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The Servers Overloaded!?


hedberg

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Just a thought, what has happen to GC.com since the problem started? The PQs were extended from 5 to 20 per user, and up to 5 per day.

 

Might this be a problem, that some users has gone "PQ-crazy" and wants five PQs every day with 500 entries in each? If let's say 1000 people wants that every day, will it be 5000 big PQ's to email every day for GC. Might that be a problem also??

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Below is what I seem to be getting as an answer to every second request today. Is this what we should be expecting as a response in the future ??

 

Description: An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below.

 

Stack Trace:

 

[NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.]

Geocaching.UI.seek_cachedetails.BuildCachePage() +17087

Geocaching.UI.seek_cachedetails.Page_UserLoggedIn(Object sender, EventArgs e) +57

Geocaching.UI.WebformBase.IsLoggedIn() +1079

Geocaching.UI.seek_cachedetails.Page_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) +325

System.Web.UI.Control.OnLoad(EventArgs e) +67

System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +35

System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain() +731

 

Or,,, is the purpose only to 'un-serve' selected set of the users ?? Pls let us know if this is the case!!

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The PQs were extended from 5 to 20 per user, and up to 5 per day.

WHat? I know that you are limited to 5PQ a day but what do you mean by extended from 5 to 20? As for the rest of your post, I don't think that is the problem, I'm pretty sure the site has plenty of bandwidth, the problems are with the server and all the bots that attack them.

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While it is nice that geocaching seems to be catching on, it is frustrating that the server can not handle the load.

 

I am sure that TPTB are trying to resolve the recently surfaced problems, but it is getting pretty tiring trying to log finds, activate caches or even trying to get them uploaded for approval, look up new caches and more only to have one of many SERVER ERROR messages pop up. :ph34r:

 

It doesn't seem to be during "expected heavy use" times either. I tried to log stuff from yesterday and was doing it at a rather late hour, only to have the error messages foil the action I was attempting to do.

 

I will contiune to support as a premium member, because I feel geocaching is a great hobby, promotes family activity and the website, despite the current problems, is well laid out and informative. :ph34r:

 

Yes, while frustrating we can only live with it until the problems are resolved.

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After things cleared up last night, I got my caches logged. But now, when I look at one of the mini-maps that is supposed to have caches I've found checked. I find that they're not checked. Anyone else experiencing this? Yeah, I know, its a small thing, not that important. I was just curious....

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It doesn't seem to be during "expected heavy use" times either. I tried to log stuff from yesterday and was doing it at a rather late hour, only to have the error messages foil the action I was attempting to do.

Keep in mind that your late hour isn't everyone elses. This is an international sport. I'm 3 hours behind you, for example.

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Keep in mind that your late hour isn't everyone elses. This is an international sport. I'm 3 hours behind you, for example.

Yep, thats true, and please don't think that my post was meant to be demeaning in any way!

 

I really think the site is great and will continue to to support it throughout its "growing pains" :ph34r:

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I don't spend much time in the forums, but I checked in today to see if anyone knew what was going on with my "Server Too Busy" messages.

 

And I find, as I kind of expected, that there's a host of people a lot more concerned and frustrated with the problem than my sporadic-cacheing self.

 

I guess I just want to say Thanks to Jeremy and everyone else who puts time, effort, and blood into keeping this ride running. I know I don't know the half of it. But when I feel an itch to look for tupperware in odd places, this site is amazing, and does far more than I'd ever need it to.

 

My membership is the best money I ever spent, and thanks for all the stuff you do that I never give a thought to.

 

And I'll try the site later, to see if you've cracked the problem... Thanks again everyone.

 

Shannon

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It doesn't seem to be during "expected heavy use" times either.  I tried to log stuff from yesterday and was doing it at a rather late hour, only to have the error messages foil the action I was attempting to do.

Keep in mind that your late hour isn't everyone elses. This is an international sport. I'm 3 hours behind you, for example.

