Server Issues? Web Site Down? Cpanel Access? Server Migration issues to report.

[velma 6]

As many of you are aware, Xisto migrated it servers two days ago and left everyone who did not get an email about this server migration in the dark. Let me apologize for the inconvenience this might have had on everyone, both paid and free hosting customers. I know many support tickets were sent about this and since many were about hosting being down not all of them were replied to because information about this would be posted at a later time.

The reason why the servers where change because the old datacenters were suffering severe power outages because it was unable to handle the current load Xisto has right now. So two days ago it was decided to move everything to these new data centers. This meant all the resources Xisto had were needed in order to move everything in an organized and safe manner so no data could be lost during this migration.

That is one of the reasons why no one on Xisto was informed about what was going on because the admins, support and tech staff was concentrating on making this server migration as efficient and fast as possible. Once we were able to move most of the servers over I started to send out emails to those with accounts in Xisto - Web Hosting and keeping everyone constantly updated on what was going on at that time.

It was supposed to take six to eight hours including the DNS propagation, changing IP addresses and reconfiguring the network. However, nothing is perfect, and many delays have made this process longer then it should have.

Yeah, it's funny how customers wonder what's happening when they're kept in the dark. "In all fairness," staff could have avoided all those trouble tickets (or at least the majority) had they posted something - anything - at the Xisto forums when they knew a migration was going to take place. A little head's up would have been both the professional and courteous thing to do. As it stands, we were only alerted to the cause of the problem because a newer member took it upon himself to investigate the matter at headquarters after the fact.

Due to the fact that websites would be down on all the servers it was necessary to post the news on the Xisto - Support website, since it wouldnt be suffering any downtime during this migration because the server was already moved over that he support page was on. I also would like to thank saxsux for posting a link to this server migration. Also because of this server migration we did not know when Xisto would be up again, and we knew questions would come up immediately the moment forum was online again.

If admin would please chime in with the estimated uptime of the remaining down sites here in the support forum we'd appreciate it. I for one need to access my site as soon as possible.

I am sorry about the downtime, but currently the sites are down due to some technical reason. I thank you for your patience and cooperation.

Not necessarily. Some people don't take the time to search for and look at the topics concerning Xisto or Xisto in general, especially when they believe submitting a support ticket will solve their problem. The server movement does not affect Xisto alone, it also affects other Xisto hosting sites. It is proper and much more convenient to post at Xisto - Support than to go into each forum and make a topic concerning this. And since Xisto forums have been down for a while (i'm still feeling some lag on my side), the Xisto forums shouldn't currently be relied upon for making announcements.

If this topic is any indicator, customers who "believed" they would receive a response via your suggestion have in fact not. When staff has foreknowledge -however slight - that individual websites will be down for a length of time, than that information should be disseminated through the channels that customers frequent as a matter of course before maintenance.

Truefusion is correct, generally clients prefer confirming the news they read by submitting a ticket so that they know what they are exactly looking into. Very few clients use the forums to find current news about Xisto - Web Hosting updates and maintenance and rely on the Xisto - Support website to keep them updated.

I do not, as a matter of course, visit xisto.com before getting down to the business of editing my website.

It is most certainly not convenient for me to visit xisto.com prior to accessing my website to check on announcements that apparently appear after the fact.

We do not expect nor ask you to visit xisto before you edit your pages, I know it can be tiresome but there is an option where you can subscribe to the news. We put up only important news so you do not have to worry about spam.

And it is inconvenient to attempt several login attempts at my website, post a valid question at the SUPPORT forum, wait for a response from admin only to receive apologist rhetoric from a moderator. I request admin confirmation of this moderator's statements.

That is why there is support website so any member who has questions could send in a support ticket or talk to support through live chat as well. Remember a moderator is job is to inform members as best they can when an admin is not available, and when OpaQue has the chance he will make a statement about the server migration.

Not all Xisto - Web Hosting accounts were affected. It was suppose to be for VPS accounts only unless stated otherwise. I received an email because I am also on a paying server.
It looks like the whole server IPs are being shifted but no word on why Xisto was also part of request failure. I'll try to keep you updated as my own free web hosting is down.

