Server problems.

[Hades]

Well,
   I was again... experimenting with my box... Sadly, It is 2am and the server doesn't seem to want to to stay up for some reason... I guess during my experimentation I must of did something to make my box not want to stay online... Opppp! =)

Good news is? I can easily fix it... Bad news is... I'm way to tired and lazy right now due to the fact its 2am. Don't worry, your save files are are not gone! And even if they were, I always make a backup file before I start experimenting anyway so don't worry about it.

I'll attempt to fix it first thing in the morning. Once I awake. As for now, goodnight.

Oh ya, Me experimenting consisted of trying to make pwmangband.game-host.org into a domain name for a website/forums I was trying out various Web servers etc etc. I finally gave up hehe... Sorry guys for my curiousness in trying new thing =).  

[PowerWyrm]

Wake up
It's 2pm here and I'd like to play  :P

[Hades]

Well,
   The problem is deeper then I thought, my router is acting like a child again. It seems that the server only works when I'm remotely connected. And then after I disconnect remotely my router blocks it.

Again, bad news is? I'm pretty busy today and I can't take out the name to fix it asap.

Good news is... I can fix it, just not as soon as I would of liked. So please be patient I will resolve this later today when I get back...

And I'm sorry Powerwyrm, Don't think I will have it up at a reasonable time for you considering our different time zone. But it will be up tomorrow when u wake up =).

[Berendol]

Sounds like you've possibly got port triggering set up instead of port forwarding.

[Hades]

Well,
   I have to say, I am completely dumbfounded. For some reason that I do not know, after about 30seconds of my server running, it runs perfectly smooth, and then randomly times out... Reason? Unknown, I already backed up my router to all its default settings. I guess my only option left lies inside the server it self. So I will check to see if that is the problem. If it is. I might have to start fresh, if its not... I don't know what else to do.

[Hades]

I fixed it... NOTE!!! I am hosting it on a temporary host for now... Just to make sure its running properly I will keep it on this host until I'm sure the problem is resolved. Why? Cause its a lot more easier fixing problems on this host then it is on my box. Since I need to remotely connect to my box It can be annoying sometimes.

Bad news. It seems, the safefiles may be corrupted, which was causing the server timeouts. I will try to fix it... This might of happened from me backing up the files at the same time a savefile dump was being created corrupting my back up savefiles. It is a very very very rare thing to happen. But thats what is looking like what happened. If that is what happened. I'll have to remove the corrupted savefile. But that would be drastic. I will try to fix this issue.  But if I can not... I should have a backup file from around 2hours to before this problem started. Unless that is corrupted also. I will keep you posted.

[Hades]

Well....
   I am sadly to announce. It seems my savefiles keep on timing out the server after around 30seconds of it being online. I will attempt more tests tomorrow. But I am not sure if I can salvage them. They seem fine. I went through them, all look fine. Looks like they load fine. I just don't know what the problem is with them. I will look into it some more. But as of down time I am keeping it down until I am certain I can not use ANY (I have lots) of the savefiles I have. If you see the server back up without another post that my attempts were not successful then considering your savefiles saved. But not be from the most recent but at least its something.

-Later

( I think I am done experimenting with my box now. It was not worth any of these problems. I am terribly sorry.)

[Berendol]

Could be a bad hard drive, then. When things don't read back the way you wrote them, or if reading a small file causes a full-system hang.. that's usually a sign of a dying hard drive. Get a SMART readout from the drive if it's new enough and check the numbers. But more importantly, make a big old TAR of your important data and copy it somewhere pronto!

[Domino]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA that's rich.  SMART info is useless.  I've got a recent report hanging around from a test done over at Google on a sample of around 20,000 drives over a 5 year span where SMART info was not associated with any failure ever.

One of the problems here is that early on the industry used to set the SMART threshold too low and so people were returning an insane amount of drives within warranty due to failures reported by the built in SMART diagnostics.  Since then the SMART thresholds have been bumped to a point that they're irrelevant.  By the time SMART errors start reporting, your drive(s) will generally have other issues.

I'd be more suspicious of general filesystem errors at this point.  If it were the drive, one would suspect that it would have issues booting or would randomly hang the system not just an individual application.

What flavor of Linux are you using and what filesystem type is it?  I would suggest that you try running an fsck.

If you're not familiar with fsck read up on it here:

http://linux.die.net/man/8/fsck

[Hades]

I basically isolated it to the server... Since I tested it on various other machines to make sure it was. I just don't get what could be wrong? It runs fine for about 20-30 seconds (Besides the utmost lag) and then just craps out. The server says its still on and when I close it it states "Shutting down" but its like its not even there. So I tryed starting from scratch, which worked. I tryed importing all the files back over (savefiles/data/users) same problem, I moved only the savefiles over same problem. I just don't get it really. I am able to log onto my character and from what I know everyone else can log onto there character, it just "craps" out... Anywho, I'm going to be busy mostly all this week between work and helping my friend move. But i'll try to work on it if I have the energy.

If worst comes to worst, I'll just remake it. I'll give back the experience loss to peoples characters and other items such as *AQ* scrolls and one or two random artifact scrolls but thats about all I can do to make up for all your hard-work that would be loss. Hopfully I can fix it, if I can't, then thats what i'll do.

[Hades]

Well,
   For me to resolve this issue I had to do a full server reset.  But I kept your savefiles and loaded them onto the server. What does this mean? It means what ever house you had, is gone. You don't have a house. It sucks, yes I know. second thing, I do not know how this will effect the artifact list. So please when you sign on, if you have an artifact and it is not in the list. Please get rid of it. I will personally reinburst you with a new item. I promise. Just tell me.  third thing. I worked, I helped my friend move, I have a life, I'm exhausted.  I'm going to bed. It's fixed. Be happy... Good night =)

P.S. The server is on a very very temporary host right now. Its almost 12am and I have work in the morning and I'm to tired to spend the 10minutes to transfer it over. It should run fine, should not lag. I'll move it back to the box tomorrow night.

[PowerWyrm]

Sorry not to have replied earlier, but I faced exactly the same problem with my test server while coding... the server stayed up for 30 seconds after which any character would get "timeout mark 0" errors. I didn't found any solution except exactly what you did - simply erase the server savefile and restart with a brand new town layout. This means the characters kept their xp level and gear, but lost all their houses. No problem with artifacts, as the game parses the savefiles for art list too...