My apologies

[theGinsue]

I thought about posting this in the Announcements section, but the General Discussion gets more "eyes on".

I owe all of our site members a big apology. As many of you know, earlier tonight if you tried to get onto the site you received a message indicating that your IP address had been banned. To steal from a common phrase used in the breakup of a relationship, "It's not you, it's me."

When trying to block IP addresses used by spammers to access our site today I inadvertently entered an extraneous character that effectively blocked just about EVERY possible IP address. I got careless and found a previously unknown rule for banning IP's that I need to be especially vigilent about in the future. Since this knocked out my access as well, I was unable to fix my mistake.

Thankfully we have a top-notch server admin team (J, jhood and Foxtrot) who saw the problem and were already working it before they could be contacted. My hats off to these gentlemen and a HUGE "THANK YOU: for saving my bacon.

So, if you're reading this post you already know you're membership here on the site is still in good standing and all is well back in Wonkaland. I'll try to be extra careful not to repeat my mistake and thank you all for your patience.

Ginsue

[Graves]

Glad you guys got it squared away! Thanks!!

[brutal]

That Ban Hammer gets too heavy to control sometimes. Stuff happens.

Appreciate all that all you guys do.

[hurley842002]

It's all good brother, it happens. I think I was genuinely more concerned with who I pissed off than anything else lol.

[asmo]

We have all done it.. Beat enough on keyboards and stare at screens long enough and you are guaranteed to mistype something somewhere.

Glad you recognized what happened and it was able to be fixed.

[Irving]

That Ban Hammer gets too heavy to control sometimes. Stuff happens.

Appreciate all that all you guys do.

Weeks when no one gets banned are the weeks his tennis elbow is acting up.

[Great-Kazoo]

Must have missed it.

[zteknik]

To err is human. But you did get the spammers so no worries. With a lot of maintenance you do some things just happen.

[XC700116]

Thanks for fixing it up quickly, and honestly, it got me off my butt and into the loading room to knock out 500 rnds of 45. [Beer]

[theGinsue]

Haven't had to ban any existing members for some time now - and hope we don't have to for even longer to come. I did deny a new account created by someone today who put "Earth" as their location. His IP traced to Denver. I could have fixed it for him but figured he'll read the rules and try again on his own.


We have all done it.. Beat enough on keyboards and stare at screens long enough and you are guaranteed to mistype something somewhere.

Glad you recognized what happened and it was able to be fixed.

Funny thing is that I was always extra careful and double-checked my work when I was in IT (Sys Admin). Did that stuff for 30 years and seldom made the big errors (could count the time on less than one hand in those 30 years). In May I got a new position as a Network Engineer (anyone seeing the irony here yet?). The job is more requirements stuff than hands-on IT type of stuff. I guess I let loose of my old habits a bit too soon.


Must have missed it.

Huh? I thought you lived on this site? How could you possibly have missed it?

[theGinsue]

Ms. Ginsue decided to talk to me while I was trying to figure out how to get the problem fixed. Not the best time to talk to me. I don't know what I said to her, but she's especially pissed at me right now. Looks like multiple apologies, some flowers, and lot of groveling are in order on the home front now too.

[buffalobo]

Should do it monthly, I really did get some chuckles from the texts.[LOL]

[buffalobo]

Not the pissing off the wife part.[dig]

[GilpinGuy]

LOL I'm on the couch tonight for some unknown, mysterious reason. I feel your pain.

[Fentonite]

On balance with the good stuff you do for the site, this little glitch doesn't even register. Thanks for what you (and all the admin folks) do.

[Irving]

I only post on here when I'm in trouble with the wife. Fortunately it's not often.




Hey what happens when J, Jhood, and Foxtrot are all away at the same time (at the yearly Mod Retreat in Peru each year for example)?

[theGinsue]

While we're discussing blocked IP addresses, let me just say...

We block lots of IP subnets regularly (4 today). While we try to be extra careful not to block existing and potential real (not spam) members, sometimes it happens. If you find yourself in this situation and can't think of anything especially egregious that you did to deserve it (like attempted murder on one of the staff) and if you're not traveling (many IP's across the US get blocked), then chances are it wasn't an intentional block. The staff is usually pretty good about giving people warnings before they get too deep into trouble where they get banned without warning.

In these cases, please use the Contact Us email link (as 87 of you did tonight and I'm trying to respond to all of you) and let us know what's up so we can either try to fix it. Please be kind.

We have a member in Australia who gets his IP banned from time to time and we always get him hooked back up once he lets us know his situation. He's been awesome about being understanding.

But, if the email link isn't working for you and you have access to Facebook, try contacting us on the Colorado AR-15 page. This is always a good avenue when the site goes totally dead.

Alright, back to responding to emails.

[spongejosh]

Thanks Ginsue. It's always nice to know what caused the panic after the dust settles. No need to respond to my ban message [panic]

[Ah Pook]

Thanks Thomas!! A thankless job but still a thankless job. [Coffee]

We still love you... in a manly non ghey way.

[TheGrey]

No worries, no worries! :) It must have happened when I had logged off, because I didn't see the ban hammer. Regardless, you do so much for the site and for the members here that a little mistake like that is nothing! :)

[Fentonite]

.... No need to respond to my ban message [panic]

Yeah, same goes tor me. (See? Now just 85 to go!)

[HoneyBadger]

T, you're one of the reasons this site is so fantastic. Thank you for all that you do. Really - thank you.

