I’m back from two weeks in Australia, a country that’s just as great as everyone makes it out to be. While I was gone, there was all kinds of behind-the-digital-scenes drama at johnaugust.com, most of which hopefully wasn’t visible to Loyal Readers.
Basically, the webhosting company moved the site to a “non-production server” because we were suddenly using way too many processing cycles. I hadn’t changed anything about the programming in over a month, which leads me to believe it was an external cause — probably an automated attack by some ne’er-d0-well.
In the movies, Evil Hackers break into defense networks and bring down satellites. In reality, they overwhelm little sites on shared servers, forcing their screenwriter owners to spend Quality Beach Time in tiny internet cafes, trying to figure out what the hell is going on.
Oh, the villainy!
I’m trying to get the situation resolved. I’ll definitely be upgrading the underlying software, and may need to move to a different hosting company. In the meantime, comments will still be turned off (to reduce the load). If the entire site suddenly goes dark, please check back in a day or two. It will be back up shortly.
Happy New Year, everyone!
UPDATE: If you’re reading this, then the move to the new server is complete. Things will be a little wonky for a day or two, so please be patient while the Oompa-Loompas sort things out.