Sunday, 13/Nov/2005

Why this site was down, why it's not, and what I will not discuss.

For avid readers, I apologise that this site has shut down periodically. For the most part, this has not been my doing or controlling. Until recently, I.F. has always relied on free hosting (from Hypermart to a personal friend's server), because when the site started I couldn't even legally get a job to pay for hosting. Between its opening and its current look, school usually took time away from the site, and so updates were sporadic even when the site did not shut down. Due to encouragement by friends, I brought back I.F. as a long-lasting hobby of mine. Because of this site, I've picked up new programming languages and eventually created the website I had wanted to make: a site that permitted me to be lazy in everything but content.

When this happened, the site migrated to a friend's server in Houston, which proved problematic since I didn't move there until recently. With the new server meant more technology Hypermart wouldn't give, and conveniently Hypermart was discontinuing their free hosting right after my migration. My friend's server, however, is not a box on full-time watch. Much like this site is a hobby for me, that box was a hobby for him. Periodically, the server would shut down as a consequence of hacking, crashing, or personal reasons, which did not give me much arm-room for updates. Similarly, I did not even register my own domain until earlier this year, so I had to rely on whoever was giving me space to not change their plans either. During one extended downtime, I registered a domain, thus leaving me free from someone else's issues, but the site remained hosted under the friend's server.

Well, after ample updates during my summer break from college, the server crashed. I gave it a little time to come back up, but it had not. Two months later, I had my own problems to deal with. The server crashed, and in late August, I had to leave New Orleans, and I left without my computer and my files. Obviously, I needed to recover from the losses from the hurricane (and a FEMA who claims that they were "unable to help me at this time" was not going to be sufficient enough). Luckily, the job I had in New Orleans moved with me, and once I decided I really wanted to bring this site back, I was able to get the backup files from my friend's server. And I also decided to buy some good hosting so that I can keep this site on and have no more unscheduled interruptions.

Many of you were already aware of this situation, but this leads to my next thing. I'm not going to cover the experience of the Hurricane on this site, at least not right now. The news has saturated people with coverage, and for an entire week I saw the remains of a place that, despite my hatred of it, was still a part of me. There's not really much I want to or need to say about that situation, and I, for one, think it's getting kind of old. This site has been an avenue for me to keep my head straight, and at this moment, I've pretty much moved on from this situation. And to kick off my overcoming of this, I decided that a few dollars a month would be worth having a website again.

For all of those that may read this, and think they know who I am, and you've helped me in some way get to where I am after the storm, your generosity has not been overlooked. I do thank you for helping me make it out of New Orleans.

For the rest of you, your life has just been marked OVER. I.F. is back to bring meaning in to most of your lives, and for the haters: I am still better than your best friend.