Static? Dynamic? [en]

I had a conversation with Karl the other day, about static vs. dynamic implementations for a website.

Depending on how many page views you have per hour on the server, a dynamic implementation could slow down a site unnecessarily.

The important analysis is this one: divide the number of content changes in a given time by the number of page view requests for a given page. The closer that number is to zero, the more static your content is. The closer it is to one, the more dynamic it is.

My content is definitely more on the static side. I add pages every now and again, edit them every now and again, and of course, update my weblog fairly regularly. I don’t use a database back-end, but I do use a fair amount of PHP to hold things together.

I use PHP because it makes maintenance easier. I don’t really use it because my content is dynamic – so it could be seen as “abusive” use of a dynamic implementation. However, I don’t have so many visitors that it does make a difference to the server.

If the server load did become too important, however, I would certainly consider putting in place a script that would generate a static version of the site (each day or on demand). Visitors would access the static version, but it would be easily produced by the “generator script” on the basis of the easy-to-maintain dynamic version.

What is your opinion on the subject? Are “dynamic” website implementions being used abusively? Under what conditions do you consider using a database as a back-end? Do you have any numbers or statistics which either validate or invalidate the theories exposed above?

I’d love to hear from you. Add your comments below.

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Organisation [en]

Poorly organised but accessible information is better than highly organised but unusable information.

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Light in my Life [en]

Those of you who know me well won’t believe it. Those of you who have visited my flat, even less.

I have actually replaced the bulb in the kitchen (yeah, I seem to have a hard time doing these little things). But more important, I have replaced the one in the bathroom.

That actually is a feat, because during the last year, I tried to unscrew the lamp from the wall at least four times – with various assistance. This time I just decided to give it a go (never mind if it breaks, it’s not working anyway)… and it worked!

So, be informed and rejoice: a candle is no longer necessary.

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Webloblog [en]

Autotélique?

Quand le moyen et le but se confondent. Quand le weblog est son propre but. Quand la communauté ne fait que parler d’elle-même…

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Hockey [en]

Voici deux jours que les visiteurs affluent depuis le forum du Journal du Hockey pour lire mon petit texte sur le hockey. Bienvenue à  tous!

Au vu des commentaires qui m’ont été fait, j’ai bien peur que ce texte n’ait été perçu comme très négatif et plutôt polémique. Si vous lisez les commentaires, vous verrez que je tente de m’y expliquer un peu.

Sachez tout d’abord que je n’ai rien contre le hockey en particulier (je n’aime pas tellement le sport de compétition, mais ça n’a rien à  voir avec le hockey), et n’hésitez pas à  participer à  la discussion!

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Meta Tags [en]

Here is a good page on using meta tags like “description” and “keywords”, and how they influence (or rather: don’t influence) search engine rankings.

Remember, you are using these tags to help make up for the lack of text on your pages, not as a way to successfully anticipate every keyword variation a person might enter into a search engine. The only hope you have of ever doing that is to have good, descriptive pages with good titles and text that is not buried on the bottom of the page by JavaScript, frames tags or tables. The meta tags are a tool to get around these aforementioned problems.

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Sing [en]

I realised last night that what I enjoy the most when I go dancing is singing to the music at the top of my lungs.

That’s probably why I like all those ’80s songs I know by heart, and stop moving pretty fast with that modern (!) “boom-boom” stuff.

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Besoin de relecteurs! [en]

Un grand merci à  J.J. Solari et à  Stéphane pour leur traductions! Maintenant, avant de pouvoir les publier sur pompage.net, j’ai un grand besoin de relecteurs. Annoncez-vous, il y en aura pour tout le monde!

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HTML simple? [en]

Un collègue de travail me faisait très justement remarquer que ce qui rendait mon approche du HTML simple, c’était qu’une feuille de styles CSS commune et des “includes” PHP étaient déjà  en place. Justement!

Editeurs: la suite. Ce qui rend simple l’apprentissage du HTML…

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Quand même! [en]

Si vous utilisez un navigateur autre que Internet Explorer, allez donc faire un petit tour sur MSN. Vous serez probablement accueilli par ce gentil message.

C’est un peu fort, non, vous trouvez pas?

Un article en anglais rend compte de la situation: MSN.com shuts out non-Microsoft browsers.

[via webdesign-l]

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