Forum Changes (again)

[drcollie]

When I first started this forum, I did it as cheaply as possible. Business was bad and there was not much extra cash. So I hosted it at GoDaddy.com on a shared server at a cost of $ 9.00 per month and I had no idea if anyone would even use it, so that's as much as I wanted to spend on it (cost of setup and the software was an additional $ 700).

Well, turns out the forum is a hit and has a lot of visits, but the Shared Server meant huge variations in waiting time for the forum to load. Basically we had to wait our turn for resources and that meant load times up to 30 seconds on a page, which is annoying at best. That's what you get for $ 9 a month.

We've upgraded to the very latest v.bulletin thanks to Aarons' volunteer work and re-arranged the way the forum handles photos thanks to Gail's work, and we're still S-L-O-W.

So today I decided to upgrade us to a VPN (Virtual Private Network) which means we might share a server with 4 or 5 other godaddy.com customers rather than 3,500. Our load speeds will increase dramatically once the move is made to that new server, and once again I have to depend on Aaron and/or Gail to help out since I am all thumbs on doing that. Hopefully the move will be done sometime this week and I'm sure you see a noticeable speed difference in page load times.

Cost per month is ten times the old one ($ 90 per month) but I'll consider it an advertising expense and continue to make it free with no obligation to anyone that wants to use it. I'm a big believer in that you should buy from whomever you want to, but do appreciate any business that comes my way as without sales I cannot offer a no cost service such as this along with the Icovia Room Planner which costs $ 19 a month.

If you know of a way to make our forum even better, please let us know! You can post ideas here, or PM either myself, Aaron or Riddle (Gail).

[drcollie]

Whoooo-Hooo! Looks like the new server is up and running, look at the speed now.....

Aaron says you will have to reset your bookmarks for the site, because of the new server. Do that and we all should be good to go.

[aaron]

Not everybody will have to update their bookmarks, assuming that's how they get here, but if you have a problem navigating from a bookmark please try resetting it.

[Maxie-ann]

Duane,
So excited about this!! This is great! Now for some reason I could not open the shipping rates etc. information. I need to get all my facts for hubby, you know how you men are!! and time is ticking for me. We are in Upstate,NY.
thanks,
Maxie-ann

[Us+2 ferts&theDog]

Thank you riddle, aaron & Duane!! I held my breath when the forum went offline last night...just before Thanksgiving (oh my! Nothing like a little pressure, eh?). I was very glad to see it up and running this morning (after dreaming of leather swatches all night )

Tammy

[aaron]

We had a minor glitch with attachments associated with changing to a new server. If you're looking at attachments on a thread, they should work now.

[Us+2 ferts&theDog]

Aaron,

I've been trying to view the H&M Resource pix and the attachments ain't there. I've tried reloading pages, with no change. Any suggestions?

Tammy

[aaron]

I see we still have problems in some threads....

We'll keep working on it.

[Us+2 ferts&theDog]

I (We) appreciate your due diligence. Nothing like working on the forum while preparing for Thanksgiving!

Tammy

[drcollie]

We thought it best to make the change to the new server as quickly as possible. The forum was bog-slow the past week, on that shared server there just was not enough resources and another client was taking all the power. Aaron has worked tirelessly on getting this up and running, and he's all self-taught on the intricacies of hosting and v.bulletin as a volunteer, to make this forum a better place and FASTER place to be. I can't thank him enough. We were swapping emails back and forth last night at 1:30 a.m. ! (Aaron, Riddle and I) on the faults and hiccups the transfer caused. But its mostly bug free from here on out....and everyone should see much faster page loading times now.