This situation (upgrading server during traffic spike) is an example of why saving a $20-50/mo on hosting isn't worth it, unless it's for something non-commercial.
If you've got maybe tens of thousands of dollars of time (and money?) invested in your app, what's another $40-80/mo for better hosting (e.g., 8GB/4 cores on Digital Ocean is $80/mo), in case something like this traffic spike happens? The app reaches the top of HN, where thousands of people that use Trello, Basecamp, and/or Freshbooks (I use all 3, every day) will be frequenting, and you've lost all that revenue.
Completely agree. Once it happened though, my options were limited. Just trying to improve the experience for everyone that will come after the resize is done (should be soon). Seems slightly better than providing a terrible experience for the entire day rather than for just 30 mins.
One of my two requests to your site loaded eventually. I don't see any reason why your front page couldn't be cached indefinitely. I don't know what webserver you are using, but here are some guides:
If you've got maybe tens of thousands of dollars of time (and money?) invested in your app, what's another $40-80/mo for better hosting (e.g., 8GB/4 cores on Digital Ocean is $80/mo), in case something like this traffic spike happens? The app reaches the top of HN, where thousands of people that use Trello, Basecamp, and/or Freshbooks (I use all 3, every day) will be frequenting, and you've lost all that revenue.