HOSTING TIPS ARCHIVE
October 2026 hosting guides
Practical steps and checks for hosting, WordPress and performance. Browse a topic or use the dates to explore the experience behind the advice.
13 guides, newest work first.
zram swap on a web server: setup, numbers and rollback
Swapping to a cloud disk can make MySQL and Redis wait hundreds of microseconds per page. zram swaps to compressed RAM instead. Setup, real numbers and rollback.
Self-hosted WordPress: eight WP-CLI checks for speed and safety
Eight practical checks for WordPress on your own server: verify core files, run cron properly, find autoload bloat, lock down editing, use an object cache and update with a way back.
Warm every cache variant you actually serve
A deployment can refresh the desktop page while a phone still receives an older cached copy. I make the warmer follow the same choices as real requests.
Running Varnish in front of a Redis page cache, without stale pages
Varnish and a Redis page cache can make WordPress very fast together, but only if they purge as one. The VCL and purge rules that keep both caches honest.
The first add to basket is a cache test
I test the moment an anonymous browser becomes a shopper with a basket. A fast cached product page does not prove that transition works.
Test deployments as the web server user
A release can pass checks in an administrator’s shell and still fail for the account which serves the shop. I check both the runtime and its access.
Move WordPress media to object storage and a CDN safely
How to move a site’s images to private object storage behind a CDN, rewrite the links, and only delete local copies once every file has been checked.
Lock your origin server to Cloudflare with nginx
Proxying through Cloudflare only hides your server if the server refuses everyone else. How to lock an nginx origin to Cloudflare and stop visitors faking their IP.
Ten Linux server habits: disk, logs, updates, SSH and timers
Simple, repeatable checks for anyone running a Linux server: what is listening, what is filling the disk, automatic security updates, SSH keys, systemd timers and more.
Caching a WordPress block means keeping more than its HTML
A block can register scripts, styles and interactive state while it renders. I need those effects back on a cache hit too.
Atomic deploys with automatic rollback for PHP and WordPress
Release folders, a symlink swap that is truly atomic, rollback when a post-deploy step fails, and the OPcache and permission traps that catch people out.
Apache tuning and hardening: PHP-FPM, HTTP/2, caching and Cloudflare IPs
Practical Apache tips: switch to the event MPM with PHP-FPM, turn on HTTP/2 and Brotli, cache static files properly, read real visitor IPs behind Cloudflare and hide what should be private.
Deployment configuration needs one clear owner
Define which source owns each deployment configuration file, then test that old local copies cannot silently override an intended change.
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