Well, it looks like the site's back to normal and what's giving me the biggest chuckle is that all the rage posts that we've posted since the crashdown have disappeared as if nothing happened.

The obvious reason behind that is probably because Wowio must have gotten their hands on a recent backup (from today) and uploaded it into the site and that copy didn't contain our last few rants, of course.

So I'm very happy that this craptastic thing got resolved and I hope this will be the last of that.

Edit: Oh and for those who missed out on all the exitement, the site crashed today and 3 months worth of content got lost in the process.

You can read about it over here.

Magic goblins.
I think people are still leaving anyway.

Things are not fixed at all. It says all my comics are restored, but they aren't. There are no files at all, just empty pages except for the comments and the page numbers… default html, no comic pages. even though my account pages still list all the pages, they're gone. so now, it's even worse than starting over… I really don't know where to start, now… erase these non-exist but listed pages and upload new copies? Edit the pages that exist so I keep my comments?

EDIT: Never mind, the new Latest News post explained it

Unfortunately it is not a complete restore, the stuff that was on the image servers is definitely gone.

So, Wowio has saved all database information, as well as all images and custom html done before January 13th.

The only things lost were images and custom html uploaded after January 13th. That may still mean a significant amount of effort by some frequent updaters in order to EDIT their comic pages to re-add the images (to retain the comments).


Still I think this is a huge relief after the site almost being rolled back completely 2 months.

I just have to edit my pages? That's it? The comments and everything are all back?! YAY!!!!!

Seriously! Too happy.

Sadly, I was in such a cruddy mood over it I ate a candybar… Arg! I've been trying to lose weight! (Obviously I'm a stress eater.)

Well, least I'm in a good enough mood now to go hop on the treadmill. Whoot!

I have to thank them for the extra effort to restore comments and forum posts. :) It is a bit of work re-uploading pages, but I'm glad to have my comments back.

I am SO GLAD the comments were restored!! My first thought when I saw that they were back was: April Fool's Day a little early?

OK — “what I learned making comics” restoring the web design html

Oh… I didn't realize the images were still missing. I saw the forums and the PQ's and all the news posts, along with all newest updated comics being back up so I thought it was a resounding fix.

Fixing a page isn't actually all that hard, although pretty tedious.

Here's how to do that.

1. Select “My Account”, located under your profile picture.
2. Find the comic you wish to edit and press the “Edit” button next to it.
3. Select “2.Comic Pages”.
4. Select the first page you wish to edit and press the “Edit” button next to that.
5. Next to “Page Graphic:” you will find the option to reupload the artwork on this page. Upload the image that you wish to put into this page. This will preserve all the comments that have been left on that page.
6. Press “Send Changes”.

Repeat steps through 4 to 6 for every subsequent page.

Like I said… tedious.

Edit: Ah. I see a newspost popped up that explained the exact same thing, while I was writing this…

Oh well, no harm having this information posted on more then one location.

I prefer my version of how the site was restored, but yours is ok I guess.

Just want to say to anyone that complains about having to reload pages. I lost 200 images for the mafia comic. (I'm just glad the actual pages stayed because I don't really keep the images in exact order on my computer.)

I'm not gonna forgive so easily.

I don't think it should have happened at all.

Messy work.

Well, after 5 hours of work I got Time Girls exactly where it was before Wowio screwed it up. I'm just deleting my other two comics, it's not worth the time to fix them, even though one was a top 100 comic.

I'm glad they could restore comments and make it not the start of the year again, but…

…this even shouldn't have fucking happened in the first place and it isn't acceptable, nor is it really acceptable to just laugh off our anger at it.

That issue is really just a huge flashing, whirring, spinning, dazzling indicator (in comparison to the many smaller ones we've had since Wowio's bought this place) of Wowio's capacity for fucking over the site and it's users and giving nothing more than a “Start re uploading pages because we lost everything including comments and there is nothing we can do.”

Like I said, I'm glad most stuff is back, but uploaders are faced with more or less the same task as before and if Wowio wasn't staffed by a group of incompetent morons then this wouldn't have happened in the first place.

Forgiving Wowio for the huge massive fuck up that they told us nothing could be done about is tantamount to excusing it, and I will not be doing so.

Larry

Logs onto DrunkDuck and begins reading the latest news on the server issues.

"Hey, they got all the data back! They did it, they got the data! Wait… reupload every page after Janurary…?"

Some of us understand the accidents happen no matter how prepared one is. It wasn't just the data that got lost, it was the back ups as well. At least they managed to get it as close as possible to it being as if nothing happened. What also counts as they put a lot of effort into this. If it were me, I would have just given up and said, do what you can. But the people in charge went the extra mile of getting it restored to this point.

Am I angry? No. Am I upset that I have to reload 200 images? A little. But at least it is just the images and not the entire page.

I do agree with what Larry has to say, but more with the mindset that this isn't exactly a rare occurrence. Well, at least actually losing months of data is, but it seems every week DD has another horrible problem that brings us to the brink of destruction and back again. It's almost episodic at this point, like a really bad formula-reliant sitcom.

