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Tech: Mudcat Troubles (from Max)
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Subject: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Max Date: 15 Jun 05 - 02:20 AM Looks like we got most of it back, lost a day or two, but that's a lot better than 6 months. Gotta get some sleep, I'll be back in the morning to get out the rest of the bugs. Please let me know if you notice something missing or something not working. Please let me know in this thread. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Joe Offer Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:02 AM Hi, Max - apparently, personal messages aren't working right yet. I sent you a personal message to thank you, and it generated an error message. Also, all of the thread groups have duplicated themselves (see groups admin). "Links" categories have also duplicated. All the photos display double, too. Same with the DT alphabetical index. -Joe- |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Allen Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:03 AM Thank you for the marvellous job and I'm sure you know this, but supersearch is broken again. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: s&r Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:05 AM I didn't know how much of a mudcat addict I am. Thanks for your work Max Stu |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Rasener Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:28 AM Well done Max. I need to send you that feather for your hat :-) |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Skipper Jack Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:41 AM I seem to have lost all the threads from the last two days?? |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Lanfranc Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:44 AM Thanks, Max. What happened? Alan |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Liz the Squeak Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:45 AM Skipper Jack - the first posting from Max says we've lost a day or two.... would that cover it? Max, I hope that you have a long and healing sleep.... reboot your physical server and download your brain for a while! Thank you from this side of the pond. XX LTS |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: fat B****rd Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:46 AM Thank you Max. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: JohnInKansas Date: 15 Jun 05 - 03:55 AM Having used the down time to good(?) purpose, I can report that a new version (SE 1.06) of Ad-Aware is out, and can be downloaded now. Go to Lavasoft.com and click on downloads, or just click "check for updates" in your current version. Running the old (slightly obsolete) ver 5.25 on her machine found only 3 cookies, but the new version reported 239 critical objects and about a dozen suspect registry keys, so it's aparently much more thorough. All the suspect reg items had been "disabled" by Norton, so they weren't really a threat, but the cleanup probably was a good thing. The last previous (SE 1.05) version on my machine found 3 cookies, and the new version added one more - not much of a change. (I should get out and about more?) Spybot S&D signature files have also apparently been updated quite recently, so checking in there would be something to do while Max gets things put together. John |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: pixieofdoom Date: 15 Jun 05 - 04:28 AM Thanks Max, glad to see the cat back again! |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Kaleea Date: 15 Jun 05 - 04:39 AM Been real interesting trying to keep the Ol' Cat online for us, huh? Thanks for being there for us. I'm a definite Cat addict too, I guess. Haven't been able to get here for a couple of days. Earlier this evening, whenever I clicked on a thread, I went to the google front page--interesting, huh? Or dare I quote a famous alien & say, "Fascinating!"? Uh, oh, now you-know-who will be telling us that on the ole NCC-1701 the computer never goes down. oh yeah, right. Only every few episodes! Even in the 24th, 25th & 26th centuries they have 'puter tribbles--OOPS I mean, troubles, too. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Wolfgang Date: 15 Jun 05 - 05:18 AM In many threads, the order of posts is not chronological any more. Wolfgang |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: MBSLynne Date: 15 Jun 05 - 05:23 AM Thanks Max. Still posts missing on some threads.... Love Lynne |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Dave Bryant Date: 15 Jun 05 - 06:25 AM I've got a PM flagged, but when I go into my personal page it says "No Messages". I hope Mudcat's OK over the weekend as I was planning to post as a roving reporter from the Knockholt Mini Folk Festival (and sheep shagging) weekend. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: freda underhill Date: 15 Jun 05 - 06:33 AM Thanks very much Max! |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Dani Date: 15 Jun 05 - 06:46 AM Hmmm. I can access my PMs, and the number posted on the front page is the same as a few days ago, but the actual messages listed are 3 less, and the most recent three are gone.... Dani |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Bat Goddess Date: 15 Jun 05 - 07:45 AM You're incredible, Max!!! What can we do to help to avert any future crisis? Linn |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: An Englishman Abroad Date: 15 Jun 05 - 07:49 AM Good suggestion Linn |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Stilly River Sage Date: 15 Jun 05 - 07:54 AM When the first message came up this morning "Your Cookie is Corrupt" I knew I was once again looking at the more recent version of the 'Cat. Beggars can't be choosers--I'm happy to take whatever you can cobble together today, Max. Thank you very much! SRS |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Rapparee Date: 15 Jun 05 - 08:26 AM Thanks, Max. I know how hard it is to do what you've done. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Flash Company Date: 15 Jun 05 - 09:56 AM I second all the above, now, as Bat Goddess said, is there anything we can do to help? It aint fair to leave everything in the principal that 'Good ole Max will fix it'. I will be the first to admit that I would be useless at sorting technical problems, but I probably know a few men who can. FC |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Suzi Date: 15 Jun 05 - 10:15 AM Thank you from me too Max.... |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Dave the Gnome Date: 15 Jun 05 - 10:19 AM Similar to DaveB's but mine says 2 posts and I only have 1! Posted on the help forum before I saw this. DtG |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: John Hardly Date: 15 Jun 05 - 10:37 AM If I had $1 for every corrupt cookie I've ever eaten... |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Max Date: 15 Jun 05 - 10:43 AM What happened? Well, I woke up yesterday to our primary server saying that there was a disk error and couldn't be written to. So I followed protocol and shut down and scanned the disk. When I got her back up, the database said that the mudcat database was in the spot that was damaged on the disk. So I followed protocol and did what the pros recommend to restore the data. What can you do to help? Send contributions to paypal (max@mudcat.org). We're well short of our monthly expenses. Seems to always fall off in the summer. What can I do? Backup more often, rebuild the RAID array, learn to replicate the database real-time, format another machine to run another DNS server... As usual, everything is harder with the Mudcat because of its high volume of traffic and the fact that we have 4GB of data now. Got PM's working, the other stuff is gonna have to wait… my real job needs me today. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Noreen Date: 15 Jun 05 - 10:51 AM Hi Max! Since you asked- I retrieved via Google, urls for a couple of members' search pages Bill Sables and Ferret (as I'm looking for the lyrics to "The Ballad of Mini Cooper". However, when I click on the link on the page which should go to the 'Mini Cooper' thread, they both take me to somewhere completely different- i.e. the Message_ID numbers are out of synch. You probably knew this, or it follows from some posts having been lost. Good luck with all the hard work. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: JudyB Date: 15 Jun 05 - 11:35 AM Max - Thanks for the update - and for all the work you put in last night and all the other nights. Donation on its way via PayPal. All this and a day job too - WOW! Thanks again, JudyB |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Pauline L Date: 15 Jun 05 - 12:06 PM Thanks so much, Max. We all love you. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Bev and Jerry Date: 15 Jun 05 - 04:58 PM Max: Thanks for all your effort but allow us to correct you on one small point. This is your real job. The other one only provides money. Bev and Jerry |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: vectis Date: 15 Jun 05 - 06:25 PM Thanks Max. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: SINSULL Date: 15 Jun 05 - 07:32 PM I am back to work, Max, and can Paypal some money. Meantime, given the time you lost for your accident, work and then rest. This crowd needed a breather anyway. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Tattie Bogle Date: 15 Jun 05 - 07:37 PM I just thought you were too busy to let little me in! haven't checked my personals yet though! TB |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Jim Dixon Date: 15 Jun 05 - 10:58 PM Something very peculiar has happened to thread#41573. The messages do not appear in chronological order. If you look at the date and time each message was posted you see that the 7th message from the top is actually the oldest. That's the one where GUEST,Dallas made the original request for lyrics. Some of the answers to that request appear ahead of the question! Yet, if you look at the message numbers, they are in ascending order (as they should be). It looks as if some messages have been assigned new numbers, incorrectly. If this has happened to one thread, it has probably happened to others, too. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I'm really very grateful that Mudcat has reappeared. