Stats and Insights – High CPU & RAM
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Has WordPress.com suddenly started preloading all the user’s embedded videos (from posts) on the Stats and Insights pages? That’s what the problem looks like to me.
I’m a regular WordPress.com user who logs in most every day and often keeps the Stats page open while doing other things. Today when I logged in to WP, CPU and memory usage went crazy. The problem was repeatable. It seems like there have been programming changes which introduced a bug where the Stats and Insights pages try (inexplicably) to preload videos in the background – a long list of videos embedded in the user’s blog posts. This is new behavior and troubling behavior since it maxes out RAM and CPU.
Maybe WordPress is experimenting with a new feature for gathering stats about embedded videos. All I can say is, please stop! It’s a disaster! You’re killing my little old ‘puter! (This problem might not be noticed by users who don’t embed videos in their posts.)
Here are some facts: After launching Firefox, and with the Stats or Insights page the only page open, I see multiple calls to YouTube, DailyMotion, and Vimeo, and to their various subdomains or cdn’s. Looking at memory usage, the Firefox plug-in container is using over 356 MB of ram! (This is in addition to the main Firefox application.)
This is from the Stats or Insights page only — no other pages open. Tried totally clearing out the Firefox cache, and even rebooting the computer, but those things had no effect on the problem. I can see no useful reason for Stats or Insights to load 356 MB of videos in the background. Surely this is a bug.
Another reason I identify the problem as WordPress loading videos in the background is that my Flashgot lights up and shows a humongously long list of videos in every possible format that YouTube et al. provides. Flashgot wouldn’t see these videos unless the Stats or Insights pages were making calls to them.
I’ve used WordPress, Firefox, and Flashgot together for years without problems, and have not recently updated either Firefox or Flashgot. So it looks to me like changes on WordPress.com are causing these problems. In addition to maxing out CPU and RAM, it’s also a huge time-waster waiting for all these unwanted video preloads to finish.
– Firefox clean launch with no pages open: Firefox RAM usage 123 MB, plug-in container 0 MB, Firefox CPU usage 0%
– After signing in to WordPress and clicking on My Site (which takes me to either Stats or Insights): Firefox RAM usage 468 MB, plus plug-in container 356 MB, Firefox CPU usage 75%, eventually settling down to about 24% (still too high).
Note 1: This is not a problem with Firefox addons. The problem persists even with Firefox started in safe mode (no addons).
Note 2: This does not happen on the old My Stats page, only the new “upgraded” Stats and Insights pages.
If you’ve made recent changes to the Stats and Insights pages, please revert until you can troubleshoot this. In general, please try and keep the Stats page simple, clean and efficient. Blogging shouldn’t require a supercomputer.
Thank you for your help. My site is:
http://ethicsandspirituality.wordpress.com/
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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Hi there!
Thanks for the detailed information about what you’ve tried already. I had a look at your stats and instights pages with my own browser (Safari) and it used less than 0.1% CPU. I’m not sure why the usage is so high for you but something is definitely wrong. Can you try a couple of tests for me? First, try using a different web browser, like Safari or Opera to see whether it happens there too. Also try temporarily deactivating Flashgot and loading the page again. I was not using Flashgot in my test. Let me know how you go!
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Thanks Rachel. As mentioned, I did test in Firefox safe mode (no addons = no Flashgot) and the problem persisted.
I’m on Linux and don’t have easy access to Safari or Opera. I did test using Google Chrome, and the problem with high CPU and RAM usage on Stats and Insights pages persisted there also.
Would the manner in which you accessed my Stats and Insights pages affect whether or not video preloads? If WordPress doesn’t “see” you as the blogger who “owns” a bunch of embedded videos on his/her posts, then maybe it wouldn’t preload video for you as it does for me? (I’m assuming you don’t have Flash content blocked.)
Firefox is more or less the standard browser on Linux (as well as being popular on other platforms). I very much hope the software engineers would revert recent changes until they can troubleshoot this issue.
Blogging is something universal in nature. In order to accommodate a wide range of users, I strongly encourage WordPress to use simple, universal code that isn’t dependent on a particular browser, version, or platform. I also encourage WordPress to test on single core machines, since testing on multi-core will often hide problems.
Thanks again.
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Ok, I’ll check in with our Stats team to see whether anything has changed recently which might be causing issues with loading that page. I’ll keep you posted!
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Our developers have made some changes which have hopefully improved this for you. Can you give the Stats page another try and let me know whether you’re still seeing the same performance issues? Thanks!
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Thanks for following up. I’ve retested, and sorry to say the same problems with high CPU & RAM and videos preloading are still present to the same degree. I don’t see any improvement.
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I have a similar problem with my blogs (analisemusical.wordpress.com and gergelyes.wordpress.com) when trying to access to stats from google chrome. It’s impossible since a couple of days. Access from linux (chromium) is OK
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Is there an error message when you try to access the stats? Does it eventually load?
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Yes, there is. After a long while trying to load, the error message appears.
It doesn’t load. However, I succeeded accessing in private mode (google chrome, windows 7), besides linux (chromium). -
Can you share the error message? I’m wondering whether it’s the same issue or something different? Thanks!
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I can’t paste the “print screen” here. However, it’s short:
Image: deceived folder. Text:
“Oh, no! An error occured while showing this webpage”
Thanks for the help! -
Ok, that sounds like something different. I tried signing into your site and having a look at the stats and I can’t reproduce this which makes me think it is a browser issue. Can you try clearing your browser cache and cookies and then loading these pages again:
https://wordpress.com/stats/insights/analisemusical.wordpress.com
https://wordpress.com/stats/insights/sergiodelaossa.wordpress.com -
I executed CCleaner, it cleaned the chrome cache and cookies, but I have the same problem. I clicked on the links above and tried to acces the stats of my pages, but I couldn’t. (As earlier, I can access them from linux or Chrome in private mode)
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Hi @sgdelaossa, I hope you don’t mind me jumping in to help. Are you still having trouble?
I’d suggest checking your browser plugins, if you haven’t already, to see if any need updates:
chrome://plugins
You can also check to see if an extension is getting in the way:
chrome://extensions
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Thank you! Suddenly a couple of days ago it started working again (maybe earlier, but since I was accessing in private mode, I didn’t realize).
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@sgdelaossa that’s so odd, but I’m glad it’s working anyhow! If you need more help, let us know.
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Yes, I was surprised. I think it may have been after one of the automatic windows updates, I hadn’t changed myself anything on the computer… Thanks!
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Ah, it may well have been an outdated plugin being updated automatically. I’m glad it’s working now. Cheers @sgdelaossa :)
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