# ABOUT FREAKIN' TIME



## fubar57 (Aug 20, 2017)

Longest 24hrs or so in my life. Lawdy be praised to who ever fixed it

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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Aug 20, 2017)

We are not fixed yet. We will get it there though. I am in contact with Horse. He will be online tomorrow, so that the Admins/Mod team can discuss the issues and see what we can do.


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## fubar57 (Aug 20, 2017)

Again...many thanks Alder. Hopefully you guys will get more control. We know it's his site but sometimes things need to be addressed during his away time


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## pbehn (Aug 20, 2017)

DerAdlerIstGelandet said:


> We are not fixed yet. We will get it there though. I am in contact with Horse. He will be online tomorrow, so that the Admins/Mod team can discuss the issues and see what we can do.


Well at least he is still alive, not a possibility that was discussed much but it can happen, I hope he is OK.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Aug 20, 2017)

fubar57 said:


> Again...many thanks Alder. Hopefully you guys will get more control. We know it's his site but sometimes things need to be addressed during his away time



That is something we talked about.

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## Wayne Little (Aug 21, 2017)

Seems I missed the fun...but glad all is ok.


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## Gnomey (Aug 21, 2017)

Yay!


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## mikewint (Aug 21, 2017)

You actually "spoke" to him "alive and in color". Will wonders never cease.
Methinks that there is at least ONE of you trustworthy enough to receive the Keys to the Kingdom


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## Old Wizard (Aug 21, 2017)




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## Gnomey (Aug 21, 2017)

mikewint said:


> You actually "spoke" to him "alive and in color". Will wonders never cease.
> Methinks that there is at least ONE of you trustworthy enough to receive the Keys to the Kingdom



And nobody knows which one of us it is...

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## Lucky13 (Aug 22, 2017)

Hmmmm....I wonder what button does?


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## Wayne Little (Aug 22, 2017)

Don't touch nuthin' Jan.....


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## Lucky13 (Aug 22, 2017)

But it's so......pretty!


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## Wayne Little (Aug 22, 2017)

Look out jan's on the prowl.....


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## mikewint (Aug 22, 2017)



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## Gnomey (Aug 22, 2017)

It's not Jan that's for sure...


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## Old Wizard (Aug 22, 2017)




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## mikewint (Aug 24, 2017)

_View: https://youtu.be/kfj0sRiEqx4_


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## Gnomey (Aug 24, 2017)

The safest be is to probably just not let him near any buttons and that should probably include keyboards...


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## Old Wizard (Aug 24, 2017)




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## Wayne Little (Aug 25, 2017)

It was Jan alright...


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## fubar57 (Aug 25, 2017)

Gnomey said:


> The safest be is to probably just not let him near any buttons and that should probably include keyboards...



Keyboards, buttons, toggles, switches, relays, sensors. swipes.................


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## Lucky13 (Aug 25, 2017)

Boobies!

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## Marcel (Aug 25, 2017)

The fallen Madonna.....

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## vikingBerserker (Aug 25, 2017)

....women, liquor cabinet, common household appliances, uncommon household appliances....


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## Gnomey (Aug 25, 2017)

Fallen Madonna with the big boobies?


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## mikewint (Aug 25, 2017)

Lucky13 said:


> Boobies!



You can try Jan but they won't like it


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## Marcel (Aug 26, 2017)

No, he means this:

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## Wayne Little (Aug 26, 2017)




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## Lucky13 (Aug 26, 2017)

Terry showing off again, during his moustache era....


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## Robert Porter (Aug 26, 2017)

Can someone please get enough "authority" to clean up the group builds section?

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## Marcel (Aug 26, 2017)

For the people who don't know, the picture I posted is from a renown BBC documentary called 'Allo ' Allo.


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## Old Wizard (Aug 26, 2017)

'Allo'


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## CORSNING (Aug 26, 2017)



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## Lucky13 (Aug 26, 2017)

Wasn't me this time!


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## Wayne Little (Aug 27, 2017)

yes it was....


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## mikewint (Aug 27, 2017)



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## Gnomey (Aug 27, 2017)




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## Lucky13 (Aug 27, 2017)

Something stolen from the family album again?

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## CORSNING (Aug 28, 2017)

You the man this time Mike.


