AskWoody is on the new server

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It’s twice as big as the old one – 4 cores, 8 GB, 4 TB transfer rate. Should help stability quite a bit. We still have a way to go. Getting the Login
[See the full post at: AskWoody is on the new server]

11 users thanked author for this post.

GoneToPlaid, JDeC, MrBrian, Elly, Capella, walker, SueW, KarenS, Pepsiboy, AJNorth, BobbyB

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Now it is really fast, but I still have to hit F5 to refresh home page and some comments pages or else I don’t see anything new.

4 users thanked author for this post.

dgreen, HiFlyer, JDeC, walker

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There was a caching problem this morning that should’ve been sorted out. I hope.

1 user thanked author for this post.

HiFlyer

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@Alex:  I had the same problem, even staying logged in right now, so whatever it is the F5 worked and I got in.   Hope that one gets “fixed” soon.

2 users thanked author for this post.

dgreen, HiFlyer

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THANKS, BOSS  &  CONGRATS!!

 

6 users thanked author for this post.

dgreen, HiFlyer, JDeC, walker, woody, abbodi86

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Oh Happy Day!! Keep up the good work Woody!!

4 users thanked author for this post.

AJNorth, dgreen, HiFlyer, JDeC

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Thought something must be changing, when trying to access site earlier this morning, all three of my browsers triggered a file download and the site wouldn’t open.

1 user thanked author for this post.

HiFlyer

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Hi,

Every time I visit this site, I have to forced refresh cache to see new posts since previous visit. Is there fix for this? I’m on latest Firefox 57.0.1

Thanks

1 user thanked author for this post.

walker

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@anonymous:     Found the reference to the latest version of Firefox at last.   I had asked elsewhere if there was verification as to the “latest version” since I had not seen anything other than a “prompt”.   This verifies that the 57.0.1 is the latest version.   Thank you for posting this reference, and a big “thank you” to PKCano as well to whom I asked that question.  

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I was logged in using the *Keep me signed in* check box–it was several days ago that I actually last logged on.  Every time I visited any AskWoody web page, I was still logged in.

In the last hour or so, I was automatically *Logged Out*.  All the AskWoody web pages that I had previously been logged into this morning were now requiring that I *Log In*.

Something must have changed on the web site that canceled currently logged in status–at least for me.

NightOwl (posting anonymously)

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@anonymous:    Posting as NightOwl:

I stopped clicking the STAY LOGGED IN” ages ago” because it was not functional, and I was always getting “logged out” anyway.   What I did, quite some time ago, was to do the “log in gymnastics”.  After  had the log in page finished, I clicked on the “Lounge Forums” at the top of the tool bar.  Then I from there, I clicked on the “Blog“.   That’s when I got LOGGED OUT without my consent.   I noted immediately that the message box shows “log in” rather than “log out”.

When that occurs I start hitting the F5 (slowly to see if it’s going to work) , and then it almost immediately goes to “log out”, so I know I’m logged in.  The menu also changes to show the “thanks”, “reply”, etc.   Sometimes it may take a few times of hitting the F5, however it does the trick.   Good luck!

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Congrats on the new server, Woody.

Somehow I just stay logged-in. Pale Moon browser.

-Noel

4 users thanked author for this post.

AJNorth, HiFlyer, GoneToPlaid, ryegrass

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As do I, Noel (Firefox ESR 52.5.0; Win 7 Pro x64).

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When I first brought up askwoody.com I got a top of the screen menu that included an item “log in” so I did. Then the screen came up with the information that I was already logged in, and for good luck, repeated that line a second time.

I then selected the Home menu item which returned me to that screen. Great, except that the menu at the top of the screen again offers me the chance to “log in”.

But since I am typing this after selecting “Comments …”, I am apparently already and still logged in.

Also the box above these comments asks for “Your Information:” but nothing can be typed there.

Whatever, best wishes for continued success and further enhancements.

= Ax Kramer

1 user thanked author for this post.

HiFlyer

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It is not hip or flashy, and it would require a larger button, but the message could be changed to “You are currently logged in. Would you like to log out? Press HERE, and have a nice day.” With a green indicator. Reverse wording with red for the other condition.

It won’t help the logic flow problem in the code any. But will give us a new giggle, to relieve the annoyance.

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anonymous wrote:

Hi, Every time I visit this site, I have to forced refresh cache to see new posts since previous visit. Is there fix for this? I’m on latest Firefox 57.0.1 Thanks

There is an easy fix for this in Firefox and other web browsers. Firefox, by default, compares the current web page to the cached version of the web page only once per every three times the web page is loaded. I recall that IE does the same by default. For Firefox, the solution is to tell Firefox to compare the current web page to its cached version every single time. The result is that, instead of displaying the cached web page two times in a row when the Reload button is clicked on, Firefox will instead download the current web page every single time when you click the Reload button.

