewed the performance optimization of Wordpress and Joomla .
In this article we will look at the basic Drupal performance optimizations, which have significantly increased the performance of the optimized site and can be applied very quickly.
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Increasing the site loading time by 1 second has the following consequences:
At the end of the article there is a link and a promo code for free registration of a trial version of a VPS or Cloud VPS from Infobox.
Let's determine the download time of the site. For testing, we will use the GTMetrix service. The site contains more than 50,000 posts with different number of comments.
Also check the site service WebPageTest. The test results are below:
Not surprisingly, with such results, many users refused to wait for the page to finish loading and simply left. Let's try to make a difference.
Minification is a very effective way to increase site performance. Let's minify the used HTML, CSS and JavaScript. To enable it, install the Minify module. Go to the “Configuration” -> “Performance” section of the Drupal control panel and enable all throughput optimization mechanisms.
To enable JavaScript minification, first click on “Click here” on the corresponding checkbox and run the optimization for javascript files. After that, you can enable the checkbox and save the changes.
To activate caching of pages and blocks, go to the “Configuration” -> “Performance” section and activate the corresponding functions. It will also include gzip – compression.
At http: // (domain) / sites / all / themes / (theme name) / images / there are images that are recommended to optimize. To optimize lossless (removing excess meta information), you can use Yahoo! Smush.It or ImageOptim .
For more compression of images with loss of information, you can use Photoshop, GIMP and other software. It is also recommended to optimize and pictures in the content before uploading to Drupal. This will save the amount of downloadable data, which is especially useful for mobile connections.
Adding CDN support will significantly increase site performance. It is often enough to simply set the DNS CDN and enable optimization. Many CDNs allow you to compress and optimize CSS and Javascript on the fly. This is how CloudFlare works. The CDN service is made very simple, but unfortunately it does not have points of presence in Russia and has some problems with login to the control panel in new browsers (for example, in Safari 8). As an alternative, you can consider SkyPark CDN , well represented in Russia and abroad and having a ready-made Drupal support plugin. The most correct way to select a CDN is to look at the points of presence in the cities with the largest audience of your site.
The above optimizations are those that lead to quick results. However, there is still a very large space for optimizations. Further recommendations are set out in High Performance Drupal: Fast and Scalable Designs .
Even the basic optimization allowed to significantly increase the performance of the site on Drupal.
According to GTMetrix, the site loading speed has been reduced from 6.77 seconds to 1.20 seconds, about 6 times!
According to WebPageTest, the download speed of the site has decreased from 3.19 seconds to 1.64 seconds, about 2 times! .
This suggests that having spent even half an hour optimizing a site you can achieve significant results and significantly increase the number of views, satisfaction of site users and conversion. Taking up deeper optimizations can achieve even more!
We are sure that this is only the first step in optimizing Drupal. For further experiments (and not only), we provide our readers with a trial version of Cloud VPS for 15 days free of charge. Sign up on the link . For those who need a classic VPS - use the freevps promo code to order here (for a typical VPS, the testing period is 5 days).
If you can not ask questions on Habré - write in the comments in the InfoboxCloud Community .
Successful optimization of Drupal and let your sites work fast!
In previous articles, we have already reviewed the performance optimization of Wordpress and Joomla .
In this article we will look at the basic Drupal performance optimizations, which have significantly increased the performance of the optimized site and can be applied very quickly.
')
Increasing the site loading time by 1 second has the following consequences:
- 11% reduction in the number of page views;
- decrease in customer satisfaction by 16%;
- decrease in the rate of conversion of visitors into buyers by 7%.
- 40% of mobile customers leave the online store, whose pages load longer than 3 seconds.
At the end of the article there is a link and a promo code for free registration of a trial version of a VPS or Cloud VPS from Infobox.
Drupal performance testing before optimizations
Let's determine the download time of the site. For testing, we will use the GTMetrix service. The site contains more than 50,000 posts with different number of comments.
Also check the site service WebPageTest. The test results are below:
Not surprisingly, with such results, many users refused to wait for the page to finish loading and simply left. Let's try to make a difference.
Minification
Minification is a very effective way to increase site performance. Let's minify the used HTML, CSS and JavaScript. To enable it, install the Minify module. Go to the “Configuration” -> “Performance” section of the Drupal control panel and enable all throughput optimization mechanisms.
To enable JavaScript minification, first click on “Click here” on the corresponding checkbox and run the optimization for javascript files. After that, you can enable the checkbox and save the changes.
Enable caching of pages and blocks
To activate caching of pages and blocks, go to the “Configuration” -> “Performance” section and activate the corresponding functions. It will also include gzip – compression.
Optimization of theme images
At http: // (domain) / sites / all / themes / (theme name) / images / there are images that are recommended to optimize. To optimize lossless (removing excess meta information), you can use Yahoo! Smush.It or ImageOptim .
For more compression of images with loss of information, you can use Photoshop, GIMP and other software. It is also recommended to optimize and pictures in the content before uploading to Drupal. This will save the amount of downloadable data, which is especially useful for mobile connections.
CDN
Adding CDN support will significantly increase site performance. It is often enough to simply set the DNS CDN and enable optimization. Many CDNs allow you to compress and optimize CSS and Javascript on the fly. This is how CloudFlare works. The CDN service is made very simple, but unfortunately it does not have points of presence in Russia and has some problems with login to the control panel in new browsers (for example, in Safari 8). As an alternative, you can consider SkyPark CDN , well represented in Russia and abroad and having a ready-made Drupal support plugin. The most correct way to select a CDN is to look at the points of presence in the cities with the largest audience of your site.
Think about performance when developing a site
The above optimizations are those that lead to quick results. However, there is still a very large space for optimizations. Further recommendations are set out in High Performance Drupal: Fast and Scalable Designs .
Basic optimization results
Even the basic optimization allowed to significantly increase the performance of the site on Drupal.
According to GTMetrix, the site loading speed has been reduced from 6.77 seconds to 1.20 seconds, about 6 times!
According to WebPageTest, the download speed of the site has decreased from 3.19 seconds to 1.64 seconds, about 2 times! .
This suggests that having spent even half an hour optimizing a site you can achieve significant results and significantly increase the number of views, satisfaction of site users and conversion. Taking up deeper optimizations can achieve even more!
Trial version of VPS and Cloud VPS for free
We are sure that this is only the first step in optimizing Drupal. For further experiments (and not only), we provide our readers with a trial version of Cloud VPS for 15 days free of charge. Sign up on the link . For those who need a classic VPS - use the freevps promo code to order here (for a typical VPS, the testing period is 5 days).
If you can not ask questions on Habré - write in the comments in the InfoboxCloud Community .
Successful optimization of Drupal and let your sites work fast!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/235573/
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