"GolfWRX is currently unavailable"

[Howie]

And underneath it reads:

 

"Hello. We have a scheduled maintenance underway. The community will not be accessible during this maintenance window. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience. Thank You! -GolfWRX"

 

Over the past 24 hours I continue to receive this message when attempting to access the GolfWRX forums. It seems to be isolated to my PC as I'm currently typing this from my Mac and also noted the forums are reachable from my iPad (Safari browser).

 

I've cleared cookies, restarted browsers, etc. Browsers is plural as Chrome, Vivaldi, Brave, and Edge (the last three- including Edge- are based on Chromium) are all exhibiting this issue. Interestingly, however, Firefox on my PC isn't suffering from this problem. 

 

Could it be an interaction between Chrome based browsers and the GolfWRX forums?

 

Anything which might explain this glitch?

 

This just started yesterday.

 

Thanks.

Edited September 28, 2020 by Howie

[Gxgolfer]

We just moved servers so your computer history will take time to catch up. Clearing local cache may also help. 

[Howie]

Cleared local cache and it didn't help. I'll try again later this evening. Odd (at least to me) that it is only impacting Chrome-based browsers on my PC (not Firefox) but it isn't impacting a Chrome-based browser within the Mac OS environment.

 

Thanks,

 

Howie

[PureDivots]

Running into the same on Mac OS with chrome. Even after clearing all browser data and trying incognito mode. 

Edited September 29, 2020 by DaltonSTL

[nsxguy]

12 minutes ago, DaltonSTL said:

Running into the same on Mac OS with chrome. Even after clearing all browser data and trying incognito mode. 

 

How did you get to make THIS post then ? Another browser ? Another device ?

[PureDivots]

22 minutes ago, nsxguy said:

 

How did you get to make THIS post then ? Another browser ? Another device ?

Apologies left out that it is working on Chrome through iPhone although not 100%. Firefox and Safari on Mac OS also not working. 

[ScottF]

2 minutes ago, DaltonSTL said:

Apologies left out that it is working on Chrome through iPhone although not 100%. Firefox and Safari on Mac OS also not working. 

I'm on a Mac using Safari ver 10.15.6 typing this. Working just fine.

[PureDivots]

Cant say I changed anything but it appears to be working now.

[PureDivots]

8 minutes ago, DaltonSTL said:

Cant say I changed anything but it appears to be working now.

Short lived back to (Offline) page 

[nsxguy]

I'm not sure how exactly to explain it but sometimes when there's a major upgrade/overhaul/whatever of a website there are things called DNS (Domain Name System) settings that need to propagate through the entire internet world.

 

I'm under the impression these changes can take up to a few DAYS and there's literally nothing the site or the browsers can do about it.

 

So if you're unfortunate enough to be traveling through the net via a DNS that hasn't caught up yet, you're out of luck until it does.

 

This would explain (I think) why it works on some devices but not others.

[leegee38]

I'm typing this from a chrome browser.  No issues here.

[PureDivots]

14 minutes ago, nsxguy said:

I'm not sure how exactly to explain it but sometimes when there's a major upgrade/overhaul/whatever of a website there are things called DNS (Domain Name System) settings that need to propagate through the entire internet world.

 

I'm under the impression these changes can take up to a few DAYS and there's literally nothing the site or the browsers can do about it.

 

So if you're unfortunate enough to be traveling through the net via a DNS that hasn't caught up yet, you're out of luck until it does.

 

This would explain (I think) why it works on some devices but not others.

DNS was my thought, it never plays nicely when you make large changes. Although all my devices should be pulling the same DNS. Anyways, give it some time see if it’s any better tomorrow. Maybe it’s just me. 

[nsxguy]

1 minute ago, DaltonSTL said:

DNS was my thought, it never plays nicely when you make large changes. Although all my devices should be pulling the same DNS. Anyways, give it some time see if it’s any better tomorrow. Maybe it’s just me. 

 

I think that's the explanation.

 

I have FF and Chrome on my desktop MAC and Chrome on my Android phone and they all work fine.

[Howie]

8 hours ago, DaltonSTL said:

DNS was my thought, it never plays nicely when you make large changes. Although all my devices should be pulling the same DNS. Anyways, give it some time see if it’s any better tomorrow. Maybe it’s just me. 

 

Same here. All of my devices use the same DNS servers- Google primary and OpenDNS secondary- so that shouldn't have impacted it.

 

After deleting the GolfWRX cookies, cleaning cache, restarting the affected browsers, etc., I wound up rebooting my PC. Afterward, the glitch ceased to exist. I don't think it was coincidental but also don't know what that would have done to correct.

[pseudoswede]

For a while yesterday, while using Chrome on my laptop, the forums were nothing but a wall of text (no graphics). What was even more strange was that going to golfwrx.com's main homepage was normal. If I clicked on the link to the forums from the home page, I got just a wall of text. Clearing cache and cookies didn't fix anything. Someone in the ColoradoWRX thread said Chrome worked fine, but it was Internet Explorer that exhibited the strange behavior.

