Problems with Posting

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Paul/Shirley Cole

Problems with Posting

Post by Paul/Shirley Cole »

Over the last week, we've had problems posting to this site. Sometimes it will read "invalid session" or "username already taken." (???) We found a way around it by exiting the site, then coming back into it again. For some reason, it worked for us. I got a couple of emails from people stating that they had problems posting as well, and couldn't even contact the site administrator. So - this post is to both alert the site administrator to the problem, and then offer a suggestion (or at least what worked for us) as to how to get around it. Maybe someone could let everyone know what they could/should do to avoid these error messages. Thanks!
Joey

It could be ;p

Post by Joey »

Hi paul.. I think the error's you mentioned are just common internet error's cause by high traffic or even, are server's make this happen. from Conjestion?

to many peep's getting on at a giving moment. Its hard to say but this stuff happen's. I dont think jeff can really do anything about it?

Have a good week all, no big deal to me. :argue: :-$
Jeff
Posts: 1827
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2002 9:31 pm
Location: Beaver Island
Contact:

Post by Jeff »

Sorry to hear that, but thanks for letting me know. I don't have a quick answer for you but please keep me up to date if the problem continues over the next few days.

The only way that I've produced the "Sorry, but this username has already been taken." is by registering as Jeff for example, deleting my browser's cookies or logging out or using a different browser, and then simply entering Jeff when I go to post. The forum software doesn't allow that (unfortunately) - you have to login with the Login button at the top first, and then post. (hopefully a future version of the forum software will let you login and post at the same time if you get logged out).

The "invalid session" is more of a mystery. How often do you encounter that? Maybe there is an error that I'm not noticing because I'm always logged in when I visit the forum so it uses a cookie instead of temporary sessions for that....

Again, thanks for letting me know there are some glitches. I can't promise I will solve them right away because I'm not seeing them here, but I'll keep a close eye for any other reports. If you ever get an email from friends who can't load the site at all or can't post, forward it to webmaster@beaverisland.net and I'll be glad to try and troubleshoot further (for example if they can't get to the site at all I'll want to know what ISP they're using or even the IP in their mail headers so I can do a traceroute to see where the problem might be in the route between the two. Most of the time any such issues clear up within minutes, but every so often there can be a longer lasting issue).
WiLL
Posts: 11
Joined: Wed Jul 23, 2003 10:14 pm

Just asking :}

Post by WiLL »

Jeff said: so I can do a traceroute.

Hi Jeff just wanted ask you about this Tracer stuff :?: Will you beable to find out who the Guest people are or where there From from that Traceroute. Just asking :)
Jeff
Posts: 1827
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2002 9:31 pm
Location: Beaver Island
Contact:

Post by Jeff »

You can find out which ISP someone uses and from that, very generally where theyâ??re located, but thatâ??s about it.

When someone posts, almost all forum software does record an IP address. Then if there was some reason to, you can go to http://www.arin.net/ and do a whois on any IP to find out who owns the IP block (the person's ISP usually). The only reason I can think of that someone would actually go to the trouble is to report abuse to the ISP. For example if someone is trying to crack into your computer or server, the ISP can usually then take the server log, the IP, and then connect which username was logged in with that IP or who the IP was assigned to during the timeframe in question (not taking into account proxies, etc.). All ISP's should protect their usersâ?? privacy (well, unless you pretend you're the music industry suing a napster/kazaa user where due process seems to have gone out the window for nowâ?¦ but hopefully that will be corrected). So unless law enforcement is involved, the exchange of information is always one-way, meaning the IP lookup is only used to report abuse to the ISP who them would warn the user or disconnect them, but they should never release any personal information or address, etc. So you canâ??t really tell who the person isâ?¦ you can only report severe problems or attacks to the ISP who could then find out who the person is if they take the abuse complaint seriously.

A traceroute (unix/linux) or tracert (windows) on the other hand is simply a log of the route followed between one server and another with three ping times for each router or server the route passes through. If someone is seeing slowness connecting to one site in particular you can zero in on whether the congestion is happening nearer your ISP or nearer theirs which determines which ISP you ask to look into it (because the only one with any real leverage is the person paying the bill!). For example the route from this server to your IP right now goes via above.net to att.net before reaching torchlake.com. You sometimes will see one router in particular which causes a sharp spike in the response times, or where there is a large variance between ping times (meaning the router is responsible for a slowdown not just the geographical distance.) If it goes on for a while without a sign of resolution, you can sometimes get your ISP/datacenter to adjust their BGP routing to add preference to another route. Or every so often if someone canâ??t connect at all, you find there is a router looping, etc. but these are usually fixed within a few minutes. I think there has only been once in the last five years where I â??couldnâ??t get form here to thereâ?? and it wasnâ??t resolved within a week.
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