35 replies to this topic

[Kaeloree]

Hello hello hello, everyone!

 

The good news? 

 

SHS and G3 are now working perfectly fine. There was a double harddrive failure, so we had to go through the process of working with the host to replace the failed harddrives and then restore from backups.

 

The bad news?

 

The automatic backup system apparently broke around April, so we've lost a couple of months of content. BOOO HISS. This sucks, and we're very sorry about it! G3's backups were just fine, though, so G3 is in tip-top-condition.

 

We're going to be working with G3 to try to create a better solution for this whole kerfuffle. SHS is fairly painful to host (as there's a HUGE amount of data to worry about), and it's difficult to find a solution that will work for everyone, but we're giving it a red hot go. We anticipate it'll take a while, though.

 

In the meantime -- everything is back to normal, sans a few months of posts and mod updates.

 

xo

[Lava Del'Vortel]

Yay! Thanks for the bringing SHS back. I had no chance to check the uploader. Is it working again? Can we update our mods?

Cheers!

[Bartimaeus]

Too bad this thing that happened with the hard drives. :/

 

But i have to repot that G3 isnt working yet, something went wrong. :/

 

About the huge amount of data i suggest a simple solution that most of forums owners reject for no reason, you should erase all the threads (except sticky ones) that didnt get a reply in 30 days and erase all the accounts of ppl that didnt log in the last 90 days (30 days would be better but it's not possible to the site being offline) that would clean your database a lot.

 

Another problem is that the main site wasnt updated in more than 4 years and lots of stuff came by like the new Weidu 2.39, new mods, tweaks, fixes, restorations, etc.

 

That's all, welcome back and good luck solving the problems.

 

Yes...deleting the accounts of the hundreds of modders who have contributed over the years, as well as inactive staff members...and then the records of thousands of hours of collaboration between those said modders in threads all over the forums... Somehow, I don't think that solution will fly with most.

 

Welcome back, SHS!

Edited by Bartimaeus, 06 July 2016 - 06:41 AM.

[Tzarnal]

Also those posts represent basically the only troubleshooting for problems for many mods, that no longer get active support.

[Bartimaeus]

1 - I doubt hundreds of modders accounts will be deleted simply because most of modders are always here, the same with inactve staff, if they are inactive they dont care about shs anymore so why care about their accounts? Even so they can create another one in case they wanna get active again.

 

2 - I agree about the collaborations but only regarding the most updated/recent ones, i dont see why shs should keep threads about the version 1.0 of a mod when the version 9.0 is available (and thus threads that talk about it). It makes no sense at all and only serves as an useless thread to be kept/ressurected for no reason like so many times i saw to happen.

 

1. That's simply patently false, all of it. Many modders go through long hiatuses for some reasons or others, and don't visit for months. Ascension64, Yovaneth, Zyraen, Avenger, SirBillyBob, Leomar, Miloch, Leonardo, et cetera - that was just from quickly looking at the "released mods" section*. I'm pretty sure these people would be less than pleased to see their accounts deleted AND their thousands of posts gone because they were inactive for a while.

 

2. I don't have SUPER strong feelings about this, but I don't think stuff should just start getting deleted. Archived and set for some sort of permanent storage, perhaps, but not outright deleted. That's years and years of work from some folks, and most of it is just plaintext that costs very little to store on a per character basis (but may be cumbersome to the forum database).

 

 

*This short list also accounted for the old backup - I only listed accounts where people hadn't visited for a few months BEFORE the backup date.

Edited by Bartimaeus, 06 July 2016 - 11:44 AM.

[Creepin]

Damn was I worried! Welcome back, and don't do that again!

[Kaeloree]

The problem isn't the forum database, it's the mod storage and the bandwidth that uses.  

 

G3 is working fine from here Felipe! Check it out again.

 

Lava: Uploads should be working fine, give me a whack if they aren't!

[subtledoctor]

Welcome.

Btw there is a thread over at the Beamdog forums where someone is trying to drum up support for unauthorized hosting/distribution of G3 and SHS mods, so that users need never suffer two weeks' outage again.

Needless to say that is a terrible idea for a lot of reasons. Perhaps it's worth starting a discussion about better ways to avoid this in the future. Over at G3 various mod authors are discussing hosting mods on Github, with some fans and some detractors. (Personally, I love it.)

I suggest ever-so-gingerly, maybe this is a good time to have a similar discussion over here...

[Kaeloree]

As I mentioned in the top post, we're already talking about better ways to handle things. I'm all for people hosting their mods on Github, but the problem is mods whose creators are no longer around. That's where the issue becomes more complicated. 

 

Two weeks of downtime a year (max) is not enough to justify (potentially illegally) ignoring the wishes of mod authors.

[Fiann of the Silver Hand]

Shared ftp?

 

Either way, people seem to be finding (temporary) solutions during these down times.  I'm not positive much sweat (or money) should be expended to close that gap, much less an unofficial alternate and permanent hub.  I really have no stake in the outcome.

[Oracle]

Welcome back iam glad to see everything is ok

[Pain Elemental]

 A double harddrive failure? Man, that sucks! Good to be back.

[The Imp]

1 - I doubt hundreds of modders accounts will be deleted simply because most of modders are always here, the same with inactve staff, if they are inactive they dont care about shs anymore so why care about their accounts? Even so they can create another one in case they wanna get active again.

Who is "Ascension64" ? Only the BGT-weidu's maker/maintainer, logged in last 2013. Thumps, man. You clicked it.
Our hosts would all have been out dated too, and I would be... I only have ~14 000 posts in these forums. And I were a victim of this sort of thing ... in a sense, but it was not due to the forums features.
The maintenance of the user base is not as simple as "yeah, lets' delete everything unused" ... it's not like we need any of the links in this thread ... it's just the FAQs of the Megamods.

I just posted about 1-10 thousand posts about it, for no reason... using the very ones in it, cause I made it for that purpose.

Edited by The Imp, 07 July 2016 - 12:55 AM.

[Azazello]

First, Thanks for coming back! We love you!

 

Next-- Well, someone has to say it, might as well be an oldhead...: is it true that G3 and SHS are hosted on the SAME SERVER(S | farm(s))???

 

Careless!

 

I know all about cost-savings and priorities and all that. But really, that is the, er, um, weakest 'reliability option' [words re-edited for politeness] I've never wanted to hear.

 

Come on, guys & gals, you can do better than that.

 

btw, thanks for keeping the RSS feed updated!

[psycros]

I think the ideal situation would provide full redundancy behind the scenes and a single community hub on the user-facing side.  Considering that both SHS and G3 are using the same host, a site merger and reorganization to enhance ease of use would be of great benefit to the community (and ultimately the site maintainers).  I hope the fine folks behind both sites come up with some good solutions to pursue.  Personally I find Github and other code repositories not particularly user-friendly but if something like that ends up being the best file hosting solution then I hope it goes smoothly.

 

BTW, I had re-create my user account.  I assume that a few others will need to do the same.

[Almateria]

the Gibberhold StudIIIos