I'm from Missouri

This site is named for the famous statement of US Congressman Willard Duncan Vandiver from Missouri : "I`m from Missouri -- you'll have to show me." This site is dedicated to skepticism of official dogma in all subjects. Just-so stories are not accepted here. This is a site where controversial subjects such as evolution theory and the Holocaust may be freely debated.

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Location: Los Angeles, California, United States

My biggest motivation for creating my own blogs was to avoid the arbitrary censorship practiced by other blogs and various other Internet forums. Censorship will be avoided in my blogs -- there will be no deletion of comments, no closing of comment threads, no holding up of comments for moderation, and no commenter registration hassles. Comments containing nothing but insults and/or ad hominem attacks are discouraged. My non-response to a particular comment should not be interpreted as agreement, approval, or inability to answer.

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Blogger software glitch -- slow loading of home page

UPDATE: The problem of slow loading of the home page is gone. The Sitemeter still appears to be giving trouble.

UPDATE #2: The Sitemeter now appears to be back to normal too.

This blog's home (main) page takes about a minute to load on my dial-up connection and I have no idea why loading is so slow. Everything except the articles loads immediately and there is no indication that loading is incomplete. If you have a broadband connection, you probably don't have this problem -- or the problem is not as serious -- because of the faster data transmission. My apologies. I hope that this problem clears itself up.

9 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Howdy. I do have a broadband connection, and your site also takes longer than most to display. Looking through my Firebug log, it seems "http://s24.sitemeter.com/js/counter.js?site=s24tracktanman" is taking about 20 seconds to load, and "http://s24.sitemeter.com/meter.asp?site=s24tracktanman&refer=http%3A//www.typepad.com/t/comments%3F__mode%3Dred%26user_id%3D117205%26id%3D26644243&ip=66.142.236.232&w=1280&h=1024&clr=32&tzo=360&lang=en-US&pg=http%3A//im-from-missouri.blogspot.com/&js=1&rnd=0.5980139800020369" took about 30 seconds to load.
The sitemeter may be what is slowing your site down.

Sunday, November 25, 2007 6:41:00 PM  
Blogger Larry Fafarman said...

>>>>>> The sitemeter may be what is slowing your site down. <<<<<<

Graeme,

Thanks for your interest and effort to help.

I've had the sitemeter for over a year and it didn't cause any trouble. The sitemeter gives a lot of important data and I don't want to get rid of it.

The slow-loading problem appeared suddenly and without apparent cause. I think that maybe the cause is that Blogger.com has been monkeying with the software. For example, when I click on one of the monthly archive labels in the sidebar, a new label, "Current Posts," appears at the bottom of the list. I don't remember seeing that label before. It appears to serve the same function as the "home" option at the bottoms of the webpages of the individual articles. The monthly archive pages do not have this "home" option at the bottom and I don't know why. Maybe the "Current Posts" option in the sidebar was intended to be a substitute, but I don't know why the archive pages do not also have the "home" option at the bottom for the sake of consistency. Maybe Blogger.com messed up the software when this "Current Posts" option was added. Anyway, any article in the "Recent Posts" list in the sidebar can be brought up immediately without waiting for the home page to completely load. Also, readers can scroll down through the list of posts by clicking on the last post in the list.

Sunday, November 25, 2007 7:41:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

> Everything except the articles loads immediately <

Because it is in cached memory.

Sunday, November 25, 2007 11:01:00 PM  
Blogger Larry Fafarman said...

Voice in the Urbanness said...
>>>>>> Everything except the articles loads immediately <

Because it is in cached memory. <<<<<<

OK, but how can that piece of information help solve the problem?

Blogger.com software has had a number of problems, e.g.,

(1) Poor formatting of sidebar link labels in the Layout mode -- there are no spaces or indentations to separate link labels consisting of two or more lines (which is one reason why I still use the Template mode).

(2) Maximum of 20 posts per post label in the Template mode.

(3) I still haven't figured out how to list the most recent comments.

(4) Not user friendly -- software coding that should have been built-in has to be inserted by hand in the right place in the esoteric Template coding -- not an easy job.

(5) I am unable to insert the Sitemeter software into the Layout mode (another reason why I still use the Template mode).

The post label feature -- which did not exist when I started this blog -- has been a tremendous aid. With around 600 posts now, I could not easily find old posts without it. The post label list in the sidebar is also a great help to readers seeking posts on a particular subject.

The Blogger.com software is free and I should not look a gift horse in the mouth. However, this slow-loading problem is intolerable and I hope that it clears up soon.

Monday, November 26, 2007 12:51:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"I've had the sitemeter for over a year and it didn't cause any trouble. The sitemeter gives a lot of important data and I don't want to get rid of it."

That doesn't really mean anything. Any site can go down or slow down, and it will affect your page if you are linking to javascript or image files on that host, which you are.

Your site is loading fine for me now, and both the files I mentioned are now loading in less than half a second. Coincidence? Maybe.

I don't user blogger.com to blog, so I can't really comment on the issues with the software used. However, just because the articles were the last thing the DOM rendered to the page, doesn't mean that's where the hang up is being caused.

But whatever.

Monday, November 26, 2007 5:10:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

And just an aside note.. If the slow down was being caused by a 'software glitch', broadband users would actually be having the same hang ups as dial-up users. (Realistically, broadband users would load the page quicker, but not any quicker than they do normally without such a 'software glitch'.)

Monday, November 26, 2007 5:26:00 PM  
Blogger Larry Fafarman said...

Graeme said,
>>>>>> Your site is loading fine for me now, and both the files I mentioned are now loading in less than half a second. Coincidence? Maybe. <<<<<<

Yes, the slow loading of the home page is gone for me, too. That's a relief. The problem was here for so long that I was afraid that it had become a Blogger.com feature.

I have a lot of missing data in my Sitemeter statistics, so maybe you were right about Sitemeter being the cause or part of the problem of slow loading of the home page. The Sitemeter still appears to be giving trouble.


>>>>>> However, just because the articles were the last thing the DOM rendered to the page, doesn't mean that's where the hang up is being caused. <<<<<<

I wasn't saying that was where the problem was -- I was just making an observation. I was particularly afraid that visitors would leave the blog immediately because there was no indication that loading was incomplete.

Thanks again.

Monday, November 26, 2007 8:24:00 PM  
Blogger Larry Fafarman said...

Thanks, Ann.

Friday, March 27, 2009 4:27:00 AM  
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