Server Problems

Server Problems

In the last 2 days, I’ve been having some major problems with the dedicated server I am running all my blogs and sites. For probloggers, the downtimes can only be measured by the amount of revenue that was lost.

Brings me to re-think the idea of putting all my web properties in one big basket. If the server is down, all sites are down.

The remedy? There’s no real remedy for this actually. My previous strategy was to spread the blogs across multiple servers so that if one server is down, majority fo the other sites are still up on other servers.

But that changed when I pooled them all up in one dedicated server along with other bloggers and charity sites which I offered free hosting.

Now, the strategy turns to weekly remote backups. If the server is down, I can switch the domain nameservers to another server containing the latest weekly backup and have the sites backup in a matter of minutes. Although the backups will not have the latest updated contents, at least the archives are still there and I still get the lost traffic and the revenues.

Abe Olandres

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.

https://www.yugatech.com

8 Comments

Bangis says:

18 years ago

Yuga,

Maybe you need this backup software:

http://www.cpsitesaver.com

Hope this helps.
- Reply
SELaplana says:

19 years ago

there’s no problem with the downtime actually. I will not complain about it as along as we have an active webhost owner like him who immediately work hard to settle the problems.
- Reply
Aaron says:

19 years ago

I think a mirror server is the solution, but it is costly.
- Reply
noemi says:

19 years ago

My most common problem is when one site overloads the server like sending mass emails, overusage of mysql database, or spam hitting the client’s site.
- Reply
ade says:

19 years ago

so THAT’s what happened. Good luck!
- Reply
alfa says:

19 years ago

I thought your server got hit by a tornado rin. Glad it’s back!
- Reply
Abe Olandres says:

19 years ago

Mostly hardware-related actually, and specific to my own personal dedicated server. This one has been doing really great with 100% uptime for over 60 days.

There are pros and cons actually if you want to spread your blogs across different servers: more problems since there are more servers to take care of but if you have some problems, it’s not gonna affect all your sites.

There’s just so many levels to consider:

i) Data Center wide problems – whole data center gets some power problems or hit by disasters like blackouts, earthquakes, hurricanes.

ii) Network wide problem – some bandwidth providers going down and connectivity is lost or weakened.

iii) Webhost-wide problems is usually dependent on their DC they get their servers but occasional problems such as targetted mass spamming or DDOS can also be a cause.

iv) Server-wide problems occur if a certain specific server have problems in OS, kernel, services (apache, mysql), cPanel, or hardware.

v) Account-specific problems only concerns a single domain or account and is usually the most common one.

Imagine all these 5 layers of potential problems you could get into. The less layers you are on, the less problems or shorter downtimes you get (since you cut off the escalation).
- Reply
Manuel Viloria says:

19 years ago

What kind of dedicated server problems, Abe? Specific only to the server, or was it webhost-wide?

Are probloggers better off putting their blogs in different shared hosting accounts, instead of in a dedicated server?
- Reply