Well, it looks like the site's back to normal and what's giving me the biggest chuckle is that all the rage posts that we've posted since the crashdown have disappeared as if nothing happened.
The obvious reason behind that is probably because Wowio must have gotten their hands on a recent backup (from today) and uploaded it into the site and that copy didn't contain our last few rants, of course.
So I'm very happy that this craptastic thing got resolved and I hope this will be the last of that.
Edit: Oh and for those who missed out on all the exitement, the site crashed today and 3 months worth of content got lost in the process.
You can read about it over here.
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Comic Talk and General Discussion *
Nothing to see here, move along.
Things are not fixed at all. It says all my comics are restored, but they aren't. There are no files at all, just empty pages except for the comments and the page numbers… default html, no comic pages. even though my account pages still list all the pages, they're gone. so now, it's even worse than starting over… I really don't know where to start, now… erase these non-exist but listed pages and upload new copies? Edit the pages that exist so I keep my comments?
EDIT: Never mind, the new Latest News post explained it
Unfortunately it is not a complete restore, the stuff that was on the image servers is definitely gone.
So, Wowio has saved all database information, as well as all images and custom html done before January 13th.
The only things lost were images and custom html uploaded after January 13th. That may still mean a significant amount of effort by some frequent updaters in order to EDIT their comic pages to re-add the images (to retain the comments).
Still I think this is a huge relief after the site almost being rolled back completely 2 months.
I just have to edit my pages? That's it? The comments and everything are all back?! YAY!!!!!
Seriously! Too happy.
Sadly, I was in such a cruddy mood over it I ate a candybar… Arg! I've been trying to lose weight! (Obviously I'm a stress eater.)
Well, least I'm in a good enough mood now to go hop on the treadmill. Whoot!
Oh… I didn't realize the images were still missing. I saw the forums and the PQ's and all the news posts, along with all newest updated comics being back up so I thought it was a resounding fix.
Fixing a page isn't actually all that hard, although pretty tedious.
Here's how to do that.
1. Select "My Account", located under your profile picture.
2. Find the comic you wish to edit and press the "Edit" button next to it.
3. Select "2.Comic Pages".
4. Select the first page you wish to edit and press the "Edit" button next to that.
5. Next to "Page Graphic:" you will find the option to reupload the artwork on this page. Upload the image that you wish to put into this page. This will preserve all the comments that have been left on that page.
6. Press "Send Changes".
Repeat steps through 4 to 6 for every subsequent page.
Like I said… tedious.
Edit: Ah. I see a newspost popped up that explained the exact same thing, while I was writing this…
Oh well, no harm having this information posted on more then one location.
I prefer my version of how the site was restored, but yours is ok I guess.
Just want to say to anyone that complains about having to reload pages. I lost 200 images for the mafia comic. (I'm just glad the actual pages stayed because I don't really keep the images in exact order on my computer.)
I'm glad they could restore comments and make it not the start of the year again, but…
…this even shouldn't have fucking happened in the first place and it isn't acceptable, nor is it really acceptable to just laugh off our anger at it.
That issue is really just a huge flashing, whirring, spinning, dazzling indicator (in comparison to the many smaller ones we've had since Wowio's bought this place) of Wowio's capacity for fucking over the site and it's users and giving nothing more than a "Start re uploading pages because we lost everything including comments and there is nothing we can do."
Like I said, I'm glad most stuff is back, but uploaders are faced with more or less the same task as before and if Wowio wasn't staffed by a group of incompetent morons then this wouldn't have happened in the first place.
Forgiving Wowio for the huge massive fuck up that they told us nothing could be done about is tantamount to excusing it, and I will not be doing so.
Some of us understand the accidents happen no matter how prepared one is. It wasn't just the data that got lost, it was the back ups as well. At least they managed to get it as close as possible to it being as if nothing happened. What also counts as they put a lot of effort into this. If it were me, I would have just given up and said, do what you can. But the people in charge went the extra mile of getting it restored to this point.
Am I angry? No. Am I upset that I have to reload 200 images? A little. But at least it is just the images and not the entire page.
I do agree with what Larry has to say, but more with the mindset that this isn't exactly a rare occurrence. Well, at least actually losing months of data is, but it seems every week DD has another horrible problem that brings us to the brink of destruction and back again. It's almost episodic at this point, like a really bad formula-reliant sitcom.
And with that taken into consideration, I'm at a loss to explain the "oh ha ha, all is forgiven" attitude as anything short of being sycophantic.
So, last night, eager to have my updates prepared for the next over-a-month, uploaded 5 weeks of comics ahead of my update… for last night. Wednesday is my highest traffic day, by far.
As soon as I saw the missing pages, I took a breath and went ahead to reupload the 15 missing pages. It was a pain, and a few pages took three attempts to go up, and it was an extra headache with the site moving slow, as it often does, but it was worth it. An hour or so later, I was done. I was finally all up and ready to share my silly little comic with my beloved readers. The only real problem was the loss of two and a half months of stats, which I eagerly track.
