For general Groups.io questions, please see the Group Managers Forum and Group_Help groups. Note: those groups are volunteer-led and are not officially run by Groups.io.
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Hi Mark,
in responding to a query on Group_Help, i just found that members that do not have permission to upload new files still see the button with the drop-down menu to do so but each option does nothing. Should the button be shown at all? Regards Andy
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I needed to edit and resend a message in a locked topic this morning, but got a red banner
"This thread has been locked by the moderators; edits are not allowed." Is this a new bug, or a conscious change? It's definitely an old banner, judging by the term "thread." So is it perahps obsolete? Perhaps failed to be removed when the change allowing mods to edit and post to locked topics was implemented? Thanks. -- J Messages are the sole opinion of the author, especially the fishy ones.
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moderated
Re: #suggestion to facilitate ease of contacting specific members
#suggestion
On Tue, Jan 18, 2022 at 03:05 PM, Peter wrote:
As my message was addressed to Mark, I’ll await his sage thoughts.This is a discussion group, so you can expect commentary. And I agree with Andy - my main group has a database of people that includes both members and non-members. Pete
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moderated
Re: 1/15/22 Outage
#postmortem
Mark, thanks so much for the complete explanation. Informative and interesting. Consider Better, not Bigger. So many advantages. Just ask. USA adds a Chicago to our overpop each year. "Still more population growth is not our way to a healthy community, a healthy planet, OR enjoyable cycling." ~Mike
On Tuesday, January 18, 2022, 03:14:31 PM EST, Mark Fletcher <markf@corp.groups.io> wrote:
SUMMARY: Between the hours of 2:44pm Pacific Time and 3:38pm Pacific Time on Saturday January 15th, all aspects of the service, including the website and email delivery, were down. People visiting the website were redirected to the Maintenance page. Emails sent to the service were temporarily rejected for resending. FAULT: The event was triggered when the main database stopped accepting internal network connections at 2:44pm Pacific Time. DETECTION: The event was detected by our monitoring system, and a page was sent to me within one minute of this happening. RESPONSE: I was away from home at the time, and did not have my laptop. Because of this, I did not have easy command-line access to the servers. I had to rely on our web-based internal dashboard systems to diagnose and fix the problem, using a third party's computer. I also had trouble changing the https://status.groups.io page and updating the Groups.io Twitter account. RECOVERY: Once I had determined that the main database was not accepting internal network connections, I restarted the database, and the site came back on-line. No data was lost and no emails were lost. CORRECTIVE ACTIONS: The main database has never frozen in this way in the past. I don't know why it froze, and there isn't anything in the logs. Given that the uptime of the database is measured in hundreds of days, at this point I don't see any changes that need to be made. If this happens again soon, I will re-evaluate. In situations like this, I normally rely on command-line access to the Groups.io servers. But I did not easily have that in this instance. For the purposes of diagnosing this problem, our internal dashboards were missing some features that would have helped with this, and which would have reduced the amount of downtime. A major focus is to try to eliminate my need for command-line access to the machines in order to diagnose issues with the site. I have embarqed on adding features to our internal web-based dashboards to address this, including the following:
I expect these features to be completed this week. Mark
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moderated
1/15/22 Outage
#postmortem
SUMMARY: Between the hours of 2:44pm Pacific Time and 3:38pm Pacific Time on Saturday January 15th, all aspects of the service, including the website and email delivery, were down. People visiting the website were redirected to the Maintenance page. Emails sent to the service were temporarily rejected for resending. FAULT: The event was triggered when the main database stopped accepting internal network connections at 2:44pm Pacific Time. DETECTION: The event was detected by our monitoring system, and a page was sent to me within one minute of this happening. RESPONSE: I was away from home at the time, and did not have my laptop. Because of this, I did not have easy command-line access to the servers. I had to rely on our web-based internal dashboard systems to diagnose and fix the problem, using a third party's computer. I also had trouble changing the https://status.groups.io page and updating the Groups.io Twitter account. RECOVERY: Once I had determined that the main database was not accepting internal network connections, I restarted the database, and the site came back on-line. No data was lost and no emails were lost. CORRECTIVE ACTIONS: The main database has never frozen in this way in the past. I don't know why it froze, and there isn't anything in the logs. Given that the uptime of the database is measured in hundreds of days, at this point I don't see any changes that need to be made. If this happens again soon, I will re-evaluate. In situations like this, I normally rely on command-line access to the Groups.io servers. But I did not easily have that in this instance. For the purposes of diagnosing this problem, our internal dashboards were missing some features that would have helped with this, and which would have reduced the amount of downtime. A major focus is to try to eliminate my need for command-line access to the machines in order to diagnose issues with the site. I have embarqed on adding features to our internal web-based dashboards to address this, including the following:
I expect these features to be completed this week. Mark
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moderated
Re: #suggestion to facilitate ease of contacting specific members
#suggestion
Peter
Andy,
As my message was addressed to Mark, I’ll await his sage thoughts. I see what you say but beg to disagree‘
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Maria McGrath
Thank you, you are a gem x
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On Mon, Jan 17, 2022 at 8:22 PM Maria McGrath <maria@...> wrote:
This should be fixed now. I had added an additional permission check, but had gotten the logic wrong. Thanks, Mark
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Maria McGrath
Hi, I have been updating our database for a few years ow by importing updates from a CSV file.
