capacity planning

Measuring the ability of a Web site to deliver content to its customers at an acceptable speed. The number of site visitors is measured, as well as the demand each user places on the server. The resources required to meet existing and future usage are then determined. This involves assessing the adequacy of resources such as network bandwidth, disk space, and processor speeds.

Factors that affect the capacity of a Web site include: the site content (content that uses a lot of bandwidth, such as video and large numbers of images, has an adverse effect on performance); user numbers (as use of the site grows, so must capacity in order to continue to deliver acceptable levels of service); and hardware and software infrastructure (upgrading infrastructure such as hard disk space and processing speed can increase capacity).