Then the restore happened. A restore that previous posts suggested -wouldn't- happen. Then I was granted the choice of wading knee-deep through the latency-fest to reupload the comics AGAIN.
I put up with a lot from this site, serverwise. Unannounced downtimes, generally slow surfing, and a lack of customizability for non-html people. Not to mention a few miscellaneous complaints, like non-DDers being unable to vote on or comment on my comic (hint: most or all of my readers are NOT DDers).
I have been happy to work within this neat community as long as I have, but I am actively seeking a better option. Thank you, DD, but as soon as I can, I am moving on. Good luck to you guys.
I'm not gonna forgive so easily.There is really no way to have prevented this.
I don't think it should have happened at all.
our HOST- NOTHING TO DO WITH WOWIO- lost our entire site.
And Lawrence Leach, our chief programmer, has been shitting bricks trying desperately to restore the site, staying up through the night, getting backups from here there and everywhere.
You people blaming Wowio in this instance have it wrong. This was not neglect or incompetence or anything of the sort on their part.
Try putting a major site up on on your own and hosting it.
——————
Let me ask you all a question, that includes the perennial complainers Larry and Lefarce especially:
Why can't I blame YOU personally for losing your work last night? Can't I call you both fucking imbeciles for having your comics wiped? Isn't it your own incompetence that caused it to happen?
No, I can't and no it wasn't. It was out of your hands, wasn't it?
THAT is what happened to DD. Understand?
The company that is paid to host the site on their servers, the major commercial host fucked up. Not Wowio, not DD.
Wherever you host on the web you can not be protected from such eventualities, all you can do is recover from them as Lawrence has done here.
Because my post specifically stated it was Wowio. What fantastic readhing comprehension you hav-oh that's right you glance over 99% of my posts. I'll admit I assumed it was though until late in the afternoon when I actually got the site to load the 'duck update'.
My issue stems from the fact that I'm browsing DD, which has experienced another massive fuckup, and regardless of whose fault that is, it doesn't change that fact that DD has experienced another fuckup.
Yeah the difference is I'm not in charge of DD's backups or making sure that the people hosting the server are competent at keeping their shit together, dumbass.
I'm tired of you kissing wowio's ass at every chance you get, because frankly they ARE to blame in the midst of this mess and their whole mishandling of the situation (see: vidihawk) only makes it worse. I don't know if you think you have some sort of future position with them or something, but it's fucking nauseating and I'm sick of having to read your pretentious shit about how wowio can do no wrong.
They fucked up here, and it's part of a beautiful series of screw ups they've done since they've bought this site, except this time everyone got fucked out of updates and the site is slow as shit again and they do not deserve any sort of forgiveness from any users.
There is a difference between hiccups and constant downtime and errors and broken features and going back into the past for three months but not really but sort of that makes it really frustrating and difficult to use the site, and I guess it's just the straw that broke the camels back for some.
It was stated earlier that DD is on WOWIO servers. In fact an almost quote is 'After Wowio moved the site to their servers…' So, that was what I was going on… the official word that DD is hosted on Wowio servers. But even if it isn't, Wowio is in charge of overseeing site backups… I mean, why would that even be an issue? If you care about your site you make sure it's being backed up properly, right? What else does a sysop/chief programmer do? That's part of the job.
The fact is, they realized their screw-up and searched down an incomplete backup. I think it's obvious that no one at Wowio has ever even read a webcomic on DD… they thought, oh well, the little people can upload their sites again, if not, new little people will join with new comics. They then realized that people on here treasure their comments and feedback and that we 'little people' were truly pissed off about losing our comments… it isn't a matter of uploading pages, we were losing feedback and connections with fans of our comics. Only then did they say, oh well, let's skip brunch and see if we can dig up a partial restore to give them their comments back.
So, a bunch of execs missing a meal doesn't impress me much… they make money from US, not the other way around.
Lefarce and Larry, You can leave if you like.
I don't care about your constant complaining one little bit.
You are wrong yet again and can't take it. You are childish and I am through humouring you both.
————
Tim, I understand that you are feeling Mad. So am I, so are we all. But your anger is completely misdirected.
The host DD is on is a major, major company. They host some of the biggest sites on the net. This was their job to see that things were backed up and all ship shape.
They fucked up.
Not Wowio.
Lawrence, our chief programmer, worked as hard as he was able to. He luckily had a special backup that he'd made for testing.
With further calls to our HOST he was able to get THEM to find and restore our database. And that was after THEY claimed that it was all gone.
What people are tending to do now is akin to blaming the Japanese government for their Earthquake and Tsumani.
I'm going to stay to finish up my one active comic out of respect for my co-author and what readers will have stuck around after this, but I'm leaving very very soon. It doesn't help that wowio is either really incompetent or (worse) simply doesn't care but that the one lifeline to helping get our opinions a little more known to wowio thinks that we're crazy (and perennial complainers no less!) for being mad about this shit happening as it has.
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