Maximum Page Number/File Size Limit to Rapidweaver Sites?

RapidWeaver Classic
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Hi:

I’m currently working on a Web site project in Rapidweaver.

It’s currently about 30 pages with a file size of 515 MB, and I have many more pages to add.

Is Rapidweaver stable with large site projects? Is there a maximum limit to the number of pages that can be developed in a single Rapidweaver file, and if so, how does one get around this limit?

Thanks,
Eric

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A 30-page site should not be this heavy (515 MB). I bet you have a lot of images, or images are way too big (in file size, dimensions, or both). You should consider warehousing (images, PDF documents, etc.) instead of putting them into Resources.

Although there is no strict limit on a number of pages in RW, the more pages you add and the more content you place in those pages, the performance will decline. To get around this problem, some of us split big projects into two or more separate projects and link them using offsite linking.

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I don’t think there’s a set maximum page number or file size.
Some of are running very large sites, it’s m of a performance issue (RapidWeaver not the website) as the project file g larger RapidWeaver can slow down.

Greg(@1611mac) has a very large site that he broke down into multiple RapidWeaver projects. He might be able to give some insight.

1 Like
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I create a number of course websites. On average each one is about 40 pages with a file size of about 30 Mb. So what I’m paying attention to is not the number of pages you have, but the very large project size.

You will probably be fine, but on the surface it does not seem you are developing your website in the most efficient way possible.

Some things to consider:

  1. do you use videos that are stored within RW? If so, I’d suggest moving them to YouTube or Vimeo and then embedding them.
  2. ditto with audio
  3. most likely you are using a lot of images. Image problem #1: your images are way too large for good website effectiveness. Check to see the size of individual images. Ideally they would all be 300k or smaller. But if some are somewhat larger it’s not a real issue. Yet if you see some of them are over 1 Mb in size then that’s a great indicator you need to optimize those images by resizing or running through an optimization routine.
  4. Image Problem #2: what a number of folks do is warehouse their images. This means directly placing the images on their hosting server and then linking to them within RW. This could be very simple or fairly time consuming in your case. It would depend on how you are displaying images. As an example, if you are showing a big gallery of images then something like the Gallery 3 stack by @instacks would allow you to simply point to the folder where the images live on your server. If all are individually placed, then that’s more work.

Put differently, I would be wary of a website that large given the relatively small number of pages you have. (It is a large website you have, but smaller than some projects created with RW.) But I don’t know the cause of the largeness. You’d have to identify that first, then a new course of action could be developed. All that said, RW “should” be fine with both your page number size and project size, but it’s all worth looking into.

2 Likes
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The site I maintain has a section of reports, a bookstore, downloads, etc. We serve up a few hundred ebooks and videos (in 3 formats each). Some are paid, some are free. Free ebooks are served up from web server, free video downloads from AWS, (and also available from Vimeo and Youtube). Paid eBooks from a 3rd party cart system.

As of indexing this morning (for our search tool) there were 1590 php/html pages and 2940 “other” files (css, php, etc)

The site is broken down into several project files. Project files represent “reports” (articles), “Store”, “Free Videos,” “Free eBooks,” etc.

A lot of the site was in place before I took over. Images were “dropped” in. I mostly use “warehousing” with images being placed on the web server.

Projects in TOTAL add up to 560mb for the 1590 pages and it could be somewhat smaller if all images where warehoused instead of those of only the past few years.

Mathew and others are correct… If you have 30 pages and your project is 515mb, something isn’t right.

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You can make enormous sites with RapidWeaver, especially with a CMS, like Total CMS. Look at Joe’s Weaver.space page. That site is made with RapidWeaver and has a ton of pages on it.

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@zeebe

I read something from Joe recently that suggested that the actual project file for weaver.space was quite small and it had a relatively small number of pages.
The trick was using Total CMS for the product pages.
This intrigued me as I have a very large site because of a lot of product pages and the idea of doing something similar would be very useful.

However I got the impression this was being done with V2 soon to be released?

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I want to point out that RapidWeaver project file size is strictly related only to how the RapidWeaver program performs on your Mac when building your site. It has little to do with website or individual webpages performance.

You could build a website that has a tiny project file size but creates a horrible user experience by loading extremely slowly. Using remote resources such as warehoused images, videos, and an external CMS will shrink the internal RapidWeaver project file size but have nothing to do with page load speed.

Page Weight not Project File Size is what matters.

Unless you’re experiencing RapidWeaver performance issues, there’s no need to be concerned or even look at the project file size. It really has little to do with how fast a page loads.

If you’re trying to measure page weight or page speed then don’t use the RapidWeaver project file size. There’s tools that can help with that like the built in web developers tool all browsers have.

1 Like
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That is true, the project file is small, but it can be done with either v1 or v2, depends on how you use v1.

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@zeebe
A couple of questions if I may, (just about within the parameters of this thread):
Is Total CMS V2 imminent?
If I purchase Total CMS V1 now will I get an upgrade to version 2?

I’ve had a look at some of Joe’s CMS videos.
More specifically can you point me to where I might find out more about using CMS to set up product pages that are not part of the RW project file.

Thanks

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