What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Topic: What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ (Read 9882 times) previous topic - next topic

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

April 08, 2007, 07:54:44 PM

"Forbidden
You don't have permission to access / on this server.

Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
Apache/1.3.33 Server at www.foxtbirdcougarforums.com Port 80"

Is all that would show up from 11AM to 4:30PM PST. I see no posts logged during that time either, so I am assuming it happened to everybody.

*EDIT BY THUNDER CHICKEN* I've explained it below, as well as provided some important site news. Please scroll down to my post.

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #1 – April 08, 2007, 07:59:10 PM

I got it too

403

Reply #2 – April 08, 2007, 08:05:16 PM

I couldn't log on either what's up with that?

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #3 – April 08, 2007, 08:11:30 PM

I concur I couldnt get on. But I also belong to another forum and My password doesnt work there anymore? Are the forums breaking down or something?

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #4 – April 08, 2007, 08:14:01 PM

Me 2. I started a thread on it too. Mods please kill it...

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #5 – April 08, 2007, 08:18:51 PM

Glitch happens.

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #6 – April 08, 2007, 08:19:42 PM

We should be grateful that we have this resource at our disposal and it costs us nothing. Anytime the site goes down for a little bit, everyone gets on the bitch bandwagon. It's irritating to me too, but these things happen.

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #7 – April 08, 2007, 09:04:12 PM

Funny you should mention that, Brian...

It appears our little corner of the internet is a resource hog on its shared server, which is why we've had slowdowns in the past. Our hosting service provides plenty of bandwidth and storage space, but it apparently doesn't have a whole lot of horsepower (CPU cycles) at its disposal. Godaddy, our host, moved the whole shebang to a faster server today, which is why nothing worked (it came as a surprise to me, too - I got the email AFTER the site went down).

Unfortunately, the move to the faster server is only temporary - we have 30 days to make the site more efficient. After the 30 days we have a few choices:

1) Leave everything as it is, and the site will revert to being slow
2) Pay GoDaddy $60/month for a dedicated server
3) Move the whole shebang to another host.

2) and 3) both have their problems. To pay $60/month to host a site like this would be overkill - that $60/mo includes a dedicated server with a 150GB HDD, 2GB of RAM, and all kinds of bandwidth, but we only use about 1% of that now. We'd essentially be paying for a processor, as that would be the only advantage we'd have over the current situation. That, and I can't afford an extra $60/month, and would hate to charge for memberships to pay for it.

As for moving everything, in the future that may be an option, but right now we're paid up for 3 years (non-refundable) with GoDaddy. That is only part of the problem, however. The other part is the physical move. Remember last time, when we lost the whole attachment database? That could happen again. More importantly, though - I'm on dialup internet. Imagine trying to download, then upload, a gig of website through a 56k connection. The three years would be over before the download finished.

#1 looks to be the only viable option here, but there are some things that can be done to make it better. I will be going over some settings in the vBulletin control panel to try to optimize the system - the problem we're having is that vBuilletin is making too many calls to the database (where all the posts, attachments, images, etc are stored). I'm pretty sure I can change some settings to relieve some of this pressure. For example, limiting the size and number of attachments, as well as changing their storage type (right now they're stored in the database, I can change it to store them in a regular web folder). I'm also going to purge some inactive user accounts, and make other tweaks wherever I can.

I guess it all boils down to this: for the short term, we'll have to put up with a few bumps in the road, as I tweak things here and there trying to free up precious CPU cycles. AT the worst, after 30 days, we should e back to slightly faster than the site was before. At worst, we may have to come up with another host. One thing to look forward to: In 30 days we'll have another downtime just like today as they move us from the fast server back to the original. I'll keep you posted.

I'm gonna sticky this thread and change the title so others can see the score...

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #8 – April 08, 2007, 09:08:27 PM

$60 per mounth doesn't sound that bad, but how much is that per member, per year? Just to throw that out?

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #9 – April 08, 2007, 09:08:47 PM

Im just glad were back!!!!!!!!

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #10 – April 08, 2007, 09:52:24 PM

I went through and deleted a bunch of old attachments, if everyone does this I'm sure it will help some. I got rid of anything older than 2007.

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #11 – April 08, 2007, 09:54:18 PM

Can you go back and delete old posts ( in my case, alot of usless stuff from the beginning) to make up some room too?

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #12 – April 08, 2007, 09:59:08 PM

Fila that sounds more like "I made and ass out of myself if you delete them no one will ever know" LOL But if it helps do it. I love this place and would hate to lose it.

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #13 – April 08, 2007, 10:02:32 PM

I'm not afraid to admit I made an ass of my self..... many, many times. But if it will help the site out.

What happened today - an explanation. EVERYONE PLEASE READ

Reply #14 – April 08, 2007, 10:23:50 PM

just deleted all my old attachments, there weren't many but eh...