We realized that the issue was serious when we noticed the VPSs' accounts were suffering severe downtime, and so every server, VPS accounts, dedicated IPs and owner IPs had to be change and thus another reason for the delay in informing everyone.

I just hope that no data will be lost during this transfer, and also that they may have more uptime after the transfer... Never again should there be more than 12 hours of downtime for any Web-Hosting provider, heck, I thought Xisto and/or Xisto - Web Hosting was going to shutdown after I couldn't access any of the main servers that I can remember from the top of my head

That is why a server migration takes time so no data would be lost in the transfer, and thus the reason for patience while the bugs are being fixed.

It might not work for those of you on Gamma (which currently isn't online), but I've been able to access my cPanel on Theta by going to http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/It might be worth trying the same thing to access your cPanel - you'll need to change the URI if you're on a different server, though.

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ is a server where paid clients are hosted, and so free hosting clients will not be able sign in there and that you try not to attempt to login into others servers except for what your hosting accounts are on.

So in order to end anymore topics and posts related to this situation I asked that you bookmark this link and check it periodically until an announcement is made to everyone that all the problems are fixed.

https://support.xisto.com/index.php?_m=news&_a=view

Any doubts, queries or complaints should be strictly sent to the ticket system and not to any one's pm boxes or email addresses.

Thank you

[kobra500 1]

Well i dont pay, so i dont care... my site doesnt really do anything at the moment anyway!!

[mrdee 1]

The problem is, I don't know whether the free Xisto accounts are on shared servers or what, nor do I know which server my account is on (gamma, delta......)
I wish i knew whether I have to change my DNS settings or what, at the moment my settings are:

DNS Check ResultDomain name vlaanderen-flanders.org.uk
IP Address (A-Record) 64.69.46.210
Name server 1 ns.computinghost.com
Name server 2 ns1.trap17.com
Name server 3 ns2.trap17.com
Name server 4 ns2.computinghost.com
Mail server 1 vlaanderen-flanders.org.uk, 0

Is that OK or should that be changed? If so, what to?

It is good that we get such a big chunk of information, but it is very technical.
Hopefully I can have everything up and running ASAP.

[Saint_Michael 3]

If you have hosting through trap your on the gamma server, and as for your settings they should be Name server 1 ns.computinghost.comName server 2 ns2.computinghost.comand nothing else, the Xisto DNS are no longer in use and so you can remove those and push ns2.computinghost.com up to the second slot.

[mrdee 1]

Oh my goodness,just got a message from Xisto that, due to technical issues, the situation is going to go on for another 24-36 hours (in my case (GAMMA server) anyway).I just do not believe this.............

[disneyreporter 0]

Well, I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one having issues. At first, I thought my account had been deleted for an unknown reason. I hope everything gets moved without any major problems and that the servers are back online soon. My readers count on me having daily updates.

[Carson 0]

Another 24-36 hours? Thats a lot of down-time, especially since it's already been over 12 hours since my site went down. Longer since I haven't been able to access my CPanel. Thanks for the info Velma. Hope everything comes back to normal soon.

[Misanthrope 0]

That is one of the reasons why no one on Xisto was informed about what was going on because the admin?s, support and tech staff was concentrating on making this server migration as efficient and fast as possible. Once we were able to move most of the servers over I started to send out emails to those with accounts in Xisto - Web Hosting and keeping everyone constantly updated on what was going on at that time.

In most cases I'd be inclined to say something conciliatory like, "better late than never," or, "thanks for the after-thought" but this isn't one of the times. I'm so very happy for the elusive customers who were "constantly updated on what was going on that time," but this is of little consolation to the end users who were, by your own admission, purposely "kept in the dark" on the status of access to their own web sites. Questionable customer service aside, this methodology seems to me an incredible waste of time and resources. Perhaps I'm simply not privy to the entire story here, but sending out emails to only a select number of customers after the proverbial sh*t hits the fan doesn?t' make a whole lot of sense to me. And I think most would agree, especially after witnessing how this situation has panned out, that notifying Xisto customers here at this forum before migration began would have been the right thing to do. Yes, I know you were all busy and that the forum was intermitently down, but if I managed to log in to post this thread, I'm fairly certain someone from xisto could have done the same.

