My sincere apologies for the downtime over the last several days, which was due entirely to circumstances beyond my control.
The site went down in the wee small hours of Friday morning. I won't bore you with all the details, suffice to say that vBulletin - the people who write the forum software, provided what transpired to be the correct solution quite early on in the proceedings - it was all to do with server errors, as almost every single problem the forum has experienced over the last few months has been too. The solution was handed to the host on a plate by me the same day, on which they failed to act. Had they done so it would have restored the site instantly, but in so doing they would have admitted culpability. Instead, they insisted the fault was down to coding and so embarked on a lengthy process of debugging and generally fobbing off. The process of restoring it has finally resulted in the host being sacked, who may still yet be the subject of legal action.
In the end, it was decided that the most expedient solution was to migrate the site to a completely new host, which was completed and mended by them over the past 24 hours and tested this morning. It went live again at about lunchtime today, and if you are still experiencing problems in accessing the site it is because the DNS is still in the process of propagating. That can take upto 24 hours to fully complete, so in the meantime, you may find that you can access the site from some devices and not from others. I can currently get on it from my PC, but not from my phone for instance. That situation will sort itself out over the next several hours, although in some cases you may find you need to delete your cache to see the change.
A huge thank you to the many people who have contacted me since Friday with offers of help, and to the many more who sent messages of support. I'm sorry I haven't found the time to reply to everyone. For better or for worse, I do feel a great sense of responsibility to all members here, and there have been several times over the last few days when I just wanted to lie down in a darkened room with a good bottle of whisky, or maybe a sharp knife, and hope it would all just go away. I can assure you that your messages have been some of the few things that have kept me on the straight and narrow, so thank you all.
A huge thank you too to absolutely everyone, for your patience and understanding over the last several days. You don't know how much you miss something until you can't have it, but hopefully from hereon in, things will at last be trouble free, so that we can all get on with what we do best, which is making and talking pens.
Best wishes
Phil
The site went down in the wee small hours of Friday morning. I won't bore you with all the details, suffice to say that vBulletin - the people who write the forum software, provided what transpired to be the correct solution quite early on in the proceedings - it was all to do with server errors, as almost every single problem the forum has experienced over the last few months has been too. The solution was handed to the host on a plate by me the same day, on which they failed to act. Had they done so it would have restored the site instantly, but in so doing they would have admitted culpability. Instead, they insisted the fault was down to coding and so embarked on a lengthy process of debugging and generally fobbing off. The process of restoring it has finally resulted in the host being sacked, who may still yet be the subject of legal action.
In the end, it was decided that the most expedient solution was to migrate the site to a completely new host, which was completed and mended by them over the past 24 hours and tested this morning. It went live again at about lunchtime today, and if you are still experiencing problems in accessing the site it is because the DNS is still in the process of propagating. That can take upto 24 hours to fully complete, so in the meantime, you may find that you can access the site from some devices and not from others. I can currently get on it from my PC, but not from my phone for instance. That situation will sort itself out over the next several hours, although in some cases you may find you need to delete your cache to see the change.
A huge thank you to the many people who have contacted me since Friday with offers of help, and to the many more who sent messages of support. I'm sorry I haven't found the time to reply to everyone. For better or for worse, I do feel a great sense of responsibility to all members here, and there have been several times over the last few days when I just wanted to lie down in a darkened room with a good bottle of whisky, or maybe a sharp knife, and hope it would all just go away. I can assure you that your messages have been some of the few things that have kept me on the straight and narrow, so thank you all.
A huge thank you too to absolutely everyone, for your patience and understanding over the last several days. You don't know how much you miss something until you can't have it, but hopefully from hereon in, things will at last be trouble free, so that we can all get on with what we do best, which is making and talking pens.
Best wishes
Phil
