Welcome to Fractal Forums

When "reply" is clicked on this post:

http://www.fractalforums.com/images-showcase-%28rate-my-fractal%29/talispirals/

it requests this URL:

http://www.fractalforums.com/index.php?action=post;topic=11283.0;num_replies=0

which results in the following incorrect response, which I'm sure you'll
agree is NOT either the post submission form or the login/register page:


Why is that thread apparently blocked from receiving new replies? Who made the claimed "error" here? I'm fairly certain I made no error, so it would seem that someone else must have made the error in question. Yet I'm apparently the lucky guy who gets to be punished for that error, in that I am obstructed from participating in a discussion thread apparently because of it. Why is this? And without first being confronted with evidence of the alleged error and given a chance to present a defense, at that. (No wonder the wrong guy got punished if no procedure is in place to make sure the accused actually is guilty first before blocking them in some manner! It doesn't help, either, that the message is extremely vague about the nature of the alleged error. "You did X when you should have done Y" is specific. "You did something wrong so you can't post a reply", which is what the above amounts to, is vague. What did I do wrong? If I don't know how can I avoid doing it again? Of course since all I did was read something, decide I had a comment about it, and click the "reply" link, it seems that I actually didn't do anything wrong and the blame therefore actually lies elsewhere. So someone does something wrong and then someone else both gets the punishment and the too-vague description of the error. The actual guilty party will have no clue that they did anything wrong at all, let alone know exactly what it was, in case it was an accident; and hasn't been deterred in the least, in case it was intentional. Great going. Please fix things so that from now on if someone does something wrong then that exact someone is the one who then experiences negative consequences, such as reduced functionality, such as not being able to post a reply somewhere; and so that the message they get tells them exactly what to avoid doing in the future.)

To top it off, the message says that if I received it in error (which I'm pretty sure I did) to contact a particular email address. Guess what happens if I do?


So, tried in absentia, convicted of I-still-don't-know-what, sentenced, and then when I show up at the appeals court I find the place boarded up and abandoned. And this is actually entirely typical of pretty much all websites, in my experience, when some automaton such as a spam filter gets set off by some innocuously-intended user input. Franz Kafka would have had a field day with the Internet, had he lived to see it; though particularly with Google's services.

Paul, the server where FF is hosted is experimenting random errors lately, is not a problem related to my post, I also get that error page sometimes when navigating the forum...
Try again a few minutes later and it should work.

Internal Server Errors are happening a lot.

You are wrong to assert that anyone made the error.  It's purely due to traffic.  Try again later  (it just worked for me so just give it time).

The page says "error". If there's an error, then somebody made it, pretty much by definition.

Wrong again.

It says Internal Server Error.

The server is not a somebody.  It is a machine.  And it experiences errors from increased traffic.  Nobody made any error, we are just growing faster than it can handle.

If you want to help, make a donation rather than trying to blame anybody.

I haven't been wrong at all; sorry.


That doesn't magically make it disconnect agency or responsibility. This isn't a tornado or other such force of nature that is under no-one's control when it does something destructive. This is software programmed by a human being to perform specific tasks, precision machinery that is supposed to be utterly predictable and deterministic in how it reacts to inputs, behaving incorrectly in violation of the specification of its desired behavior -- unless, of course, someone instructed it to do what it did.

Then we reach this dilemma:

• On the one hand, someone may have specifically instructed the server to behave the way it did. This might have been in retaliation for someone doing something wrong -- in which case blaming me was wrong, since I wasn't the wrongdoer. Or it might have been an error to instruct it to do so. In either case, though, someone else did something wrong but I was the one who got smacked for it.
• On the other hand, the server's behavior could be a bug instead of intended behavior. In that case, again someone (the programmer) did something wrong but I was the one who got smacked for it.

In every case, though, it stands that someone else did something wrong but I got smacked for it.


If so, then that's a bug. It should perhaps respond more slowly, or maybe even time out, but it should not respond with a page with incorrect HTML contents. If page A is requested, it is permitted to react to load by serving page A slower than normal, or even by failing to respond, but it is not permitted to react by serving page B instead of page A, and yet you are claiming that that is exactly what it did.

In which case someone programmed the server incorrectly. The programmer made a mistake. And, incorrectly, I was the one who experienced the negative consequence of that programmer's error, instead of that programmer being the one that got smacked.


I don't have a credit card. Furthermore, it shouldn't matter who donates how much to what. The server should not substitute page B for page A when page A is requested from it, under any circumstances, and furthermore, a user who had nothing to do with programming the server should not be randomly selected to receive the consequences of the programmer's error. That is where there is misplacement of blame -- when I am stopped from replying to a post not because I did something wrong when attempting to reply but because somebody else (the server programmer) made a typo in their work at some other place and time.

In this particular case I'm with Socratease - but the error message is worded incorrectly - it should say "Due t the fact that this board is run through limited funds and there are consequently bandwidth restrictions on activity the page you requested is currently unavailable".
i.e. it\s not an error, mistake or malicious design - it's simply an in-built restriction due to economic limitations.

If you want to complain about this sort of problem then the real liars are the ISPs who claim your connection has "unlimited bandwidth" and to the legalities regarding this statement which allow them to make the assertion even when it is a blatant lie (AFAIK there isn't an ISP on the planet with what the average person would expect as unlimited broadband i.e. 24 hours a day at full connection speed).

Take one big chill pill Pauldelbrot and stop constantly complaining and accusing please...  :angel1:

ok, as i am talking with the admins, the ff server has somehow low config, 40 concurrent threads and 80mb of ram usage is allowed, whenever
the server goes above anything like this, it spits out the "internal server errors"

additionally i tried to install a custom "internal server error" and this is what paul saw, but now it is somehow gone, and i somehow had no idea when the htaccess config was right ...

so, this can happen any time, but it is usually just gone after a few minutes, if it happens that you double post, try to delete it right when you see it ...

next server update is planned, this will double the amount of RAM ( bigger images that can be thumbnailed ), the amount of threads ( more concurrent users ) , and it will feature unlimited webspace ( i still dunno how they will guarantee for this ... but it stands on their website ... ) ... and double the costs...

the date for the update is unsure ....

(http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/143e3a38-adae-45fe-bf82-07e6b702db70.jpg)

You're joking.

What kind of hardware has that little memory, in this day and age? Let alone that you'd be using as a server.

A machine with several GB of RAM costs maybe $500 ... I'm sure you'd scrape that up in no time with a call for donations. I'd almost be able to supply that whole amount myself -- if I had a credit card. Ten people who do have credit cards chipping in fifty bucks each would be enough to buy a new computer to use as a server with way better specs than what you posted. Heck, $100 or even a few hours dumpster-diving might suffice to scrounge up a used computer with better specs.

Sockratease: I don't get it. If a web server is serving page B, instead of either serving page A or timing out, when asked for a page A that exists on the server, then that web server is behaving incorrectly. Since it's not a random force of nature but a piece of precision engineering, if it is behaving incorrectly then a human being made a mistake somewhere in its engineering. So, the "someone else did something wrong" part of my statement stands. And since I was prevented (at least for a while) from making a legitimate, on-topic post, the "I got smacked" part of my statement stands. Lastly, since the cause of that was the engineering mistake, the "for it" portion stands. So I don't see where you get the notion that my argument is "invalid". It's nearly as ironclad as the argument proving that 2+2=4.

Suicide, the only way out.... ;)

It says, "Internal Server Error," likely due to high traffic or something that has to do with the server, not an administrator limiting your freedoms, or something like that. In any case,

OP:
(http://i.imgur.com/kuX9f.gif)

Everyone else in this thread:
(http://i.imgur.com/G28Gb.gif)

Does not compute.

Jeezus H. on a Rubber Crutch...ISP's never Lie, Programmers never mangle code and Machines never screw up, get a grip. ISP's always Lie, programmers invariablly screw up and machines are only as reliable as those using them. Whining about Internal Server Errors is like Pissing into the Wind, Always going to be Backlash, just take a breath, backup and do it again, it's better than gettin yer Leg Wet.

As I recall, at the time of the incident the first thing I did was "back up and do it again". Unfortunately, the server produced the same erroneous response about fifty times in a row, by which time it was apparent that it was not going to start working correctly again without someone whacking its side with a crowbar or whatever it takes to get it back to normal, and therefore the administrator needed to be notified.

hey dudes, watch the tone!

it appears that once you are in the "internal server error" mode, reloading the page just doesnt help, dunno why, perhaps you have a designated thread this time, usually when this happens i open up a new window, and load the index page, after it has loaded correctly i would assume reloading the formular page is working correctly again

server update is coming, i hope to get it ready on 1st of may ... for the annual compo ....
but it wont do any endless fun, it just has doubled thread count and doubled memory usage, but this can be full sooner or later as well ... and then hosting cost is going through the roof ....

The truth is that the server really sucks, but it's not your fault, Christian, and I never complain about it because we are talking about a totally free service! and you have no responsability or obligations to us, you run this forum because you want to, and we should be always grateful for your efforts.

Instead of complaining, I will donate something when I have my international credit card available again, and I encourage everyone to do it if you really enjoy this forum, so we can make it even better  :dink:

On the other hand, not all of us have credit cards.

On the gripping hand, the server hardware specs cKleinhuis posted earlier can easily be exceeded by more than an order of magnitude with well under a thousand bucks and a trip to Best Buy, so in theory it shouldn't need that much in the way of donations for a major upgrade. The computer I'm using to post this is a few years old and would run rings around the FF server if it really does have the claimed specs (which are so bad I'm actually fairly skeptical there wasn't a typo in there somewhere); all it doesn't have that the FF server needs to have is particular software, a domain name of its own, a T1 or whatever for the necessary bandwidth to operate decently as a server, and possibly enough disk space for the galleries. Copy the FF server onto a machine like mine with maybe a fatter disk drive, unplug the FF server from the FF server's internet connection, and plug the new machine in in its place, and that'd do it.

rofl

(http://www.sockrateaze.com/stuff/exploding-head.gif)

this is the same as a friend of mine told me ... just put up a computer and its cheaper and easier ... dudes, 40mb memory usage is meant for a single process, so if 80 users are using 40mb you can calculate for yourself what real server memory amount is ... and i refuse to answer anything more on this topic ... setting up a computer is work, much work, backing up system is work, 99% uptime is something that cant be guaranteed, dsl lines simply do not have the upstream bandwith to serve lots of clients, paudel, i dont know if you are totally unaware what it means to host a website, or if you are just renitent and up for nasty comments, please, believe me the server is cheap but it is stable, and the internal server errors are just exceeding for what i am paying right now ... just be happy that the forum is thriving .... and stop complaining!

a credit card isnt needed, just a paypal account, my plan was to extend the server when ad-income ... something i can calculate with, because donations are nothing i can rely on, is around 50€ a month ... but ad income is stuck at 30€ a month, and as i said in some other posting my bank account is actually closed by our beloved state because i have to pay taxes, and the only reason this server is still online is that i am transferring the money by hand to the hoster every 3 month ....

arrrh!

exactly! thanks for understanding ;)

Oh. Your earlier post sounded as if it said the whole machine had only 40mb.

Even then, 80 users times 40mb is 3.2gb which is actually about the same as the machine I have here. There are 64-bit computers with 16 and 32gb being sold for as little as a couple K. That's ten times the memory as what you've got, and the internet connection you already have seems to be adequate. Whether you administrate the server directly and replace the hardware with something like that, or you've contracted it out and whoever you contracted it out to replaces the hardware, you'd get a lot of bang for not very many (in the big scheme of things) bucks.

Anyway, good luck with the donation drive. I don't use Paypal either -- they have a bad reputation and I heard something recently about them censoring some online bookshop? And I don't have very much money anyway. If there's something else I can do to help, besides money or hardware purchasing advice, though, I'm all ears.

damn it a t1 line for 15€/ a month ?!?! you must be kidding me ... calculating in the administration time ... i am just not willing to admin anything, i have enough to do sorting all stuff out, speaking to people how to behave, and keeping the content as clean as possible .... argh, this makes me somehow really really mad ...

just stay as calm and polite as possible ;)

when talking about time put in in the forums, when was the last time i thanked the admin team ?

ADMIN TEAM: YOU ARE DOING JUST GREAT!

btw, do not come to the idea to click on ads, ad click rate is at 0,22% and anything above 0,04% is seen as fraud, so please dont click on ads if you arent interested on them ... at least not every day, 1 click per week seems ok, but would be better to have none to 1 click a month ...

I pay £30 a month to rent a low specification server on the internet.  On that I can have as many websites as I require, but as all mine are generally low traffic sites, I don't need anything further.  Even with the server being 'looked after' at a data centre, I still have many things I have to administer even with the relatively low traffic I get, so I can sympathise with you cK and I know what you are going through.

Even with life's commitments which take up an inordinate amount of time (I am a full time carer for my wife), I still get to watch snooker on the TV, play with fractal software and ignore real world stuff like email, DIY and doing housework if I choose, so I say if you don't like it (the errors due to excess traffic) do something about it and either donate towards the expense of running the service or cancel your membership and leave it free for others to enjoy.

Simon

...and that's ok! I wasn't saying you have to donate! It was a suggestion if you are interested in improving the forum, but if you can't, or even if you don't want to do it, is just fine, off course... and it's also ok that you report errors or make suggestions, but what I think is wrong, is that you are always doing it in a way that looks like you are an angry customer, and it's not polite to be always complaining about something you enjoy for free!

Maybe it's not your intention, but it's just the way you makes it look with some of your posts.

Hope you'll understand what I'm trying to say, Paul.

Cheers,

regards to paul as well, because i know he is an active part of this, but i dont understand his tone as well not really ....

I just get frustrated sometimes. Sorry.

np, i do hope you appreciate the upcoming tiny upgrade....