We want Forum Feedback!

[Slaskia]

The only issues I've been having with the forum lately is the occassional 'Forum is overloaded, please try again later' type message. So, like other's have said, Ashes, it's likely an issue with your machine itself, not DC, giving you the problems.

 

Your issue could range from a bottleneck in routing between you and DC (which can't be helped), to malware/hijackers on your computer. I would suggest running a reliable up-to-date anti-virus/anti-spyware/etc on your computer ASAP to help rule out malware.

 

Once any virus'/hijacking software is cleaned out, get an ad-blocker of some form (or update the one you have). I, personally, don't use a third-party ad-blocker: instead, I keep my hosts file updated. A hosts file is a file on your computer that basically contains a blacklist for any untrustworthy site, which includes ad sites (this is a laymans explaination: more info (and access to a batch file that will update your hosts file) here. This one is only for Windows computers, unfortunately.)

 

Only problem with protecting your computer in this manner is that you cannot 'pick and chose' which sites to allow ads to display (like DC). And of course, you need to keep it updated.

 

Anyway, I hope this was helpful (even if it is a bit off topic).

[earthgirl]

I keep getting a lot of 'Forum on heavy load' message when I try to surf around topics/post/etc.

 

What's up with that? It's really annoying and it's been happening a lot in the last month.

[aangs-sister]

I keep getting a lot of 'Forum on heavy load' message when I try to surf around topics/post/etc.

 

What's up with that? It's really annoying and it's been happening a lot in the last month.

Ditto here. I'm glad I'm not the only one. It seems to be steadily getting more frequent, and it is really starting to be a pain.

[Rally Vincent]

Now that everything is back to normal - aka closing threads instead of dealing with whoever Mods think did something wrong - we can all lay back and pretend that straying from the usual practice never happened.

[TheGrox]

For once, Vincent, I can somewhat agree with your painfully sarcastic comment. Surely it would be better to deal with the offending posters, and try to keep the discussion on topic by posting a few reminders, rather than stopping a perfectly valid discussion due to a minority of people posting off-topic. =/

[Hailwidis]

Ditto here. I'm glad I'm not the only one. It seems to be steadily getting more frequent, and it is really starting to be a pain.

 

I keep getting a lot of 'Forum on heavy load' message when I try to surf around topics/post/etc.

 

What's up with that? It's really annoying and it's been happening a lot in the last month.

Quoted for truth. It's so frequent it's getting annoying for trading etc.

[RWyvern]

Ditto here. I'm glad I'm not the only one. It seems to be steadily getting more frequent, and it is really starting to be a pain.

Ditto here too. I thought it was due to my iPad and slow Internet at first, but it's getting to the point where multiple refreshes, cache clears and complete turnoffs won't stop it. If a forum page does load, it's usually just luck.

[olympe]

For once, Vincent, I can somewhat agree with your painfully sarcastic comment. Surely it would be better to deal with the offending posters, and try to keep the discussion on topic by posting a few reminders, rather than stopping a perfectly valid discussion due to a minority of people posting off-topic. =/

Nah, can't be, or things would be handled that way. /sarcasm

[KageSora]

I've been getting the "forums are overloaded" messages more often than normal ever since the Christmas event started, too.

 

Sometimes for around an hour (or more) at a time.

[PointOfOrigin]

Yeah, I've also been getting the message. But in the last couple of days I'm getting it constantly when I check message tracker. To "test it", I've opened two tabs: one with a tracker, and the other with main forum page. Message tracker hasn't loaded at all, while the main page loaded in half a second

[Fuzzbucket]

Yeah, I've also been getting the message. But in the last couple of days I'm getting it constantly when I check message tracker. To "test it", I've opened two tabs: one with a tracker, and the other with main forum page. Message tracker hasn't loaded at all, while the main page loaded in half a second

Got to be some geographical component here - just tested, and the only thing that took a while (and fair enough) - my tracked had loads of tracked messages in and I wanted to kill the read ones - that took almost 5 whole seconds....

[SilverMoonRain]

I've had the 'under heavy load' message lots of times too! Also on the mobile site the adds are really annoying!!!!!

[Anna Selka]

I've been getting the "forums are overloaded" messages more often than normal ever since the Christmas event started, too.

 

Sometimes for around an hour (or more) at a time.

Same here, it's quite frequent since a week or so before Christmas.

 

Also, very often pages take a very long time to load... they'll just be blank for up to a few minutes before they load. It makes hanging out on the forums quite difficult. My connection is quite good, and other sites load very well, so it can't be that ; especially since it's a recent thing.

[KageSora]

Also I noticed it happening plenty during times generally not associated with high traffic--dead of the night times.

 

When it does load, it usually takes some time to do it. Right now I've gotten a few good ones in, but... No telling how long it'll last.

[HeatherMarie]

I've had that same "overloaded" message MANY times, but since any lag-related topics tend to get closed with no actual answer, I didn't bother making a topic.

 

It's not holiday/new-release anymore, so that can't be an excuse. And it seems to happen completely randomly, no matter how many people are actually on.

