Response time of servers is the most important metric from all, that are using to monitor Content Delivery Networks. Such monitoring helps to find out the problems and to use right CDN solutions. One of the most weighty factors to improve a response time of CDN servers is to use a right software. There are plenty of software decisions, that are available for webmasters. Most of server software reviews include from ten to thirty products. Most of them are free or have both versions- free and paid. Some of the most popular server software are Apache, Nginx and Litespeed.
The most used webserver is Apache. The great benefit comes from that – it has a really rich documentation. It was used by just about every website at some period. At the same time, the default install on the Apache is not the best performer. On the other hand, a big amount of users have left a large valuable experience, that can be used to improve the response time. Going on the experienced webmasters instructions, new webmaster can configure Apache rather successfully. In addition, there are some modules to increase efficiency. However, Apache is a safe variant for most of websites, but it should be configured very scrupulously. PHP runs at an average tempo.
The Nginx is one the most effective decisions for high traffic websites. This web server perform very effective even in default install. PHP runs much faster, than in Apache. The Nginx web server uses much less recourses than other web servers. Therefore it can handle more traffic, than most of software solutions. Nginx CDN perform faster, because nginx typically has faster response time, than most of web servers.
The example of combined free and paid versions of software is Litespeed web server. This software decision have a big benefit for those websites, that changing web server from Apache, but don’t want to change the configurations. This web server perform much faster, than Apache. For example, PHP runs six times faster. At the same time, the added version are totally compatible with Apache. That is why all configurations, that were made for Apache, are expected from Litespeed added version. So moving to this web server will be relatively painless for Apache users.
Some specificsof PHPCDN should be mentioned too. PHP works at the specific way. The mechanism of PHP can be described this way: before PHP processes won’t be done, the page can’t be displayed. Meanwhile, the more processes server must do before serve a customer, the slower will be a response time. There are several ways to increase the efficiency, when a website uses PHP. One of these ways is to change the server software to more effective. Like it was said above, the Nginx web server works much faster with PHP. There are a lot of software solutions, that can help to improve the response time of PHP website. But moving to this software can be quite problematic. The other way is to compare the effect of PHP use with the servers response time slowdown. To what degree PHP is required to the concrete web site?Maybe a good decision will be not to use PHP at all.