cannot post - hoping this will work. keep getting ips error message or can't find server message...yesterday morning for quite some time and now this morning for about an hour. I am hoping this post will get on there. What's going on??

Database issues, I am working to resolve them, long term, I was under the impression that they were resolved short term as I hadn't seen the problem occur since last night, I will have another look.

Would you mind explaining what the problem with the board is? I've heard the database is too large, but I'm not sure what that means. Does it mean there isn't enough space on the server for the database or does it mean there's too much data in it and it's malfunctioning?

I'm asking because if it's the former, wouldn't it be fixed by adding more disc space? If it's the latter, is there some way to save the stuff you have to remove and make an archive for it so we don't lose anything?

Thank you for asking this, MG. I am concerned as well about losing stuff.

There is plenty of physical space on the server it's simply that with a database this large being accessed this often it is not uncommon for all the queries to simply overload it's capabilities. The site is not on a dedicated server as I simply couldnt afford it and as such it may not just be related to the size of this database but also demands on the server from other databases stored on it as well.

I have been trying to get the database shifted to another server in the cluster but the problem is that with such a large database uploading it to another machine is problematic and keeps failing (times out usually).

At the moment I am simply spending every waking hour watching over it, refreshing the site every few minutes and repairing the database everytime I see it throwing up an error.

I am looking for a proper solution but at the moment this is all I can do. Apologies for any downtime whilst I sleep.

Thanks for doing all of this dev.

What the lady said!

Oh, thanks so much for explaining things and for all the work you're doing.

Maybe the archive option isn't such a bad idea. That would at least allow you to remove some things from the database and make it smaller.

Yes dev, thanks for the explanation, and for babysitting the boards the way you are.

Can I ask what happened with the paid membership money? I renewed my membership recently, but I think it was before the change of command. Did any of that go to you?

I was thinking it might help afford a better server if you had more paid members, is all.

The paid membership money I have received since I took over the boards has gone into renewing the support license for the board, gallery and blog, so when things go really tits up I can get assistance.

If there is continuation of renewal of subscriptions then I would be looking to put that towards the hosting costs I am already incurring and if there is an extra then it would go towards trying to find dedicated hosting.

I expected this board to cost me, and I am sure that one way or another it will. But I dont mind, this community has given so much to me it's only right that I do what I can to repay it.

It shouldn't need a dedicated server - it didn't have one before... It might just be time to up sticks from Servage if they can't get their shit together. It was with United Hosting (dot co dot uk) before.

Dev, you rock.

Just sayin'. Thanks.

Well if I do squid then you are one of the reasons I do. Remember the old days?

Just curious, dev. How come when I come to the board and it says it's too busy for me to enter I can still hit the lo-fi version at the bottom of the page and get in and read just fine.
Not only that, when I enter it's not the lo-fi version... it's the regular look of the board for me.

We'll see if I can post too... that's what this is for, in addition to the question.

Yup, I can post.

Because you're special?

LOL - well I am, but I was just curious.

No, I had that happen to me the first day we went down, once the board was actually get-in-able. At that time, I could read the board okay, but in order to post I had to hit the lo-fi button first. Weird, huh?

ETA: Er, not saying you're not special, FollowMal, just not in that way.

dev,

I think I speak for the majority of posters on this site when I say a) we are irritated at the significant problems the site is having and b) what can we do to help?

You shouldn't have to go at this alone.

Do you need donations to help move the board to a more stable server? Do you need more paid subscriptions to accomplish this?

Please let us know what we can do to help you. We love this site, and want to work with you and support you however you need us.

-Mav

*hacks into Mav's bank account and transfers money to dev*

I'm irritated about the problems with the site, but not irritated at dev. And your points are all very important.

Right now the site has suckage. Dev is doing all possible to improve the site - but are we? Are we the people that post a LOT on this site doing anything FOR the site? This is a community, and we all should do what we can for the site, for ourselves. If you have not already, contribute to the site - this might make a difference to moving the site to a better server. Thin your PMs from your message boxes (you can archive them).

When this site is functioning well it is a great community to be a part of. Show your support and love for SM.org with a bit of cashy money.

I'm currently researching hosting providers, this site has some pretty high requirements, the database is nearly half a gig, and current traffic levels are at about 75 Gig a month. This limits the options somewhat. What's odd is that gossi said that it was only about 20 Gig a month. But, there ya go.

And for the record the best reliable service I have found so far that meets our requirements would be about $1200 a year, suffice to say, I am still looking.

http://www.xo.com/smb/hosting/websites/Pages/standard.aspx

VERY solid servers. $420 - $960 (USD) per year. (Not sure what other tech requirements you might need, but I HTH.)

Cheers for that.

On their site they only mention MySQL 4 and they dont list how large a database they will allow, I'm contacting them now to see if they can answer my questions satisfactorially.

If anyone else has any suggestions, please feel free to let me know

Here is another hosting company that I've used:

http://hostek.com/web-hosting-plans-linux.asp

Even more attractive prices, if they do what you need done. (Do you need MySQL 5? Hostek has 4 and 5.)

http://www.portal360.com/

I use them and they are solid and reliable.

This is great....Fly and Mav are right (they would be so good together, if only they knew eachother IRL) we should do this together. I don't have any experience with hosting or servers but I can certainly send some money and would be more than happy to. More than happy. If the very best we can get will cost $1000 a year, that should be easy enough to raise, no? $25 from how many, 40-50 people? And if that is too much for some, maybe some of the rest of us could pony up an extra $10. Does this make any sense or am I hallucinating? I wish I could help more in the technical department but, alas, I cannot.

