Another successful CPD registration

Another successful registration for the Chicago Park
District.

Once again today we had a successful registration event for
the Chicago Park District.  This was our
biggest one ever – as the summer session usually is.  At peak we had over 10,000 simultaneous users
and revenue of over $100,000 per minute! 
This has been a great project (and case study) on the effectiveness of a
well designed and executed AJAX
application (and significant load testing). 

Because we only have these registration events quarterly, we
needed the ability to handle a huge increase in traffic without adding
additional servers (because this burst happens only four times per year).  We built a lightweight AJAX application at http://programs.chicagoparkdistrict.com/programBrowser/
that allows user to browse programs and build a wish list in advance.  Then, on registration day users easily move
their pre-selected programs into a shopping cart and check out quickly
(minimizing utilization of hardware or software resources).  Using this approach we were able to reduce
our hardware requirements by over 50% - and service the expanding user base
with a minimal amount of infrastructure. 

Congratulations to the Chicago Park District team for this
amazing and efficient application!