Tech Support Tag - Week 2

For two weeks and more
You have failed, you have failed.
For two weeks and more
You have failed me!

For so long you've been true,
But now nothing that you do
Can make my problem up and go away.

For your tech support
I have begged, I have begged.
For your tech support
I have begged you!

I've complied with your demands,
Yet you will not understand
That it just don't make my problem go away.

Grumble, mutter, snarl... I've had nothing but good luck with my site host for years. Whenever there's been a problem, a quick missive to tech support got things straightened out within a message or two. Now, they did restore my site when they figured out it was on their end, but that's when the annoying User Name/Password loop set in. I couldn't publish to my subdomain (Brightdreamer Books) without being locked into entering my User Name and Password time after time after time... and it never did take. I just sent my fifth e-mail informing them that I cannot publish to one of my subdomains, and that, once again, their suggestion failed to fix this lingering problem. It's on their end. It has to be on their end. Nothing in FrontPage 2000 has any capacity to screw up a user name/password authentication on their server, especially since it works not only for my main site, but for my new subdomain. Besides, it was their glitch on their end which had the whole site shut down to begin with, so logic tells me that perhaps it's yet another glitch on their end which suddenly doesn't allow me to publish a subdomain which I have been able to publish successfully for well over a year.

The last e-mail from their support had a slightly snippy tone to it, so I finally had it. I spent this morning doing screen captures of every step in the process of my attempt to comply with their demands, the disastrous results (the main site was overwritten and the index page screwed up - this is why I've never had an index.htm problem on my subdomains, folks, and I never had a publishing problem until now!!!), how I fixed it, and how I still cannot publish my subdomain. I even went into Paint Shop Pro and added helpful circles and lines, and in my e-mail I annotated each image. I'm pretty sure they hate me by now, but they're just not listening to the problem and I'm getting very, very angry. So Brightdreamer Books languishes as the book review backlog creeps ever closer to 20 (I think I just hit 16 with the latest addition.) It's the only site I have with a potential for revenue, and while it hasn't exactly been a gold mine (or a silver mine... heck, even a coal mine), I rather liked the possibility of a little extra income now and again. This whole problem is, in a word, ridiculous. Actually, it's absolutely frellin' inexcusably ridiculous, but that's four words and I promised one. If this doesn't clear up soon I'll have to find another site host; I should not have to pay for a second domain name/server just to publish one third of my site. If this means teaching myself Dreamweaver so I'm not limited by FrontPage compatibility, so be it. I've just about had it.

I think I'll grab a cup of cocoa and and find something mindless and vaguely aggressive to do.

If You're Looking For Skyhaven...

Okay, just a quick little post here to say that I know my domain (Brightdreamer.com, home of Skyhaven Adoptions and my book review site that I don't think anyone even knows about) is having "issues" at the moment, as in it's been essentially inaccessible since Friday night. I'll be throwing together a quick update as soon as possible to see if that helps; if not, I'll be trying to contact tech support to see what's up. Just so you know, the Skyhaven Hunt will NOT be returning in this update - I am simply trying to get my sites back up and running. Work on the Hunt has begun, though, so don't fear, but this problem will be delaying the process. (By an odd coincidence, it was the night that I requested the subdomain for the Hunt - so it'll be easier to manage via FrontPage on my end without poking through the rest of Skyhaven - that my sites went down. I sincerely hope the two aren't connected...)

Anyway, if you need to contact me, leave me a message via Comments here.

UPDATE - It's Saturday night. Tech Support got back to me (yes, on a Saturday) to say that the problem was indeed on their end and it should be fixed within 24 hours. I'll probably be too busy tomorrow (Father's Day stuff and all), but I'll try posting Monday.

UPDATE UPDATE - So close, yet so far away... I finally got my main site (Skyhaven) back and updated, but I get stuck in a weird loop whenever I try updating to the subwebs (Brightdreamer Books and the new Skyhaven Hunt subweb.) I'll give them another day to work it out... maybe it's a last glitch. But at least the site's back up now. That's something.