My May 2021 article described investigating failures in a database-heavy PHP API platform. Increasing server memory had not resolved the underlying workload problems.
Find repeated work
Inspect slow queries and execution plans. Look for query-per-record patterns, large unbounded results, and repeated database round trips. Batch appropriate operations and use parameterized queries.
Tune with evidence
Connection management, memory, worker concurrency, indexes, and timeouts must be considered together. Values that helped a particular historical workload are not universal settings.
The useful lesson is to measure where work accumulates and understand the failure before adding resources. This adaptation intentionally leaves out dated blanket tuning advice; the original article is available at the source link.