Today I had a new set of updated data to import and i deleted the old data. The file will not import and i am using the same csv file as I always used. I did a test on a simple import with only two columns and it will not import. Please can this be looked into as our members use the database daily. Thanks in advance Maria
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moderated
Re: #suggestion to facilitate ease of contacting specific members
#suggestion
On Mon, Jan 17, 2022 at 12:23 PM, Peter wrote:
That may be the case for your group but that won't be the case for other groups. If your members are savvy enough to access a database, then 'RSVP'ing to a calendar event should be no more of a challenge. Regards Andy
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moderated
Re: #suggestion to facilitate ease of contacting specific members
#suggestion
Peter
Thank you Andy for your message. However, as our database(s) do not contain non-members (in fact only confirmed members can post to the Group or access any of the extant facilities), I don't see this as an issue. In common with other groups, many of our members are non-pc and have enough problems with using the system - thankfully, the majority now know how to access a database, thank goodness! An Actions button would only be used by a table owner or the moderators.
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moderated
Re: #suggestion to facilitate ease of contacting specific members
#suggestion
On Sun, Jan 16, 2022 at 04:40 PM, Peter wrote:
As far as I can see, the Actions buttons on other screens (such as the one on RSVP events when viewing the responders) have one thing in common and that is that they operate against group members. Given that any email address could be entered in a database, having an Action button that allows you to send a message to that address could mean sending messages to non-members. Shouldn't those messages be limited to invites or related to subscription requests? If you use the calendar and RSVP events for your meetings, you can easily contact those who respond and you don't have to maintain a separate list of email addresses. Regards Andy
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moderated
#suggestion to facilitate ease of contacting specific members
#suggestion
Peter
Hello Mark, Is it possible to add an 'Actions' box for Owners and Moderators to the bottom (or top!) of a Database, similar to that in the Members List. But to only have one action? In our Group, we often create a database for a specific meeting/reason etc that includes an email address column and it would be really good if the Owner / Mod could simply tick the box adjoining each line entry or all, then select the 'Action' and send a message to any or all of the people in the Database? Not sure if this can be done but it would be really great to have this facility. Looking forward to your thoughts and knowledge. Kind regards
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Mark,
I just posted about this but you can just delete my message. One of my group members seems to have run headlong into the bug before you took the system down for maintenance to fix it (he got "510 - group does not exist"). All seems fine now. Thanks. -- J Messages are the sole opinion of the author, especially the fishy ones.
