Hi there
In my web-application I have some forms and based to those forms, users will generate some excel and chart files(.xls and .png). Each use has to generate at least 2 excel files and 5 png files.
The problem is that when is about to generate those files it takes 2 seconds for a excels file and 1 second for a chart. I'm using the PHPExcel and pcharts libs.
Can you give me some ideas about how to optimize this task?
Definitely time of generation depends on how many records you are working with.
Let's suppose this number is in small range..
Option 1
1 second for chart generation is ok. For excel files - no.
Possibly PHPExcel library is the one what you may want to replace with your own functions for faster xls file generation. Check out here. I have used functions from that article before and they are working like a charm. Sure, if you need to nicely format your data, you are forced to use PHPExcel and can nothing to do with that.
Option 2
Cache your files server-side.
For example, once you generated chart/xls you can save it to appropriate place, and when user requests later the same chart/xls you are not needed to rebuild it.