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Possible Site and Email Outage

Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 7:53 am
by Sharkey
The host for my web site is making some changes, and I've been asked to change to a different DNS name server provider. This ~might~ mean that there will be some difficulties reaching this site (the whole thing, not just the forum) periodically over the next few days. The process is supposed to be seamless when it happens properly, but in practice, there can be times when the domain name can't be resolved.

You should always be able to reach this site by using the IP address: http://216.116.32.101

I'll institute the change this evening. From what I can see, the DNS name server provider that I chose has propogated the IP address of this site through their system. Now I have to go inform the registrar of my domain that the name server has changed, and away we go.

See you on the other side...

Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 1:03 pm
by j_nigrelli
i'm afraid... very afraid... .

Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2007 4:33 pm
by Sharkey
The web site changeover seemed to happen wihtout a glitch, but my email has been broken for the last 24 hours, and I can't get the administrator of my host server to return my messages, so I can't tell if there is a system outage or the change wrecked something. The MX (mail) records for both the old and new name server settings is correct, so I've changed back over to the name server that is supposed to die (but don't know when) to see it that corrects the problem.

Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2007 3:43 am
by Sharkey
It looks like this process is finally completed. After getting in contact with my mail server's administrator, I was able to correct the problem that was plaguing the mail delivery.

I spent some time comparing the records on the old and new name servers, and I'm pretty sure that I found the problem. Turns out that there are two "A" records, one for the web site and one for mail. The default on the new server was to send mail to the IP address that my site is located on. Unfortunately, my mail goes to a completely different machine at a different IP address. The "MX" record (mail record) was always correct, sending messages to mail.mrsharkey.com, but then the "A" record would then direct those messages to my web server (216.116..32.101) instead of the mail server (66.244.216.40).

So, process terminated. Result = OK.

Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2007 6:31 am
by Griff
Isn't technology grand? :roll: Great when it works, rotten when it doesn't! :lol: