What's wrong with the server/hosting?

This site should be very easy to host. I run and host several VB forums myself and would be willing to assist. What's with the ongoing issues?

Working great now, thanks folks.

It appears today was another rough day for the server (database errors) ... but at the moment it seems to work again. Cross fingers ... though - nobody else around?

What happened?

Is there anything we can do to help to keep the forum and its software running?

Thanks for getting the site back up and running and mobile version is working well right now.

Mobile no longer works FYI back to stand desk top viewing.

Someone should really take Entrep or imarktu on their kind offers of help, the website has been running terrible for weeks on end with no public response as to what is being done to resolve it.

This is a great forum and thanks to those who provide it for us. But, please, please let's get it working properly, it's been so frustrating for weeks now. Even some indication of just what the problem is and maybe an ETA for a solution would be helpful.

This is a great forum and thanks to those who provide it for us. But, please, please let's get it working properly, it's been so frustrating for weeks now. Even some indication of just what the problem is and maybe an ETA for a solution would be helpful.

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Originally Posted by Norwest

Someone should really take Entrep or imarktu on their kind offers of help, the website has been running terrible for weeks on end with no public response as to what is being done to resolve it.

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Sometimes all it takes is a fresh pair of eyes, though from a permissions perspective this might be easier said than done, especially if the database infrastructure is hosted and/or administrated by a third party.

Either way, offer is always there. Hope we can get things up and running properly soon.

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Originally Posted by Poet

This is a great forum and thanks to those who provide it for us. But, please, please let's get it working properly, it's been so frustrating for weeks now. Even some indication of just what the problem is and maybe an ETA for a solution would be helpful.

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I second that. Quite frustrating to use this forum at current - and, to be honest, I start to look for alternatives.

If there is anybody around who is still listening ... any chance to get from a moderator / administrator some acknowledgement of the problems (i.e. are you aware of them?) and do you have some idea and a plan how to resolve them? It looks like some of the forum members are not just prepared but as well qualified to help.

Please - lets keep the communication channels open.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Poet

This is a great forum and thanks to those who provide it for us. But, please, please let's get it working properly, it's been so frustrating for weeks now. Even some indication of just what the problem is and maybe an ETA for a solution would be helpful.

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I second that. Quite frustrating to use this forum at current - and, to be honest, I start to look for alternatives.

If there is anybody around who is still listening ... any chance to get from a moderator / administrator some acknowledgement of the problems (i.e. are you aware of them?) and do you have some idea and a plan how to resolve them? It looks like some of the forum members are not just prepared but as well qualified to help.

Please - lets keep the communication channels open.

God it's running slow again today. Practically unusable.

Hosted by 'Rimu Hosting', using a server based in Chicago?

Their own website - https://rimuhosting.com/ - is just timing out at the moment which says a lot.

Can we not get this hosted on AWS or any other cloud-based host?

(Rimu hosting's own website is back up - I tried to post this earlier but couldn't, because the server was down...)

Yep, it's getting beyond a joke unfortunately. No Russian gangs doing a NZX type DDoS then, just rubbish hosting service?

Well, back up after being down for the last day or so, but al least seems a lot faster.

Vince, any comments on what's been happening over the last few weeks?

Yes an update would be great. I was almost at the stage of giving up on the website.

Okay, - site has now transferred over and running on a new server. There were major issues with the database and quite a few other things which I won't bore you with.

I know it's been really painful and pretty hard to deal with but hopefully, fingers crossed it's sorted now and running at speed.

Thanks to all those who weren't dicks about things but some of the other comments weren't appreciated that much either.

Just remember this site has been going for 20 years and this is really the first time it shat itself well and truly.

Enjoy.

Vince

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vince

Okay, - site has now transferred over and running on a new server. There were major issues with the database and quite a few other things which I won't bore you with.

I know it's been really painful and pretty hard to deal with but hopefully, fingers crossed it's sorted now and running at speed.

Thanks to all those who weren't dicks about things but some of the other comments weren't appreciated that much either.

Just remember this site has been going for 20 years and this is really the first time it shat itself well and truly.

Enjoy.

Vince

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Many Thanks
I have missed my daily sharetrader fix over the last few weeks.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vince

Okay, - site has now transferred over and running on a new server. There were major issues with the database and quite a few other things which I won't bore you with.

I know it's been really painful and pretty hard to deal with but hopefully, fingers crossed it's sorted now and running at speed.

Thanks to all those who weren't dicks about things but some of the other comments weren't appreciated that much either.

