How to succeed in submitting an application on a high-traffic website

Question

I'm curious: Sometimes there are different events, when websites cannot handle their traffic. (usually starts at precise time until sold/booked/etc.) For example:
Class registration at schools,
Sale of some super cheap stuff (for example $99 tablet pc on ebay: http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/11/they-love-me-they-really-really-love-me/),
some other improtant registration (in my particular case this is a visa application (only 300 entries worldwide).

Often, websites do not respond very well when clicking submit button, pay button, or next step button in these situations. Are there ways or tricks to make your application more responsive.

The only ways I found:

1. Have good internet connection (Concerns about ISP provider? How to check latency or some other smart words?)
2. Have fast computer and browser (Any special settings?)

But these are all basic stuff. What really happens is that server just cannot handle all traffic (is there a queue? Should I press submit button multiple times? can I monitor somehow through firebug that my response was lost? there should be something!!)

Answer 1

There really isn't much that you can do. One thing is to reduce the amount of traffic that you're pulling if possible. Some websites rely heavily on ADs and by using an addon like ADBlock Plus on Firefox will prevent these sites from displaying. Not only does it prevent it displaying, it will block the traffic hence giving you more availability to download/submit desired content.

However, again, there really isn't too much that you can do.

If the application that you're trying to submit has several files that you're uploading then you may want to check with your ISP about upgrading your upload bandwidth.

Also, if you use something like OpenDNS. instead of the provided DNS servers from your ISP has been shown to increase speeds in some cases.

Answer 2

From the point of view as a user (browsing), if the server is truly busy then there's not much you can do but keep trying.

Think about calling the radio station to win concert tickets, they only have so many phone lines, and so many people able to answer.

Keep in mind that there is caching along the way which may cause multiple (possibly repeat) requests to eventually get through, and that hammering at it (trying over and over in quick succession) usually only makes it slower.

IMO, you're better off waiting and trying again later. The timespan you wait will depend on the situation, and how the servers respond will depend on the server and the infrastructure of that specific server/service.

Otherwise, it's luck. :)