Memcaching on Bluehost: Which server, port?

[mahoski]

While installing MediaWiki (http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki) (i.e., the roll-your-own Wikipedia), I'm prompted for the following:

http://drunsen.com/memcache.jpg

I filled out the above with my hosted account's IP address, as listed in cPanel:

http://drunsen.com/ip.jpg

I called BlueHost support and the technician verified that, yes, Bluehost definitely supports memcaching. However, he didn't know how to set it up (i.e., which server/port to use). He filled out a ticket, but I haven't heard back and thought I'd ask the user community here.

According to the MediaWiki manual, the default settings are 127.0.0.1:11000 (http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:%24wgMemCachedServers). Is this configuration valid for a Bluehost hosted account?

Does anyone know which server and port will work? I realize I could select the default "No caching" radio button, but I would prefer to enjoy the speed benefits which accompany memcaching.

Thanks,
Ryan

[dvessel]

Hi Ryan, I never knew we had the option. It's listed as a perl module (http://helpdesk.bluehost.com/kb/index.php?x=&mod_id=2&root=8&id=230). If you find a way to configure it then please post it.

Thanks!

[mahoski]

I have tried:
http://drunsen.com/70.jpg

and

http://drunsen.com/127.jpg

to no avail. Ideas?

[mahoski]

Agreed, according to that link Bluehost advertises support for the memcache PEAR module. It also appears from that list that you support APC (http://us3.php.net/apc).

How do I enable APC? On the same MediaWiki config page as I referenced in Post #1, I see this:

http://drunsen.com/mcache.jpg

If I figure out how to use memcache or APC, I'll post the solution here. Meantime, I'm open to suggestions.

[dvessel]

Hmm.. I'm trying to figure out memcache itself. It's not so simple. It takes loads of memory and they recommend using multiple machines so it doesn't look like BH would fully implement it.

If I figure any of this out, I'll be sure to post it here.

[mahoski]

Thanks dvessel: I'll stay tuned. BH support emailed me:
Select no, when asked if the server supports shared memory.
Thanks,
Flavio Martins
Level II Technical Support
Bluehost.com

Net, BH does not support shared memory caching (at least not on my box). Which is fine, it's more of a nice-to-have than an imperative for me, but then what good is the following? What factors determine which box (and thus, which features) a BH customer gets?:
http://audiothink.com/bh.png (http://helpdesk.bluehost.com/kb/index.php?x=&mod_id=2&root=8&id=230)
http://audiothink.com/pear.png (http://helpdesk.bluehost.com/kb/index.php?x=&mod_id=2&root=8&id=230)
(truncated)

I'm still a satisfied customer. The issue described is small compared to the peerless value BH provides.