Like other hosts we use a couple of benchmarking sites to help show our hosting prowess. The two key sites are:
http://www.magespeedtest.com/
http://magebenchmark.sonassi.com/

Both are useful for different reasons.

Mage speed test.

Created by the rather talented Ashley Schroder mage speed test is essentially a managed Seige benchmark interface. It will take the standard magento sitemap as the input and run tests against random pages within the site.  One of the most useful features is the ability for anyone to test their own setup.  It is very useful for testing in real time, changes to server configs.

The idea was that end users would get a representative idea of what their host could offer. Dx3webs was the second host to join this site and we added a couple of our packages. Shortly after we were noticing that other hosting companies were coming in with load times that could only be achieved with reverse proxy servers. Eventually we decided to add a Varnish enabled option to the list and currently we are neck and neck with two other hosts offering their own cached versions. We are currently using Cache Extension powered by Varnish which is a free extension. There is also PageCache powered by Varnish which was previously a paid for extension but has recently gone free. We will be testing this in the near future.

We know form speaking to Ashley that he is keen to ensure that his tests are an accurate reflection of real world tests and that each store needs to be functional to the end user. With the use of these Varnish extensions you can have insanely fast stores AND dynamic content.

One final comment on Mage speed test. Each of the hosts that post on there are highly reputable and enjoy a strong reputation and are active participants in the Magento community. Any of the packages listed on there will be plenty fast to run most magento stores and I don’t believe most shoppers would spot the difference between a store delivering 15 transactions per second and 30 transactions per second.  At Dx3webs we aim to offer the best possible home for your magento store.  This means not only being able to provide a fast hosting environment but also best possible up time, excellent support and buckets of advice and guidance.

The key thing to recognise is that Magento is demanding, you will need a host who cares about performance and you will have to pay a slight premium for the privilege.

Oh and did you notice that the fastest result in the table is also the cheapest and the only one based in the UK.

Magento Benchmark

The original Magento benchmark site has been around for a long time now and is run by Manchester magento developers Sonassi.  Whilst it is not as handy as Mage speed test and aimed exclusively at hosts it goes a long way to give a much better picture of actual server performance that simple Seige tests.  ”Based on levels of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20 and 30 concurrent connections, there will be two tests. Both tests are custom written and have been designed to reflect real-world load not artificial testing such as siege/ab.”  Full details of the test can be read here.

As you can see from the table, Dx3webs offers excellent value for money on our entry level package.. again, we not only offer the cheapest package but also a generous disk allocation, unlimited traffic and no limits on the domains you can run from your store for less than £15 per month.  Top this off with a free two week trial…

To fix edit app/design/adminhtml/default/default/layout/sales.xml

and add

<action method="removeItem"><type>js</type><name>extjs/ext-tree.js</name></action>

like so:

<adminhtml_sales_order_create_index>
<reference name="left">
<action method="setIsCollapsed"><value>true</value></action>
</reference>
<reference name="head">
<action method="removeItem"><type>js</type><name>extjs/ext-tree.js</name></action>
<action method="addJs"><file>mage/adminhtml/sales.js</file></action>

There is a simple fix.

1. Copy wishlish.xml in base/default/layout to your_template/layout
2. Copy the whole wishlist folder in base/default/template to your_template/template
3. Refresh Cache

1) configure magento.

In system > manage stores

Add a new website, store and store view for your new site. Remember the code for the website.

2) Create a domain alias for you new domain pointing to your existing domain.

3) Add a little logic to index.php

umask(0);

if ($_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] == "newdomain.com" || $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] == "www.newdomain.com"){
$_SERVER["MAGE_RUN_CODE"] = "website_code";
$_SERVER["MAGE_RUN_TYPE"] = "website";
}

/* Store or website code */
$mageRunCode = isset($_SERVER['MAGE_RUN_CODE']) ? $_SERVER['MAGE_RUN_CODE'] : '';

/* Run store or run website */
$mageRunType = isset($_SERVER['MAGE_RUN_TYPE']) ? $_SERVER['MAGE_RUN_TYPE'] : 'store';

Mage::run($mageRunCode, $mageRunType);

1) /lib/Varien/Object.php (Line 484)
replace __toString
with __invoke

2) /app/code/core/Mage/Core/Controller/Request/Http.php (Line 274)
replace split
with explode

3) app/code/core/Mage/Admin/Model/User.php (Line 374)
replace split
with explode

This is a text file which you will see contains the info you used when setting up Connect. Make the necessary changes to this to reflect the new server location.

Simple fix

Open /app/design/frontend/base/your_theme/template/product/

Find the line:

<?php echo $this->getChildHtml(\'product_type_data\') ?>

replace with :

<?php echo $this->getPriceHtml($_product, true) ?>

1) On our new site http://dx3webs.com we needed to make it clear when prices were Monthly or Annually or One off. All our Magento hosting options are monthly while the likes of SSL certs are annual. So we created a new attribute called “billingcycle” which is either set to
Per Month, Per Year or &nbsp (the latter for products that are simply one off payments)

If is then simply a case of calling the following code in your list.phtml file

 <?php echo  $_product->getAttributeText('billingcycle')  ?> 

2)
In the second case the client wanted to show in the grid view all the available options for the attribute “frame_colour”

Available in
<div class="array">
<?php
echo $_product->getResource()->getAttribute('frame_colour')->getFrontend()->getValue($_product)
?>
</div>

So you will need to edit this by hand.

you can add the following code anywhere.. For this particular client we used:

/ app / design / frontend / base / default / template / checkout / cart / sidebar.phtml

add

<?php echo $this->getLayout()->createBlock('googlecheckout/link')->setTemplate('googlecheckout/link.phtml')->toHtml(); ?>

for example:

   <div class="actions">
        <?php echo $this->getChildHtml('extra_actions') ?>
        <button type="button" title="<?php echo $this->__('Checkout') ?>" class="button" onclick="setLocation('<?php echo $this->getCheckoutUrl() ?>')"><span><span><?php echo $this->__('Checkout') ?></span></span></button>
    </div>

<?php echo $this->getLayout()->createBlock('googlecheckout/link')->setTemplate('googlecheckout/link.phtml')->toHtml(); ?>

    <?php endif ?>

All you need is to add the correct url link to the name of the product…

open
app/design/frontend/your-package/your-theme/template/catalog/product/view/type/grouped.phtml

find

 <!--?php echo $this--->htmlEscape($_item->getName()) ?>

change to

<a href="<?php echo $this->htmlEscape($_item->getProductUrl()) ?>">
            <!--?php echo $this--->htmlEscape($_item->getName()) ?>
</a>

Here shown with thumbnail patch“