I can also certainly contribute some cashey money to help move to more reliable servers.

And I'll clean up my pms, too.

I'll clean up my PM's this weekend. And I'll contribute money as well. Happy to.

So. Any progress? Will SM.org get a new home?

xo wont allow a database as big as we have, hostek have yet to respond to my query about database size and Portal 360 aren't going to suffice on either webserver space or database. I am still looking but sadly my job keeps getting in the way.

Also I am painfully aware of just how wobbly things have been today.

Thanks for working on it!

Hmm. Xo is a pretty formidable host, despite the fact that I always think of "kisses and hugs" (XOXOXO) when I think of their name. If they balk at the database size, then I (personally) would take that as a sign that perhaps... the database is too big. I know, far fetched logic. Finding a host for, and subsequently managing that growing database looks like a lot of trouble. I know nothing about *scrolls to bottom of screen* IP.Board software - is a thread archiving function present with that software? Perhaps that remains the most (if not only) reasonable next step.

It's what I do dahlin', it's what I do.

I guess one question that I don't know the answer to is if archiving something removes it from the monolithic database to make the database smaller.

Can the database, and the board, be split into distinct parts?

OK Let me clarify, xo dont have a package that will allow that kind of database size, of course you can have a dedicated server which could do it, and they make it that way so it's a selling-up point. They could do it, but they dont.

As for the archiving thing, I'll look into it. I havent noticed anything in the admin control panel which allows for it, but I havent looked before now. If there is no in-built functionality, we'd need someone with a damn-sight better knowledge of SQL than me to do it. Also I dont really get the point of archiving a thread to reduce the database size, as this would mean removing it from the board, so it would be inaccesible anyway, why not just delete it.

Well I'm still looking into stuff, I'll let you know when I know, in the meantime, if you guys can keep looking as well, that would be appreciated.

Cheers

dev

Delete? The librarian/archivist in me shudders.

I'm sorry if I'm poking at you a bit in this thread. It isn't that I don't think that you have one of those what do you call it? Brains. One of those brains to do your own thinking with. In fact I'm sure I'm not mentioning things that you haven't thought of. I'm also not trying to come across as nagging you about problems or saying "if I were running things it would be better." Certainly not. I'm just draining my brain of the thoughts that I have, just in case something sparks an idea that would help. You never know where inspiration would come from.

And I thank you tremendously for keeping us in the loop. We want to know what is going on with our home. Your updates help us to feel good that something is being done.

I did find another board that uses IP.Board and it has a menu item that lists "archived threads", but I think it was a manual effort to move threads and then lock them. *shrug* I don't know if that is really what I had hoped to find. I thought that perhaps archiving would put the thread into another database. So db #1 would be smaller, and have the current threads, and would be reasonable quick to access. db #2 would be a different file and would be the less-frequently accessed archive stuff.

Meh. I could be all wet. Wouldn't be the first time.

But again, thank you for all of your effort.

Where did gossi have it?

Ditto dev! Always thinking this no matter the frustration. Just so you know.

Gossi had it with UH and I am looking into this, however it seems traffic levels on the site have picked up and the old package he had it on wouldnt provide enough of a usage allowance, the $1200 I quoted somewhere was for the package they offer which would meet our requirements.

Crap. Who are all these people coming here? Spammers? We've had a humongous influx of spammage over at Goners recently. We had over 100 guests there the other day, and we estimate about 90% of them were spammers getting ready to sign up and post their evil drivel.

You archive the threads removing them from the database and putting the static threads on a web site so that we can still read them. The point of archiving is to reduce the size of the database, but prevent data loss. Some of us do like to go back and read old threads even if we can't (or don't want to) post in them. This is something I suggested in a previous post in this thread because it's a way to reduce the size of the database without losing threads we might like to be able to read in the future.

We used to have an archive of the Uni board posts like that, but I'm not sure where they went. I know Kev ended up not having web space for them all so he removed them, but I've no idea if he even has them anymore.

I would think doing this would entail exporting items from the database and having them end up in a static html format. I don't know how it could be done as I'm not familiar with IP Board software, but I would think there's a way to do it. Does the IP Board help site have any suggestions?

I wish that I could view a whole thread. If I could, then I could save a whole thread (locally) and have the option to ask that that thread be deleted. Then the saved thread could be reconstructed on an external web site.

But if the board SW has the ability to do this, all the better.

You know, I seem to remember reading that this particular software was easy to convert to another type. If that's true, then there should be a way to export the data in some other format. Of course, I read that a number of years ago, so who knows what kind of changes they've made since then.

In theory, and I do mean only in theory, I could backup the entire database, then download it to my PC, on which I have mysql setup, then use the upgrade function on phpBB3 to install it as the database for that, then scythe out all the old threads that arent old and huge, then re-backup and upload the smaller database that wouldnt time out on restore from backup to a database online, then install phpBB3 and once again use the upgrade function so that it would then use the new streamlined database for the new "archive" board.

Don't know if it will work, but it may be worth a try.

I will see if I can schedule sufficient time to try it in.

*looks at watch* Can I have it by noon?



If you can do that, more power to you. And phpBB doesn't cost cashy money every year, so there is that. I have a little (little little) phpBB knowledge, and enough general knowledge to know that you wont be done by lunch. So if this is the route that you will take for us, you are a helluva guy.

To be honest if I was at home I could do it in very little time (if it would work) but I'm at work and have to do husbandly duties when i arrive home, so i'll just have to see when I can fit it in.

I'm off monday and tuesday (working the weekend) so if not before it should be done by then.