A better way to handle real-time data?

On Fri, 25 Jan 2008 09:25:11 -0700, Martin wrote:

> I have a series of php scripts that provide the user interface to an
> industrial automation program.
>
> One of the scripts serves out a page which displays some data, some of
> which is constantly changing. On that page, I have some AJAX code
> running that frequently requests fresh data and displays it (frequently
> means about once a second).
>
> When the php script that services the AJAX requests receives one, it
> passes a request of its own over to the main process (via a socket)
> which responds with some data which the script then sends out to the
> browser page.
>
> This all works fine but I'm concerned about the load this exchange of
> data places in the main process.

I would suggest having the data collection process write out the data to
an external repository such as a database (a MySQL server can handle a
pretty massive load even on a relatively low-end machine) and then you can
separate the display of the data completely from the data collection
process.

You then have real-time data, historical data and the ability to
stream-line the data collection process for better performance.

--
I told you this was going to happen.