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Justa Picker Date: 15 Jun 05 - 11:06 PM Max, hows your health? Your arm, the healing etc....coming along? |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Jim Dixon Date: 16 Jun 05 - 01:09 AM Yup, just as I feared. Thread#1319 has a similar problem. The oldest message in the thread—if one can believe the dates and times that are attached to these messages—is the one by Bo Vandenberg, #5 from the top. Oddly enough, messages 5 and 6 are about THE LAMBTON WORM while the first 4 messages are about an unrelated song called PUT YOUR SHOES ON, LUCY. Yet someone noticed the oddity of this and commented on it on 06-April-2004. So the problem may be older than the latest problem. Or is it? This is terribly confusing. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: JohnInKansas Date: 16 Jun 05 - 06:38 PM Each post is given a "record number" when submitted. While the database was down, the system had no way of knowing what record numbers were already used. In at least one case of a thread started during the db downtime, the older thread that already "owned" the record number is the one that came up when I "went to" the new one. In any case where a db gets "corrupted" the list of which records (posts) belong in which "thread" has to come from data in the database, so it's not too surprising if there are some confused linkups - especially where new data may have been assigned the same recordno as an existing post.(?) I'm guessing a bit, but each "post" should have a separate number, and there may be some that remain in the database that have lost their links to which "thread" they should be listed with - or in what order. In principle, someone could maybe search for the "lost records" and reassemble them by hand, I suppose. The 4 GB in the database would all fit on a data DVD, so maybe Max could burn one and let some volunteer give it a shot... or not! Any takers? Many db systems include a "compact" utility - of the sort that your email db uses. When a db record is "deleted," the record usually stays in the db file, and only its link from the "record list" is deleted. Commpacting your email is how you DELETE all the "unlinked records" from the database file. SOME databases may include "recovery" or search utilities that let you save the orphans to a separate place???? If the unlinked records include the thread name and a date/time, a volunteer might sort out where they go so that an "errata thread" could post them back?????? All kinds of possiblilities - but what's practical? Probably just what we're doing - talk about it 'til Max and the clones get as much of it fixed as they can. John |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: JennyO Date: 16 Jun 05 - 11:16 PM I haven't noticed any posts in the wrong threads. What I have noticed though is that the order of posts is mixed up within a thread - at least the posts made before the crash. For instance, the "For Real. I quit" MG thread now starts with a post I made on the 11th June, followed by what were actually the first few posts on the 10th June, then there are a few from a different time, then one completely out of place by itself, etc etc. I'm hoping that this will sort itself eventually when Max fixes the bugs he is still working on. I don't particularly want to appear to be the initiator of that infamous thread. And no, I am not Martin Gibson - at least I don't think I am :-) But who can tell in these confusing times? AAAAAAARGGGHH! - I think I'll go and lie down for a while..... |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Jim Dixon Date: 16 Jun 05 - 11:59 PM Oh, heck. It's happening all over the place threadid=5717 threadid=9434 threadid=11594 threadid=41765 threadid=60602 threadid=81984 |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Pauline L Date: 17 Jun 05 - 01:42 AM Max, I didn't know that you had surgery recently. Take good care of yourself. That should be #1 priority. We'll still love you. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Joe Offer Date: 17 Jun 05 - 05:32 AM As Jim Dixon said, the message numbers got changed. the Happy Index isn't very happy about it. All the links lead to the wrong places. -Joe Offer- |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Jim Dixon Date: 17 Jun 05 - 07:48 AM Whoa! I hadn't thought of that consequence. If you change a message number, then any link that's supposed to go to that message won't work. However, it appears thread numbers haven't changed, so links that go to threads are OK. To spell it out: 1. Links in the format href=/detail.cfm?messages__message_id=000000 will go God-knows-where. 2. Links in the format href=/thread.cfm?threadid=00000#00000 will at least get you to the right thread. If the message you wanted has been renumbered, the link will take you to the top of the thread (which isn't so bad). 3. Links in the format href=/thread.cfm?threadid=00000 are just fine. 4. Links to the DT href=/@displaysong.cfm?songid=0000 are OK too. I'm really glad most of the links I've created are in format 2 or 3, not 1. Joe: Is Max aware of this problem? Can it be fixed? Does anybody know: have all messages been renumbered? Or just all messages since December? Or is there some other pattern? |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Jim Dixon Date: 17 Jun 05 - 08:20 AM More news: The SuperSearch is working, sort of. However, it has some problems. When you see a result like this:
If you click on "Thread", it will take you to the right thread, but it will take you to the top of the thread instead of to the exact message you wanted. In other words, the message number that's embedded in the link is wrong. Or maybe the message number that's embedded in the link is right according to the old numbering scheme, but wrong according to the new one. This sounds hopeful. If the index contains a record of what the old numbering scheme was, then maybe it can be reconstructed. (Although it boggles the mind to think of how it might be reconstructed. I'm glad I'm not a programmer any more.) MAX: DON'T THROW AWAY THE INDEX! |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST Date: 17 Jun 05 - 09:01 AM All I know is that my computer doesn't crash anymore now that I got rid of my mudcat cookie. What's that about? |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Bill D Date: 17 Jun 05 - 05:03 PM serendipity |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Jon Date: 17 Jun 05 - 06:50 PM John, I'll try to clarify some of what you said. First let me explain the type of structure in use. To keep it simple I will forget members and use the old Coldfusion tutorial and a database I created based on that. The tables are called Threads and Messages. The field lists for each are: Threads: Thread_ID, Name Messages: Message_ID, Thread_ID, Posted, Subject, Username, Body. The fields Thread_ID in threads and Message_ID in messages are the primary keys (or main indexes if you like) and are of autoincrement (or similar) type. Each time a post is added or a thread is added the next number in the relavant sequence is allocated. Most of the rest is based on how it looks to me from here and involves several "best guesses". When the database came back up for the first time, I think it was restored from a Dec 2004 backup so for additions, the sequences would have started from then but I think those new posts/new threads got deleted. My best guess is that what happened on the second restore was that the working copy from the failed disk was "uncorrupted" as best as possible. Thread_ID in messages is the foreign key or the link that joins messages to threads. The data in this field looks to be OK but it does appear that the Message_ID sequence got changed at some point, I think in the "uncorrupting". As date/time stamp (Posted) also looks OK, there is a simple fix that as far as I can make out would have nearly all posts appearing in the correct order in threads. Changing the ORDER BY clause to say "Posted" instead of "Message_ID" (or something along those lines) in thread.cfm should work. The advantage of using Message_ID was that a sequence of posts would remain correct even if the PC clock went out. There should also be enough info to generate a new Message_ID sequence that would order correctly in threads but the difficult one is to re-create the old Message_ID numbers so that links/references to messages either by bookmark in a thread or by detail.cfm work. I haven't a clue how that could be achieved. Maybe Jim Dixon has an idea with the supersearch index but I can't see how to do it. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: Jim Dixon Date: 18 Jun 05 - 12:45 PM Jon: I didn't mean to give the impression of any expertise I don't actually have. My experience in programming was long ago. (It was mostly in COBOL, in fact.) It gave me some appreciation of the complexities of programming, but I am far from being able to fix the current problem. I only meant to point out that some information seems to exist in the index about how the messages were originally numbered. How to extract that information and use it, is totally beyond my experience. There might not be a practical way—or any way—to do it. I was hoping someone else could figure something out. Meanwhile, here are some more observations that I hope will be useful to someone: Even some very old messages appear out of sequence, and seem to have been renumbered. It isn't just the messages since December, 2004. See this thread for instance: Lyr Req: You're a Rascal, Tarry Flynn. There are 20 messages. Only the last message is recent; all the other postings are from 1999. If you number the messages according to their age, they appear in this order: 19, 2, 1, 12, 13, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 14, 18, 15, 17, 16, 20. That means the oldest message appears in position 3, the second oldest in position 2, the third oldest in position 6, etc. In other words, they are quite scrambled. |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Jon Date: 18 Jun 05 - 02:04 PM Jim, I'm no expert either. I had understood what you were saying and looking for and had a feeling you could be right. Looking again at the supersearch index, I see it does give the date/time of the post, the thread_ID and what we think is the correct message_ID. It might be possible to match that up with the date/time and thread_ID in the threads title although I'm not sure what you do if 2 date times are equal but I don't think that is unresolvable. It doesn't sound impossible. For Each record in threads Select matching records in index by date/time and thread_ID Assign thread record the message_ID Next record. It needs a bit of refinement but what do you think in principle? |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: GUEST,Jon Date: 18 Jun 05 - 02:16 PM I meant record in messages above. One other thought from me. how many posts are there? !!!
-Joe Offer- |
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Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Troubles From: JedMarum Date: 18 Jun 05 - 02:39 PM Thanks Max of fixin' us up. We appreciate your hard work. |
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