Just remember this site has been going for 20 years and this is really the first time it shat itself well and truly.

Enjoy.

Vince

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Thanks Vince, much appreciated! Great to see things running well again, was really starting to suffer withdrawal symptoms!

Good to see the website up and running again ... only if one misses the chat around the watercooler (or the coffee machine) one realizes how useful it can be :):

Thanks Vince for the heads up and a big thank you to the helping hands in the background to get this forum back to life.

Only one small thing ... if the forum should go again (heavens forbid) through a similar phase ... communication is key. Would it be possible to get next time during the outage at least some sort of acknowledgement of the issues and an idea what's going on (like server under maintenance and we plan to be back by dd.mm.yy hh:mm)?

Earlier in the week it sort of felt that the forum might be gone forever and posters might need to look for alternatives. I hope they didn't.

Feels like sharetrader.co.nz developed some sort of "morning sickness". Down yesterday am and today am as well for some hours.

Just wondering - will it be a boy or a girl?

Seriously - any chance we could get an update on what's happening?

this site remains very slow for me. Other websites respond quickly this one takes a long long time.
I dont think it is just me either.

I am just saying so that you know - in case you dont.

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Originally Posted by peat

this site remains very slow for me. Other websites respond quickly this one takes a long long time.
I dont think it is just me either.

I am just saying so that you know - in case you dont.

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I second that ... and am suffering under the same symptoms

1.8min to load this page.

improves the time on site metrics I guess?

The performance of this site is so bad that...

Attachment 12597

...I am beginning to think that it uses some software I have written.

Still slow, intermittently speeds up but generally crappy speed for some reason. One of my favourite sites to fritter away my working day when working.

Having the same problem as well

Very slow for me also, only noticed it in last couple of weeks.

some further feedback ...

The response of this website has recently been better... sometimes....
but (esp today) still erratic and slow , sometimes worse, sometimes marginally acceptable. but rarely good.


I'm not sure if its useful or not but as an end user my view is that google ads are taking too much time to 'work' , as evidenced by this showing for a while during refreshes....

Attachment 12677


and also that anything search related on the website is very slow....


If resources are an issue then you need to take this to management and get funding. Plenty of people would pay if it meant a better functioning website.

Agreed Peat, giving up on the site for the night. Sometimes good, sometimes not... regularly annoying.
Maybe tomorrow will be better, who knows?
All day today has been cringingly slow on mobile and PC.
Like you and others have suggested, happy to make a contribution if that's what it takes to get over whatever problems are going on here.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by peat

some further feedback ...

The response of this website has recently been better... sometimes....
but (esp today) still erratic and slow , sometimes worse, sometimes marginally acceptable. but rarely good.

I'm not sure if its useful or not but as an end user my view is that google ads are taking too much time to 'work' , as evidenced by this showing for a while during refreshes....

Attachment 12677

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I am running the Firefox 89.0.1 (64 bit) browser on a Kubuntu 20.04 platform (Kubuntu is a form of linux). The way my system is set up it has an ad blocker on it. I didn't set up the ad blocker myself. It is just the way this particular version of Kubuntu comes as standard. I am having all the sporadic connection problems you describe Peat. So while the google ads may not be helping things, I don't think the server problems will be fixed by axing the google ads.

SNOOPY

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Originally Posted by Snoopy

I am running the Firefox 89.0.1 (64 bit) browser on a Kubuntu 20.04 platform (Kubuntu is a form of linux). The way my system is set up it has an ad blocker on it. I didn't set up the ad blocker myself. It is just the way this particular version of Kubuntu comes as standard. I am having all the sporadic connection problems you describe Peat. So while the google ads may not be helping things, I don't think the server problems will be fixed by axing the google ads.

SNOOPY

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you're such a geek Snoops.
yes its more likely the database response or name resolution - I dont know all the ins and outs of running a website , but I thought I'd mention it. I must admit I find it very hard to understand why the problem is not resolved satisfactorily by now.

Hey good people out there, a hint re the double posting

When you type up a post and hit post.. etc and it comes back with "do you want to leave/stay on this page ... " message can usually just click on leave and it saves/posts the entry.
Have done this twice in recent days and it worked - I just copied the contents 1st to make sure I did not lose it, but may not need to.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jay

Hey good people out there, a hint re the double posting

When you type up a post and hit post.. etc and it comes back with "do you want to leave/stay on this page ... " message can usually just click on leave and it saves/posts the entry.
Have done this twice in recent days and it worked - I just copied the contents 1st to make sure I did not lose it, but may not need to.