[theGinsue]

What a banner night.

I,was working my way through all of the emails (everyone, even you folks who said I don't have to reply I'll probably reply since I am not even looking at names and just pasting in the text from the 1st msg'd I sent) and then I lose internet.

I troubleshoot that for an hour and then called CenturyLink and found there's an outage in my area. I'm on my phone now which sucks for accessing the site and other Web stuff.

I'll continue sending replies tomorrow. I want to make sure everyone who sent a message gets a reply so they know it's not them, it was the site.

Ugh!

[Great-Kazoo]

T, you're one of the reasons this site is so fantastic. Thank you for all that you do. Really - thank you.

That's officer material reply.

[WETWRKS]

Don't take it personally but I got a good laugh at your expense over this. :)

I too had one of those days. Nothing was easy or went right.

[HoneyBadger]

That's officer material reply.
I've been practicing. :)

[sroz]

Thanks for everything you do. Funny thing was I lost my internet connection and got the ban notice after I reset my router. I thought "wow, these guys can even kill my internet." Scary thought.

Now we all know what it feels like to get banned. You start wondering what you did.

Thanks again, Ginsue & all admins.

[Hotchef181818]

No worries at all Thomas. Thank you of getting it fixed!

[Gman]

I had figured that's what had happened last night...and we're all still alive. Shhhtuff happens.

Sent from my Galaxy S7 Edge using Tapatalk.

[Bailey Guns]

I miss all the drama. Guess that's what I get for having a job where I need to be up at 0400...and in bed by 2000 or so. I would've never known had you not fessed up. But I'm thankful for this site and all the work that goes on behind the scenes by a dedicated staff to keep me entertained and informed.

You got paid OT for all that extra work, right? :)

[roberth]

The mods do a great job here. Thank you all.

[StagLefty]

No worries-thanks for all you guys do here !![Beer]

[BlasterBob]

Thank you Thomas. Especially, thanks for the explanation as I believe many would have resolved the problem but would not have taken the time to furnish the details. This mixup was just a little speed bump for us in typical life on the Internet. Now, take the day off for your lack of rest time and having the wife apparently give you the ole "stink eye" for not giving her your usual attention. [blaster]

[Hummer]

Too bad you can't release an army of killer nano robots into the web to take out the spammers permanently. Death to spammers and robocallers.

[Grant H.]

I was in the boat of trying to figure out what I did to piss who off.

Sent an email asking, which you don't need to reply to, and then went to the garage and got a head start on a project.

Thanks for fixing it and the explanation.

[SouthPaw]

Apology accepted [Coffee]

I was trying to think of the last thing I posted... haha. Glad we have mods that take care of things so quickly.

Thank you.

[theGinsue]

I miss all the drama. Guess that's what I get for having a job where I need to be up at 0400...and in bed by 2000 or so. I would've never known had you not fessed up. But I'm thankful for this site and all the work that goes on behind the scenes by a dedicated staff to keep me entertained and informed.

You got paid OT for all that extra work, right? :)


No OT. In fact, I think Jerry and Hoser are talking about docking my pay for this one.


Apology accepted [Coffee]

I was trying to think of the last thing I posted... haha. Glad we have mods that take care of things so quickly.

Thank you.

The day-to-day administration of the site is important, but gets monotonous a lot of the time. Then... there's a faux pas like I did last night, or we get hit with a major attack and we see how very blessed we are for having such an amazing team of server admins. These guys have been amazing in reducing the site downtime when poop hits the fan.

[theGinsue]

I figured the whiner who got my post deleted last week, got me banned.

Naw, we've got Irving watching you closely for us; he's a secret mod - why do you think he's on the site so much? (whoops, the cat's out of the bag)

We can't ban you. Who'd we get to make those awesome leather holsters for us?

[sellersm]

3 lashes with a wet noodle and we'll call it good... Sounds like your wife is taking care of the "beating" part, sorry to hear about that!! I just figured the site was down for some reason, or broken in some way.

Eh, things happen, a character here and a character there, and the whole thing goes "pooof!". Been there, done that, got the T-shirts (with holes in them).

Thanks for all you guys do, God bless you brother!

[gnihcraes]

Sounds like a new title is in order?

I'm on a static IP, just whitelist me. [Pepsi]

[lex137]

I have to stay off the phone during work so no big deal mistakes happen. Thank you mods for all the hard work that goes unnoticed!!!

[J]

Sounds like a new title is in order?

I'm on a static IP, just whitelist me. [Pepsi]

No

[mtnhigh]

Been there... Sh*t happens..
thanks to all for getting things back up and running!

[Gman]

I was trying to think of the last thing I posted.
I did the same and came to the realization that it was in the words or phases thread; "government oversight"

I was joking with the wife about it, but she was busy testing via Verizon which indicated it was pretty much a global issue.


Sent from my Galaxy S7 Edge using Tapatalk.

[Hummer]

Glad to see you're still with us, Gman.

[BigBear]

Nice, thank you. Was wondering what was going on. I thought you finally found that backdoor programmed in to the... oh wait... nvm....


hehehe

[JohnnyEgo]

When I realized I was banned, I went through the following series of questions pretty quickly:
1. What did I do?
2. What did Jim do that I might be affiliated with?
3. Is this a result of too much internet porn surfing?

Fortunately, the answer to all three turned out to be 'no'.

[Squeeze]

No worries. Glad you guys got it all squared away. Thanks for keeping us up & running!