PHP speed differences with and without preloading and validate_timestamps in a real application

[iquito]

PHP speed differences with and without preloading and validate_timestamps in a real application

[iquito]

Leave a comment if you have any questions or your own experiences to add! You can also find this discussion on Github to comment more easily: #1

[MrMage]

Hi Andreas,

Thank you for your post! It’s great to see some real-world performance numbers for preloading. I am also using thecodingmachine‘s Docker images without Timestamp validation in a small Kubernetes cluster.

However, my understanding is that preloading only works with PHP-FPM, so I have it disabled (using their Apache mod_php image). Also, I’m not quite sure how to serve static assets in conjunction with the PHP-FPM service, given that I’d need a separate container for serving HTTP requests. May I ask how you solved that problem in your particular case?

Greetings from Munich,
Daniel

[iquito]

Preloading is not tied to PHP-FPM, so it should work with mod_php just like opcache does, as it is a part of opcache and configured in php.ini. PHP-FPM cannot serve static assets though (except if it goes through PHP), I use Nginx for that. In general you need some web server anyway to use PHP-FPM, so either Nginx or Apache, but Nginx has better performance and easier configuration, which is why I prefer it.

[MrMage]

Thank your for the quick reply. I'll try preloading with mod_php then :-) Regarding serving static assets: I know that you'd need a separate HTTP server container for that; does your build process simply build two separate images? I.e. one with PHP-FPM and the PHP code, and another one with Nginx and the static assets? That's the part that has kept me from using FPM so far.

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On 20. Dec 2020, at 15:12, Andreas ***@***.***> wrote:  Preloading is not tied to PHP-FPM, so it should work with mod_php just like opcache does, as it is a part of opcache and configured in php.ini. PHP-FPM cannot serve static assets though (except if it goes through PHP), I use Nginx for that. In general you need some web server anyway to use PHP-FPM, so either Nginx or Apache, but Nginx has better performance and easier configuration, which is why I prefer it. — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or unsubscribe.

[iquito]

In my applications, the Nginx container is hardly ever restarted, because I just set up the assets directory as a volume for Nginx. A container generates the assets (with Webpack) and the results become immediately available for Nginx through the shared directory, and only PHP-FPM needs new containers for application deployments.

[MrMage]

Thank you! I did not consider the option of having the PHP-FPM container "provide" the static assets to the Nginx one at runtime; that is a great option.

[iquito]

It is a good use case for volumes, you can even make it read-only for Nginx. I also do not delete old versions of the assets, so they are only ever added.

The main drawback/complication is that you need to generate the assets separately from the PHP container, but that also has the advantage that something like Webpack is only needed when generating the assets, not for the PHP containers themselves.