We’re Baaaa-aack!
Posted by david on 31 Mar 2016 at 08:33 pm | Tagged as: Uncategorized
Kind of.
We had 2 disk failures early Tuesday morning (2016-03-29 05:14:49 PST). Jim and I spent today at the data center where the server lives, fighting with the BIOS and getting 3 replacement drives installed (1 disk had died a few months back).
The drives are back and the servers are serving, except for the main database which wasn’t redundant on the server. We have backups of it off site, but it will take some hours to get it copied back.
The database is where we store the scores for the high score tables and leader board, as well as user login information. This means those features are not going to work until the database is restored. In the meantime, you should be at least be able to play games anonymously.
Jim and I were impressed by how many people tried to reach us when they couldn’t get the site to work, and at the lengths some of you went to: one of you figured out my cell phone number and called me (I was asleep and didn’t hear my phone ring), another one of you figured out who our hosting provider was and emailed their support team (leading to a funny conversation when we went into the data center today). Don’t take that wrong, we aren’t annoyed—we’re heartened that so many of you like the site so much, and we’re sorry for the downtime.
Update 2016-03-31 09:25 PM PST: The site doesn’t work well without the database so we’re temporarily pointing to our offsite backup database. This is just hosted on my cable modem at my house so I might not have enough bandwidth to support the full load of green felt. This is just temporary until the backup is copied back to the main server. Hopefully it’ll hold up well enough until then ;-).
Update 2016-04-05 01:25 AM PST: The backup has been restored and we switched over tonight at midnight. Everything seems to be OK.
Yay! Happy it’s back up. I continued checking each day at different times. I never gave up! LOL.
Thanks for your hard work repairing the stuff to make it run again. Everything else out there to play was suckie.
Thanks
I’m so glad you’re back. Didn’t realizehowmuch I senjoyed playing solitaire on green felt until I couldn’t. Thanks for working so hard to get back up and running.
Best. lilly96
Hooray, So glad you are back on air. Greenfelt is the best organised and most pleasing sight to the eyes for playing Solitaire games. Just love this site. Keep up the good work.
I missed you soooo much.
I’m glad you’re back.
Thanks for a wonderful site.
Found you!! I thought you’d abandon us! I’m still having trouble signing in – but I guess you know that. Now I know you’re still around I’ll wait patiently for fix-it time.
B (downunder in New Zealand)
Welcome back!
We missed you(a gigabunch!
Don’t do that again! *LOL*
I am SOOOOO happy you are back – as others have said – everything else out there is sucky!!
Thanks for the site, the way you maintain it, and the effort you made to fix it! I’m baaaaack, too!
Didn’t realize how much I missed your site. I was checking every hour! I thought it was all over! Thank you for getting back….
Thank God you’re back! There’s nothing even close to your site. Don’t ever do that to us again!
Welcome back! I really missed you. I tried many times, and then tried different solitaire games. None of them even comes close! You’re the best. Thank you for hooking us back up again.
Absolutely agree with all the previous comments. It is indeed a privilege to have you willing to go to such lengths to indulge our passion for (or obsession with?) this site.
I hope you have understanding families and employers in letting you put so much time in to keeping us all happy – and some of us grounded, possibly even sane.
Thanks very much for your generosity and all-round niceness! Be very assured that it is wholeheartedly appreciated.
So glad, I was going insane and decided to learn another language I was so desperate! Maybe you guys should get a facebook site or something similar in case it happens again??? Easier way for us to contact you.
Thanks for the awesome site.
Nice to see you back.
Missed the side during the last days.
btw. looks like this summer a anniversary is coming, any plans for a celebration?
Greetings from Germany
M
Agree that you should have a Facebook or Twitter presence, so we can keep in touch. Thanks for all your efforts.
I thought you prepared an April’s fools joke. (No I know you were not). Thanks a thousand times, even over here in France you site is much loved, in fact all over the world !
Marc R.
OMG! I’m addicted. You guys are the crème de la crème of the gaming sites which offer the same genre. Thank you for being here!
