FUDKnox.org

You’ll notice the Build Attributes on the right or below the intro, depending on what device you’re using. Regardless, the Build Attributes reflect the areas I’m concentrating on. If the site has part of the attribute I will mark it as a yes. If it has none, no. And, if I was unable to determine, as unknown (?).

Content Management

The site is built using WordPress, a content management system (CMS). WordPress is quite a robust and capable CMS as evidenced by it’s extensive usage on the newly redesigned NASA website.

Utility Framework

Unfortunately they are not using a Utility Framework (a WordPress theme is not a Framework). This is evident in the coding by a lack of CSS attributes typically found in a framework such as sizing units (EM, REM, Clamp, etc). Their site is still using PX which is a fixed unit vs EM or REM which is variable and changes according to the screen size and so on.

HTML Structure

Their site doesn’t follow the standard semantic HTML structure. When you view the code, you should see a Body tag (which is does have) on the top level. From there, when you expand that branch you should immediately see a Header, Main, and Footer tag…. you don’t. Those three main tags should be on the second level of the HTML as Body -> Header, Main, Footer. Instead they are:

Body -> Div -> Header
Body -> Main tag is missing and instead uses a Div labeled et-main-area
Body -> Div -> Div -> Footer

From there the individual elements of those sections are buried in a ton of Div’s which increase the overall DOM and subsequently the page loading times. In short, even basic HTML structuring is poor and only continues to get worse especially with the complete absence of the Main tag. Why? It’s using the Divi theme with it’s built in website builder. Unfortunately where they provide ease of usage via their visual builder, it suffers significantly in code output and causes several other issues as a result. Just for full disclosure, I have used Divi in the past to build websites so I understand the appeal to use it. However I no longer use it because there are significantly better options.

Next Gen Image Optimization

There is some image optimization in the form of compression using Smush but all the images appear as JPEG, or PNG. None are converted to WebP or AVIF, despite the fact that Smush supports conversion to WebP even in their free version . The images still load decent in spite of this, and luckily they are using some sort of caching. So even though they are compressing the images, they are not converted to next gen image types.

Content Caching

As I mentioned above, there is some caching on the site. To test this, open a private browser and visit their site. First page interaction is delayed (6-9 seconds) before full page load. Each subsequent visit to the same page is significantly faster (2-4 seconds), and the inspector shows the content loaded by cache as well. This caching is being handled by the built in caching by their theme, but it’s only basic caching which is better than nothing….  however they are on a LiteSpeed server. Unfortunately even though they have the capability for some pretty good server side caching, it’s clearly not being leveraged as their site isn’t using the necessary LiteSpeed Cache plugin as it’s missing from within their RestAPI and in the source code. So it appears very little caching is being leverage at the site or server level even though they have a LiteSpeed Server and Jetpack Boost installed.

CDN

There is no CDN used on the site and their hosting, LiquidWeb does not offer it. However the site has Jetpack Boost installed which offers a free CDN for images, but that’s not being used either.

Search Engine Optimization

The site SEO is present and is powered by All In One SEO (AIOSEO), and appears to have the important basics setup properly. Sitemaps are present as well. In this area as a whole they are doing well.

Overall Design

The overall look is simplistic and the color palette goes well across the site. Nothing was broken that I found or redirected to anywhere it shouldn’t. The only issue I really found, which isn’t an issue, is the house icon which typically represents the home or homepage was actually the old icon/logo that NextDoor uses/used to use. Perhaps the new icon hasn’t been updated in Divi yet, but there are still ways to add it manually.

Conclusion

The site looks fine and functions fine as well. My biggest issues are with some of the behind the scene things such as:

• The site being on a LiteSpeed server but not utilizing the benefits of it.
• Lack of converted images to next gen (WebP or AVIF).
• The PHP version, 7.4.33, reached it’s end of life Nov. 2, 2022 and is no longer being supported. Honestly this one should be updated.
• The Divi theme version is 4.20.4, so that means the theme also hasn’t been updated in almost a year.

So while the front end seems to be ok, the back end needs some updating and the LiteSpeed Cache plugin installed and setup. I’m sure on top of that either Redis or MemCache could be enabled as well that would only make things even quicker. On a small side note, I personally find it tacky and unprofessional when developers use their logo as the Favicon, on the Login pages, etc.

So the question of the day, why host a site on a LiteSpeed server that’s clearly activated and not leverage the significant benefits it offers?