 

Yet, everything looked just fine on my phone's Chrome browser. Later in the evening, I disconnected from my company's VPN, and the forums looked normal--so I attributed it to my corporate VPN blocking something underneath the forum. I tried again this morning on my corporate laptop, and everything is normal again. The joys of technology.

[aaron]

Hello All - 

 

There are a couple of things going on here.

 

First, we did make a total DNS change so the theories about needing it to propagate throughout the entire Internet are accurate.  Further, some networks (corporate) do their own DNS and DNS caching so that can even further delay it.  It's typical. We allowed 48 hours before pulling the trigger on the migration but there is always the risk of some networks not updating as frequently.

 

Second, if you occasionally see a short window when the site doesn't "look" normal but has all of the text on the page; that is due to us updating some code (stylesheets). Waiting a few seconds and then refreshing will typically put it back to normal. The homepage (www.golfwrx.com) is a separate platform.

 

Thanks for hanging in there with us as we endeavor towards making this place even better than it already is!

[Howie]

Happening again this afternoon. Chrome-based browsers running in a Win10 environment. Deleting cookies and clearing cache doesn't help.

 

However, if I reboot my computer it has the effect of enabling GolfWRX to function normally (i.e., the message as listed in the original post doesn't appear).

 

What has changed with the forums to cause such lingering problems?

[Gxgolfer]

As stated above, DNS may still be propagating. You can try shifting to open dns which may actually improve your internet speed as well. 
 

https://www.opendns.com/home-internet-security/

[Howie]

As noted previously, I use OpenDNS as a secondary DNS server.

 

It also doesn't compute that it would be a DNS issue as Firefox hasn't been impacted by the identified issue but Chrome-based browsers (three different ones) have on my PC. If I'm missing something here, I'd appreciate being corrected.

[nsxguy]

17 minutes ago, Howie said:

As noted previously, I use OpenDNS as a secondary DNS server.

 

It also doesn't compute that it would be a DNS issue as Firefox hasn't been impacted by the identified issue but Chrome-based browsers (three different ones) have on my PC. If I'm missing something here, I'd appreciate being corrected.

 

You seem to know more about this than the average guy; certainly more than I do.

 

I did a quick search and came up with this. The English is poor but maybe it'll help.

 

http://net-informations.com/q/mis/reached.html

[Howie]

Interesting info. I'll keep it handy in case this persists. The fact it has only ever been an issue with the GolfWRX site and, more specifically, coinciding with the GolfWRX server move leads me to believe...actually, I don't know what it leads me to believe. Hopefully it doesn't again occur as I'm able to navigate about the forums this evening using various Chromium-based browsers <fingers crossed>.

 

Thanks,

 

Howie

[nsxguy]

1 hour ago, Howie said:

Interesting info. I'll keep it handy in case this persists. The fact it has only ever been an issue with the GolfWRX site and, more specifically, coinciding with the GolfWRX server move leads me to believe...actually, I don't know what it leads me to believe. Hopefully it doesn't again occur as I'm able to navigate about the forums this evening using various Chromium-based browsers <fingers crossed>.

 

Thanks,

 

Howie

 

Maybe there's a clue here ? https://superuser.com/questions/65382/does-chrome-use-a-different-dns-server-from-firefox-and-ie-which-use-the-os-defa

 

Actually, over the last few months I've been having a terrible time with Chrome (on my MAC). I've used Chrome for about 12 years now, ever since FF slowed down to a crawl. I tried Chrome and it was miles faster than FF. Goodbye FF.

 

But a few months ago, admittedly while having many tabs open, Chrome started giving me all sorts of trouble; very sluggish. I'd look at my Activity Monitor and see that every open tab has a "Chrome Helper" running as well. I'd get a lot of "Resolving Host" and "Waiting for cache" in the lower left hand corner of the browser.

 

Net-net, FF has improved its speed greatly over the years and I'm now using FF for most things. I do have Chrome open as well, for my email mostly and my radio.com works better there as well.

 

But that link I gave earlier has something about Chrome using different DNS servers - which sounds a little like your problem.

 

 

 

 

 

[Howie]

Recommend looking at the Brave Browser for the Mac. It's built on Chrome, uses Chrome extensions, but is geared toward a better user experience from a site tracking, etc. standpoint. That's what I use primarily on my Mac and it wasn't exhibiting the problems noted on my PC (which Brave, Edge, Vivaldi, and Chrome...but not Firefox!...were). I haven't used Vivaldi on the Mac but assume it's identical to its PC version- another built on Chrome but allows for great customization including a must-have feature called "Tab Stacks" (you can create "stacks" of websites all contained within a single tab). It's outstanding for keeping things organized- I even have a "GolfWRX" tab stack into which I'll place active tabs/windows.