Good to see you back again,I’ve felt quite lonely these last few days,sad really.Without doubt the best site and well appreciated.Good to be back with my distant friends.Thank-you.
Yes!
And I agree with jabba, if you had (eg) a fb page you might not get called in the middle of the night (and that was some serious investigative work by whoever wasn’t it?)
Thank you for being back, I can actually look forward to my lunchbreak now, the other solitaire sites I resorted to this week were pants.
I’m so excited for you to be back online. I was about ready to check myself into rehab if I’d have to wait another day. I love Greenfelt. It’s the best game site anywhere!
Very pleased you’re back, it’s the best freecell solitaire, the alternatives didn’t cut the mustard.
Huge thanks.
Happy you are back. Have tried to reach you every day, several times. Last night my computer said I was refused entry. Thought I’d been thrown out the door.
Just to let you know we missed you so much. Went to another site. Just doesn’t compare to Greenfelt. Charlie and Mary Lou
Welcome back – you were missed
Missed the site, thought the gremlins got in the puter and stole everything. Welcome back and thanks for a great site.
I listen to a lot of lectures online… while playing. I can’t learn without you.
Thank goodness – serious withdrawal here.
Glad you are back online. Curious why the trump card is red instead of black. There may be other issues but this is what jumped out first. Thanks for the game.
From Belgium – welcome back – I’ve missed you 😉
I LOVE your programming on these games! I tried to use another (Microsoft) version and it just doesn’t compare. I figured that they have a limited number of iterations since I felt I was playing the same game over and over. Other online games try to get too fancy and it just ruins the game play.
You should publish this in a free standing game suite. I would purchase it in a heartbeat!
Echoing the same — never realized how much I need the site for a break, and how well done your site is compared to other soliatire glitz-oriented sites. Fantastic work and very glad you’re back. You may want to put a tip jar in a small corner somewhere.. a little PayPal donation once and a while can’t hurt!
As my desperation grew of not having your site functional, I was forced to resort to cleaning my home and accomplishing many other things. Thanks for reminding me that other things matter too! Now back to normal……..
and an April Fools day joke to boot! swapping card colors. Glad you are back.
Whoop Whoop! somehow I knew you’d be back by April Fools Day!!!
thank YOU so much for your hard work!!
I agree with Rosie, the other sites don’t come close.
Made me worried you got absconded by Microsoft or something!
Love your April Fool’s Day joke. So glad you’re back. Missed you much.
I’ve been trying to get on to play every morning, and was thrilled that Green Felt came up on my first try just now!! I love the site and am heartened to read so many complimentary messages. Know that your hard work is very much appreciated.
I am so glad you’re back! Yours is far and away the best site for Solitaire games.
SO happy you’re back up and running. My freecell addiction pined for more more more every single day you were down. Wishing you ALL good things as you finish working out the kinks. And a HUGE THANK YOU for all you do to keep us entertained.
I’ll bet I checked every hour on the hour to see if you were back up yet. Believe me, Klondike saves my sanity!!! Glad you’re back and I wish you luck!!!
Everyone has spoken so well about the disappointment when the site was down and their pleasure to find it available again.Must make it worth all your efforts when you see the degree of fun you give us all.
Keep up the good work and don’t do that again
Thank You!!! I missed you so much. I now realize how addicted I am to your wonderful games. You have the BEST site ever.
Missed this so much!! Totally through off my workday, as this is my favourite break time activity!!
Wow! So glad you’re back! I went through hardcore withdrawal! Haha. But seriously, am glad to have this chance to say thank you so much for all your hard work to give us this site. It is very much appreciated. It’s the best one on the internet, and I’m so glad to have found it. Once again, thank you very much.
Did you know that the hearts and diamonds are black and the spades and clubs are red on the free cell game.
ditto. I hate it when you are down. your freecell is better than all the other sites.
Thank God you’re back, I’m SOoooo happy! You’ve no idea how much I need you, thank you, thank you! You’re the best Forty Thieves ever!