Here is how you implement this tweak in Firefox:

1. In a new Firefox tab, type about:config and hit Enter. You will get a warning message about voiding your warranty! Click on the I accept the risk button.

2. In the about:config window, type

browser.cache

into the search box. You do not have to hit Enter or click on the search magnifying glass since Firefox automatically displays all matching results.

3. You should see, second down in the list of search results, this:

browser.cache.check_doc_frequency

Double-click on the above named search result. This will open a popup box. Enter a value of 1 and then click on the Okay button.

4. Close the about:config window and restart Firefox.

Now, every single time when you click the Reload button, the current version of the web page will be downloaded and displayed, instead of reloading the web page from Firefox’s cache two times in a row after clicking the Reload button, since the default setting is to actually download the updated web page only after Reload has been clicked on three times in a row.

Where does this arcane default setting of 3 for the browser.cache.check_doc_frequency config value come from? This default setting is a throwback to the olden days of when 9600 baud and newer 14.4K to 56K dial up modems were the only type of Internet connection, when compact disks for software were the latest new thing, and ASDL modems were a pipe dream, and when forum subtopics generally contained new posts only once every few days to once every several days. It wasn’t Mozilla who created this setting. It was Microsoft, and I think it was in IE4? Back in those olden days, you were somebody if you had a computer with an Intel 486 CPU. Back then, an Intel 486 running at 50 MHz was considered to be the speed limit for any CPU since anything on the drawing boards were encountering serious internal timing issues because they running “too fast”. Back then, the Intel Pentium and Intel’s infamous Pentium Bug were not far around the corner. AMD and IBM/Cyrix weren’t making CPUs.

Now you know how to fix this Firefox issue. And now I realize, after traveling down memory lane, just how old I am getting.

6 users thanked author for this post.

Noel Carboni, MrBrian, SueW, woody, AlexEiffel, HiFlyer

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@Gone2Plaid, you have long experience, and excellent memory, have talent with methods that go directly to the issue, and explain them clearly. As you say, these are legacy defaults from an ancient age.

Why then, are users of recognized names and above basic skills communicating that they are experiencing a change in website navigation in just the last three months? Have many of us had our settings changed on us without our knowledge? Possibly through updates that do not respect prior settings, I suppose. It would be fair to say a new visitor may not be familiar with how a particular website loads. But longtime followers reporting a change in behavior leads me to believe a change has occurred. The logic of seeking a simple answer suggests the change has occurred in the item in common, this website, over the idea that many changes have been made in many systems.

2 users thanked author for this post.

AlexEiffel, HiFlyer

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On cards in one hand Mozilla was wrong to hide this setting, the other hand says it might have caused some trouble. My third hand throws a wad of virtual confetti at you and at the other human whose blogging placed this essential tip. Thank you both!

Waterfox does (and I think Palemoon and other Mozilla based browsers can) benefit from changing this setting. (YouTube is still currently slow, but I reason it is because of Google changing the interface and possibly content serving software.)

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Glad to hear about the new server. What CPU? Personally, I would add another 8GB of RAM for more stability in between cleanups. If the CPU is an Intel later generation CPU which has known hyper-threading issues, then I would turn off hyper-threading in the server’s BIOS in order to prevent random crashes. I had to turn off hyper-threading in BIOS on a couple of new computers at the office due to this issue, which can also result in data corruption.

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HiFlyer

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Not sure which specific CPU. It’s a hosting deal with Zoho – one of their fanciest packages.

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Does everyone that has the caching issue uses Firefox? I still had the issue this morning. I agree that althought the fix suggested by GoneToPlaid might work, to me, it doesn’t make sense to ask users to change a default setting to have a correct experience with a web site. I doubt Firefox would have kept the setting that way if it was that big of an issue after all these years.

Maybe there is a trick one can use to force a refresh or to not use the cache in the browser when you revisit a page between sessions?

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Have you tried Shift+F5?

The devs tell me that their caches are all flushed now.

1 user thanked author for this post.

AlexEiffel

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I usually just do F5 and I see the updated page. But I have to manually do it every time I see a page. I will flush all local cache and keep you updated if the problem comes back.

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I haven’t seen cache issues here in a while, though I do remember getting some older pages at one time back when there were serious site problems.

One thing I always reconfigure on browsers is to check every time a URL is accessed for updated page data. This ensures the server will deliver new pages if they’re there, and is not the default setting as I recall. This may not be the preferable choice for everyone, but I have a good fiber internet connection and don’t find it introduces unacceptable delays.

I presume this is not the default because the default setting can potentially reduce network / server load and speed up displays of pages that have a lot of different content sources, but if I’m going online for data, I’m going online – not to my disk! I reduce the display load in other ways (e.g., by not allowing ads, tracking, etc.).

IE – Internet Options > Browsing History [Settings]

Pale Moon (and other FireFox derivatives) – URL about:config

-Noel

1 user thanked author for this post.

AlexEiffel

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Do we have a status update for article subscriptions?

(Still nothing through my Outlook.com address, but have a Gmail account to transfer to, should that become necessary — a minor issue in the grand scheme of things.)

Again, thanks Boss!

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On the cache issue, it’s ‘workaround’, and traffic volume that leads to redlining.

I think you already see the point, but to be clear, if a very large portion of your most devoted readers are reloading every page multiple times just to see a more recent posting, there is a problem. That they become trained to do so every time — even when there is no new posting, but there might be, if I just reload it again — means the problem may become fixed, but retraining may be necessary. When the devoted see that the timestamp of the most recent post does not match their system time by a margin far greater than the ‘m minutes ago’ notation, after timezone adjustment, they reasonably assume the difficulty lies in the source of that information. I am referring to actual traffic from real pageload requests, not the non-existent traffic from refreshing a page from the user’s local cache.

Apologies, if this remark has been made unremarkable by the impressive new server. Perhaps there is a communication gap and delay between the new capability, observed improvement by user, and end of complaint notices.

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anonymous wrote:

@Gone2Plaid, you have long experience, and excellent memory, have talent with methods that go directly to the issue, and explain them clearly. As you say, these are legacy defaults from an ancient age. Why then, are users of recognized names and above basic skills communicating that they are experiencing a change in website navigation in just the last three months? Have many of us had our settings changed on us without our knowledge? Possibly through updates that do not respect prior settings, I suppose. It would be fair to say a new visitor may not be familiar with how a particular website loads. But longtime followers reporting a change in behavior leads me to believe a change has occurred. The logic of seeking a simple answer suggests the change has occurred in the item in common, this website, over the idea that many changes have been made in many systems.

Thank you for your kind remarks. Yeah, the issue is with the server. Firefox, after installing updates, does preserve your settings.

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anonymous wrote:

On the cache issue, it’s ‘workaround’, and traffic volume that leads to redlining. I think you already see the point, but to be clear, if a very large portion of your most devoted readers are reloading every page multiple times just to see a more recent posting, there is a problem. That they become trained to do so every time — even when there is no new posting, but there might be, if I just reload it again — means the problem may become fixed, but retraining may be necessary. When the devoted see that the timestamp of the most recent post does not match their system time by a margin far greater than the ‘m minutes ago’ notation, after timezone adjustment, they reasonably assume the difficulty lies in the source of that information. I am referring to actual traffic from real pageload requests, not the non-existent traffic from refreshing a page from the user’s local cache. Apologies, if this remark has been made unremarkable by the impressive new server. Perhaps there is a communication gap and delay between the new capability, observed improvement by user, and end of complaint notices.

You bring up a very good point about time stamp issues and repeated page load requests. Repeated page load requests can redline a server. This is one of the simplest types of DOS attacks to perform, and it takes a surprisingly low number of computers to do it.

If everyone is used to reloading a page 3 times in a row, just to see the most recent posts instead of setting their web browsers to always get the latest version of the web page every single time, then page request traffic to the server is 3 times higher than what it needs to be.

Another issue, potentially, are computers whose time is significantly out of sync with the server and the rest of the Internet. I have been using a freeware utility for years on all of my computers which keep my computers synced to atomic time clocks to within 1 or 2 seconds. This is much better than the built-in Windows time service.

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For the first time in weeks I’ve not had to do a Shift+F5 or otherwise fiddle with caching, to view the latest posts. The caching problem may be gone.

Stan

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Please ignore my last comment on caching, was irrationally optimistic. I’ve discovered that the comments area within posts also needs a shift+refresh to present newer comments.

Stan

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Annony150368 from above again.

Today this website is very much more responsive. Whether it is a repair or just another glitch, but this time in the right direction, I don’t know. Hope Stan and others are enjoying the same fast response and timely postings that I am.

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Annony150368 from above again.

Ironically, like Stan, a temporary condition.

Several hours later, the hyperlink that brought me here described freshness as 13 minutes. I am not nagging, just wanting to give ‘data points’.

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No complaints on speed, is very much appreciated. As for web caching I’ve decided to resolve the issue at my end by disabling caching, to override and set to zero. I’ve found this to be an issue at couple other sites I visit. With U-verse DSL speed the web cache does not seem too help much with page loading, so no loss.

Stan

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I haven’t had any issues with this site, but when I check uMatrix for http://www.AskWoody.com to see what scripts it loads, I see these 3 crazy URL’s:

pnamic.com

netanalyzer.space

worldnaturenet.xyz

The last 2 are related to Cloudflare — what do these scripts do?? I see scripts from these 3 being loaded when browsing other legitimate websites.

 

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I’m not seeing that, but then again I’ve fully blocked any ad or ad provider who has annoyed me.

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