World: r3wp

I can't speak for everyone, but yes please. Having the world fast 
is nice, but losing years of data has really shaken my faith in AltMe.

place faith in backups!

but backups can't be used in altme, so unless they are put back into 
the server, they are much less usefull.

for my self, I'd like to have the backup file directly, but not restored 
on the server... I had stopped PMs cause at 4.5 MB... slow... doesn't 
even begin to describe it.

In AltME, your local sync'd copy is supposed to be your backup.  
I did not know it would get deleted on a server problem. "Was not 
supposed to work that way."

(R3 Chat uses better method, and can use demand-based virtual msg 
entries to lower the overhead even more.)

+1 for restoring/merging old and new PMs

AltME uses a write/append which for some reason on Linux means: if 
you cannot append, truncate the entire file to zero.


For performance reasons (blame the early optimization guys), the 
default setting for many file systems on Linux is to write metadata 
independently from data, which means that it often gets written first. 
The result is that if writing the data fails (eg. power failure, 
kernel panic, ...), the files end up 0 length.


This can be disabled by setting the filesystem to always write data 
and metadata at the same time (at the price of write performance).

What filesystem is the AltME world server using? ext2 / ext3 ?

Gab, wow, interesting.

Good info Gab.  Anton ext3.

+1 Carl to restore altme data.

What ext3 journaling level did the server have?

Could one of our world masters please create a "!REBOL3 Proposals" 
group and put it under the R3 divider? Thanks.

Done.

(I don't seem to be able to position it under R3.....Perhaps it'll 
move whe it has some content)

yep... it just did.

Cancel that gripe.....I think it just took a while to resync and 
update the list.

....Or Maxim's dot worked magic.

ah... the magic dot.   ;-)

ok... so I am thinking loud.... should we switch  the new and old 
group namesÉ

since, as Brian noted, so far, most of the !REBOL  discussion has 
been about proposals, ideas and stuff?

oh.. I guess it would break up the [web-public] stuff  and any links 
to them.

Renaming groups should have no effect on either REBOL.org's or REBOL.net's 
links (both use the persistent group number rather than its name).


Taking a group from [web-public] to not web-public.....REBOL.net 
deletes the posts (that does break links). REBOL.org simply stops 
publishing newer posts. So all posts orginally [web-public] stay 
that way.

Carl: http://www.mjmwired.net/kernel/Documentation/filesystems/ext3.txt

data=ordered should be default on ext3 (not so on other fs though), 
but your distribution may be using writeback. or, what you have seen 
may have been due to something else. (personally i've often seen 
the 0 byte files on XFS after crashes, but never with ext3 or ext4)


There's also the fact that the fsync() semantics are not what most 
apps expect it to be, which turned into the filesystems trying to 
work around bad apps... and thus complexity.

This weekend (probably).....The 150,000th [web-public] post in this 
world:
    http://www.rebol.org/aga-groups-index.r?world=r3wp
It could be you!

it would be funny if it was a "." post.

What's the prize?

Who knows?
Maybe., eventually, a name check on REBOLweek.

Bummer, I thought something like a free breast enlargement in Romania 
:-)

I manually removed altme from my Ubuntu netbook today as 1.1.29 would 
neither connect nor uninstall  -  is it worth trying again with a 
more recent release, or should I just use this ole windoze box (with 
1.2.25) and spare myself  the aggravation?

altme 1.2.25 on works for me on ubuntu 10.04

1.1.29 is ancient

and would refuse to update itself because  ... ?

Likely because there's too much difference with 1.2.x, and 1.2.x 
for Linux was always officially just a beta, which they didn't automatically 
update

1.1.x for Linux, I mean

I was using 1.1.29 up until a few weeks ago when it stopped connecting, 
and have been using 1.2.25 since

also Ubuntu 10.04

AltME broken for me....


Background: this morning my Windows computer froze and I had to cycle 
the power on it. (AltME was running, but nothing to suggest that 
AltME was the cause of the problem).


After a reboot, AltME would not start -- complained there was a file 
it could not read.


No worries....I deleted the entire REBOL3 folder, and restarted AltME.


After it had downloaded 40+ meg of messages, all should have been 
back to normal. But the resync process got itself stuck, continually 
resyncing the SQLite group.


I have since tried downloading the whole world again; and I have 
uninstalled AltME completely and started again from scratch. Same 
problem.


Now, if I restart AltME, it looks okay at first. But, if I click 
into the SQLite group (or if someone posts a message to that group) 
the endless resync starts up again.


I am not seeing the problem on a different machine where I have not 
reinstalled AltME.

This is like the opposite of the ancient resync bug :)

***


I suspect the SQLite folder is somehow corrupt on the server; but 
the corruption only triggers trouble on a fresh install.....If so, 
we will all see it eventually :(

Can someone copy this to whoever maintains AltME? Thanks!

install Altme on the other PC !

Who is reporting this ?

So I'm not the only one with the SQLite goup problem..

Thanks.....Good to know it's not just me.

Peter Wood has sent me his SQLite file (439.set). Thanks Peter!

Copying that over the one in the /chat folder seems to have cured 
the problem.


So it looks like the server has a corrupt version that it sends out 
on a fresh install.

I've sent a Feedback to REBOL.com.

Well... at this point... given that the more time goes on the harder 
it will be to fix this world, why don't we just make a new one?

or, move to Qtask :P

A new world has several attractions.

But if the problems lie in the codebase and/or the backup strategy, 
then they will recur..

I posted an Altme issue over at Accounts this AM - as I relented 
and put  a 1.2+ (the page said 0.42 ??? )  on my Ubuntu netbook - 
it now connects - but then rejects my account - which is working 
from this Windows box 1.2.25   Must be me.  3-letter word for dolt 
... let's see ... "usr"

42 is the code for the Linux version

Are you sure you are entering the correct password?