And I'm always ahead you, meaning I can beat you with about 8 hours as a FTF :ph34r:

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Being an IT Engineer, I can tell ya exactly why the servers are such a problem.

 

The entire east coast has been hit by a 50+ degree weekend after months below freezing. Everyone and their mother is out Geocaching, Muggling, and whatever. The woods are CRAWLING with humans emerging from their homes. Couldn't tell mugglers from cachers today!

 

After all that, everyone comes home and completely overloads the Geocaching.com server. It's nobody's fault really, the weather has created an unusually high demand on the servers today. All the messages you're receiving is the server saying "YAAAAHHHH! Cant... Handle... Too... Many... I give up. Can't do it. Funny error message for you."

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Add to that the fact that there were 16 events yesterday accross the US. Then add to that the novelty of getting out and caching on February 29... something you can only do every 4 years and that does add up to a lot of cachin'!

 

I know I took full advantage of an event and 60 degree weather to get out and cache... in short sleeves... on February 29th. Something that I may never get to do again! :ph34r:

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Ok, I'm going to put in my two cents. I have been banned (Get a denile page when i goto geocaching.com) and i was not running a bot in your deffinition. I was however "scrapping" data in the areas in which i trave regularly.

 

When i was trying to adjust the cumstom means on how i download your pages (using a modified IE 6.0 application) I was banned. Having Cable makes connection attempts go very fast when the server is fast. So scraping is only slowing things down when their is a real load. I was making a single connection a couple of times minute (my guess) to download ruffly 5 to 10 caches at a time.

 

I am not havesting for stats or anything else. I am running a database on my laptop that only looks up pages it never looked up before. Mostly to retrive vital information about a cache so i can use it when i'm out and about. I travel most of AZ reguarly, So i was down;oading my first bigger grouping when i was banned. I am not doing this to cause any harm or damage. If not anything cause less load in the long run. I get the info i want once and i don't comeback browsing before every trip i make.

 

If there is an approval means of downloading data, I would like to jump the hoops. I don't want to cause any damage or be blamed either.

 

I feel i am not stealing... just getting what i want (or might want in the future) in a short period of time. I have no need for anything but the cache info it's self. Maybe help me and others like me with XML feeds. I know this goes against member services, but maybe that should or could be part of it.

 

I very well plan to become a member just to be able to download .loc files to keep current with. But i would like to know the limitations on which i guess is being labled as scrapping, how bout "high speed browsing for future use". I don't want to be banned... But i don't see the difference if i do it with a scrip or bot then if i do it by clicking the links and printing pages (which aren't the helpful).

 

Anyway... I'll coop to scrapping yesterday for what only worked right of less then one hour (between the different small batches). Went out last night and it was great to have all the info at my fingertips though, like others have said. I don't want to hammer anything but i also have not seem anything yet about limitations and how to get aproved scrapping times (or methods).

 

MadManX of Team XtroTech

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XtroTech,

 

Buy a membership and sign up for pocket queries. They're much more useful, and are generated in a manner that avoids undue server load on the website. Scraping the website and hitting up the server for the same info. that members are paying for in pocket queries is unfair to the rest of us, who want to access online information at Geocaching.com for purposes other than obtaining cache information (such as logging our finds).

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If a pocket quiery is the all in one solution then why would there be any bots at all. Looking (when i last could) at what membership entitles, pocket quieries said nothing more then customised quires of caches and .loc files. For not seeing what this is and not knowing what it contains, this does not fit to what i was wanting. At least i think it doesn't. I'll gladly purchase a membership even if this isn't my perfect fix. But if it is not, then what?

 

Maybe a new feature or something to keep bots or scrapping away is better then trying to ban people. I now have serveral logs and a TB that can't be logged because i'm banned. Thats not helping the comunity any more then the server being slow.

 

I don't want to break things and i'll work within rules if i were givin them. Sorry for my 1.5 hours (reported by the admin to me) of could have been slowdown. But that that many times less that i will have to browse outside of logging.

 

MadManX of Team XtroTech

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