How To Measure Webservices Turnaround Between 2 Servers

1. Use ping to test the response time between any two computers/servers.

2. Your problem is PROBABLY not network speed, though. Most large hosts have a pretty good data pipe to support their users, so switching from one like HostGator isn't likely to improve speed.

3. USUALLY if a web site is slow, it is because of something on the site itself (slow queries, large sites, unoptimized content, etc...). One way to test this is to create a simple HTML page that simply says "Hello world". After you create the page, visit it in your browser and see how long it takes to show up. If it's still slow, try asking someone else to also try visiting it in their browser and see if it's still slow. Usually it will come back pretty fast because it's just delivering static content.

If your HTML page still comes back really slow, there's always a slim chance that you're on a shared server with too many people. You can ask HostGator to switch to another one of their servers.

We have a dedicated server, sorry I didn't make that clear.  

I thought ping just tested between my desktop and whatever ip or domain name I was trying to contact?  How would I do between the 2 servers?

I was thinking the slowness was based on how many hops to the internet.  Am I wrong in wondering that?

Also, a few notes:

1. The above is an approximation, not an exact breakdown. The exact breakdown requires a bit more analysis and deeper understanding of all the pieces involved.

2. Item #2 also depends on geographic distance. If you're in the United States and you're trying to access a web page hosted on a server in India (or vice versa), you ARE going to experience slowdown due to network hops. Pretty much any time a network connection has to cross a large ocean, it's going to be a bit slower. But pretty much any land-based connections (even larger distances, like going from North America to South America or vice versa), are going to be pretty fast connections.

The underlying data pipes today are massive things. Your web page request is like a tiny goldfish swimming in a gulf stream with hundreds of whales. So unless you have some SERIOUS geographic discrepancies, changing hosts is going to be like your goldfish moving to a new position in the same gulf stream.

the two locations are in the US but it is now taking at least 2 -3 minutes to receive back the packet we send them through webservices.  So any improvement will help greatly.

The ping isn't being recognized.  By the way, the ping will only show what my current server to the vendor time is.  I need to know what the proposed server to the vendor time is too.

Thanks,

Actually, ping should indicate the round trip (it's called "ping" because of "ping-pong", implying the return trip). If the ping (an ICMP network packet) hits a firewall or something that causes it to drop instead of being returned, it'll just seem to time out (which sounds like what is happening).

If you want to understand the ping time between you and any given hop between you and the destination server, you can perform a traceroute which will give you those details.

That said, if the two locations are in the US, I can all but guarantee that there's absolutely NO reason that you should ever see a network hop delay of 2-3 minutes. If there is a delay of that amount on ANY hop, it means that there's a malfunctioning network switch somewhere. That said, if there was a delay like that during transmission, it would probably result in a complete failure, not in just a delay.

That kind of delay is almost certainly due to the processing time (the step 6 I mentioned earlier). If you don't trust me and really want to give it a raw test, install a telnet client on your server. Then in that telnet client, connect to the destination server's IP on port 80.

Different telnet clients act differently, but usually you can tell once the connection is established and it's waiting for your input (usually it's a blank screen with a blinking cursor). Once you have that blinking cursor, you have passed the point where the network hops make a difference.

Then type:

GET /index.html HTTP/1.1<hit Enter>
Host: thedomainofthedestinationserver.com<hit Enter>
<hit Enter>
<hit Enter>

Select allOpen in new window

That will trigger step 4. It's the HTTP protocol that basically says, "Give me the page at http://thedomainofthedestinationserver.com/index.html"

That should give you either a valid HTML page or an error HTML page. Either one will tell you how fast the destination server CAN respond.

But if you give the destination server a really hefty request (e.g. a web service request to download two years of stock price history), then it's going to take that web service some time to gather the data and assemble it (could even be up to 2-3 minutes). Again, changing your web host will not change this.

It would be like trying to change cars in order to reduce the amount of time to get food from a drive through. It doesn't matter what car you drive - it still takes a minute to heat up a hamburger.

Please bear in mind that I have no reason to tell you something that's not true. I have no affiliation with HostGator or anything. I'm just trying to save you from the headache and cost of switching to another host only to discover that you're still getting 2-3 minute response times.

I would suggest you complain to your vendor about the long processing times, by the way.

We have mentioned it to the vendor but they haven't been able to change it or may not have had the resources allocated yet.

I have found that I can change my uplink connection (250 mb/s) to either 750 mb/s or 1GB .  In your opinion would I see much improvement?

So am I understanding correctly, there isn't anything that I can use that will measure response time from another server company like Arvixe.com and my vendor?  Arvixe is just a hosting company I am considering.

It never even crossed my mind that you could be affiliated with any vendor.  So no worries!

I don't think you would see an improvement unless you're uploading or downloading a TON of data (gigabytes). A 250 mb/s uplink is quite fast already, and the downstream speed is typically the same or faster, so you're probably fine with what you have.

You can do a traceroute to watch the individual hops that go from you to the destination server. The final hop will likely time out (since it doesn't respond to ping), but you should be able to see the ping time for the next-to-last hop, which should give you a pretty good idea of the time.

I'm not a gambling man, but I'd put $50 down that it's the vendor's problem, not yours nor your hosting company's problem. Maybe look for an alternate vendor or maybe open up another question on EE about the details of the service being provided by the vendor and what you're sending/receiving to see if there's a better way to do it?

Thanks for the help.