Server Issue -- alert on top of the page

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• PA

  

  Paul

  Apr 20, 2017

  I have noticed a few times when I have logged onto the site the photos on the home page was missing but non other but today some of the photos for the groups are missing.

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• HA

  

  Half

  Apr 20, 2017

  [quote]Dilbert took over the IT world a long time ago and these phrases are now commn, political excuse crap.[/quote]
  
  I don't know the specifics of the TN data loss, if any, but you sir are spot-on correct about the sad state of I.T. I remember when computer science was actually SCIENCE, not today's "try this, try that" mentality.

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• ST

  

  Steve

  Apr 20, 2017

  I go back to punchcards in IT, and computer science was never science. I think of backup programs and systems as being like those schemes for freezing one's head for future revival. Of course no one fully tests it, because no one will voluntarily risk the loss it's intended to remedy. Every significant data loss is an exercise in muddling through.

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• HA

  

  Half

  Apr 20, 2017

  [quote]I go back to punchcards in IT, and computer science was never science. I think of backup programs and systems as being like those schemes for freezing one's head for future revival. Of course no one fully tests it, because no one will voluntarily risk the loss it's intended to remedy. Every significant data loss is an exercise in muddling through.[/quote] I too come from the punch card generation, but I have to respectfully disagree with "no one fully tests it". That's what duplicate hardware is for, that's what hot spares are for, and even hot sites. Maybe "no one" budgets enough money to test properly; I always made sure I did. I am still in the business, and I do restoration tests monthly.

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• FU

  

  FullSun

  Apr 20, 2017

  With computer system issues on 'upgrades' etc that my group has experienced we always joke that we should 'upgrade' to sliderules :) !!!!

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• HA

  

  Half

  Apr 20, 2017

  [quote]With computer system issues on 'upgrades' etc that my group has experienced we always joke that we should 'upgrade' to sliderules :) !!!![/quote] Haha, I have a few end-users I'd like to see upgrade to crayons and butcher paper!

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• BO

  

  BobOriginal Poster

  Apr 21, 2017

  The "Great job" referred to a timely message that there was a problem and it was being addressed.

  I was in IT for about 40 years. The last 25 before I was forced into retirement I managed an Interactive Voice Response System (a robot operator) for a large call center. We did have backups daily. We had two recovery exercisers each year where in a 48 hour window, the backups would be used to bring up the entire data center in a recovery site. We did have this down to a science.

  Project reporting at a detailed level could be a full time job. I have suggested the TN admins to maintain a kind of score board that can be updated daily to show things like:

  Date: 04/21/2017
  Bug reports opened: ##
  Bug reports closed: ##

  Bug reports in process: ##
  Oldest bug report still open: MM/DD/YYYY

  This would give us a sense of how much progress is being made and how bogged down they are.

  Bob

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• BR

  

  Brett Rapley

  Apr 22, 2017

  [quote]Great job???!!!!??? Anything BUT a "great job" unless you were being sarcastic. Having worked in IT for 40yrs, this failure to restore and so lose 60%. Of pics is the very opposite of a "great job". Nobody, but nobody on this planet does backup/restore properly and it is the restore element that is never tested. Ever. When it is needed, it always fails. Still "great job" is not as vacuous a comment as those that said "these things happen". That is in same league as "lessons will be learned" and "moving forward...". Dilbert took over the IT world a long time ago and these phrases are now commn, political excuse crap.[/quote] I assume that means they didn't verify the backup properly to ensure the information was intact and fully available ?

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• DE

  

  DesertRat

  Apr 22, 2017

  I don't know a lot about the inner workings of computers but I believe that most computer problems have nothing to do with the computer but the blame lies with the person punching the keys. Last week my wife had a doctor's appointment scheduled. A couple of days before the appointment, someone from the doctor's office called and asked if she could move the appointment up by an hour. I asked why they wanted to change the time and they answered that they had a new computer system and needed to re-enter her data. I answered that they already had the information and they just needed to transfer the information from one system to the other. They said that it couldn't be done and she needed to come in an hour earlier. I said that they needed a new computer programmer and that we'd be in at the scheduled time. End of conversation.

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• ME

  Member

  Apr 22, 2017

  As others have said it was possibly the 'restore' function of the backup that failed, its all too often not tested properly. Whatever it was the communication with regards to the sever issues from TT has been of the usual poor standard. Taking responsibility isn't a strong point. If this site was run professionally it could still have server failures. As its run in an amateur fashion the loss of photos is no great surprise. If you dispute the amateur aspect, look at the mess the site 'upgrade' late last year was/still is. The communications breakdown over that was of a similar order to this server problem.

  I used punch cards too. At times I also ended up with reams of print out when a hole punched in the wrong place caused a crash, I understand how easy it is to make a mistake, but I also understand the processes to avoid this, all too often today those processes are skipped/partially done. Money, money, money....

  Speaking of money, I can't see any reason to pay to use an amateur site.

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• BO

  

  BobOriginal Poster

  Apr 23, 2017

  If you rely on system level backups you are at the mercy of the system administrator who may have a funding issue caused by their management who is only interested in keeping spending low.

  There are two kinds of system backups, full and incremental. To restore a file system, you would start with the last full backup then work through the incremental backups. With DEC systems the incremental backups were applied in reverse chronological order. This insured that files that were deleted between the backups would not be restored. Just remember that anything that happen after the last backup will not be restored.

  As the industry evolved, the database systems started having specialized backups and transaction logging in an attempt to be able to restore all committed transactions.

  At the system level RAID storage would store redundant copied of data on separate disk drives so that data could be restored by just replacing the bad drive.

  Each step here adds recurring cost to the application systems. You get what you pay for. Or we get what the site owners pay for.

  Bob

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• NM

  

  Nevada Motojicho

  Apr 23, 2017

  [quote] Speaking of money, I can't see any reason to pay to use an amateur site.[/quote] I found this link posted in a Facebook Naturist Christian group yesterday. I opened a profile to investigate it for my music buddies but... it appears to have many advantages. Just FYI ya'll. The Next Generation Social Media Site (with no targeted ads or sponsored ads, no FB censorship, easy to setup groups of similar interest). https://mewe.com/about

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• JO

  

  John

  Apr 23, 2017

  [quote] I hope they treat security with more urgency than their backup/restore systems. [/quote] They don't. I reported a security issue more than a month ago involving media marked as viewable by "certified only" that actually allows EVERYONE to view it. It hasn't been fixed. Also, any photo posted is visible via the users "feed" for days regardless of the viewing rights assigned to it. This is why I removed most of my photos. John aka cobeachbum

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• ME

  Member

  Apr 24, 2017

  TT1 blog post about the server issues -

  https://www.truenudists.com/blog/state-of-the-media/

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• JO

  

  John

  Apr 24, 2017

  [quote] Hmmmm ... in that case ... I will be deleting some of my personal photos as well.[/quote] Andy, Yours are all set to "Certified Friends" I believe, or you have it set in your profile settings for friends only. That works. John

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