Slow MySql queries – causing problems for hoster

For the third time in under 30 days, Mediatemple has picked up a surge in database activity. Not knowing much about this, I thought it may have been down to getting more site visitors than usual, but although number are growing, I only get around 100 page views a day according to Google Analytics.

So, I’ve just run a slow query analyser, and here are the results:

Created 10:55 AM 01/08/2008
### 9 Queries
### Total time: 18, Average time: 2
### Taking 2 , 2 , 2 , 2 , 2 , 2 , 2 , 2 , 2 seconds to complete
### Rows analyzed 12454, 12454, 12454, 12454, 12454, 12454, 12454, 12454 and 12454
SET timestamp=XXX;
select ID, post_date, post_title, post_status, name
from wp_posts, wp_terms, wp_term_relationships, wp_term_taxonomy
where wp_posts.ID = wp_term_relationships.object_id
and wp_term_relationships.term_taxonomy_id = wp_term_taxonomy.term_taxonomy_id
and wp_term_taxonomy.term_id = wp_terms.term_id
and post_status = ‘XXX’
and taxonomy = ‘XXX’
and post_date < NOW()
order by name asc, post_title asc;
SET timestamp=1199818410;
select ID, post_date, post_title, post_status, name
from wp_posts, wp_terms, wp_term_relationships, wp_term_taxonomy
where wp_posts.ID = wp_term_relationships.object_id
and wp_term_relationships.term_taxonomy_id = wp_term_taxonomy.term_taxonomy_id
and wp_term_taxonomy.term_id = wp_terms.term_id
and post_status = ‘publish’
and taxonomy = ‘category’
and post_date < NOW()
order by name asc, post_title asc;
### 1 Query
### Total time: 2, Average time: 2
### Taking 2 seconds to complete
### Rows analyzed 12454
use dbXXX_mywp;
SET timestamp=XXX;
select ID, post_date, post_title, post_status, name
from wp_posts, wp_terms, wp_term_relationships, wp_term_taxonomy
where wp_posts.ID = wp_term_relationships.object_id
and wp_term_relationships.term_taxonomy_id = wp_term_taxonomy.term_taxonomy_id
and wp_term_taxonomy.term_id = wp_terms.term_id
and post_status = ‘XXX’
and taxonomy = ‘XXX’
and post_date < NOW()
order by name asc, post_title asc;
use db00000_mxxx;
SET timestamp=1199818410;
select ID, post_date, post_title, post_status, name
from wp_posts, wp_terms, wp_term_relationships, wp_term_taxonomy
where wp_posts.ID = wp_term_relationships.object_id
and wp_term_relationships.term_taxonomy_id = wp_term_taxonomy.term_taxonomy_id
and wp_term_taxonomy.term_id = wp_terms.term_id
and post_status = ‘publish’
and taxonomy = ‘category’
and post_date < NOW()
order by name asc, post_title asc;

I don’t know how to read them – can anyone tell me if I can understand which plugin may be causing problems?

I’m using WP 2.3.2, PHP 5 (I have 2 WP sites on the server – so two databases – the other database was on PHP 4 – now changed to PHP 5)

These are the plugins that are active:

* Adsense-Deluxe
* Akismet
* Archives By Category
* Articles
* Contact Form 7
* Democracy
* Democracy Widget
* Future Calendar
* Google XML Sitemaps
* Similar Posts
* Simple Tags
* Social Bookmarking RELOADED
* Viper’s Video Quicktags
* wp-cache – not activated, was activated before recent WP Upgrade

Any suggestions – before MediaTemple make me pay more?

Thanks in advance,

Alex