MYSQL Question

[BozzaJos]

Hello everyone,

I was wondering something about mysql databases. I am looking for a new webhost and got my eyes on a couple of good-looking ones. It's a good thing that I'm someone who's willing to do some intensive research coz a lot of webhosting companier offer a lot but forget to mention some details.

My current forum got over 17,000 members registered. How many are online simultaneously is hard to say. Most of the times it's 20-40 but the record shows 234 users online at the same time so something it's a bit more... I've got many mods installed which could cause a higher server load.

First of all I would like to ask something about the wait_time of mysql. On my current host I noticed it's set to 28800 which is the default right? The host CirtexHosting.com told me they've set it to 30, even on their own vBulletin forum which runs more then good according to them. Hostgator for example got it set to 3600. Is 3600 good enough?

Another thing I would like to know more about are the mysql connections. At my current webhost it's set to "max_connections 100". The "max_user_connections" is set to 0. Does this mean that unlimited number of users can connect to the database? Another webhost (which I kind of fancy) told me they got their wait_timeout set at 28800 (which is good), max_connections to 500 and max_user_connections to 50. Can I work with these numbers? My mysql knowledge is very limited so I was hoping I could get some help here.

I hope I could get some help. Would be really appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Greetings,

Bozza

[Steve Machol]

IMO a 'wait_timeout' value of 30 is too low and you will likely experience many 'can't connect' errors.

Also the 'max_connections' setting is for the entire server. Your forums alone will use more that that and you will likely see a lot of connections errors from this as well, even though 'max_user_connections' is set to '0'.

And finally, a 'max_user_connections' setting of 50 is too low for your forums. You will get connection errors there as well.

[BozzaJos]

Thanks for the explanation Steve. One more question, what should be the minimum number of the wait_timeout for a vBulletin forum to run smoothly? Should it really be 28800 or is that just extreme high? I found another webhost which got max_connection set at 500, max_user_connections at 0 and wait_timeout at 100. Is 100 enough?

[Steve Machol]

The MySQL default setting for wait_timeout is 28800 but our server here has this set to 1800.

As for max_connection, this is a server-wide limit and whether or not it is sufficient depends on what other applications are running on that server.