As ever we give Graham a round of applause for what seems to have been a speedy resolution. (Touch wood).
Having had problems with forum software myself earlier this week I know what a minefield it can be - and an exciting challenge too - to fix it. However at the back of your mind there is always a feeling that while you are doing your upmost to fix it there are people clicking impatiently on their mice trying to use the forum.
However you will notice there were regular updates at the head of the page - how often do we comment on information being lacking at times of rail disruption....
I'm fairly sure the direct problem is fixed. I do, however, remain less sure of why it occurred, and repeated. I think I know but there's an element of doubt that means I'll keep monitoring carefully for a while and leave database backups (which may effect performance noticeably) in place for a while.
Keeping the customer informed during disruption is something that I have learnt from the rail industry - often as examples of how not to do it. First test when I noticed the forum was down was to see if it was general and at the server end or something local to my internet connection / browser, or specific to my login. Once generally known, then I've learned the stages need to be:
a) Take action to stop any immediate problems getting worse
b) Let people know that there's an issue, and give an update time
c) Do some work to(wards) get(ting) the thing fixed
d) Update by the time already notified - even if it's just a further time for update
e) goto c)
Users sending me messages "do you know the forum is down" are helpful at the early stage - that may be how I learn of the problem, and also help me to be made quickly aware that it's a more general issue. Messages with clues as to what happened / odd things noticed may be real gems in telling me something that I hadn't seen / noticed that's a big clue. But once the problems's noted and described, they become heartwarming in that I know people care, but a diversion from actually fixing the problem. Thus the status pages and reports.
It actually costs a few minutes to do the status pages - and I have the luxury of being invisible / isolated from our users while I'm doing it. And I don't have the mandated deadlines and the serious issue of people building up to get home that the rail industry has. Additionally, forum users are well read, bright people and well know to us as friends for the most part with whom the sharing of a degree of background technical information and probabilities works well. These are not necessarily the metrics of rail users in general, so whether the technique described and used would work in the case of rail delays, I'm not sure. "We don't know if we're going to have to cancel the 12:02 to Westbury - we will give you an update by 11:30" seems sensible but will everyone understand, and does the time taken in getting the message out mean there's less chance of it running due to a loss of fixing time?
Anyway ... I am still keeping a watching brief after yesterday ... and the status has been updated to reflect that.
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