Truefusion is correct, generally clients prefer confirming the news they read by submitting a ticket so that they know what they are exactly looking into.

It appears you're suggesting Xisto customers not use the support forum for its' intended purpose. Or maybe I'm just confused on the purpose of the support forum. Either way, I'd love to see the statistics that back up your claim on the end user's preferences. I imagine if you took a poll right now asking Xisto customers where they prefer to have their support queries addressed, it would probably be right here in the good old support forum. What a novel idea. And since we're speaking in generalities here, I'd venture to guess clients prefer advance notification of maintenance as well.

Very few clients use the forums to find current news about Xisto - Web Hosting updates

You're right. I'm not interested in current news regarding Xisto - Web Hosting. I am, however, interested in anything that affects my Xisto hosting. As it happens, there is a forum right here aptly named Alerts and Notices, which presumably pertains to news and announcements relating to Xisto. But if as you say, "very few clients" are using the forums to find current news related to hosting, then I'm unsure why xisto maintains a sub-forum at Xisto by the name of Alerts and Notices. I'm also unclear on the presence of the Hosted Members forum if xisto truly feels "very few" have any interest in using it. Never mind the fact support and hosting updates are among the forum's touted services. Seems counterproductive.

I know it can be tiresome but there is an option where you can subscribe to the news. We put up only important news so you do not have to worry about spam.

Something of this magnitute constitutnes an ALERT and could have been broadcast accordingly through all available channels. Again, the Alerts and Notices forum comes to mind. Spam? LOL, what I wouldn't give for a little spam right now?.

That is why there is support website so any member who has questions could send in a support ticket

As this thread demonstrates, many of us have done just that and have yet to receive a response. I know I haven't.

Remember a moderator is job is to inform members as best they can

Objective information that encourages continued and open dialogue while simultaneously helping the customer is always appreciated. Suffice it to say, some mods are more objective and helpful than others.

[kasm 0]

My site http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ is not up. I am not sure when that srart since it is home page in the old computer. I use http://www.sedrak.ws/ as home page in the recent computer. I hope this problem to end soon because some sites are published in the search engine.

[bishoujo 0]

I'm experiencing this issue this morning. Hope it resolves soon!

[Saint_Michael 3]

Misanthrope I believe your really twisting the words around and making xisto look incompetent, if you haven't notice, Xisto alone as 40,000+ members, asta has about 20,000+, and not to mention a few thousand paid clients as well. With what I know about the support, there are not that many people working the back end of support and so a list priority has to be made. That being the fact sending at least 75,000-80,000 emails is going to take up a lot of resources and time to reach everyone, and that was time Xisto could not afford. Also I believe the post is referring to Xisto - Web Hosting clients using the forums and not the regular Xisto members, and for informing everyone through an email would seem a bit unnecessary now since a post was made on whats going on right now.From looking at the post it seems that they were not planning on this happening and if they didn't I doubt they were expecting the problems that they were having especially with gamma. I don't know the reason why gamma is completely down now, just saw the server status and I know earlier that only the Apache and the internet connection were down. So wait it out like everyone else is with patience, and remembering the world isn't perfect or there would be only one hosting company making billions.

[gaspe86 0]

As many of you are aware, Xisto migrated it servers two days ago and left everyone who did not get an email about this server migration in the dark. Let me apologize for the inconvenience this might have had on everyone, both paid and free hosting customers. I know many support tickets were sent about this and since many were about hosting being down not all of them were replied to because information about this would be posted at a later time.
The reason why the servers where change because the old datacenters were suffering severe power outages because it was unable to handle the current load Xisto has right now. So two days ago it was decided to move everything to these new data centers. This meant all the resources Xisto had were needed in order to move everything in an organized and safe manner so no data could be lost during this migration.

