Reduce GET results for lists and tables

I have created an app that connects to the UK customs system and clears containers coming in. It went live and was working beautifully and then I started to receive (justified) moans about page speed followed by tables and lists timing out. I reduced the pages down to single blocks as the main 2 tables are both at 490 fields and started archiving cvompleted data to google sheets to keep Airtable under the 50k pro limit. I also consolidated some fields to reduce what appears to be the slowest block, tables with 8-10 fields. Some improvement but I’m still getting 7-10 second load times and I suspect that when it’s back live with 20+ users I will be seeing time outs again.

I asked support what can be done and if lists or tables were faster and they told me the problem is many fields and then alot of linked fields inside each record. This is very much the case as I have around 30 tables all interlinked to deliver the XML to the UK ports.

Is there a way to put this problem to bed inside of either softr or airtable? My understanding is that views don’t limit the returned data which seems daft so I thought of a couple of solutuions…

  1. Create a separate table that only includes softr required fields through lookup/rollups to take the field number returned down from 470 to around 100. This would still include linked fields but far less and then I could script a deletion once the data had run its course.

  2. Use list table pre filtering or some other method of reducing the data in a custom code block.

  3. Switch active data away from airtable and into google sheets due to the higher API quota I have through G-Suite. This is something I would rather not do but GS allows for 10 requests per second which is double AT limit.

I did insist on a backup solution being in place so I have taken the app out of action while this is solved so even if the solution is large or drastic (switching to GS say), I am prepared to do it and certainly open to offers from any devs.

@Acefast the issue is with Airtable API I think not being fast and if you can consolidate only fields you need for the app in a single table that would definitely help.

I would also suggest doing one time experiment with dump and googlesheet import to try with ghseet too and compare…

1 Like

Thanks A, I will give those a go and comeback with my findings :+1:t2:

@artur I am not convinced it’s the Airtable API, here is why; I built the same app both in softr and ycode and ycode is much faster. I also tested softr with data from gsheets, and the speed is still slow.

Thanks

@mywebmaster might be they copy your data in their DB and store a copy. We don’t work directly with an API.
Share your links for Airtable and Gsheet and we will compare