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How to make your website load in under 2 seconds using Apache, Nginx, Redis, PHP7, MySQL, and WordPress

Load Times Under 2s: WordPress Speed Improvements

May 6, 2018 | By David Selden-Treiman | Filed in: hosting.

At this point, you’re going to need to install a couple of plugins: one to allow the WordPress page to benefit from the Redis server, and one to cache the rendered versions of the WordPress site pages so that they don’t have to be generated every time someone tries to access the site.

Redis WordPress Plugin

To have the WordPress installation use the Redis cache, we’ll need to install a plugin. I personally use Redis Object Cache (https://wordpress.org/plugins/redis-cache/) , but you could use another Redis plugin. To set it up, install the plugin by searching for “Redis Object Cache” in the plugins list from the admin section. Click install, and the plugin should be installed.

We will now need to follow the installation instructions on the plugin page, specifically by adding a prefix for use in the Redis cache. Simply add the following line to your wp-config.php file

 

Reload the plugin, and everything should be working.

Caching Plugin

The easiest way to cache the rendered pages from your site is to use a caching plugin. To do this, search for and install the “WP Super Cache” plugin. When it’s installed, We need to select “Caching On” on the “Easy” page. On the advanced page, we need to select “don’t cache pages for known users”, “compress pages so they’re served more quickly to visitors”, and “cache rebuild….”. Under the “Preload” tab, select “Preload mode” and then select to preload the cache. This should cache your website’s contents to the folder that we specified in the Nginx configuration file

Further Development

At this point, if you’ve followed the tutorial from the beginning, you should have your website loading quickly. If your website is still loading slowly, there are a number of speed improvements that can be made.

If you have reached the end of this tutorial, and need the installation done quickly, or if you just want the work all done automatically, we can do that for you (for a fee of $100). We have an automated script that can SSH into your server and run this tutorial from beginning to end (as long as it’s running CentOS 7). If you would like this done for you, please contact us using the form below.

Also, if you require assistance, we provide server consulting starting at $100/hour, and we have a number of scripts that we can use to get your server up and running quickly. Please contact us below if you need further assistance:

 

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    Part 1: Introduction and Planning

    Why it’s important to have your pages load in under 2 seconds, and a plan of how we will set up and configure the server.

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 2: Installing Software

    Initial setup of the server, including installing CentOS7, installing tools, installing SSH and SSL, enabling repositories, and installing support packages.

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 3: MySQL, Apache, PHP7, & Composer

    Installation of MySQL database serverApache web serverPHP, and Composer package manager for PHP

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 4: PHPMyAdmin & Redis

    How to download, install, and configure PHPMyAdmin; How to install and configure Redis

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 5: SSL Certificate & Apache Configuration

    How to create a self-signed SSL certificate; how to configure Apache as a PHP backend

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 6: FTP & DNS

    How to install and configure an FTP server with dynamic users; how to set up a DNS server

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 7: Installing Nginx

    How to download, build, and install Nginx with additional modules

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 8: Configuring Nginx

    How to set up Nginx configuration files including (with explanations): nginx.confGzip compression settingsvisitor browser caching settingsSSL settingsreverse proxy settings for sending data to the Apache serverreverse proxy connection configurationsfile access restrictions, and WordPress configuration settings

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 9: Adding a WordPress Website

    How to add a WordPress website to the server including configuring the DNS Server, adding a verified SSL certificate, either manually or for free using Let’s Encrypt, setting up FTP for your site, configuring Apache, configuring Nginx, uploading your WordPress site files, and importing your MySQL database.

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.

    Part 10: WordPress Website Speed Improvements

    Speeding up your WordPress installation using a Redis plugin and a caching plugin.

    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.


    David Selden-Treiman, Director of Operations at Potent Pages.

    David Selden-Treiman is Director of Operations and a project manager at Potent Pages. He specializes in custom web crawler development, website optimization, server management, web application development, and custom programming. Working at Potent Pages since 2012 and programming since 2003, David has extensive expertise solving problems using programming for dozens of clients. He also has extensive experience managing and optimizing servers, managing dozens of servers for both Potent Pages and other clients.


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