That is one of the reasons why no one on Xisto was informed about what was going on because the admins, support and tech staff was concentrating on making this server migration as efficient and fast as possible. Once we were able to move most of the servers over I started to send out emails to those with accounts in Xisto - Web Hosting and keeping everyone constantly updated on what was going on at that time.

It was supposed to take six to eight hours including the DNS propagation, changing IP addresses and reconfiguring the network. However, nothing is perfect, and many delays have made this process longer then it should have.

Due to the fact that websites would be down on all the servers it was necessary to post the news on the Xisto - Support website, since it wouldnt be suffering any downtime during this migration because the server was already moved over that he support page was on. I also would like to thank saxsux for posting a link to this server migration. Also because of this server migration we did not know when Xisto would be up again, and we knew questions would come up immediately the moment forum was online again.
I am sorry about the downtime, but currently the sites are down due to some technical reason. I thank you for your patience and cooperation.
Truefusion is correct, generally clients prefer confirming the news they read by submitting a ticket so that they know what they are exactly looking into. Very few clients use the forums to find current news about Xisto - Web Hosting updates and maintenance and rely on the Xisto - Support website to keep them updated.
We do not expect nor ask you to visit xisto before you edit your pages, I know it can be tiresome but there is an option where you can subscribe to the news. We put up only important news so you do not have to worry about spam.

That is why there is support website so any member who has questions could send in a support ticket or talk to support through live chat as well. Remember a moderator is job is to inform members as best they can when an admin is not available, and when OpaQue has the chance he will make a statement about the server migration.
We realized that the issue was serious when we noticed the VPSs' accounts were suffering severe downtime, and so every server, VPS accounts, dedicated IPs and owner IPs had to be change and thus another reason for the delay in informing everyone.

That is why a server migration takes time so no data would be lost in the transfer, and thus the reason for patience while the bugs are being fixed.
http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ is a server where paid clients are hosted, and so free hosting clients will not be able sign in there and that you try not to attempt to login into others servers except for what your hosting accounts are on.

So in order to end anymore topics and posts related to this situation I asked that you bookmark this link and check it periodically until an announcement is made to everyone that all the problems are fixed.

https://support.xisto.com/index.php?_m=news&_a=view

Any doubts, queries or complaints should be strictly sent to the ticket system and not to any one's pm boxes or email addresses.

Thank you

Thanks for taking your time to informing us of the matter, here in the Support Forum for all Xisto accounts. It's a bit late, but thanks a lot, it is some consolation to finally know whats going on with the servers. As some say above, it would have been more appreciated if this memo had been posted here in Xisto before the whole migration started. Yes we know that emailing everyone would have been a great hassle, but that was not necessary... a single thread stating what was going to happen would have done the job because everyone hosted here would have come back here to find out... I know I did.

[Watermonkey 0]

Mike, why is it so easy for you to jump in the middle of a discussion not remotely related to you and start making excuses for others' bad behavior? No one suggested that Xisto is a "perfect" entity, but there are some very basic protocols that should be followed before a major undertaking such as physically moving servers from what appears to be nothing more than a parking garage with no A/C, and poor or no UPS backing it up and transporting it by someone's VW Bus or something to a real data center where I'd assumed it was in the first place. Even if it was an emergency, someone could have and should have taken three minutes of their valuable time to post something up on the Alerts and Notices forum to make people aware their service was going to be interrupted. It's called basic common decency, communication, and good business. And everyone who keeps calling this service "free", stop! There's no free lunch, and there's no free hosting. If it was free, I wouldn't be sitting here in front of my laptop responding to Mike.

[savge17 0]

aH so thats what going on, I thought so for a second that their servers must be getting upgraded or moved to a diffrent location. Hopefully its closer to me lol! That would be sweet. It seems weird however, does Xisto do this often?

Edited May 1, 2008 by savge17 (see edit history)

[Watermonkey 0]

Well, if they did, you'd probably notice. They're really had a pretty good track record for a long time, miraculously it would seem, up to now.