poolforum.com

[Strannik]

Hey what's the story with it? I seem to meet quite a lot of google references to it, and a lot of people say that they read it, but registration is closed.

However whenever i try and go there it just doesn't find the page.

 

[chem geek]

Access to the site from other than North America was turned off by the site by Ben when it was getting hacked by overseas people, possibly from Russia.

 

[Strannik]

thought so..

oh well, i guess i'll have to find US proxy...

 

[launboy]

I can't get onto it either and I'm in Wisconsin. When I try to go to it via search engine or typing directly it either takes a LONG time then eventually goes to a search engine(what our computer always does) or jut gives me the "Cannot Display This Page" page.

Adam

 

[JohnT]

I don't know if Ben limited access to poolsolutions.com, but there is a bunch of good information there as well. Adam, I don't recall any discussions about Ben having problems with your ISP. He had problems with some hacking attempts and blocked some ISPs.

Try turning off any firewalls or directly pinging the server at 66.129.2.151

 

[Molson]

Its up, but looks like they lost their database completely.

Welcome to the Pool Forum!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's back, but . . .

After months of absence, due to the need to make a living otherwise, I'd been refocusing on the PoolForum and PoolSolutions. Part of that focus included some overdue filesystem maintenance. Unfortunately, somehow the work I was doing caused the Forum database to implode, and take the server with it, generating some really bizarre behavior*.

The good news is that the Forum is back up.

The bad news is that ALL the data is gone, with no hope of recovery. Fortunately, I was able to recover the user list, but everyone will have to get new passwords. You can do that on this page. Remember, that the old rules still apply: a short PoolForum terms of use page is here.

But, other than the user list, I've banged my head against that wall all I can stand, and it's time to move on. I promise to never again trust the internal backup processes of forum software. Instead, I'll be taking the server offline for 5 - 10 minutes each day, probably around 3:00 in the morning, so I can do a full offline backup, and store it on another system.

Once you have a password, you can use it to post new questions (there are no old ones!) on the forum, here.

Please understand that I and the moderators are all learning the new software, and that things will be changing frequently, over the next few days and weeks. (I hate the default style, and am trying to learn to modify that!)

Also, PoolSolutions is up, and I am taking pre-orders on the new PS234 kit. Info on that can be found here.

If you urgently need to contact me directly, you can email me at admin AT pool9 DOT net (you'll have to fix the address, and type it in directly). But, please understand that I'm primarily focused on getting things fixed for everybody.

Thanks for your interest and support!

Ben

* Having rebuilt the server, and worked with the remnants of the PoolForum data, I'm more puzzled than ever. I still don't understand what happened, nor do any of the PC wizards I've spoken with about it. But, it's time to move on, and not waste more time trying to understand what happened.

 

[JohnT]

That message is several years old.

 

[Molson]

yeah, I just realized that. heh, shows how much I use a forum front page.

 

[launboy]

Try turning off any firewalls or directly pinging the server at 66.129.2.151

First, I typed that into the Adress Bar and got the Page Cannot Be displayed page. Then I went into Command Prompt and typed "Ping 66.129.2.151". It said...

Pinging 66.129.2.151 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 66.129.2.151: Destiation net unreachable.
Reply from 66.129.2.151: Destiation net unreachable.
Reply from 66.129.2.151: Destiation net unreachable.
Reply from 66.129.2.151: Destiation net unreachable.

Ping statistics for 66.129.2.151:
Packets: Sent = 4, Recieved = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

That was the second time I did it, the first time the bit at the bottom that says the percentage said "Recieved = 0, Lost = 4"

HTH,
Adam

 

[chem geek]

poolforum.com seems to be down again. Is anyone else able to access it?

 

[spishex]

It's working for me.

 

[waste]

I got on without a problem - there wasn't much to look at (1 new post re. plaster) but I got on.

 

[launboy]

FWIW, I can get on PF at school(was their today) and at the library, but still can't access from home. Unfortunately, this site is blocked on the school computers. I believe it was Catagorized as Parked by the filtering software(LightSpeed Systems).

Adam

 

[chem geek]

For whatever reason, I can access it at work, but not at home, even though I used to be able to access it from home. That sounds like a DNS problem so I'll have to see if I can access the IP address directly. Either that or the server is now rejecting my IP address (I know it does that for some foreign IP addresses). At home, I'm on comcast.net.

 

[chem geek]

I found that I can access pooforum.com by using this public CGI proxy server site by typing in http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/index.php in the URL field on the site and clicking on "Surf!". It looks like my public IP address from comcast has changed and may now be in a range that poolforum is blocking. Strannik, you could probably use the proxy server site to "look like" you are coming from a U.S. location (select "us" for the Country) in order to access pooforum and poolsolutions. If you have a login, you will likely need to re-login each time.

Richard

 

[amjohn]

I have tried applying for a login to poolforum but only get an answer that it is no longer taking registrations. Also, I have not received any response to my attempts at contacting the admin. Is that site closed?

 

[waste]

The admin there went MIA ~ 2 years ago, the site has been closed to registrations since before then - he left 4 good mods that are handling things, but they can't access registration and haven't been able to contact him . It's a long and upsetting story - including $ taken for goods that were never delivered :grrrr:

The info there is priceless, but only accessible to the members at the time it 'stopped running' or folks who can get into the site and PATIENTLY search for the info :| It was the birthplace for this site and fortunately much of the info and the progression of what was being done there has flourished here

There are enough of us here that if you are looking for something specific from that site, we can search it for you.

It's a shame that PF is closed, but a God- send that TFP rose up to fill the gap left! :angel:

 

[Ohm_Boy]

I have tried applying for a login to poolforum but only get an answer that it is no longer taking registrations. Also, I have not received any response to my attempts at contacting the admin. Is that site closed?

Yep, the site is closed, due to the owner dropping off the face of the earth. It still runs, but is only maintained by the forum moderators, who have only the limited ability to manage postings. Unfortunately, there is little hope of it's ever returning to an open-registration status. On the other hand, it was the stagnant condition of the site that led to the creation of this one, so as usual, there is some silver lining to the cloud.

As for being able to access it from some locations and not from others, Ben had some provisions to detect and block many malevolent activities, and at least some of them were designed to block access from addresses which made attempts to gain illicit entry to the server.
If you have an IP address which has ever been involved in attempts to access sensitive areas of the server, his tools may have simply blocked your IP from any further access. Unfortunately, once blocked there is no provisions to ever allow access to that address again, as Ben is no longer around to release them from the blocking list.

 

[jimk0512]

chem geek,

Thanks for your posting, Comcast is my ISP, and I haven't been able to connect to poolforum.com in weeks. I was wondering what was going on.

Jim

 

[watermom]

The PoolForum.com domain name expired on October 25, 2008. I just noticed it this afternoon when I tried to log on. Some of you may also have tried to log in today unsuccessfully. The PoolSolutions.com domain name will expire February 20, 2009. The link which is on the PoolSolutions page for PF also no longer works. The only way to be able to access the PoolForum website for now at least is through the following url.

http://66.129.2.151/pf2/login.php?do=lo ... e8dc488770

If we have any further info for you, we will post it here on TFP as well as on PF.

Watermom/Lisa