5 ms·

Cold startup sucks - it's horrendous for Java and just bad for Python. If you have a popular app, this isn't an issue. If you don't, it hurts.

by cgrinds 17y ago

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
eop 17y ago
Cold startup is almost unnoticeable for Python apps (bite my lip! see update below). On the Java side it can be an issue but, as with most things, if you dig around, you can find some acceptable workarounds.
- cgrinds 17y ago
  No - I've seen 'Hello World' style apps take over 4s to cold startup. For example http://timezonetimezone.appspot.com/iscorrect?query=EST http://timezonetimezone.appspot.com/iscorrect?query=EST Took 4.67s to render http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100306_5PZ7/1/details/ http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100306_5PZ7/1/details/ I monitored cold startup for a month on one of my apps and some times see 10s cold startup. http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100309_5TDW/ http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100309_5TDW/ This is after profiling, reducing imports, caching, using app appstats, etc.
  - eop 17y ago
    Wow, you're right. I just ran a test on one of my Python apps and found the same thing. I always assumed 4 seconds was an acceptable start up time, especially when compared with some of the Java apps I have runnning on App Engine which have often exceeded the 30 second page limit on startup and generated a DeadlineExceededException. Thanks for showing your results. I would never have known this was an issue.
cmelbye 17y ago
They're fixing this in the future by allowing reserved instances that will always run.
jeff18 17y ago
Couldn't you just set up a cron job to ping your app every 15 minutes until you start getting some real traffic?
- cgrinds 17y ago
  You could - but it would need to be every 1 minute. Google tears down your app after 60-90 seconds of inactivity. Some folks have resorted to pinging every minute but Google discourages that since it ties up their resources. If everyone pinged their site once a minute then resources would never be freed.... Here's a good thread on the issue https://groups.google.com/group/google-appengine/browse_thread/thread/22692895421825cb/659bbb536f54028f https://groups.google.com/group/google-appengine/browse_thre...

Cold startup sucks - it's horrendous for Java and just bad for Python. If you have a popular app, this isn't an issue. If you don't, it hurts.

by cgrinds 17y ago

Cold startup sucks - it's horrendous for Java and just bad for Python. If you have a popular app, this isn't an issue. If you don't, it hurts.

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

eop 17y ago

Cold startup is almost unnoticeable for Python apps (bite my lip! see update below). On the Java side it can be an issue but, as with most things, if you dig around, you can find some acceptable workarounds.

cgrinds 17y ago
No - I've seen 'Hello World' style apps take over 4s to cold startup. For example http://timezonetimezone.appspot.com/iscorrect?query=EST http://timezonetimezone.appspot.com/iscorrect?query=EST Took 4.67s to render http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100306_5PZ7/1/details/ http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100306_5PZ7/1/details/ I monitored cold startup for a month on one of my apps and some times see 10s cold startup. http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100309_5TDW/ http://www.webpagetest.org/result/100309_5TDW/ This is after profiling, reducing imports, caching, using app appstats, etc.
- eop 17y ago
  Wow, you're right. I just ran a test on one of my Python apps and found the same thing. I always assumed 4 seconds was an acceptable start up time, especially when compared with some of the Java apps I have runnning on App Engine which have often exceeded the 30 second page limit on startup and generated a DeadlineExceededException. Thanks for showing your results. I would never have known this was an issue.

cmelbye 17y ago

They're fixing this in the future by allowing reserved instances that will always run.

jeff18 17y ago

Couldn't you just set up a cron job to ping your app every 15 minutes until you start getting some real traffic?

cgrinds 17y ago
You could - but it would need to be every 1 minute. Google tears down your app after 60-90 seconds of inactivity. Some folks have resorted to pinging every minute but Google discourages that since it ties up their resources. If everyone pinged their site once a minute then resources would never be freed.... Here's a good thread on the issue https://groups.google.com/group/google-appengine/browse_thread/thread/22692895421825cb/659bbb536f54028f https://groups.google.com/group/google-appengine/browse_thre...