WP Multi-site server setup

[Ryan]

I'm interested in setting up a WordPress Multi-site network so that I can manage all of my sites on a single installation (to reduce my workload). I'm also looking at hostin a bunch of other people's sites in the future, some of which could potentially get a reasonably high traffic load. So I'm thinking I probably need something beyond a bog standard cPanel hosted VPS, however my knowledge of server management is pretty much zilch and I don't really have the time to learn. From what I've heard elsewhere, a slimmed down VPS setup with opcode caching and perhaps NGINX appears to be suitable, then if I need to upgrade in the future it's just a matter of increasing the RAM on the VPS.

Do any of you have suggestions on the best way to approach this? Perhaps there are hosts out there which can manage this sort of thing for me?

I had a chat with Rackspace a few minutes ago, but it seems their cloud service can't support wildcard sub-domains which I believe I need support for to allow for adding domain names to extra sites on the network.

My alternative is to just use a cPanel VPS or some other noob friendly system and deal with scaling issues when and if they arise, but it would be nice to get them sorted from the get go so it's just a matter of moving to a bigger server rather than having to rejig the way everything works just to handle a little more traffic.

[andrea_r]

but it seems their cloud service can't support wildcard sub-domains which I believe I need support for to allow for adding domain names to extra sites on the network.

No, wildcard subdomains are for... subdomains...

If you're domain mapping in volume, there's a wildcard vhost trick you can do, but it's not a requirement.

A cpanel setup in a LAMP stack is fine. A vps with a gig of RAM will hold quite a bit. (nginx, you really have to be comfortable mucking around)

Not a fan of cloud sites, mostly because of the wildcard issues. I'd rather have the option of being able to go in and muck around Apache if I need/ want to.

WiredTree has been really excellent so far.

[Ryan]

Thanks for the expert input Andrea :)

Do have any semi-accurate numbers on how much traffic you can push through a cPanel LAMP stack with 1 GB RAM? I'm running PixoPoint on 1 GB RAM VPS right now and it's lightning quick in comparison to what it was on shared hosting but I don't have any real data on how much traffic I can actually push through it. If I could piggy back on my existing site that would be quite handy for me.

I keep reading online about how any serious multi-site setup runs mem-caching / op-code caching and nginx, but if I can avoid those complications it would certainly make things a lot easier for me.

... I assume you can't use mem-caching or op-code caching with a cPanel LAMP stack?

[andrea_r]

Do have any semi-accurate numbers on how much traffic you can push through a cPanel LAMP stack with 1 GB RAM?

On a 768 megs of RAM vps account, with my hobby blog network for homeschoolers, it gets traffic like this:


Summary by Month
Month Daily Avg Monthly Totals Hits Files Pages Visits Sites KBytes Visits Pages Files Hits
Aug 2010 67213 53166 34670 9727 52088 27738910 194543 693403 1063329 1344271
<snip>
Sep 2009 73324 55245 35423 9346 79702 34941923 280389 1062701 1657367 2199738
Totals 444730685 3299145 12639422 19091734 24,737,599
Now, this is an install on the small side (couple hundred users) and there are other web accounts on the same server.

when people talk about the more serious sites, they're doing mission-critical sites and/or universities, corporations - basically things with hundreds of users & sites - if not thousands, let alone visitors. unless you're planning on setting up your network as a host for others, you don;t even need to start thinking up there yet. ;)

(also I think mine above has no caching running atm, but we're moving it to a different host so that may change)

[Ryan]

Awesome. Those numbers are pretty good! That was over 1 million page views for September 2009, which would at least be a reasonable starting point. I'm currently doing about 300,000 page views on my VPS, so if I estimate that I can push my 1 GB RAM cPanel VPS to a maximum of 1.5 million page views per month (based on your stats, the increase in RAM and the fact that there are other accounts on your server), then my current VPS should be able to handle at least 1.2 million page views per month. And if I needed to, I can always crank the RAM up to 8 GB which would give me around 13.2 million page views per month from a single box just by coughing up a bit more dough for the upgrade. That should be ample for the sort of network I have in mind and if I go past that then I'll presumably be rolling in cash and able to afford to hire your hubby to set it up for me properly ;)

... unless you're planning on setting up your network as a host for others, you don;t even need to start thinking up there yet. ;)

That's exactly what I have in mind, hence the need for potential expansion. There is no point in my current plan without the potential for massive expansion. It'll probably flop, but if it doesn't, I don't want to be cursing myself for not being prepared :P

(also I think mine above has no caching running atm, but we're moving it to a different host so that may change)

Do you mean op-code or mem-caching? Or do you just mean disk-caching, like you can do with WP Super Cache or W3 Total Cache?



Thanks for all the input :) This sort of information is invaluable, yet very difficult to find.

[andrea_r]

, so if I estimate that I can push my 1 GB RAM cPanel VPS to a maximum of 1.5 million page views per month (based on your stats, the increase in RAM and the fact that there are other accounts on your server), then my current VPS should be able to handle at least 1.2 million page views per month

Could you click through those links and see all the stats? Some months were up over 2 million. I was going to paste the whole thing in but lost all the formatting and didn't want to show you a wall of text. :D

Hmmm, I could pm it tho.

Do you mean op-code or mem-caching? Or do you just mean disk-caching, like you can do with WP Super Cache or W3 Total Cache?

I mean like none whatsoever. None. Nada. Zip. Just out of the box. :D

(we really need to take time to work on this site. But it winds up last on the list cuz it's a non-profit, just for the heck of it, first site I started.)

Thanks for all the input :) This sort of information is invaluable, yet very difficult to find.

Keep meaning to do a write up.

[Ryan]

Ahem, the term "freakin' awesome!" springs to mind here. That's not just a reference to you personally, but also the fact that you managed to hit 2,000,000 page views / month without troubles AND are running zippo caching :)

You just made my morning :) It seems I was intending to over-optimise the heck out of things needlessly.

[andrea_r]

I'll pm you the full stats, how about?

We did have some issues, but that was mostly related to the severely incompetent support staff at the old host. Stuff still ticks along fine, this woudl probably be the upper limit tho.

[Ryan]

I think I have enough information already. Maxing out at 2,000,000 page views at roughly the same ratio of hits - page views as previously is good enough as a rough estimate of potential maximum traffic volumes. This sort of thing is always going to be variable depending on the situation anyway so never going to be overly accurate when estimating for a different network.

Worst case scenario is that the site(s) sporadically bogs down and occasionally fails to load. Chances are that by the time it's bogging down I'd have moved onto a bigger and better box, and by the time I got to the biggest dedicated box I could find I'd be able to afford to pay a sys admin to optimise the heck out of it anyway.

[andrea_r]

Yep, pretty much. For reference, that's if you have about 500 legit bloggers.