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from the you-dump-the-data-out,-you-load-the-data-in,-you-do-the-hokey-cokey... dept.
Over the coming days and weeks we will be switching servers from Linode to our own hardware. The first switch will take place tomorrow. This will also require some DNS changes but you just keep using the same URLs that you are using today. Other than that services should look and behave exactly as they do now. There may well be minor disruptions to connections and we ask you to please bear with us if they occur. There will be pauses of a day or more in between each service being switched over, while we continue to monitor that everything is working as expected.
Moving the data from a live server to a new server means that there will be a finite time between making a backup and installing it on the new server. The site will indicate that maintenance is being carried out. That implies that posts made during this interval will be lost. The process will begin around 1600 UTC on Monday 28 October. We will attempt to make the switch over as quickly as possible and there should always be a live server online. If you lose access to the site completely remember that you can still contact us via email ('nickname' [@] soylentnews.org), on IRC, or by shouting VERY loudly.
If your comment is lost please do not believe those in the community who will no doubt claim that comments are being intentionally deleted. They are not (unless you are one of our small number of persistent spammers).
Once each switch is completed I would hope that we can inform you immediately. However, that might not always be possible - everyone has to sleep sometime! Please make any observations regarding problems, or even compliments if the system is responding better than before, in the comments for this Meta. However, our testing so far indicates that the new servers are more responsive than the existing servers but of course they have not yet been placed under quite the same load.
UPDATE: You should all be accessing the new server. Please let us know if you experience any problems. A big thank-you to kolie!.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by pe1rxq on Sunday October 27, @11:19AM (2 children)
Just a suggestion, but would it not be better to block posting during the move? Or just shut down the site for a few hours 'due to maintenance'?
I like that you all try to keep everything working, but I am afraid the confusion it creates is not worth it. Not being able to post for a while is IMHO better than knowing a post could just go 'poof'.
Anyway: Good luck with the move! Hope all goes well
(Score: 2) by Unixnut on Sunday October 27, @11:24AM (1 child)
Seconded, as different people will post at different times and may wonder why their posts vanished. Unless you intend to keep this topic pinned to the top of the front page then it will go down as new news is posted, resulting in people possibly missing the notice.
Should not be too hard to re-point the DNS to a temporary "we are undergoing maintenance from $dateTime to $dateTime to migrate to new servers" page while the migration is ongoing. I am sure the community is patient enough to visit later when the migration is done :-)
Likewise I wish you best of luck. Hope it all goes smoothly!
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @11:54AM
We already have plans to do exactly as you are suggesting.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 3, Informative) by drussell on Sunday October 27, @12:37PM
I think the master plan for the main transition is to make the current site a static page that says "Moving servers, please try back in a few minutes" while the currently-live database is being backed up, transferred and then restored onto the new server. You won't be able to post.
While watching Kolie do multiple test runs over the past week, he seems to have got the time to run his backup, transfer and restore procedure scripts down to about 15 minutes total. Your particular DNS lineage may take a few extra minutes to propagate the destination address change.
There should be minimal downtime. You should just see either a "Please wait, moving servers" if you're still hitting the current, old server or see the site running on the new hardware, looking normal and fully functional.
(Note that if you manually, intentionally post anything to the new "testing" server before he does the live migration on Monday, those posts will obviously be lost when he loads the real, live database onto what is currently the "testing" server, soon to become the main live one.)
(Score: 1, Funny) by crunchy_one on Sunday October 27, @01:00PM (3 children)
To stop using meta. Just give it up cold turkey. You'll be better for it. I guarantee it!
(Score: 5, Funny) by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @01:27PM
Lol! You seem to be the only one confused by it. I think we'll keep it.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @01:42PM
It wouldn't be an ideal time. If we change the nexus then all of the previous Metas will need manually changing to whatever we change it to, otherwise we cannot access them by a simple nexus search. You have not given a good reason to change it, other than you seemed to be confused by it - despite there being a big 'SOYLENT' banner on the same story.
When that is the biggest problem we have on the site I might get around to it, until then....
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mrpg on Sunday October 27, @04:51PM
Why? I like it, it's our technical gossip. It's our water cooler talk.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by mrpg on Sunday October 27, @01:53PM (3 children)
So, from Linode to a new server or servers, located where?
Is it dockers on ubuntu?
Good luck!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by fab23 on Monday October 28, @07:16PM (2 children)
Thanks to the work from kolie the transition got very smoothly.
As far as I see it is now a little bit further away from Europe, but still reachable. 🙃
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday October 28, @07:21PM
The second server is much closer to the East coast.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2) by kolie on Monday October 28, @07:49PM
♠ is a spade
(Score: 3, Funny) by acid andy on Monday October 28, @08:00PM
I mean, nice work.
Welcome to Edgeways. Words should apply in advance as spaces are highly limite—
(Score: 4, Insightful) by pTamok on Monday October 28, @08:34PM (2 children)
So well done, and thank you to all involved for their work in facilitating this.
At some point I shall want to throw some money at SN - when is a good time to do this? Or has the time to start doing that passed?
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Monday October 28, @08:51PM (1 child)
We have set up a Stripe payment link but have not yet set up Paypal. I don't think we will even try to set up another bitcoin payment system - I don't think it was ever used and it doesn't seem worth the effort.
While I am impressed with your eagerness to give us money, please be patient for another week or two until we get some of the background admin sorted out.
It has taken us the best part of 2 years to get to this stage and I hope that a few more weeks will not make a big difference. We have some money in our coffers and we are good for the immediate future.
This is now YOUR site. Everyone with an active account owns it.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by pTamok on Monday October 28, @10:30PM
I can wait a few more weeks, but don't forget to let us know when the SN coffers are officially open for filling.
I don't know if it is applicable to the New Edition of SN, but people who pay taxes to the USA might find it advantageous to donate stocks and/or mutual funds rather than cash.
Charity Navigator: Donating Stocks [charitynavigator.org]
It might depend on what kind of non-profit we are, and whether the administrative burden for SN's horde of accountant* is too great,
*Deliberately not plural.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by cmdrklarg on Monday October 28, @09:24PM
Thanks for all the work!
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Monday October 28, @10:14PM
Who made this move/transition happen!
Especially kolie.
You guys rock!
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 3, Informative) by shrewdsheep on Tuesday October 29, @10:22AM (1 child)
This was glitch free. A truly professional effort. Thanks to all!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by janrinok on Tuesday October 29, @10:54AM
You are welcome. More info here: https://soylentnews.org/~kolie/journal/ [soylentnews.org]
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday October 29, @01:05PM
It subjectively seems faster or at least lower overall latency "from click to seeing the desired result". I don't know if you have objective data. Cool.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 29, @06:31PM
> Most legends have their basis in facts. -- Kirk,
> "And The Children Shall Lead", stardate 5029.5
And stardate 5029.6