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I'm testing mod_pagespeed on a varnished powered server and wondering a couple things:

  • How can I test to see that they are playing nice with one another?
  • Can mod_page speed effectively replace Varnish?

Thanks for any insites.

Zoredache
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Michael Paler
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1 Answers1

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Yes, they can play together.

Varnish is a reverse proxy and is able to handle a big number of requests and serves documents from it's cache. You have to allow caching in Apache's configuration (I use mod_expire for this).

Google's mod_pagespeed is able to optimize your content on demand. It doesn't change the stored files for a website, it modifies the files in the moment you are requesting them.

For example: mod_pagespeed can modify your HTML page and instead of a page with 10 CSS files and 15 JavaScript files you will provide an optimized version with one packed and minimized CSS file and one packed and minimized JavaScript file. The web site you have stored contains 25 documents, the web site your are delivering contains 2 documents.

Jens Bradler
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  • Thanks for the info...What do you think about part 2? Can mod_page speed _replace_ varnish? – Michael Paler Mar 29 '12 at 19:54
  • I think no. Varnish is a reverse proxy and mod_pagespeed an optimizer module. So how can butter replace bread? They can work together or on one's own. – Jens Bradler Apr 04 '12 at 07:49
  • FYI -- more info on this topic at the [mod_pagespeed google group](https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/mod-pagespeed-discuss/goYpIcClkKY) – Michael Paler Apr 04 '12 at 16:55