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I can confirm that it lost only once any of my posts when I clicked after this message on "leave"- however, except for the one case where it did (this was after the "coffee drink event" earlier this week) it always doubled them!

More annoying though than the doubling :):) is the idling :):confused::t_down: ...

Anyway - aren't we lucky? We can always hope that things might magically improve ...

Vince,
I appreciate this is a free site. However performance has been sub par and frustrating at times .
Could you please give us an explanation as to the lag and multiple posts ?
Is there a "fix" in the pipeline ?
Can we all contribute something to upgrade this ?
Regards
S/L

Hi Vince

Just wanted to express my concern at the ongoing issues that have been disrupting the Share trader forum. Hopefully today's improvement signals an improvement, but;



For many years now the NZ Sharetrader forum has been a much appreciated and valued part of the NZ share investing scene.



For this reason alone is is sad to note that since January 2021 the site has encountered ongoing disruptions that in my opinion have effected is smooth running. I suspect that as a result of these disruptions there has been:


- A decrease in the average number of postings

- A decrease in the average viewings

- A decrease in members use of the site

- An increase in duplication of postings

- A decrease in the relevance and use of this site

- An increase in frustration by site users

- A lack of communication by site administrators about what is going on, and options for remedy.


Your assistance and comments on how can we help to either finally fix the site, or replace it, would be appreciated.

As above ^ Have loved this site for many years as both a lurker and now member when they eventually allowed gmail addresses. Unfortunately this would have to be the most broken and painful site I visit on the web at the moment. The weeks tick by and despite sporadic periods of usability (mostly by the hour) nothing much seems to change...

Okay, I know this has been an absolute pain in the butt to deal with over these past few months. The SQL and DB has been changed now to a different version which is heaps quicker at responding.

I can see over the past couple of days since being back up everything seems to be running smooth and fast. Fingers crossed.

Good morning!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vince

Okay, I know this has been an absolute pain in the butt to deal with over these past few months. The SQL and DB has been changed now to a different version which is heaps quicker at responding.

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The website is indeed quicker at responding but I believe that it is not due to the DB changes. Instead, it's likely due to an overwhelming chunk of data being lost—at the time of writing, the NZX forum only contains 17 threads while the ASX one has only 2.


Like everyone else here, I very much appreciate all the work, time, effort, and generosity put into getting this forum up and running during all these years but I wonder if it isn't time to think of a plan B?

Getting a forum up and running might have been a straightforward task in the first place but, with the growth that the forum has seen over the years, getting it to run smoothly might have become an increasingly more difficult task. And by no means should all the burden fall onto your shoulders, nor should you be expected to spend a fair amount of time profiling and optimizing the whole stack that this forum operates on, or even be knowledgeable about such processes.

I think that it would be fair and possibly beneficial to everyone to start thinking about a migration process. Nowadays it should be possible to find services that offer migrating existing forum DBs over to modern solutions that host forums on performant servers with high availability, while not requiring any technical knowledge whatsoever.

One such offer that I can think of, and that I'm not affiliated with in any way, would be Discourse. I've been browsing such forums from time to time and it does the job well, with a clean/minimalist look, and some interesting features that we don't have over here (e.g.: I find the timeline to be quite useful to quickly navigate across a long thread).


Thoughts?


Attachment 12770

Quote:

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Originally Posted by blu3

Good morning!



The website is indeed quicker at responding but I believe that it is not due to the DB changes. Instead, it's likely due to an overwhelming chunk of data being lost—at the time of writing, the NZX forum only contains 17 threads while the ASX one has only 2.



Thoughts?


Attachment 12770

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"Overwhelming chunk of data being lost"

Thoughts on this, is at the bottom of each forum is the thread display option which is user settable, you can change that show threads from the last day, days, week, etc - try that before starting a conspiracy theory about overwhelming chunks of data being lost.

Vince

Attachment 12774

Ah, thanks!
I don't remember ever needing to change such an option—has this been changed recently? It sure is hella confusing for a default behaviour to only display the threads changed during the last day :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vince

Okay, I know this has been an absolute pain in the butt to deal with over these past few months. The SQL and DB has been changed now to a different version which is heaps quicker at responding.

I can see over the past couple of days since being back up everything seems to be running smooth and fast. Fingers crossed.

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She's fair humming at the moment, whoop! Congrats on getting sorted whatever whizzo bits needed being sorted 😊