My notorious **former** domain host, in their efforts to repair my frequent FTP issues, seems to have crashed the server on which my site resides. Once I re-gain my publishing ability, will need to be thought of in the past tense.
To recap the problems I have had -
February 2003 - the renew/resubscribe fiasco >•<February 2003- When I initially transferred the domain to their servers, the tech that assisted me set up the domain space. [Remember that because later in this post it becomes important].
March 12 2003 - the first of many problems with FTP : It worked when I uploaded all of my files -- and suddenly stopped working. I submitted the first of approximately 10 'help desk tickets'. Their solution: instead of having the FTP sign-in I was using, use their suggested 'admin' name. So... I changed the name in my FTP client and uploaded the files that had changed.
March 17-20 2003 - The domain as you remember was down somewhere during this time period. >•<
April - The site was down, a-LOT. FTP didn't work in sub-directories but I could upload, download or rename files in the main directory. The tech told me to back up my site so he could reconfigure the domain. [now, I just finished explaining that I could not upload download or rename files via FTP due to some connection errors...?]
I re-submitted another ticket pointing out this shortcoming on his part, and meanwhile kept trying to access the files. Eventually, I was able to back the site up. I notified them that it had been backed up and they could proceed with whatever they were going to do- and I gave them a ticket reference number EACH time I submitted a ticket for this FTP issue.
They responded to this ticket, with telling me that I set up the domain under apache or somesuchshit when I didn't set it up... [remember the tech in the second paragraph?] And this tech suggested I back up my files so that they can work on the problem. Funny thing, the ticket that he was responding to started with "I have backed up the files on the site as suggested - REF ticket # xxxxxxx." [?] So who is doing what when? [sigh]
Next, I replied referencing the ticket that referenced the ticket that referenced the original request to back up the files to which I had responded with ""I have backed up the files on the site as suggested..."
April 16 2003 - The response I got this time said that the problem was that different files were uploaded under different fTP log-in names. Some were Apache - which the tech orignally did. Some were under the ftp name I set up for use which was the same one I used the first year of my subscription - AND the first two months of this year of my renewed subscription. Never once did I have a problem with this method.
After all that I went through, a tech was finally able to tell me that it did make a difference. The files could only be accessed by the 'owner' or the name they were uploaded under. AND s/he sent me a list of every file on the server with the name it was uploaded by. Learn something new every day. Before I was able to access files no matter what name I had them under as long as the user name and password was set up on the control panel of the domain. [Am I making any sense?]
April 20 2003 - So... is it FIXED? No. it is not fixed. My site will not come up at all. When I access the control panel I get a "the server is experiencing a problem. Please contact our administrator". I submitted a ticket for THIS - early this morning. I just received a response - it is now 10 pm. They will have the admin. look into it. That was all it said. And here I was being paranoid that they pulled the plug on me for being annoying. [grin].
Apr 22 2003 - I gave up on the people. I am now on a new server - or I will be if I did the DNS transfer correctly. [cross your fingers if you believe in it]. If you are here, then obviously I got it right. Thanks for not leaving for good guys. I'll get back to posting as soon as I can.
