site getting taken down at hosting because of high cpu use

[costacaptain]

every month or so my site is taken down from my account because the site is using to much space on the shared server.

how do i set my cache options in global configuration.

also, is there a way i can test which plug ins/extensions i actually need or how they function. the webmaster who did my upgrade seems to have a lot in my admin.

any other thoughts!

tx
[Mod Note removed personal URL from post these should be placed in signature. Please see Forum Rules]

[numinousmedia]

That's interesting that your account has been running over it's CPU allotment. I checked out your site, and didn't see too much about it that should cause that. Most of the time, when I've worked with sites that have overrun their CPU, it's because those sites are doing lots of photo processing, or video processing. But yours is pretty bare bones, as far as a processor should be concerned :-)

Caching is always a good place to start when running into these issues, and you'll want to activate it in a couple places.

Firstly, log into your website's backend administration, and go to your Global Configuration. Click the "System" tab. On the right hand side, under "Cache Settings", turn on "Progressive Caching". The default time for cache is 15 minutes, which means that your website will update it's cache every 15 minutes. You can probably increase this to something a bit higher, like 30 or 60 minutes. The higher the number, the less you are making your server's CPU work. Don't set it too high though, or your users may not see changes happen for a very long time.

Secondly, go to your "Plugin Manager" under "Extensions" in the top menu. In the filter field, search for "Cache". One result called "System - Cache" should show up. Click the name to edit it. All you should need to do here is enable it.

If you still run into problems with CPU load, you can download a very good free extension called Jotcache. It supplements your native Joomla cache, and saved the day for several other sites I've worked on that faced a similar issue. You can download it here: http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions ... ache/13155

If you'd like, I can take a quick look at the extensions that are working on your site, and see if your site is over-bloated with unnecessary extensions. If you'd like this assistance, please private message your login details.

[sitesrus]

Time to move on, shared hosting sucks and is for the average place holder and low traffic site.

Time to get VPS or Dedicated and optimize it for Joomla, even check out cluster/grid hosting if necessary.

[ozneilau]

every month or so my site is taken down from my account because the site is using to much space on the shared server.

Assuming you have cPanel access (or similar), there's a "Disk Space Usage" tool that shows you which folders are using the most space. This might help you track down where all your space is going. For example, the largest files on my websites are the Akeeba Backup files and the quickest way for me to free up space is to delete some old backup files.

In cPanel shared hosting environments, email also counts towards your space utilisation. If email users are leaving copies of their emails on the server (becasue they use the webmail interface, for example), then your shared hosting space can be eaten up very quickly. Email quotas can be enforced for each user if required. The "Disk Space Usage" tool will show you how much space is being used by email accounts as well as your public_html files.

Also note that CRON jobs often email job output to the default administration account. If no one is checking the account, this can be another source of disk space utilisation.

also, is there a way i can test which plug ins/extensions i actually need or how they function. the webmaster who did my upgrade seems to have a lot in my admin.

Unused extensions should be removed where possible. You can check which modules are being used in Extensions -> Module Manager and similarly, you can check which modules are being used in Extensions -> Plug-in Manager. Check all your menus to see what components are being used in the front-end. In Extensions -> Extension Manager -> Manage, you can temporarily disable extensions and double check if the website is affected before making the decistion about whether they can be removed.

I hope this helps,

Neil.

[ozneilau]

Time to move on, shared hosting sucks and is for the average place holder and low traffic site.

Time to get VPS or Dedicated and optimize it for Joomla, even check out cluster/grid hosting if necessary.

I politely disagree.

There's nothing to indicate in the original post if the problem website is average/low traffic or not.

Shared hosting is perfectly suitable for many websites. Not everyone needs or can afford a VPS or dedicated server.

If the original poster is having space issues, then it's better to investigate and understand the cause rather than just moving the problem somewhere else where it may well crop up again later.

Spending more money can often solve a problem but that isn't necessarily the case here.

Neil.