!!! Even Bigger Changes Ahead !!!

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Midnite and I have become increasingly dissatisfied with our current host and more than likely at some point this weekend we'll be beginning the process to switch the forum over to a new host. That will require the forum to be shut down at some point until the switch has been completed and everything has been setup on the new host. In an ideal world, that might not take much time - but, sadly, we don't live in an ideal world. The average downtime for a hosting switch is 24 to 48 hours, and we'll certainly post a notice of when the switch has begun to take place. But having already gone through three hosts, we've learned that the process can sometimes take closer to the 48 hours (or even longer), depending on how long it takes TPTB that handle the Internet's DNS servers to point our domain to the new hosting account.

The good news in all this, though, is that after the switch the forum will have more than 10 times the Web storage space that it currently has and more than 3 times the allocated bandwidth that it currently has. Some of you may not have the vaguest idea what that means, but suffice it to say that it will allow us to introduce some new features as well as revive some older ones without having to worry that we'll run out of Web storage space too soon or that the forum will slow to a crawl. So hopefully any inconvenience the switching downtime might bring will be more than made up for after the switch finalizes. 

[Josette]

Sounds exciting!!

[Lydia]

Good luck with the switch!

[Julianka7]

Keeping my fingers crossed the switch will be easy and non stressful for you both. 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

It's looking like our big switch will be delayed for a bit because I'm still waiting to hear back from one of the parties involved. However, the good news is that our new hosting account is already up and ready for the switch to take place. And I can also reveal that at long last the forum's built in spellcheck feature will be available because our new host's version of PHP supports it. Farewell typos and misspellings!   

A notice will be posted once the switch begins to take place...

[Patti Feinberg]

Thank you MB and Midnite...sounds arduous 


Patti

MB, what the heck is the picture of your avatar??

[Mysterious Benefactor]

MB, what the heck is the picture of your avatar??

The avatar itself and the caption say it all. It's taken from an episode of a TV show in which a woman is about to lick a light switch as lightning flashes all around her. (Licking the light switch will prevent a murder - but don't ask how because that would ruin all the fun.  )

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Sorry I didn't get a chance for a bit more advanced notice, but starting tonight at 10pm ET / 7pm PT the forum will be put into Maintenance Mode and the process to switch to our new host will begin. And from there we'll just wait.    The Maintenance Mode message will remain on display so long as our domain still points to our current host. So, until it disappearance, you'll know the switch hasn't taken place. But once it has, as soon as we become aware of it, we'll post a page to say that we're uploading all of the forum's files to our new host. So, until then...

[Mysterious Benefactor]

We're back!!

The forum *may* still need a few tweaks that I'm not aware of at the moment, but I'm going to bed for at least a few hours.    If anyone comes across something that appears out of the ordinary, please post about it here in this topic, and I'll deal with it later. 

And once again, yay, spell check - farewell typos and misspellings!   

[MagnusTrask]

...except for those things like "lose" vs. "loose", or "to" vs. "too", of course, which drive me nuts....  I envy you your sleep by the way....

[Patti Feinberg]

aaaahhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!


Every time I tried to access the board, I got a message that DSboardsdotcom does not exist!!!


Major HUGE thanks to Annie & Jennifer, who kept me from thinking I was a looser leper.

Patti, who's waiting for GA storm #2.

[MagnusTrask]

looser

You're doing this just to taunt me, aren't you?!

Actually Patti, I think it's temporary computer malfunctions that temporarily create the illusion that this board actually exists.

[EmeraldRose]

Hooray! You're back! It drove me batty when I got the message that there was no such website!  Unfortunately, I didn't read this topic before you went offline. Love the new Spell Check.  But... it isn't perfect, because you could leave a letter off a word, and it's another word, so you still have to make sure you are using all the right words. Spell Check is a welcome addition, anyway! I look forward to posting again.

----- Sally -----

[barnabasjr]

The speed with which this site now flies is beautiful, even the search! Thanks as always!

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Unfortunately, I didn't read this topic before you went offline.

You weren't alone in that. I guess boldfaced red text isn't as much of an attention grabber as we thought it might be. Perhaps the next time we post a request to read a topic we'll try it in flashing 72 point text - or maybe even larger. 

Love the new Spell Check.  But... it isn't perfect, because you could leave a letter off a word, and it's another word, so you still have to make sure you are using all the right words.

It might be great if they could, but no spell check feature considers context - at least not yet. They check the spelling of individual words. If they checked context, well, then they would be called the grammar check feature.    But correct grammar is still and probably always should remain a feature of the human mind. After all, we need to retain some control over computers.