Great to have you back. I thought the site had gone for good. Keep up the good work, fellas!
I agree with Jabba… A Facebook page, or somewhere else, where you can let us know what’s going on, would be good, if this might happen again. Would save me checking “isthiswebsitedown” all day. Very glad to find you back!
Ooooh, I missed you!
Was suffering from “greenfelt.net withdrawal”. NOT pretty. If this happens again let me know and I can help cuss to get everything back up and running. I’m one of the “anon.” players :).
Thanx for all your hard work!
I didn’t know there were so many hours in the day. I only get to play when the work is done so obviously not much got done while you all were down. Glad you’re back. Facebook would be good if it doesn’t create more work for you.
So glad you are back online. Had to use a sorry replacement for my 40 thieves fix the last few days. Keep up the great site, we love it.
Maybe all of this had to do with April 1st and all of the antics associated with this day…but it started before 4/1…didn’t like not being able to access your site.
Hi Guys
Sooooo very glad that you are up and running. I cannot express my frustrations when I kept trying to get on the Green Felt site. First I thought that I was having a problem with my computer, then I thought that it was taken down permanently. Tried finding a like site and I have to tell you that there is no other site like Green Felt. It certainly is the best. Thanks so much for correcting the problem.
Glad your back! Missed the game!
thanks for you efforts in getting the site back. I thought the problem was my end to begin with. You were sadly missed and are highly valued!
Now that I have recivered from my greenfelt withdawals I will enedeavour to rev up my addiction again!
xxx
glad it’s back up and i know the frustration as my machine spun a disc a day before. i believe it was one of them forty thieves that stole your program!
Glad the problem was at your end. Thought my computer was acting up. Thanks for your effort and glad to be able to get my forty thieves fix.
I missed you!! I was one of those pests- I emailed Dave. I was in a panic!!! My world is back on it’s axis and all is well (or a least bearable now that I can get my daily Green Felt Towers fix!). Thanks so much for all your hard work!!
I missed you so much – am so glad the site is back up. And it got me thinking. How do you make any money off the site? I don’t see any advertising (which is nice)/ I am a retired computer programmer – so I have a good idea what it takes to kep a good thing going. I still miss my other favorite game – bananagrams online. That just disappeared. I do not want to see the same happen with Greenfelt. I would be willing to pay a yearly subscription – like with Pandora. What happens when all you great develpers move on to other great projects? Please do something to make sure Greenfelt lives on (especially for Freecell)!
Hey guys, thanks so much for all your comments—Jim and I love to read them.
@mogdar: our first game ever was 2005-06-23 13:05:30-07 (klondike and I won it). What anniversary are you thinking of?
@Ellen: We make no money off the site, we only spend money. One reason it was down for so long was that we were both busy with our actual day jobs. We’ve considered different monetizing techniques but the only one we both really like is selling a mobile app and using our website popularity to promote it. We’ve attempted a mobile app a couple times so far but haven’t had anything that met our standards yet. We’ll probably continue iterating at some point and eventually get something going. Hopefully.
– and here all the time I thought Greenfelt had cut me off because I used the site too often. Thank goodness you are back, sorry you had problems but I’m back to enjoying games I liked.
Thank you for coming back !
Just wanted to add my thanks for all you guys do to make site a wonderful way to help me get through waiting at the doctors office or when I am stuck on 1-10 for hours because of some traffic accident. I only play addiction and i am indeed addicted. Missed you very much while you were down. So glad you are back!
I am so happy you are back up and running. You are helping me keep sane in a world that’s way to weird. I play Hopeless, Forty Thieves, Freecell and Pyramid. It so nice you are up and running I truly missed the ability to come and clear my mind for some clear thinking when I couldn’t access your games.
So Happy and holding on to sanity that you are back!!!
thought i had lost,cursing,cursing,so glad i d]got ya back,many thanks.andy
This is by far and a mile the best crib site on the web…I am so glad to be able to play here…thanks a lot.