Please help - support has broken my shop

[Jack]

I had everything working on my site, which uses the OSCommerce package. I transferred my nameservers but found that when I typed in my url, it would redirect to the test url I had been using on excelsior. I contacted support and asked them how to change it. They said they would have to do it - that I didn't have access to what needed to be changed. They did that and it worked fine.

Now, in OSC, there is an admin section. I normally access it by going to mysite.com/admin. This too wasn't working with my url and I asked them to change this. This is where it all went bad. They tried something and it caused php errors to display in the admin section. I told them about it and they changed something else. Now my admin section is not working at all. I could live without that for a few days if need be but I just tried to order a product on my site as a test and I can't do it. Whatever they have done has broken it.

I've asked them what they are doing and they just say they are working on it. This has been going on since Friday evening (over 30 hours). How long should I wait with a broken shop? Jaguar isn't too concerned apparently. Any suggestions on what I should do?

Jack

[Vin DSL]

Well, your story sounds plausible, except for the 'JagPC not too concerned' part. If you'll pardon the pun, I've seen a lot of ppl get their sites 'jacked up' here, but Tech Support always gets them running again.

I'm not saying it's YOUR fault, but judging from your posts, being new to a lot of stuff, new to this place, and so forth, all I can suggest is that you give them a chance. Patience is a virtue...

BTW, you know the squeaky gets the grease, right?

[Jack]

It's true that I'm new to things around here but I am not new to OSC. Most, if not all, of my problems have been due to Jag. Same with this one. If you re-read my post, you'll notice that everything was working. I didn't touch it - they did. Now it is broke. I'm not sure how else that can be interpreted. On top of that, I posted a plea for help last night (8 hours ago) and have yet to receive a response. I realize it is the weekend, but just a response saying something would be nice. Again, how else can that be interpreted? To me, if a customers site is down for more than twelve hours, especially if was my fault, I would be all over that problem. The minimum that could be done is that they back out whatever they did but I cannot even get a response from them.

I don't know your situation but let's assume you have a site that is important to you, one in which you could lose customers if it goes, and stays, down. Then you find out that the reason it is down is because of your host AND they are not fixing the problem (36 hours now). Just how patient would you be in such a case?

Jack

[Spathiphyllum]

I'm not familiar with OSC so I can't comment on it. Couple questions though - did you notice a version change in OSC that might be the culprit and have you noticed any recent postings regarding your particular server? That might help you pinpoint a new, unrelated problem that is the real culprit. But to be fair, there were some recent issues with this forum (which is PHP based) for a while but they seem to have been resolved. I wonder if a program modification to PHP (not a mere setting change) has affected your OSC interface?

I can appreciate your frustration with delay because when it happens, after one knows things were working, one, in an internal dialogue, says "Dang it, why can't this stuff be easy!?" or "I love status quo!". Unfortunately hiccups are inevitable and you're experiencing an unexpected spell.

Are you on a shared server or a dedicated one? Maybe it's time to consider a dedicated or colocated server so that you are in charge of all modifications. I'm not trying to be a smart*** here but your business needs may mandate a more hands on approach on your part. It increases your responsibility enormously but you'll be guaranteed that no one else will touch it unless you request it.

[tank]

I've had problems with ticket going to sales and not to techs durin gthe weekend. It's all based on what you select in the drop down. I believe that if you choose other or a specific technical option it will be directed to tech support. I would re-submit a new ticket and reference the old to be sure they got it.

[Jack]

Originally posted by Spathiphyllum
I wonder if a program modification to PHP (not a mere setting change) has affected your OSC interface?

Unfortunately hiccups are inevitable and you're experiencing an unexpected spell.

Are you on a shared server or a dedicated one? Maybe it's time to consider a dedicated or colocated server so that you are in charge of all modifications. I'm not trying to be a smart*** here but your business needs may mandate a more hands on approach on your part. It increases your responsibility enormously but you'll be guaranteed that no one else will touch it unless you request it.

Before signing up I asked which version of php was in use. It is the same version my previous host used so that shouldn't be a problem. Turns out that whatever they did caused some files to be corrupted. I had to reload everything and it is working now. Well, it is partially working. But I don't want them to touch it again until I can get a clear answer on whether they can do what I am asking. I'll contact sales tomorrow and go from there.

I know things happen. I wasn't upset when I saw that they broke it. I got upset when they didn't fix it in a reasonable amount of time.

I'm on a shared server (and no offense taken BTW). You may be right about switching. My shop is pretty easy to run and I had very few problems with it with my previous host. I guess I was spoiled by them. Unfortunately, they are smaller host and I outgrew their setup.

Jack

[Jack]

Originally posted by tank
I've had problems with ticket going to sales and not to techs durin gthe weekend. It's all based on what you select in the drop down. I believe that if you choose other or a specific technical option it will be directed to tech support. I would re-submit a new ticket and reference the old to be sure they got it.

I appreciate the suggestion. That is exactly what I did. In fact, I submitted a bunch of them - hoping to make someone aware that the problem was serious. It apparently worked since the problem was resolved a few hours later.

Jack

[the_ancient]

whats still not working?

[Jack]

There are currently two problems:

The thing that started all of this had to do with what url was showing to the visitor. Prior to switching nameservers, I was using www.excelsior.com. After switching, when I visited www.mysite.com, instead of displaying that, the browsers url switched to the excelsior one. While this would not cause a problem using the site, it would confuse the customers since they wouldn't know where they were. Jag said it was just a minor setting that they had to make and it went downhill from there. Now, in OSC there is an admin section. You generally get to it via www.mysite.com/admin. When I do that, the url is still switching back to the excelsior string. This is just an annoyance at this point since I'm the only one that uses it but it would be nice to have it working correctly.

The other problem is that the emails are not working correctly. I recevied a real order shortly after I got back online yesterday. If I hadn't thought to check my logs I never would have known about it. Support says everything is fine. I just placed a fake order - no email.

Jack

[JPC-Greg]

I'll get someone to check into this issue for you and make sure it gets fixed today .

[JPC-Masood]

Please email me your ticket # at masood@jaguarpc.com which has the current updated status of the open issues. This looks like a minor configuration issue with OSC "configure.php" file and should be fixed in no time.

Thank you for your patience,