Violating rules

[greeny]

Quoted from your TSA:

CPU Usage
Sites may not use extreme unwarranted CPU usage. This includes usage of "heavy" scripts or Flash/shockwave files. By heavy we mean oversized without cause, to the point where most users would be unable to view them in a reasonable amount of time. No single site may consume 30% of CPU usage for a sustained period of time.

I learn that violating this rule (and other rules), I may get my website removed from the web host without a refund. But, what's the procedure of removal? If I happen to exceed the limit due to the unexpected traffic, what is the first action you may take?

[dave]

We open a support ticket and wait for a response, if a response is not received within a few hours (depending on the severity of the issue) then we will chmod the offending script to 000 or suspend the account.

It's very uncommon for this us to take action against a customer in this situation unless they dont response to our emails.

[linker]

What does the 30% CPU usage mean? Does this mean the processor that was allocated for me on the package I get or is the the whole CPU on the server?

Is it a good rule not to place Flash contents on my website if ever I will be getting a shared server?

[FrankSpencer]

Ah ok, so at least there is the chance that if we stuff up accidentally, we may just have the script disabled? That is rather a lot better than loosing everything without the chance to make amends.

[ResidentGeek]

If your flash content and/or website scripts become too resource intensive, we will typically contact you first to give you a chance to remedy the situation.  If you don't respond to the support ticket then we will typically just disable the offending content or website until the issue is resolved.  You would have to be fairly blatant about abusing our hardware and/or bandwidth before your account is terminated.

If you need assistance with problematic content or scripts, you can also fill out a support ticket and someone from the technical support team can assist you with this.

[Sunwalker]

If you don't respond to the support ticket then we will typically just disable the offending content or website until the issue is resolved. 

Is it as great as it sounds or am I just misunderstanding? So if I have "resource-eating" flash content on my website (along with other content), you can simply disable it without disabling the website itself?

[dave]

It depends on the site and how the code is layed out but if there is a reasourcehog.swf file that we can identify we will disable just that file. The last resort is to disable the entire account and we try to do whatever we can to avoid that.

[Inbrief]

That's cool. You will help your subscribers much, because some beginning webmasters (me included) sometimes are just not aware that their websites are consuming too much resource when they add flashy content on the websites.

[linker]

How many flash applications should we limit in a website for it not to consume a lot of resources? I'm assuming that one flash movie or application is good enough to place on the website.

[dave]

It's hard to say really. Flash isn't all that intensive at all on the server, it mostly hits the client CPU but having said that 1 poorly written script could take more resources than 100 properly written ones.

[linker]

You are right dave and I think this does not apply only to Flash applications. I have been to a few websites where their codes are messed up and their time to upload images takes forever.

[Nadia]

I just wanted to say that I think this is very courteous. I've read the TOS  for lots of Shared Hosting Sites and 98% of them will simply disable your entire site if not take it down completely without warning.

[Di]

It is always better to find the root of the problem before you start assuming things. 

[Nadia]

It is always better to find the root of the problem before you start assuming things. 

Absolutely! Well you know what they say about "assume" anyway... 

If you read the TOS you will likely find the problem which often enough tends to be something you may have overlooked or accidentally broken a rule. Mistakes happen but if you keep your TOS in mind at all times then you should have no issues at all. 

[Gill85]

From my experience, it's mainly dynamic scripts that use databases that tend to use a lot of resources especially if they're not optimized and you're receiving a lot of traffic. Flash and medium size zip files can also use too many resources so if you created a template or script that you're sharing for free, I'd upload it to somewhere else and just link to it from your website in order to avoid going over the resources.