Search disabled, maintenance, and other changes - Page 2

Chambers · 10-06-2012, 06:41 PM

Forums are back, huzzah!

I'm not sure if it matters, but yesterday or the day before I began to receive a different error when I visited to see if the forums were back up. Instead of loading the website with the "forums are offline, etc" message it showed a white Cloudfare page that suggested the system was down (paraphrased).

Don't know if that's a helpful technical report but I'd thought I'd mention it.

Also, another technical report. While trying to use Google to read various threads I noticed that Google Cache wasn't very effective in getting what I wanted. Almost all of the Google Cache version of the pages pulled up showed the "forums are offline, etc" page instead of the Cached page. A few of them did load though, which only made the whole thing stranger.

Capt Spanner · 10-06-2012, 07:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rawhide

Yes. Put the thread title in quotes. It's not perfect (you will sometimes get some outside results), and some thread titles are too generic for good results, but it generally works.

You can narrow down the search further by adding the following search time to Google:

site:giantitp.com/forums

Gulaghar · 10-06-2012, 08:30 PM

Also, note that you can type -search term to not display any results with the indicated term. Sometimes helps to narrow things down.

Lycan 01 · 10-06-2012, 09:19 PM

Well that was interesting. And by interesting, I mean horrific.

Thanks for going through all that trouble for us, Rawhide. You're awesome.

Ravens_cry · 10-06-2012, 09:38 PM

I can say this much. The forum is much, much faster and much less prone to errors and server busy signals.
In fact, I haven't had any of either so far!
That in itself deserves a round of applauds

Fiery Diamond · 10-06-2012, 09:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chambers

Forums are back, huzzah!

I'm not sure if it matters, but yesterday or the day before I began to receive a different error when I visited to see if the forums were back up. Instead of loading the website with the "forums are offline, etc" message it showed a white Cloudfare page that suggested the system was down (paraphrased).

Don't know if that's a helpful technical report but I'd thought I'd mention it.

Just wanted to add that I saw this for a while yesterday as well.

Also: YAY FORUMS BE BACK!

Trog · 10-07-2012, 12:50 AM

Thanks for all your hard work, Rawhide!

Rawhide · 10-07-2012, 03:33 AM

So, did anyone notice the backup?

oblivion6 · 10-07-2012, 03:34 AM

no. maintenence didnt happen tonight did it?

Anarion · 10-07-2012, 03:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rawhide

So, did anyone notice the backup?

There was no backup, right? I've been righting and posting stuff uninterrupted for the last 45 minutes.

Rawhide · 10-07-2012, 03:42 AM

Backup took place between 3:00am to 3:25am, CDT (it's now 3:40am, CDT).

Lentrax · 10-07-2012, 11:50 AM

I may have noticed it, had my phone decided to not go on the fritz.

But I would also like to add my thanks, Rawhide. The site loads way faster than it used to for me. And I haven't gotten a single 500 server error yet.

Now if only I could steam to act the same way...

dethkruzer · 10-07-2012, 01:13 PM

I'll just be honest and admit that the sudden downtime was frustating, mostly because I hadn't noticed any warning prior to it, and that perhaps the first PBP game I've joined that didn't die within five pages is hosted here.

OI still do understand need for maintenance, and this will hopefully prove usefull. Hopefully future observation(something my current, sleep-deprived state is incapable of), will hopefully show the forum to be more reliable accesability-wise.

Androgeus · 10-07-2012, 05:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rawhide

Yes. Put the thread title in quotes. It's not perfect (you will sometimes get some outside results), and some thread titles are too generic for good results, but it generally works.

I think if you want to search for threads you can use intitle to get threads with those words. For instance searching for this thread you can do site:giantitp.com intitle:"search disabled".

edit:Just thought of an improvement, add in "-intitle:page" if you want to get one result per thread instead of one for each page of the thread

Killer Angel · 10-08-2012, 02:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rawhide

As such, searching has been disabled.

I suppose it's a little price to pay and, anyway, the function was far from functioning in a good way.
Google works for threads... a lot less when you search for specific words from a user, but again, it's an acceptable loss.

Thanks for the amazing work!

Rawhide · 10-08-2012, 02:28 AM

Backup coming up in just over half an hour. Watch out for it.

Rawhide · 10-08-2012, 03:10 AM

Can't actually check from here, but it should be in progress right now.

Heliomance · 10-08-2012, 04:47 AM

Wait, we're getting backups without the forums going down now?

The Succubus · 10-08-2012, 04:52 AM

Rawhide posted that message a couple of hours ago, hun.

I didn't log on to the site between 9:00 and 9:30 GMT (which is when it usually goes down) so I couldn't say.

Rawhide · 10-08-2012, 05:27 AM

Well, the backup completed successfully.

Blue1005 · 10-08-2012, 06:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killer Angel

I suppose it's a little price to pay and, anyway, the function was far from functioning in a good way.
Google works for threads... a lot less when you search for specific words from a user, but again, it's an acceptable loss.

Thanks for the amazing work!

Understandable to a point, but one shouldnt need to be a programmer just to search the database. Hopefully we can bring that feature back soon...

--Lime-- · 10-08-2012, 08:19 AM

It's hardly "being a programmer". I should know - I did nothing maths-y or computer-y at uni!

Search strings are really really common and very useful overall. I use them all the time with my general searches. Putting things in quotes, using +term or -term to include or exclude a search term, and site:www.yyy.zzz are vital to getting Google to do what I actually want and not make too many (terrible) assumptions on its own.

Edit: Rawhide, is there a maintenance scheduling thread or something I can subscribe to, so that I don't need to remember to check in here every time I log in? Just like "Gonna be doing maintenance tomorrow, 2 hours or so, 6pm GMT+11".

Serpentine · 10-08-2012, 09:31 AM

But I can't use it to ~~search for people talking about me~~ ~~stalk particular posters~~ find most recent posts by or about a particular person for totally legit and not-at-all self-obsessed reasons.

The Succubus · 10-08-2012, 09:34 AM

Oh really? Then my super sneaky post about you in one of the forum's dustier corners shall remain safely hidden!

Rainshine · 10-08-2012, 10:13 PM

I'm not going totally nuts not being able to find search, that's good.
Thank you for all your hard work; databases take up 14 layers of the hells, I'm convinced.

willpell · 10-09-2012, 09:16 AM

Er, excuse me Mr. Rawhide sir, I don't seem to be able to find a list of my previous posts on the forum, is that due to the disabling of Search? Is there some other way of accessing my post record?

Rawhide · 10-09-2012, 09:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willpell

Er, excuse me Mr. Rawhide sir, I don't seem to be able to find a list of my previous posts on the forum, is that due to the disabling of Search? Is there some other way of accessing my post record?

Yes it is, no there isn't. Sorry.

Zherog · 10-09-2012, 09:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willpell

Is there some other way of accessing my post record?

It sure would be great if there were some way to search on the internet...

Madara · 10-09-2012, 06:20 PM

I recently got a new form of error message, for the first time, and I want to know if its a result of the changes.

Spoiler

Its not that it presented problems, and it was fine after refreshing the page. I just noticed it was a different page and thought I should bring it up.

Rawhide · 10-09-2012, 06:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Madara

I recently got a new form of error message, for the first time, and I want to know if its a result of the changes.

Its not that it presented problems, and it was fine after refreshing the page. I just noticed it was a different page and thought I should bring it up.

Nah, that's unrelated to the maintenance work.