Year in review 2012
8 January 2013
2012 was one of our busiest years ever. We launched a lot of new websites, created and upgraded various modules and moved to a new hosting centre. We also moved into and finished building our house, but that's another story.
New servers
Back in January we finished moving our domain name server (DNS) and mail server (MX) to a virtual server at Linode. This gives us more flexibility and security in managing domain names and responding to issues on our hosting server.
Between April and July we transferred all of our hosted websites and services to a new facility in New York. The hosting centre has multiple levels of redundancy, high security and a 24/7 support team.
Aside from a few hours downtime of the hosting server one Friday in July, the new setup been running smoothly. Our uptime for the year was over 99.9%.
Secure backups
We have made significant improvements in the reliability and security of our backups. Configuration files from each server are backed up daily to the other as well as to an AmazonS3 cloud server. All backups are GPG encrypted meaning that they are unreadable even if they fall into the wrong hands.
All website files and databases are backed up both to AmazonS3 as well as to an offsite/offline location. Using a new backup algorithm we are able to call back individual files from any day in the last 1-2 weeks as well as weekly and monthly backups for up to a year from the offsite archive.
Upgraded CMS
Our upgraded content management system (CMS) allows for easier formatting and pasting of content from other sources. You can copy links, lists and other elements and they will be converted to clean HTML. This is now available on most websites and will roll out to the remaining websites during the year.
Virtual Hosting
For very large websites or those with specific security requirements we now have the option of using a virtual private server (VPS). A new virtual server can be set up in a day and configured to maintain security and updates with minimal supervision. We currently have websites and other services hosted with:
- Linode (worldwide);
- Amazon AWS (worldwide)
- intoVPS (Romania); and
- Mammoth Networks (Sydney).
New technologies
We're always exploring new options for our clients. Some of the standouts of 2012 were:
- Sphinx Search - a full text index search system capable of indexing hundreds of thousands of records and providing instant, Google-like, search results. You can see it in action on the Erasmus Buechercafé website.
- Responsive Web Design - websites with a flexible template meaning that the page elements can resize or rearrange themselves for mobile browsers or when a desktop browser is made wider or narrower. This website for example will appear differently at a browser width of less than 640 pixels.
- HTML5 LocalCache - most/all modern browsers now allow for content to be stored in the browser and called back on request. On this website for example the "Latest News" column has (may have) been stored in your browser so it doesn't have to be downloaded again with every request.
- CloudFlare CDN - we've set up a content delivery network to boost download speeds for some common CSS and JavaScript resources. We also used CloudFlare to protect the Charlotte Pass website during the national 'Click Frenzy' promotion in Australia.
- Predictive Search - on some websites, such as the National Farmers' Federation and The Art of Web the site search box will now present a list of possible/popular queries once you start typing.
- Disqus Comments - for the Gday Pubs portal we've recently installed the Disqus commenting system.
These are in addition to many behind-the-scenes tweaks and upgrades to improve security, block various incursion attempts, and improve website speeds. As I said, it's been a busy year.
We also have upgrades and enhancements available for our popular database modules - News/Blog; Photo Galleries; E-commerce; Maps; and Calendars among others.
Contact us if you're interested in hearing more about what we can do for your website.