That other place down…

[Sailor Kenshin]

…possibly forever?

Tried for a few hours this morning to get onto FPN. No go. Could they have disappeared? A pity if so. There was a ton of good content on there. And good people.

And this on the heels of another of my forums biting the dust, but at least this other one gave a week's warning.

Anyway,

[Ron Z]

That is a large site, with a huge amount of data accumulated over the 17 years or so of it's existence. Before we assume that the plug has been pulled, a more reasonable option is that the site was overdue for some upgrades and maintenance.... like getting the classifieds fixed. That is going to take some time to do, and to test before it reappears. New Years eve, when most people are distracted, is a good time to do it.

[724Seney]

That is a large site, with a huge amount of data accumulated over the 17 years or so of it's existence. Before we assume that the plug has been pulled, a more reasonable option is that the site was overdue for some upgrades and maintenance.... like getting the classifieds fixed. That is going to take some time to do, and to test before it reappears. New Years eve, when most people are distracted, is a good time to do it.

Given your administrative role on FPN, it would be nice if you would clarify whether you are speaking in some sort of an "official" capacity...... or if this is just your own personal speculation.

[Sailor Kenshin]

That is a large site, with a huge amount of data accumulated over the 17 years or so of it's existence. Before we assume that the plug has been pulled, a more reasonable option is that the site was overdue for some upgrades and maintenance.... like getting the classifieds fixed. That is going to take some time to do, and to test before it reappears. New Years eve, when most people are distracted, is a good time to do it.

Dishracted? *hic* Moi? 🍸🍺🥂🍻🍾

[Chrissy]

That is a large site, with a huge amount of data accumulated over the 17 years or so of it's existence. Before we assume that the plug has been pulled, a more reasonable option is that the site was overdue for some upgrades and maintenance.... like getting the classifieds fixed. That is going to take some time to do, and to test before it reappears. New Years eve, when most people are distracted, is a good time to do it.

Dishracted? *hic* Moi? 🍸🍺🥂🍻🍾

Happy New Year. Just made my first French 75 of 2023 🍾 🥂

[mana]

Returns a 500 error so could be a number of things. One thing is sure, it hasn't permanently "disappeared" or "gone", just a temporary outage. Too bad, I was kind of waiting for hanging out there now that I have some time to kill this Saturday (and an interesting recent purchase to chew the fat on). Oh well...there is here, reddit, and FB also (among others).

[Sailor Kenshin]

Returns a 500 error so could be a number of things. One thing is sure, it hasn't permanently "disappeared" or "gone", just a temporary outage. Too bad, I was kind of waiting for hanging out there now that I have some time to kill this Saturday (and an interesting recent purchase to chew the fat on). Oh well...there is here, reddit, and FB also (among others).

No fakebook or reddit for me, but, if this is the same server as that other forum that went away, they, too, were experiencing similar problems before the owner shut it down.

[Sailor Kenshin]

Returns a 500 error so could be a number of things. One thing is sure, it hasn't permanently "disappeared" or "gone", just a temporary outage. Too bad, I was kind of waiting for hanging out there now that I have some time to kill this Saturday (and an interesting recent purchase to chew the fat on). Oh well...there is here, reddit, and FB also (among others).

What sorts of things could a 500 error mean? In the FPN past, when it was down, we got one of those more personalized messages....'Dear friends of this fountain pen nut house...' or something similar.

[Jerome Tarshis]

Although I am not a Web professional, I can say that as a user of Web sites I consider this last to be a good point. In the past we have had an FPN screen that began with "Dear friends ...." and went on to say FPN's Web arrangements were being worked on. The same is true of many other sites that are being worked on in whole or in part: we see a screen that tells us at the very least that the page is under construction. We don't see an error message with a number.

Time will bring further realities, but may not bring a transparent explanation of what happened.

[LizEF]

What sorts of things could a 500 error mean? In the FPN past, when it was down, we got one of those more personalized messages....'Dear friends of this fountain pen nut house...' or something similar.

It means only that the server doesn't know how to reply to the request and none of the defined error messages apply. It could be that the database crashed, or the forum app crashed, or someone hacked something, or some similar problem. It could mean that Wim is operating in emergency mode and didn't take the time to post a message, opting instead to just shut some things down and work on recovery. Whatever else is true, the server (hardware and HTTP server) and domain (fountainpennetwork.com) are both there and functional, just not the forum app. My personal worry is that something crashed and Wim doesn't know yet (because he hasn't been using the site). And if that's the case, unless someone knows a sure-fire way of communicating with him, and has done so, the site could be down indefinitely until he realizes it's offline (or until the hosting service reboots something or whatever).

