Is it just me?

[Guest]

[Morningangel-Iola]

Oh for pete sake I keep getting the database problem thingy now

[Nienna]

I just got the server busy thingie ... what's the crack?

[Morningangel-Iola]

Just had the page cannot be displayed for the past five minutes

[Anna]

Yeah, I had the same problem (again).

[grecopa]

That kind of thing always happens to me at night.  It never happens in the morning or afternoon.

[EmmasOneandOnly]

I know, just last night for me

[Morningangel-Iola]

Maybe its the amount of people on

[Roz]

Yep I think that must be it! Nighttime in America is the busiest time on the net, and it won't just be people on our site it will also be people on sites held on the same server. I get it first thing in the morning, which must be last thing at night in Western America, hmmmm! That's very poor! Time for some more moaning, not that they give a flying monkey

[Anna]

I'm currently trying to log in ended autions into the Price Guide, but I keep getting this error message: "Too many connections" .  Do you know what the maximum amount of connections we can have?   Each time I get this message, the Price Guide window closes.

[Roz]

This is the same across the web. The number of connections we can have is not dictated just by our site being busy but if a site we share a host with is also busy then we might get problems!

I'm going to get Mark to call (you know what it's like - I'm not the account holder so they won't give me the time of day) since they don't reply to emails! I just hope he's feeling niggly, obstructive and argumentative tonight!

[MakTheYak]

Grr well I just called them and let's just say they weren't that helpful. I emailed their QA department on the 30th July with a big long complaining email and they haven't got back to me yet, which is just shocking service. Anyway I called up tech support (they don't have a line for QA) and they told me that the emails to QA basically just go to the management and they don't have access to them. And so my best bet would be to call back on Monday when there's a manager around (obviously Friday isn't a working day for big Internet managers).

I asked them about the database thing and they said it might be that we have exceeded our connections for the hour. Now don't get me wrong I know the Shack is a popular place and all the cool kids come here to chill but we have 72,000 queries available to us every hour for the databases. I don't think even we could use up that many! Apparently though if we go over that many in 1 hour then it'll stop working till the hour is up and then the total resets to 0. But I really don't think that's it.

You say that you get a "Too many connections to database" error, right? Well that means that too many people are trying to load pages with database queries on at the exact same time. Not just on the Shack but on the other sites on the same server. He also mentioned that as an option but he said there's nothing he can do about it right now as everything is running smoothly currently. If it's giving that error then apparently someone is using up way more than their fair share of database but unless the catch them 'red handed' there's no real way of knowing who it is. If they do catch them, however, they will be banned so that should go some way to alleviating the problem.

But only if them catch them.

My trouble is that I've never actually seen one of these messages and so for me to call them when it's actually having problems has been quite tricky so far. I'm obviously using it at the wrong time. But if you get an error, can you post it here just to keep a record? Don't post an error if it's identical to one already posted though - I just want to see if it's all the same thing all the time or if there are multiple evils at work here...

Hopefully we'll get this sorted out soon. I'm so sick and tired of grief from this damn hosting company, you wouldn't believe it. Well you would because you are the ones getting all the problems!

Oh and BTW the email address for QA is qa@powweb.com. The managers who have ignored a complaining customer for 19 days now. Just so you know.

[Nienna]

Thanks for keeping us posted Mark!
Let's hope they get their collective arses into gear and start giving us some decent service - it's been pretty shabby really if you think about how much all this must be costing to host!

[MakTheYak]

If it just worked without a hitch it would be an excellent deal, but as it is it's just frustrating. I'm looking into maybe finding another host but that would be a pain too with all the moving proceedure etc. I have a freind who has his own server and he says he can do me a good deal. I could think about getting a dedicated server for the shack but I don't know how much it would cost and I don't know how much technical setting up of things I'd have to do either (I don't have much experience... ANY experience... in sertting up web servers!)

[Sharon]

Thanks for having a go at them Mark.  It could be just coincidence but the Shack is running the best it has for weeks at the moment - really quick and all the un-read posts appearing.  Fingers crossed 

Just had a thought.  I would imagine the host must keep a log of who was doing what at a certain time.  Would it help if we posted the exact time the problems occurred so they can look to see who was using more than their fair share.  I know sometimes I can't post at all when there is a problem and so just put something on a bit later so the time of the post doesn't really help.  Does that make sense 

[Anna]

So what happened? The Shack was down for at least 14 hours!   I missed it. :'(

[Morningangel-Iola]

Yeah it dissapeared from under my feet too

[grecopa]

And mine.  I missed it too!

[Bryanjs14]

I litteraly could not sleep last night without it...well, ok, maybe it is just because i'm an insomniac....but I still missed it.

[Nienna]

Yep, it's been offline for hours and hours for me too - it's only just come back online, so I've no idea what the heck has been the matter with it this time! :'(

[HPfamily]

  I thought it was my computer acting up!!!