Server- Forum Issues

[TC Dale]

Quick update about the forums.

On Wednesday, Sept. 28th, the server "hanged" and we requested a reboot. But the server didn't start again and support told us that they will have to install a new harddisk with a fresh system on it, also installing the old harddisk as a slave drive.

The crash occured at noon during the backup run, and it's obviously not been a hardware problem, but a file system problem. The only backups that were not on the server HD and the forums HD, were two backup sets from July 17th, the other one from March.

After long discussions about trying to rescue the old HD file system which turned out to be corrupt, we found out we were not able to recover the latest backups since there were bad sectors, and total sections that were unrecoverable.

The crash occured at the backup around noon like all scheduled backups, which also regretfully interrupted files that were needed to reinstall the most recent forum file system information. When the server reset, it also left us without a complete backup except for the July and March backups which were in other locations.

For now I believe that Andreas will build from the July 17th database, and go from there since all the other backup databases from the 7/17 on were unusuable due to the catastrophic crash during a backup, and a HD failure.

This isn't a lot, but some info in a nutshell on the situation.

[ctorg]

Wow. That's a lot to lose!

[SandMan]

It is just hard to imagine losing all that data. I would have thought they would have had this database mirrored somewhere..... seems too valuable to lose.







Wow: even the post count go back into history...bummer, took me a while to hit the 1000 mark but did it and now I got to go back to 760.....

[metsgeek]

Seriously unbelievable, guys. The first thing that everyone learns is to back up your data and put it on a mirror server.

It's beyond amateur. You're going to have a barrage of pissed off users, especially in the Dynasty Forums

[fhomess]

That's pretty sad. And by sad, I really mean pathetic. The backup should never be able to be affected by the main server's crash. That's the whole point of the backup. I'm almost surprised there's a July 17th backup to revert to given the rest of the information.

[endgame]

Originally Posted by SandMan

It is just hard to imagine losing all that data. I would have thought they would have had this database mirrored somewhere..... seems too valuable to lose.

Wow: even the post count go back into history...bummer, took me a while to hit the 1000 mark but did it and now I got to go back to 760.....

Shame...., it really is, the value of that information was comparitively priceless to some of us. I'm assuming the issue is a done deal: irrevocable, corrupt is corrupt and no hope. But who am I?

With this catastrophe on their minds, I'm sure the attention is spread in many directions. I'm thinking it's up to us, or those willing, to begin some resurrection of key concepts and threads at work the last we knew. Specifically, the 6.5b feedback thread. I see Larry has already regenerated an introduction the the Anderson Utilities. And of course, opinions will differ, but a major hit on the updates in Feedback, Troubleshooting, etc...

Here's hoping there's a hope I'm unaware of, but we forge on nonetheless. I'm glad you guys are out there. It felt a little strange when I found the dugout emptied. Not a good feeling.

[sebastian0622]

Wait, does this mean I'm not a Hall-of-Famer any more? :sad:

[SandMan]

Originally Posted by metsgeek

Seriously unbelievable, guys. The first thing that everyone learns is to back up your data and put it on a mirror server.

It's beyond amateur. You're going to have a barrage of pissed off users, especially in the Dynasty Forums

This is MY New Orleans!!!! Not really pissed, but amazed that they had no contingency plans in the event of this. Every company I worked for had something to prevent this from happening. Can you imagine Ford saying, "We lost data on our system and now we don't know how many orders were placed for the next two months.".... This board is what made OOTP the game what it is today. Without this board I think the game would have died a while back....or be in the $5 discount CD bin at Office Max (where I first found Season Ticket Baseball).........

[sebastian0622]

This sucks, but not for me. I mostly feel for dynasty writers. Tib and his crew of loyal readers (of which I was starting to be part) come to mind first.

Some really poor professional decisions were made along the line. If something like this happened at any company with more than a handful of employees, heads would roll and people would be fired.

[Y0DA55]

Since July 17, I think Tib has written like 3 chapters. But I wouldn't be surprised if he saves them.

But yeah, big hit for the dynasties.

[GForce]

yup...my Austin James dynasty is effectively killed.

GH

[theasfl]

manually override post counts might cheer up the moral a little bit, but it would take a long ass time and not everyone knows their previous count...

either way its sad, pathetic and sad, sad all in one. When the boards didnt come right back I knew something horrible had gone wrong and look where we are now.

Logos have been lost, dynasties are dead...its the equivilent of Hiroshima to OOTP...its completely obliterated everything built, but the foundations are still there. Will radiation poisoning eradicate the rest? or can we build from the foundations of the great board this was?

[Kevin]

???

Backing up to the same hard drive, ...... unbelievable.

[CONN CHRIS]

This is tough to swallow, I lost 1,400 or so posts, roughly 1,300 or so were in the nature of photos and fighter files for others to download, so it isn't just mindless spam that is gone.

Thankfuly, I have my TBCB 'dynasty' on a seperate site, but we have a number of folks who had great little universes going down in the basement that have just been wiped out.

It hardly is the end of the world as we know it, but the best part of these games for many here are the communities that have evolved on-line based upon the games. Hopefully some lessons can be learned by the powers that be and we can all cut them a little slack while they re-group.

However, this does indeed suck.

[LeiterFanatic]

And you wonder why they can't kill some of these bugs!

[AnotherAlias]

Stupid question #1

Doesn't .400 software studios have any older data that they could sell us.

There are a ton of great posts of mine that are now in cyberspace hell.

[GForce]

Originally Posted by CONN CHRIS

This is tough to swallow, I lost 1,400 or so posts, roughly 1,300 or so were in the nature of photos and fighter files for others to download, so it isn't just mindless spam that is gone.

Thankfuly, I have my TBCB 'dynasty' on a seperate site, but we have a number of folks who had great little universes going down in the basement that have just been wiped out.

It hardly is the end of the world as we know it, but the best part of these games for many here are the communities that have evolved on-line based upon the games. Hopefully some lessons can be learned by the powers that be and we can all cut them a little slack while they re-group.

However, this does indeed suck.

Suck doesn't even begin to cover it. How these guys, supposed professionals, allowed this to happen, is just ridiculous. I'm just curious if someone is actually going to step up and take the blame for the positively asinine decision to back up to the same hard drive. A lot of people have lost a lot of things they put a great deal of time and effort into....not meaningless posts but major contributions. All washed away.

GH

[GForce]

Originally Posted by theasfl

manually override post counts might cheer up the moral a little bit, but it would take a long ass time and not everyone knows their previous count...

either way its sad, pathetic and sad, sad all in one. When the boards didnt come right back I knew something horrible had gone wrong and look where we are now.

Logos have been lost, dynasties are dead...its the equivilent of Hiroshima to OOTP...its completely obliterated everything built, but the foundations are still there. Will radiation poisoning eradicate the rest? or can we build from the foundations of the great board this was?

Who gives a rat's ass about post counts? So much that was so vastly more important than that has been lost through this debacle.

GH

[pompeytir]

SA's get fired for this type of incompetance; it really is ridiculus that there wasn't a better plan of action.

[IatricSB]

Snit happens