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Hi All, The site was down for the past hour or so. The main database process froze up, which has never happened before. To complicate things, I am away without my computer. The site is back up and I will do a postmortem after I'm back home. I apologize for the downtime. Thanks, Mark
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moderated
Re: Posting Limits
#suggestion
On Fri, Jan 14, 2022 at 02:29 PM, Duane wrote:
In that case, you wouldn't be able to turn the feature on even if it was added. Once the members found out that it wasn't a mandatory setting for the site, they'd come back on you for imposing the limit. I seriously doubt that most groups would use it and I certainly wouldn't on any of my groups.I run a group with ~1,000 members. Occasionally somebody starts to make a pest of himself by posting the same or similar messages again and again. I put such people in moderation. I explain to them that their actions are harmful to the group. If they don't shape up, I kick them out. So far (two years) I have warned about 25 people, and kicked out one who consistently refused to follow the rules. Jim F., you should enunciate some rules, and then enforce them. It's not terribly difficult. It jut takes some grit and determination. -- David Bryant Canyon Lake, Texas https://t-vog.groups.io/g/main https://davidcbryant.net
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moderated
Site updates
#changelog
Changes to the site this week: January 14, 2022:
January 12, 2022:
January 10, 2022:
The next #changelog will be published on Friday, January 21st. Take care everyone. Mark
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moderated
Re: Posting Limits
#suggestion
On Fri, Jan 14, 2022 at 02:20 PM, Jim F. wrote:
we have a contingent (not just the two offenders) who oppose any limits on anyoneIn that case, you wouldn't be able to turn the feature on even if it was added. Once the members found out that it wasn't a mandatory setting for the site, they'd come back on you for imposing the limit. I seriously doubt that most groups would use it and I certainly wouldn't on any of my groups. Duane
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moderated
Re: Posting Limits
#suggestion
Jim F.
Chris-
toggle quoted messageShow quoted text
I don't want to prolong this, but I should note that, as in Barbel's case, we have a contingent (not just the two offenders) who oppose any limits on anyone. And as I've indicated, I just don't have the authority to impose restrictions unilaterally. I believe that a transparent and impartial technical solution would meet with widespread assent; dictates from me as moderator would not. Best regards. -Jim
On Jan 14, 2022, at 2:38 PM, Chris Jones via groups.io <chrisjones12@...> wrote: On Fri, Jan 14, 2022 at 07:14 PM, Peter Cook wrote: It seems to me this at this point that there is much (well-intentioned) repetition and beating of dead horses.Sadly that may well be true. Jim F: in a post earlier today you wrote It seems harsher on the posters, who would not even know that their posts aren't getting through. Why do you seem to consider the feelings of the "miscreants" more than those of the wider ("well behaved") membership? I may be mistaken but this seems to run through your various posts. They have (from your account) not lived up to the agreement to moderate their own conduct, but you seem opposed to taking any action using the tools that are available to you, and seem more concerned about not upsetting them while fed - up group members leave or take themselves off email delivery out of sheer frustration with what is going on. IMHO you are letting your wider membership down badly. Again IMHO asking Mark to provide a technical solution to the problem is simply wrong, not least because (at the risk of repeating myself) you have shunned the idea of using what exists at the moment without even trying it. Now I have no idea whatsoever what Mark's view of this request might be, but consider this: what are you going to do if he decides not to provide what you have requested? You will still have the problem and will be no closer to a solution. The likely outcome? As Barbara stated: Exodus of the members and group eventually finished as everybody who enjoyed the group as once was had left… Is that what you want, because I really think you are risking it. Chris (Yes I know this post is probably not in the spirit of the Group Charter but I am getting more than a little frustrated myself... sorry!)
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moderated
Re: Posting Limits
#suggestion
Chris Jones
On Fri, Jan 14, 2022 at 07:14 PM, Peter Cook wrote:
It seems to me this at this point that there is much (well-intentioned) repetition and beating of dead horses.Sadly that may well be true. Jim F: in a post earlier today you wrote It seems harsher on the posters, who would not even know that their posts aren't getting through. Why do you seem to consider the feelings of the "miscreants" more than those of the wider ("well behaved") membership? I may be mistaken but this seems to run through your various posts. They have (from your account) not lived up to the agreement to moderate their own conduct, but you seem opposed to taking any action using the tools that are available to you, and seem more concerned about not upsetting them while fed - up group members leave or take themselves off email delivery out of sheer frustration with what is going on. IMHO you are letting your wider membership down badly. Again IMHO asking Mark to provide a technical solution to the problem is simply wrong, not least because (at the risk of repeating myself) you have shunned the idea of using what exists at the moment without even trying it. Now I have no idea whatsoever what Mark's view of this request might be, but consider this: what are you going to do if he decides not to provide what you have requested? You will still have the problem and will be no closer to a solution. The likely outcome? As Barbara stated: Exodus of the members and group eventually finished as everybody who enjoyed the group as once was had left… Is that what you want, because I really think you are risking it. Chris (Yes I know this post is probably not in the spirit of the Group Charter but I am getting more than a little frustrated myself... sorry!)
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