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## Gnomey (Aug 28, 2017)

Everyone will get their turn...


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## Robert Porter (Aug 28, 2017)

Okay y'all just like messing with me right? I tried to log on an hour ago and the site was "Temporarily Unavailable" it is back now obviously but someone does not want me to get to comfortable with that fact!


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Aug 28, 2017)

Robert Porter said:


> Okay y'all just like messing with me right? I tried to log on an hour ago and the site was "Temporarily Unavailable" it is back now obviously but someone does not want me to get to comfortable with that fact!



The forum is going to be up and down. Horse is making updates to the server.


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## Robert Porter (Aug 28, 2017)

That is a worthwhile cause!


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## Robert Porter (Aug 28, 2017)

That said, it would be nice if someone active ends up with the necessary rights to post things like front page maintenance coming or scheduled messages. Most sites I manage, we swap out the home page with an informative single page with a comment about what is happening and when service should resume. We keep a baby server just for this purpose and prior to taking a sites server down we repoint the IP address to the baby server. After its up we swap it back, easy peasy!


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Aug 28, 2017)

Robert Porter said:


> That said, it would be nice if someone active ends up with the necessary rights to post things like front page maintenance coming or scheduled messages. Most sites I manage, we swap out the home page with an informative single page with a comment about what is happening and when service should resume. We keep a baby server just for this purpose and prior to taking a sites server down we repoint the IP address to the baby server. After its up we swap it back, easy peasy!



That is being taken care of. We are going to get this back to the way it used to be.

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## Robert Porter (Aug 28, 2017)

That will be fantastic! Anything I can do to help please let me know! Otherwise godspeed!


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## Wayne Little (Aug 29, 2017)

Sounds good to me...


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## Marcel (Aug 29, 2017)

Robert Porter said:


> That said, it would be nice if someone active ends up with the necessary rights to post things like front page maintenance coming or scheduled messages. Most sites I manage, we swap out the home page with an informative single page with a comment about what is happening and when service should resume. We keep a baby server just for this purpose and prior to taking a sites server down we repoint the IP address to the baby server. After its up we swap it back, easy peasy!


I guess you got full control over your domain and servers. You'll probably change the proxy to point to another host. At the moment I have no idea how things are organised behind the scenes here. I don't know if it has load balancing or not, wether there is a possibility for continuous deployment/integration etc. I don't think so but we'll have to see. Maybe we don't control the proxy, I have no experience with cloudflare.


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## Robert Porter (Aug 29, 2017)

Cloudflare has exactly the necessary tools and utilities for what I outlined. But no we don't redirect via a proxy. The public IP is homed to a load balancing cluster. The actual server IP's are private so we just redirect the public IP to a different internal IP via the hosting services control panel. Pretty basic functionality for any hosting company utilizing virtual hosts which is over 90% of the market. The nice thing is since we are not messing with a proxy, or worse, DNS, the changes are instantaneous with no need to wait for addresses to update across the network. It is also rather inexpensive. We host several well trafficked sites on 2 clusters. All for less than 400USD a year. And the smallest sites generate a lot more traffic and disk utilization than a site like this. Unfortunately the hosting market is full of shysters that charge an arm and a leg for services like that. You really have to pay attention to the fine print. "Unlimited" rarely truly means what you and I would think it does.


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## Marcel (Aug 29, 2017)

The redirection, isn't that what you would do with for instance a nginx proxy up front? Outside IP goes to the proxy, which redirects the adres to a server behind it. I usually work with a bunch of dockers behind an nginx proxy on AWS. Changes are pretty much instantaneous, so sounds a lot like what you describe here. Like you, we don't have to touch the DNS. I guess what you do on the panel could be changing the port forewarding, then you don't touch the proxy, but just point to another proxy. I myself never saw a hosting here in the NL that allowed you to do that for a relatively cheap price, apart from AWS that is. But as I said, I don't have experience with cloudflare and what they do.
But I'm not sure what is used here. Most consumers hosting don't have a fine control like that, usually they just only allow you to ftp code to the cgi folder and set up a couple of databases on one server.


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## mikewint (Aug 29, 2017)

Robert, Δεν ήξερα ότι μιλήσατε ελληνικά


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## Robert Porter (Aug 29, 2017)

mikewint said:


> Robert, Δεν ήξερα ότι μιλήσατε ελληνικά


It's all greek to me?

