Faster pages, fewer database calls

County and city pages keep their data for a day, the directory waits for you to stop typing, and a dozen background jobs do less work.

Before many more people start using Front Door, we cut the work our pages and background jobs ask of our database. By our estimate, it is about a seventh of what it was. Most of what you see stays the same, and some pages load faster. One change: a broken link can now stay up to about ten days before we fix or hide it, a few days longer than before.

• County and city pages keep their data for a day. Before, every update to the site made each county and city page ask the database again. Now the answer is kept for a day, even across updates. When we add new offices, food sites or job centers for a state, its pages refresh on their own.
• Search waits for you to stop typing. In Help nearby, the search runs once you pause, not once for every letter, and only after two letters.
• The officials page is ready faster. The page for officials with no choices picked is the same for everyone, so it is built once every 15 minutes instead of for each visit. Picking a state or a kind of help works as before.
• Link checks run once a week. We check every link on local offices, nonprofits and programs each Monday, and check the broken ones again on Thursday. A link broken both times is fixed or hidden that day, so a broken link can stay up to about ten days (it was about six). The link board on the status page is now for the Front Door team only.
• Less to keep. Old sign-ins and old limits on how often someone can ask are now deleted on a schedule. Deleting your account no longer reads everyone else’s records to find yours.