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url names - problem unique to OS/2 or me?

Started by Dave Palmer, 2009.09.16, 06:02:59

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RobertM

Dave,

OS/2 and XP doesnt seem to be the issue. People have recreated the problem on both.

I suspect that index.html may be generated by a script (many of the pages on some of my sites are entirely script generated) - or contains sections generated by scripts. If the script hangs or does not process an error properly (for instance, unable to connect to the database), it can have unexpected results with the output (for instance the wrong content type and content being sent - or nothing at all being sent). Another thing I have seen that does it is a crashed and/or restarting web server or web server service.

For instance (just an example, as I do not know if this is the case on their server), on my machine I have an auto-restart script loaded for DominoGo... in the off chance it crashes, it restarts itself. That will result in no connections for the 6 seconds the script waits before restart, and an additional number of seconds as DominoGo re-allocates it's thread pool and re-caches files in it's cache list. The initial result (during the early stages of initialization) is "Cannot connect to server" or "Server timed out" or "Connection reset by server" or a variety of other non-helpful messages. During the later stages of initialization, the server sends a message indicating it isn't ready yet.



You can forward a link to this thread to the ISP/webmaster of the site with an explanation of what is happening, suggesting it may be a hanging server process or script. Using the link below is the best way:
http://www.os2world.com/forum/index.php/topic,1874.0.html

Best,
Rob


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Kirk's 5 Year Mission Continues at:
Star Trek New Voyages
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warpcafe

Hi,

I must admit that I didn't think of the possibility of that web page being served from scripts.
Looking at it, I was assuming it to be a "static" kind of thing... yeah, then, to be honest, it wouldn't hurt to have a look at the server logs. But I doubt that anyone else than the (their) admin has access.

BTW:
The link from Robert appears to be correct however takes you (or the visitor) only to the forums start page.
The actual target of that hyperlink is not equal to what the textual part reads... try this one:
http://www.os2world.com/forum/index.php/topic,1874.0.html
...and keep fingers crossed that it won't suffer the "empty body" problem we sometimes have here... ;)

Cheers,
Thomas
"It is not worth an intelligent man's time to be in the majority.
By definition, there are already enough people to do that"
- G.H. Hardy

RobertM

#17
Quote from: warpcafe on 2009.09.18, 10:55:46
Hi,

I must admit that I didn't think of the possibility of that web page being served from scripts.
Looking at it, I was assuming it to be a "static" kind of thing... yeah, then, to be honest, it wouldn't hurt to have a look at the server logs. But I doubt that anyone else than the (their) admin has access.

Here's an example (which will be in varying states of working or not working - or ugly or pretty - depending on where I am with the code - I only started writing the code today a few hours ago). The whole page and all data is script generated. There is no static page whatsoever, and no HTML page lying around. All requests to store.aibpc.com get sent to a script for processing which then reads everything after the url to determine what to do next:

http://store.aibpc.com/Laptops/Lenovo/0/

or

http://store.aibpc.com/


Quote from: warpcafe on 2009.09.18, 10:55:46
BTW:
The link from Robert appears to be correct however takes you (or the visitor) only to the forums start page.
The actual target of that hyperlink is not equal to what the textual part reads... try this one:
http://www.os2world.com/forum/index.php/topic,1874.0.html
...and keep fingers crossed that it won't suffer the "empty body" problem we sometimes have here... ;)

Cheers,
Thomas

Weird... works for me. Maybe someone fixed it for me. If so, thanks. :)


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Kirk's 5 Year Mission Continues at:
Star Trek New Voyages
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RobertM

Right now, at this exact moment, you will get some weird error, as I have taken the database offline and am recreating it (and havent yet written the fallback code to display a real error like "Store offline for maintenance")... that will be "resolved" in about 30-50 minutes when I have finished recreating the 100,000 record database.

But, that's a perfect example of how such an occurrence as Dave is seeing. Though mine is intentionally caused, I suspect theirs may not be.

-Rob


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Kirk's 5 Year Mission Continues at:
Star Trek New Voyages
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Dave Palmer

Rob and Thomas,
Thanks for the additional legwork.  I'm learning a lot from your efforts.

Somewhat confused - the link both of you provided took me to the forum start page - so I didn't see what you wanted me to see.

As to the web page (index.html) it isn't a generated page.  The code viewable (View>Page Source) is the same as the offline code I have here.  I have to admit I don't read what I call xhtml and css stuff very well and the flash coding is way beyond my knowledge - and if any of that coding has links to generators I wouldn't know it.

I can compare the visible downloaded index.html with the master copy I have and at the end user level everything appears the same.

Because it is an intermittent problem and the the web page is working today and I am not sure if I should pursue this or not -

Comments?
Thanks
Dave

RobertM

Hi Dave,

A script is perfectly capable of generating html code without it being obvious to the end user. Again, check http://store.aibpc.com/ - you will notice that the content you see will be identical to when you click "ALL" under "Brands" even though the URL changes. Same script, with a default action of showing all when nothing is selected (thus the same exact code when you actually select all brands).

Yet, going through the code will show you it's just standard html, css and javascript - but it was all written entirely with REXX and a few template files, and multiple database queries. So, the only time the page will change is when the database content changes (nothing but the top - currently disabled - navbar is static).

See my point? Any page, anywhere, can be in reality a script - even without looking like one. If the script does not work, gets overloaded or times out (or it's back end support such as the MySQL server in my case times out, does not respond or does not have the database table available), it will return (a) an error, (b) no error, (c) the wrong cotent, and/or (d) the wrong content type.

Best,
Rob


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Kirk's 5 Year Mission Continues at:
Star Trek New Voyages
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Dave Palmer

Hmmm, Robert,
Thought I'd had replied a day or two ago.  ? what happened.

Understand your point.  Thanks for explaining so well.

When all is said and done though, the site still doesn't work for me, but at the same time it will work on an XP system.

On another ISP I've multiple domains - and they aren't working (all the time) but always under XP.  The tech support is working this one, but giving excuses and something about database accesses and shared  stuff.

I've moved 3 of the troublesome sites to another ISP host and they work fine, everytime. 

Rather than pursue this further and further, I either switch to XP (not in this lifetime) or switch ISPs - and I'll do the latter.

Hate to leave an unsolved real problem, but I'm ready for a hands-on working solution and the shortest distance to that goal is to switch ISP.

Thanks to all who contributed!
Dave