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## Robert Porter (Aug 29, 2017)

Marcel said:


> The redirection, isn't that what you would do with for instance a nginx proxy up front? Outside IP goes to the proxy, which redirects the adres to a server behind it. I usually work with a bunch of dockers behind an nginx proxy on AWS. Changes are pretty much instantaneous, so sounds a lot like what you describe here. Like you, we don't have to touch the DNS. I guess what you do on the panel could be changing the port forewarding, then you don't touch the proxy, but just point to another proxy. I myself never saw a hosting here in the NL that allowed you to do that for a relatively cheap price, apart from AWS that is. But as I said, I don't have experience with cloudflare and what they do.
> But I'm not sure what is used here. Most consumers hosting don't have a fine control like that, usually they just only allow you to ftp code to the cgi folder and set up a couple of databases on one server.


Yep, the setup I use is exactly the same in function to using an nginx proxy as you mentioned. Hosting pricing is literally all over the place. One thing I learned when shopping is never to assume the published prices are nonnegotiable. In fact if you call their sales force directly you can usually get up to 50% off the consumer hosting prices just by asking. By agreeing to a multiyear deal you can reduce your rate as much as 90% off the published rates. 

I have no idea what is behind the setup here, have not really looked to be honest. I recall reading somewhere on an old thread that this site is hosted as part of Horse's business. I don't know if that is true or what exactly it means but the uptime for the forum has been pretty good. What seems to be missing until very recently is continuity in management. Meaning someone that can spend the necessary time and energy to manage the board and keep it tidy etc. Our existing staff have all done a yeoman's job in keeping it as good as they have. But it sounds like soon we will have someone able to get down into the main administrative side of things and do stuff like clean up the group build threads etc. Which is excellent news!

Oh and nothing I said was meant in any way as a criticism of those efforts! This place is a fantastic resource for which I am very grateful!


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## Marcel (Aug 29, 2017)

Robert Porter said:


> Yep, the setup I use is exactly the same in function to using an nginx proxy as you mentioned. Hosting pricing is literally all over the place. One thing I learned when shopping is never to assume the published prices are nonnegotiable. In fact if you call their sales force directly you can usually get up to 50% off the consumer hosting prices just by asking. By agreeing to a multiyear deal you can reduce your rate as much as 90% off the published rates.
> 
> I have no idea what is behind the setup here, have not really looked to be honest. I recall reading somewhere on an old thread that this site is hosted as part of Horse's business. I don't know if that is true or what exactly it means but the uptime for the forum has been pretty good. What seems to be missing until very recently is continuity in management. Meaning someone that can spend the necessary time and energy to manage the board and keep it tidy etc. Our existing staff have all done a yeoman's job in keeping it as good as they have. But it sounds like soon we will have someone able to get down into the main administrative side of things and do stuff like clean up the group build threads etc. Which is excellent news!
> 
> Oh and nothing I said was meant in any way as a criticism of those efforts! This place is a fantastic resource for which I am very grateful!


Yup, there are powers at work here and I just saw Horse online for fixing things. I don't think it will be taken as criticism. Additional insight of experienced people will always be valued, just bring it on

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## fubar57 (Aug 30, 2017)

I know how to turn my laptop on


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## mikewint (Aug 30, 2017)



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## T Bolt (Aug 30, 2017)

fubar57 said:


> I know how to turn my laptop on


I'm one up on you George, I know how to turn it off too. You pull the plug out of the wall, so there!


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## Marcel (Aug 30, 2017)

that does not work with a laptop. You'll have to wait for a couple of hours to get a flat battery


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## Robert Porter (Aug 30, 2017)

Yep unplugging will shut it down, eventually in the case of a laptop. As for tech support, especially via phone, tier one is almost universally horrible. I dread calling to report an outage for my Internet supplier at home. They read from a script and will not deviate. The last 3 times went something like this:

