stanford drupalcamp 2014 - a perfect launch, every time
DESCRIPTION
Launches are tough on a new developer. Everyone remembers the lump in their throats around launch time; the rush to finish content, make final theme tweaks, adjust for sudden browser weirdness. As momentum picks up, the odd change request always appears, databases are slingshot hither and yon, while everyone scrambles to resolve merge conflicts like a Tokyo train at rush hour. We emerge scarred but smarter, intent on making the next launch less painful. But with different teams launching different sites, it can be hard to establish an iterative process. Especially as new work accumulates in the backlog, we reap what we sow in technical debt from rushed launches, quick & dirty choices made under the gun, and unimplemented ideas from retrospectives. Pantheon, however, has the same Customer Success team launching several enterprise sites per week, while assisting hundreds of self serve customers when they need a hand. Because we need to work effectively, we have developed the tools and process to ensure: * Great Site Performance - On Day One * Less problems over the long run * Clear Expectations from Informed Stakeholders The session will cover other key areas: 1. Preparing For Launch for the PM, Stakeholder, Developer & Sys Admin 2. Auditing the Site for landmines, carnivorous acid pool islands, and deadweight 3. Load Testing to obliterate surprises with actionable results This session is Platform Agnostic; whether you use PAAS, shared hosting, or wield your own hardware, PMs, developers, and clients will leave with new tools in their belt to launch with less agita. We will share some of our challenges and how we overcame them, and hopefully hear from you about how you overcame yours!TRANSCRIPT
A Perfect Launch, Every Time
Stanford DrupalCamp 2014
What is a perfect launch?• Schedule - On Time • Cost - On Budget • Scope - On Plan
Why should you care?
A Perfect Launch RecipeLaunch Team
• Onboarding Launch Check
• Best Practices Load Test
• Performance Tuning
Launch TeamOnboarding
How we prepare for launchGoal: Get rid of all the “uh-oh” moments Method: Launch Team Stakeholders:
• Project Manager - scheduling, best practices • Developer - platform knowledge, integration • Sys Admin - responsibilities, delegation • Business owner - flawless launch
Have a system and toolsSpecify common workflow requirements
• Repeatable tasks, delegatable Project management - Wrike, JIRA, Redmine Orientation logistics
• Scheduling - calendar, deadlines • Real-time communication
• Phone, Video Conference, GoToMeeting, IRC • Training - documentation, Slides, Videos
Mapping the terrainScoping of responsibilities
• Reduce confusion, set stage Channels of communication
• Define emergency procedures • Issue tracking as primary inbox
Staying in touch • Available, open, and regular • Proactive
Launch CheckBest Practices
What is Site Audit?Drupal 7 static analysis
• https://drupal.org/project/site_audit Best practices Actionable report Vendor agnostic
• Optional Pantheon specific recommendations
What can an audit analyze?• Drupal caching settings • Codebase and file size • Database structure • Modules, including duplicate / missing • Non-standard code structures • Views caching • Watchdog logs
Drupal caching settings
Drupal cron
Drupal’s database
Extensions (modules & themes)
Views
Watchdog
Test ConfigurationSimple Drupal 7 site Apache Bench
• 10,000 requests to home page (5 concurrent) Warmed cache, cleared watchdog Comparison
• Bad config, 1 PHP notice and warning in theme • Good config, no PHP notices or warnings
Result? Doubled performance.
Performance Comparison Bad Config Good Config
Load Time (min) 20:52 10:25
Requests per second 7.98 15.99
Time per request (ms) 626.192 312.780
Good configuration matters.
Load TestingPerformance Tuning
Why load test?Validate response times under peak load Smoke - operations under normal load Stress - behavior past peak load
• Spike - short bursts Capacity - plan for growth
Who should execute load tests?Developers execute Involve stakeholders
Tools for load testingDIY and simple
• Apache Bench - http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/programs/ab.html
Complex / dynamic • Apache JMeter - https://jmeter.apache.org/ • Load Impact - https://loadimpact.com/ • Load Storm - http://loadstorm.com/
When should I load test?Baseline Tools
• Xdebug - http://xdebug.org/ • Webgrind - https://github.com/jokkedk/webgrind • Devel - https://drupal.org/project/devel • Syslog • Watchdog • New Relic - http://newrelic.com/
Incrementally during development
Where do I perform load tests?Live environment
• Bandwidth Resource limitations SaaS load testing solutions
What to expect during & after• Benchmark often
• Datapoints • Aggregate
• Be reasonable • Numbers should dictate expectations • Back-end
• Google Analytics
CachingOpcode Cache
• APC, Zend Opcache, eAccelerator Backends
• Memcached, Redis, MongoDB, file system, APC Front-end caching
• Varnish, Squid, reverse-proxy CDNs
Redis: Engage!
Anonymous page caching: Disabled!
Testing Varnish with cURL
PHP Slow Log
Nginx error log
MySQL slow log# Time: 130320 7:30:26 # User@Host: db_user[db_database] @ localhost [] # Query_time: 4.545309 Lock_time: 0.000069 Rows_sent: 219 Rows_examined: 254 SET timestamp=1363779026; SELECT option_name, option_value FROM wp_options WHERE autoload = 'yes';
Pay attention to watchdog6652 11/Oct 15:05 warning php Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /srv/www/code/includes/common.inc:2700) in drupal_goto() (line !6643 11/Oct 14:21 notice php Notice: Trying to get property of non-object in cap_ui_preprocess_page() (line 27 of /srv/www/code/sites/all/themes/cap_ui/template.php). !6595 11/Oct 13:00 notice php Notice: Unknown: Can not authenticate to IMAP server: [AUTHENTICATIONFAILED] Invalid credentials (Failure) (errflg=2) in main() (line of ).
Good load test
Bad load test
Interpreting resultsHard numbers Business impact
A Perfect Launch, Every Time
Thank you! Questions?@getpantheon
irc.freenode.net #pantheon getpantheon.com