My hope is actually that he took things down intentionally to do some fixing. We'll see.

[Sailor Kenshin]

What sorts of things could a 500 error mean? In the FPN past, when it was down, we got one of those more personalized messages....'Dear friends of this fountain pen nut house...' or something similar.

It means only that the server doesn't know how to reply to the request and none of the defined error messages apply. It could be that the database crashed, or the forum app crashed, or someone hacked something, or some similar problem. It could mean that Wim is operating in emergency mode and didn't take the time to post a message, opting instead to just shut some things down and work on recovery. Whatever else is true, the server (hardware and HTTP server) and domain (fountainpennetwork.com) are both there and functional, just not the forum app. My personal worry is that something crashed and Wim doesn't know yet (because he hasn't been using the site). And if that's the case, unless someone knows a sure-fire way of communicating with him, and has done so, the site could be down indefinitely until he realizes it's offline (or until the hosting service reboots something or whatever).

My hope is actually that he took things down intentionally to do some fixing. We'll see.

Same here.

Wow! That is a detailed response. Thanks very much; I know so little about such things.

Good to see you here, too.

[LizEF]

Same here.

Wow! That is a detailed response. Thanks very much; I know so little about such things.

Good to see you here, too.

Yes, good to see all the familiar faces. You're welcome. I noted that this morning the error page has changed. I can't begin to guess why, but I think it's a good sign and most likely means that some human somewhere is involved.

[724Seney]

What sorts of things could a 500 error mean? In the FPN past, when it was down, we got one of those more personalized messages....'Dear friends of this fountain pen nut house...' or something similar.

It means only that the server doesn't know how to reply to the request and none of the defined error messages apply. It could be that the database crashed, or the forum app crashed, or someone hacked something, or some similar problem. It could mean that Wim is operating in emergency mode and didn't take the time to post a message, opting instead to just shut some things down and work on recovery. Whatever else is true, the server (hardware and HTTP server) and domain (fountainpennetwork.com) are both there and functional, just not the forum app. My personal worry is that something crashed and Wim doesn't know yet (because he hasn't been using the site). And if that's the case, unless someone knows a sure-fire way of communicating with him, and has done so, the site could be down indefinitely until he realizes it's offline (or until the hosting service reboots something or whatever).

My hope is actually that he took things down intentionally to do some fixing. We'll see.

Most probably already know this but @LizEF is one of the "good guys" (I hope to say it that way is ok) over at FPN. As a Moderator, she is always friendly, approachable, helpful.
Thanks Liz, the input & perspective you have provided in this post is definitely appreciated!

[LizEF]

Most probably already know this but @LizEF is one of the "good guys" (I hope to say it that way is ok) over at FPN. As a Moderator, she is always friendly, approachable, helpful.
Thanks Liz, the input & perspective you have provided in this post is definitely appreciated!

Thank you, Seney! (Though, I'm not a moderator on FPN or anywhere else (well, except my own websites).) Let's all hope and pray that Wim is well and is on the case! (No idea where @junglejim got his info, but I hope that's the case.)

[Prettypenguin]

It was a bit of a surprise, as I have been extremely online over there lately. I hope it comes back soon in as good or better condition than it left us.

[Misfit]

@Prettypenguin: Are you PenguinCollector on FPN?

[Prettypenguin]

@Prettypenguin: Are you PenguinCollector on FPN?

Yes, I am ! Funny enough, I am also prettypenguin over there, but I lost the info for rhat username in 2012 and never got to post anything. PM me on here- I have something for you.

[TSherbs]

End of the year pause for clean-up/changes? Who's in the know....?

[junglejim]

It must have been the IG ink that Yazeh recently posted about at FPN. Some of it must have dripped down into the computer circuit boards and shorted something out. Remember what Mr. Scott from Star Trek said? "The more they overthink the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain."

Of course it could also be the yearly replacement of the hamsters powering everything.

Have a Safe New Years!

[Bold2013]

It must have been the IG ink that Yazeh recently posted about at FPN. Some of it must have dripped down into the computer circuit boards and shorted something out. Remember what Mr. Scott from Star Trek said? "The more they overthink the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain."

Of course it could also be the yearly replacement of the hamsters powering everything.

Have a Safe New Years!

I got IG all over my laptop keyboard and it still works (toddlers and fountain pens don’t mix).