[Emeraldmay]

I noticed that when I had two tabs on the forums open, the one I was trying to search on came up with 'heavy load', while the one I was simply trying to open a thread worked fine. The tab I was trying to search on took multiple refreshes to work.

 

Also, on cave, I can navigate fine between the biomes, but I get awful white screen and lag whenever an egg is taken and the three you can see changes. My tablet experienced little to no lag however.

 

Like everyone else, I've had this since around christmas Hope this helps in some way

[Fuzzbucket]

Forum Feedback actual suggestion:

 

We really need a sort of NEWS thread where we are kept informed about issues like this, as we must be using heaps of bandwidth a} posting about it in EVERY subforum and b} trying desperately to post when it is snookered....

 

Maybe one of those "issues with website: contact webmaster" things - so TJ doesn't get flooded....

 

I STILL want to know if all email messages are off - as I said somewhere (see, posting all over !) I even sent myself an email to test - and that hasn't made it...

[HeatherMarie]

I second fuzz's suggestion, and expand on it. When things are going wrong that will noticeably and visibly affect forum users, TELL US. Post an actual news-post *telling* us that search is disabled for awhile, that the little dots on the thread-scroll-thingys are missing for now, that a lot of people are reporting error messages. Let us KNOW that you know things are wrong, and are actually doing something about it.

[KageSora]

I agree.

 

Even if it's something as simple as "Something isn't working right, the exact problem isn't known yet" is still helpful because at least users know that the problem has been noted and presumably is being looked into.

[Banuk]

I second fuzz's suggestion, and expand on it. When things are going wrong that will noticeably and visibly affect forum users, TELL US. Post an actual news-post *telling* us that search is disabled for awhile, that the little dots on the thread-scroll-thingys are missing for now, that a lot of people are reporting error messages. Let us KNOW that you know things are wrong, and are actually doing something about it.

Yes please!

 

I hate seeing all these topics about legitimate issues with the forum being closed with no explanation or even a word on if the problem is being looked into. It makes me feel, not for the first time, like users are being treated like children who don't need to concern themselves with adult problems.

 

I'm getting, "The forums are under heavy load." messages one out of every five refreshes recently. It is a problem, and it should be addressed in some form, not swept under the rug.

[Nectaris]

I agree with what others are saying. Trying to sweep it under the rug when everyone can see that something is wrong does not strike the right note with users. People like information, they don't like to be kept in the dark, especially when it isn't that hard to post a quick blurb on the problems the forums are facing.

[Nine]

Maybe not entirely relevant, but I am reminded of the time Turpentines would 100% refuse to breed with certain species, and how it was insisted that nothing was wrong and things were working as intended. Users had gathered up the convincing stats to prove otherwise-- some 400+ refusals and nothing else-- but it was ignored for a time until it finally got fixed. 'Fixed' with the response of "everything is working normally, like it was before. Nothing was ever wrong", or something to that effect.

 

Evasive and withholding, I think that event stressed just how little is shared with users and how unappreciative people are of being kept in the dark. I feel this could be improved upon.

[KageSora]

I agree.

 

You don't have to share 100% with users. But more than "everything is working fine" when to the users it clearly looks like it isn't is needed.

 

If, indeed, there is a situation where it looks broken but isn't, some kind of data to back up the assertion that nothing is wrong would be good.

 

In cases where there is something wrong, something as simple as "Yes, we're aware that something is broken, it's being looked into" can go miles beyond the "sweep it under the rug" tactic.

 

I mean, it's not like users can reasonably expect that nothing ever goes wrong. Things happen. It's understandable that things will go wrong or break from time to time. Anybody who complains that things shouldn't break ever doesn't understand reality very well.

Edited January 7, 2013 by KageSora

[Fuzzbucket]

Yes please!

 

I hate seeing all these topics about legitimate issues with the forum being closed with no explanation or even a word on if the problem is being looked into. It makes me feel, not for the first time, like users are being treated like children who don't need to concern themselves with adult problems.

 

I'm getting, "The forums are under heavy load." messages one out of every five refreshes recently. It is a problem, and it should be addressed in some form, not swept under the rug.

To be fair, a mod posted somewhere yesterday (no I am NOT going to search !) that "yes there are problems, no we don't know what is causing them yet." But that was buried in a thread somewhere, not exactly prominent.

 

But the email thing is borderline serious in game terms - people may be trying to tell others about trades, and knowing that the PMs aren't being notified, try email instead - and they simply - aren't going anywhere. So they may be hopping mad about some trade or other. We NEED to know about that. If they are not going out (as it would seem; I just sent myself another which I didn't receive...) - instead of people being able to send into the void of vanishment, have a note "sorry, emails are disabled just now" at least ?

 

I need to archive my PMs soon, too. The last anything I got from here was Dec 30th - I just looked. And I checked my spam....

[Anna Selka]

Uuuuuuugh I've had another batch of overloaded forums messages for the last 10 minutes. So annoying It seems to be getting worse.

 

Edit : And it did it again while trying to post this message.

Edited January 7, 2013 by Anna Selka