Support: I am so sorry you are having a problem. Please unplug your modem and wait for 30 seconds then plug it back in.
Me: Okay. (Note I have usually done that at least once before I even call)
Support: Thank you! Do you have connection now?
Me: No, the following lights are on on the modem. (Describe the lights, usually the service light is off)
Support: I am so sorry can you please unplug your modem again?
Me: Okay.
Support: Do you have a connection now?
Me: No, the following lights are on on the modem. (Describe the lights, usually the service light is off)
Support: Please hold
Me: Okay. (Hold for from 10 - 30 minutes)
Support: I am so sorry you are having a problem, there is a network outage in your area. Support is working to restore service but at the moment they have not advised of as to how soon.
Me: Thanks! Bye.
Support: Is there anything else we can do for you today as our valued customer?
Me: Yes, please convince your network services people to advise you of outages so when customers like me call we don't have to do this dance each time.
Support: <click>

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## fubar57 (Aug 30, 2017)

My guys are usually named Habeeb and my part of the conversation is usually "....pardon....pardon...pardon...."

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## mikewint (Aug 30, 2017)



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## at6 (Aug 30, 2017)

Good to know that Horse back and alive+well. I was having a lot of conversations with my ISP's technical support. I kept getting Jennifer. Cindy, Ashley, Kim etc. How stupid do they think we are? When everyone has an Indian accent it's easy to tell that you aren't in Kansas anymore.


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## Robert Porter (Aug 30, 2017)

Yeah, Wilbur that I talked to had a distinctly Indian accent come to think of it.


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## Marcel (Aug 31, 2017)

Robert, my provider does that much better. Whenever there is an outage, they will inform you through their website....


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## Wayne Little (Aug 31, 2017)

Marcel said:


> Robert, my provider does that much better. Whenever there is an outage, they will inform you through their website....



Job done then...


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## Robert Porter (Aug 31, 2017)

Marcel said:


> Robert, my provider does that much better. Whenever there is an outage, they will inform you through their website....


 Now if I could only get to their website when my connection is down!


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## mikewint (Aug 31, 2017)

I certainly can't claim to be Tech Savvy but compared to....

Get the right computer - 1
Customer: I'm trying to connect to the Internet with your CD, but it just doesn't work. What am I doing wrong?
Tech support: OK, You've got the CD in the CD drive, right?
Customer: Yeah....
Tech support: And what sort of computer are you using?
Customer: Computer? Oh no, I haven't got a computer. It's in the CD player and all I get is weird noises. Listen.....

Get the right computer - 2
Tech support: What kind of computer do you have?
Female customer: A white one...

Change of Mind
Customer: I keep getting inappropriate pop-ups on my computer and don't want my wife to think that it's me.'
Advisor: 'I will remove them for you.'
Customer: 'How do I get them back when she is not in?'

Step 1...
Customer: Hi, this is Celine. I can't get my diskette out.
Tech support: Have you tried pushing the button?
Customer: Yes, sure, it's really stuck.
Tech support: That doesn't sound good; I'll make a note.
Customer: No .. wait a minute... I hadn't inserted it into the computer yet... it's still on my desk... sorry....

Amusing Password Logic
During a recent password audit, it was found that a blonde was using the following password:
"MickeyMinniePlutoHueyLouieDeweyDonaldGoofyParis"
When asked why she had such a long password, she said she was told that it had to be at least 8 characters long and include at least one capital.

Seeing Stars
Tech support: Are you sure you used the right password?
Customer: Yes, I'm sure. I saw my colleague do it.
Tech support: Can you tell me what the password was?
Customer: Five stars.

Touch and Go
Customer: I have a huge problem. A friend has placed a screen saver on my computer, but every time I move the mouse, it disappears.

Circular argument
Tech support: How may I help you?
Customer: I'm writing my first e-mail.
Tech support: OK, and what seems to be the problem?
Customer: Well, I have the letter 'a' in the address, but how do I get the circle around it?

Local difficulty
Customer: My 14 year-old son has put a password on my computer and I can't get in.
Advisor: Has he forgotten it?
Customer: No he just won't tell me it because I've grounded him.

Language difficulty
Customer: 'How do you spell 'Internet America' ? Is there a space between 'inter' and 'net' ?'
Tech Support: 'No space between 'inter' and 'net' . It's spelled normally.'
Customer: 'Ok. A-M-E-R-I-C-K?' Tech Support: 'That's A-M-E-R-I-C-A.' Customer: 'I-C-K???'
Tech Support: 'A as in apple' 
Customer: 'There's no 'K' in apple!'