And with that taken into consideration, I'm at a loss to explain the “oh ha ha, all is forgiven” attitude as anything short of being sycophantic.

So, last night, eager to have my updates prepared for the next over-a-month, uploaded 5 weeks of comics ahead of my update… for last night. Wednesday is my highest traffic day, by far.

As soon as I saw the missing pages, I took a breath and went ahead to reupload the 15 missing pages. It was a pain, and a few pages took three attempts to go up, and it was an extra headache with the site moving slow, as it often does, but it was worth it. An hour or so later, I was done. I was finally all up and ready to share my silly little comic with my beloved readers. The only real problem was the loss of two and a half months of stats, which I eagerly track.

Then the restore happened. A restore that previous posts suggested -wouldn't- happen. Then I was granted the choice of wading knee-deep through the latency-fest to reupload the comics AGAIN.

I put up with a lot from this site, serverwise. Unannounced downtimes, generally slow surfing, and a lack of customizability for non-html people. Not to mention a few miscellaneous complaints, like non-DDers being unable to vote on or comment on my comic (hint: most or all of my readers are NOT DDers).

I have been happy to work within this neat community as long as I have, but I am actively seeking a better option. Thank you, DD, but as soon as I can, I am moving on. Good luck to you guys.

I Am The 1337 Master
I'm not gonna forgive so easily.

I don't think it should have happened at all.

There is really no way to have prevented this.
our HOST- NOTHING TO DO WITH WOWIO- lost our entire site.

And Lawrence Leach, our chief programmer, has been shitting bricks trying desperately to restore the site, staying up through the night, getting backups from here there and everywhere.

You people blaming Wowio in this instance have it wrong. This was not neglect or incompetence or anything of the sort on their part.
Try putting a major site up on on your own and hosting it.

——————

Let me ask you all a question, that includes the perennial complainers Larry and Lefarce especially:
Why can't I blame YOU personally for losing your work last night? Can't I call you both fucking imbeciles for having your comics wiped? Isn't it your own incompetence that caused it to happen?

No, I can't and no it wasn't. It was out of your hands, wasn't it?

THAT is what happened to DD. Understand?
The company that is paid to host the site on their servers, the major commercial host fucked up. Not Wowio, not DD.
Wherever you host on the web you can not be protected from such eventualities, all you can do is recover from them as Lawrence has done here.

Because my post specifically stated it was Wowio. What fantastic readhing comprehension you hav-oh that's right you glance over 99% of my posts. I'll admit I assumed it was though until late in the afternoon when I actually got the site to load the ‘duck update’.

My issue stems from the fact that I'm browsing DD, which has experienced another massive fuckup, and regardless of whose fault that is, it doesn't change that fact that DD has experienced another fuckup.

Yeah the difference is I'm not in charge of DD's backups or making sure that the people hosting the server are competent at keeping their shit together, dumbass.

I'm tired of you kissing wowio's ass at every chance you get, because frankly they ARE to blame in the midst of this mess and their whole mishandling of the situation (see: vidihawk) only makes it worse. I don't know if you think you have some sort of future position with them or something, but it's fucking nauseating and I'm sick of having to read your pretentious shit about how wowio can do no wrong.

They fucked up here, and it's part of a beautiful series of screw ups they've done since they've bought this site, except this time everyone got fucked out of updates and the site is slow as shit again and they do not deserve any sort of forgiveness from any users.

…I'm really confused why everyone is so upset. Did we suddenly have to start paying for this site or something? I thought it was free…. Why all the complaining when a free site has some hiccups?

There is a difference between hiccups and constant downtime and errors and broken features and going back into the past for three months but not really but sort of that makes it really frustrating and difficult to use the site, and I guess it's just the straw that broke the camels back for some.

It was stated earlier that DD is on WOWIO servers. In fact an almost quote is ‘After Wowio moved the site to their servers…’ So, that was what I was going on… the official word that DD is hosted on Wowio servers. But even if it isn't, Wowio is in charge of overseeing site backups… I mean, why would that even be an issue? If you care about your site you make sure it's being backed up properly, right? What else does a sysop/chief programmer do? That's part of the job.

The fact is, they realized their screw-up and searched down an incomplete backup. I think it's obvious that no one at Wowio has ever even read a webcomic on DD… they thought, oh well, the little people can upload their sites again, if not, new little people will join with new comics. They then realized that people on here treasure their comments and feedback and that we ‘little people’ were truly pissed off about losing our comments… it isn't a matter of uploading pages, we were losing feedback and connections with fans of our comics. Only then did they say, oh well, let's skip brunch and see if we can dig up a partial restore to give them their comments back.

So, a bunch of execs missing a meal doesn't impress me much… they make money from US, not the other way around.

Lefarce and Larry, You can leave if you like.
I don't care about your constant complaining one little bit.

You are wrong yet again and can't take it. You are childish and I am through humouring you both.

————

Tim, I understand that you are feeling Mad. So am I, so are we all. But your anger is completely misdirected.
The host DD is on is a major, major company. They host some of the biggest sites on the net. This was their job to see that things were backed up and all ship shape.

They fucked up.
Not Wowio.

Lawrence, our chief programmer, worked as hard as he was able to. He luckily had a special backup that he'd made for testing.
With further calls to our HOST he was able to get THEM to find and restore our database. And that was after THEY claimed that it was all gone.

What people are tending to do now is akin to blaming the Japanese government for their Earthquake and Tsumani.

I'm going to stay to finish up my one active comic out of respect for my co-author and what readers will have stuck around after this, but I'm leaving very very soon. It doesn't help that wowio is either really incompetent or (worse) simply doesn't care but that the one lifeline to helping get our opinions a little more known to wowio thinks that we're crazy (and perennial complainers no less!) for being mad about this shit happening as it has.

Blow it out your ass ozone, you pretentious twat.

Ps. REAL classy trying to compare this to Japan. Hope you feel real cozy about comparing the deaths of 11,000+ people to some comic company's inability to keep a website up.

I think some of you are getting way to upset about this issue and need to calm down before posting more.

This is not a professional site. I could understand being upset at the situation (a bit) if everyone here had been paying Drunk Duck to host your comics. But that's not the issue.

I understand people have lots of work to do now, but crashes happen at every website from time to time. And with as much remodeling and updating as has been going on here it's quite frankly unreasonable to think it won't be a little slow or crash at times.

Honestly, I think for a lot of you this was the biggest drama of your week and therefore you're big chance to complain, but even if the site had completely imploded and your work was never to be heard from again… you still wouldn't have much cause to complain. This is a FREE SITE. Nothing was owed to you just because you decided to post your comic here.

I would like to say thank you to everyone who was trying so hard to fix everything. Having my comments back has seriously made my day. I didn't realize how much I love them. I'm going to be appreciating them so much more now!

Someone
Lefarce and Larry, You can leave if you like.
I don't care about your constant complaining one little bit.

You are wrong yet again and can't take it. You are childish and I am through humouring you both.

I am seriously convinced you read none of my posts. You see my googly-eyed Vegeta and go “THAT LEFARCE MUST BE UP TO HIS OLD TRICKS” and then you stop on your hat and write up some condescending crap about how much of a child I am for disagreeing with things (specifically you).

I myself were not particularly happy about this crap happening and I sure as heck aren't happy that allot of people have to reupload tons of content.

But I am happy that allot of previously assumed, permanently lost content, like the forum posts and page comments are back. At least the damage was contained with objects that could be reuploaded.

I'm also saddened about this crap happening, cause it will and has damaged the reputation of this site even more so. It's unavoidable now that people are going to leave after something like this and they will not recommend this site to others. This is something that's not going to be easy to shake off, even if the site redesign turns out to be an astounding success.

If I have to push any blame to wowio then that their mistake was opening up the site again, while things were as bad as it was. They should have kept the site closed for a bit longer, probably repost the “failduck” picture from last time and worked on double checking what was recoverable and what wasn't.

This would have prevented cases like the one vidihawk went through and it would have introduced us to a house with a burn room, instead of a roaring inferno which allot of us are still recovering from.

I can only hope this will be taken as a learning experience, which vowio has promised to learn from. They've stated that they're switching a server provider, who they're putting 100% the blame to. Take that with a grain of salt if you want but regardless of who was at fault, Lawrence Leach has been doing a great job at restoring what he could restore and he's still working on restoring the few comics that were downloaded into the beta site.

I'm not a vowio employee. I'm not expecting a job invite from them nor am I planing on seeking them out. I'm just glad that they were able to save what they could save and am still patiently waiting to see what will happen when the redesign is finally ready. But that doesn't mean I have endless amount of patience. I fully understand the decision of anyone who wishes to leave after this. This was a breaking point moment and one that was close to breaking me.

But I'm still willing to give them a chance with the redesign. Drunk Duck, with all of its problems is still operating on the original codes that it was first designed on. The redesign is the first time it's being build up from scratch. I want to see what happens when it's ready. I invite everyone to stick around and see what happens when it is.

…no pressure Vowio.

Edit:
I understand that people are still upset but some of you have reached a point where you're lashing out at each other. The best think you can do right now is to take a breather.

I myself went to the gym. Helped blow out tons of the steam that I had build up over this.

Larry
Blow it out your ass ozone, you pretentious twat.

Happy to see YOU go Larry.
You prudish, repressed, passive aggressive, mean, nasty, angry little man.


This current trouble has hit all DD very hard. ALL of DD!
Wowio has been working extremely hard to get things back to how they were , it was entirely OUT OF THEIR control.

This hit me and Skoolmunkee even harder because of all the work we do to keep things running and under control and all we had to do to alert people and get things back up behind the scenes etc.

The VERY LAST thing any one of us needs is a complaining, whining, annoying, useless pick harping on at us about what a terrible site this is, making it worse for us all.

Thanks Larry for trying to make things worse. It's the only thing you're any good at.
———-
Lefarce, if you are unfairly caught in the blast, I'm sorry.