WordPress MU

I looked at the WPMU database today and was surprised.

I realised that for each username, 9 tables are created.

For large sites offering blog hosting to everyone, this simply isn't feasible.

Perhaps you guys should post something indicating that WPMU is not for a large number of users. Just a suggestion.

Is this the final database structure? If so, this is not acceptable for a site with even a few hundred members, much less a site with several thousand.

WPMU hasn't even reached what would be considered "alpha" let alone beta...

So how many can a table handle? I guess it matters how many posts there are.

I've seen comments that the system could handle a few thousand users as it stands. Is this not the case?

It seems that there are already sites with 1000+ blogs. Are they not using the default database structure to get this scalability?

-burn

In my opinion WPMU can handle several thousand users. You'll start seeing problems popup when you get to the tens of thousands. This is mainly because of scaling issues. I'm going to try to do a bit of load testing on one of my sites this weekend and see what happens

We're already working on that problem. Look into wp-config.php - notice the multiple read dbs?
Next thing to do is spread the blogs over hashed databases. We could have any number of thousands of databases spread over any number of hosts. Should solve any scalability concerns!

very interesting. I'm assuming that there will be some kind of admin interface to manage the dbs?

not only scalability on database layer is benefitting from the current database layout, but it is also easier to make backups for the user, did anyone yet write a plugin for that?

One problem with having lots of tables: it makes it difficult to provide an rss feed of the last 20 posts made *across the system*.

We found this is important when kickstarting blogging at work - people want to know when there's a new post from *any* blog. The noise level hasn't reached the point at which people start to subscribe to individual blogs yet (10-20 posts a day), but we still have over 300 blogs to monitor.

BTW, the table design is the one reason we're still on b2evolution and haven't switched to wordpress-mu yet.

You guys are a bunch of smart cookies! Im excited at the possibilities. I am using MU right now with 32 users to date and its running strong except for a few bugs that I know will get worked out sooner or later. Hey its free right, cant complain about that!

I'm setting up a system with 10k users at the least and I'd like to use WordpressMU. How is this going?

Does anyone have a version that uses one set of tables?

Thanks

I'm setting up a system with 10k users at the least and I'd like to use WordpressMU. How is this going?

Does anyone have a version that uses one set of tables?

Thanks

I'm setting up a system with 10k users at the least and I'd like to use WordpressMU. How is this going?

Does anyone have a version that uses one set of tables?

Thanks

rufford: Currently what you can download is pretty much what everyone is using. Also, If you're planning on a *minimum* of ten thousand users then I would definetly make sure you have someone on your team that knows the ins and outs of WPMU. If something goes wrong with that many active users you're going to need someone who can find the problem and fix it FAST.

donncha:

We're already working on that problem. Look into wp-config.php - notice the multiple read dbs?
Next thing to do is spread the blogs over hashed databases. We could have any number of thousands of databases spread over any number of hosts. Should solve any scalability concerns!

Hmmm ... I'm no programmer or DB pro. But I'm wondering how this will affect existing installations running hundreds of blogs using the current table structure.

There will have to be a script to convert everything. I'd say that it would only take a few hours at most for < 10,000 users. But seeing as how wordpress.com is currently using the curent table structure they too will run into the same problem and hopefully they will show everyone else how to convert.

One simple word... *DrOol*

but with 10000 users you must have something like 4/5 servers ? or not? so the problem of resources is nothing no?

Well, It would actually depend on how many "active" users you have. It would also depend on server specs. But it *is* possible to host 10,000 users on a single server but you would need atleast a 250GB HD in it. For instance if you give 10,000 users 10mb each that would be roughly 100GB then you have to consider how many people would actually use the whole 10MB, etc, etc, etc. You also have to keep in mind the database(s). However, even if you were to have 10,000 users on one server I would definetly have a backup server online and on standby in case something goes wrong with the first.

I'm thinking about scaling similar to LiveJournal. Where you use less tables storing data in a more sensible schema. There is quite a lot of things that need to be sorted and I'm a long way off from getting WordPress MU stable for my needs.