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## mikewint (Aug 31, 2017)

1) Customer: 'My disk ran out of space when trying to save my Word document, so I changed it from double spaced to single spaced and it still wouldn't fit!'

2) Advisor: 'Press any key to continue.
Customer: I can't find the 'Any' key.

3) Great Vision
3a) Tech Support: 'Ok, in the bottom left of the screen, can you see the 'OK' button displayed?'
Customer: 'Wow. How can you see my screen from there?'

3b) Advisor: Can you click on 'My Computer'?
Customer: I don't have your computer, just mine.

3c) Advisor: You have Spyware on your machine which is causing the problem.
Customer: Spyware? Can they see me getting dressed through the monitor?

3d) Customer: My family in Australia use BT Softphone, I can see them but they can't see me.
Advisor: What brand is your webcam?
Customer: What's a webcam?

4) No Saving Grace
Customer: 'All my files I saved last week to my C: drive are missing!'
Tech Support: 'Do you remember what directory you first saved them in?'
Customer: 'No, I don't . I just know it was on my C: drive.'
Tech Support: 'Ok, I'll walk you through how to find the files.'
Customer: 'I wouldn't think I would be losing files on this computer. Gee, I just had the hard drive replaced in it yesterday.'

5) Tricky Install
Customer: 'Do I need a computer to use your software?'
Tech Support: 'Ok, I can help you install the software. Would you like me to do that?'
Customer: 'Yes.'
Tech Support: 'All right, can you insert the disk in the disk drive please?'
Customer: 'How?'
Tech Support: 'Place the disk in the opening at the front of the computer.'
Customer: 'Will I have to have my computer delivered before we can do this'

6) Customer: My iPod will only play one song.
Advisor: Which other tracks have you downloaded from iTunes?
Customer: Do I need to download tracks?

7) Tech Support: 'Have you made backups of your software and data?'
Customer: 'I didn't know it had a reverse.'

8) Customer: How do I change channel on my monitor?
Advisor: Your monitor won't have channels like a TV.
Customer: But I was watching the internet channel the other day and now I just get the word processing channel.

9) Customer: My mouse mat isn't wired up.
Advisor: I'm not sure I understand, your mouse mat shouldn't have any wires.
Customer: Well how does it know where my mouse is? Is it wireless?

Give Microsoft a chance
Customer: 'I'm having trouble installing Microsoft Word.'
Tech Support: 'Tell me what You've done.'
Customer: 'I typed A:SETUP.'
Tech Support: 'Ma'am, remove the disk and tell me what it says.'
Customer: 'It says [PC manufacturer] Restore and Recovery disk'.
Tech Support: 'Insert the MS Word setup disk.' 
Customer: 'What?'
Tech Support: 'Did you buy Microsoft Word?'
Customer: 'No...'

Dial Tone
Tech Support: 'Thank you for calling. May I have your phone number beginning with area code first, please?' There was a pregnant pause, then a series of touch tones.
Tech Support: 'Hello? I need your phone number, please'. More touch tones.
Tech Support: 'Hi, can you hear me?'
Customer: 'Yes.'
Tech Support: 'Great, then can you please tell me your phone number so I can pull up your file?' More touch tones.
Tech Support: 'Sir, what's your name?'
Customer: Malcolm
Tech Support: 'Great, now can you tell me your phone number?' Touch tones again.
Tech Support: 'Please, tell me your phone number.'
Customer: 'Again?'
Tech Support: 'Yes sir, if you don't mind, but can you please just tell me verbally?' Touch tones yet again.
Tech Support: 'Sir, contrary to popular opinion, support is not half machine. I'll need you to verbally tell me your phone number with your mouth so I can bring up your account info, got it?'
Customer: 'You people are rude as well as incompetent.'

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## Old Wizard (Aug 31, 2017)




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## T Bolt (Aug 31, 2017)

Marcel said:


> that does not work with a laptop. You'll have to wait for a couple of hours to get a flat battery


Not my laptop Marcel, It's so old it's running Windows Vista. I unplug it and I have maybe 30 seconds before the battery dies and it shuts down

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## Wayne Little (Sep 1, 2017)




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