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Unhappy Demon

Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 12:42 pm
by korexus
Hey folks,

I've been getting hourly notifications for the last day that our cron jobs are not running properly. Without going through the tedious details, these are what run the turns for us.

I've notified our webhost and they are trying to sort it out, but until then be aware that there may be disruption to turns running...



Chris.

Re: Unhappy Demon

Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2008 3:42 pm
by Zigzag
Hi Chris,
korexus wrote: I've been getting hourly notifications for the last day that our cron jobs are not running properly. Without going through the tedious details, these are what run the turns for us.
Our GM has just tried to run a turn, which failed with an error message. The message indicates that a problem has snuck into one of the SQL statements that generate the turn report. The error message it tries to insert has a contraction with an apostrophe in it, and since that also is used as the string delimiter, the system is confused.

It looks like someone is in the process of making the error message friendlier, and in doing so has broken the engine. Here is the error message:

Code: Select all

Could not execute query.
Query: INSERT INTO nuke_wok_turn_reports(GameID, TurnNR, PlayerNR, ReportLine) VALUES(430, 3, 8, 'You don't not have enough tech points. Order cancelled!
')
Error: You have an error in your SQL syntax; check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server version for the right syntax to use near 't not have enough tech points. Order cancelled!
')' at line 1
Eliminating the apostrophe and changing the query as follows will probably fix the problem and allow the turn to run:

Code: Select all

INSERT INTO nuke_wok_turn_reports(GameID, TurnNR, PlayerNR, ReportLine) VALUES(430, 3, 8, 'You do not have enough tech points. Order cancelled!
')
Doing this requires more access to the box running WOK than I do and is not of a kind that the web hosting company can deal with, so I will leave it in your capable hands to implement the fix :) I don't know how well the engine copes with a half-run turn; if there is something that needs to be done that I can help with, please just ask.

Lastly, please let me thank you for hosting and running such an enjoyable game! I hope to spend many more days agonizing over turn orders, diplomacy and general mayhem on this site! :)

Thanks,
Allan Mertner

Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2008 4:19 pm
by Hannibal
That's Allan. Knows his stuff and instantly helpful, and usually right. Thanks Allan.

This would happen when I'm the one running the only two games! I've mentioned before that I really do act as a jinx on this stuff. I didn't cause it, but it happens if I'm around. No, really. It happened in Allan's control-centre on sth else. Allan: "This shouldn't normally happen ...". Mew : "If I leave the room ...". No, I agree it's impossible; it's just spookily true. So, in more rational terms: I'm an outlier on the bell-curve of personal presence correlating with IT glitches...

Er, but for both of you ... there's an extra complication. I pressed Run a time or two. I then tried "Re-run". I know, I know! It re-ran T2 instead of trying again to run T3. My bad. So we have to get BACK to the OLD T2 result, before we can run T3. So just don't fix it and run it and say there you are. Or people's orders will be a nonsense as the engine uses the new T2 results and their orders based on the OLD T2 results. Oh, and, er, it can't go back to the old T2 results and then just run; I adjusted some provinces after the old T2 and before T3 ...

So, ideal is to give me back the old T2, let me repeat my edits, then I can run T3.

Just solving it from the current position and saying "Here's your T3" won't crack it, and would put me in deeper sh ..trouble.

Han

Posted: Sun Sep 14, 2008 8:04 am
by korexus
I go away for one day and the whole place falls apart!

This error is actually something completely different to the cron-job hicoughs I mentioned. As Zigzag pointed out, it's all down to that apostrophe, what surprises me is that it's never happened before as that part of the script hasn't been touched in a couple of years...

The cron-job error is on going, it is something that the web hosts have to deal with as it involves the modules loaded into php/apache on the WoK server, something deliberately kept beyond the control of end users like us. I received the following from dotgig tech support 2 days ago:
Yep, I know what's wrong. I can fix it in the next few hours, hang in there.
However they haven't actually fixed it yet.

On the bright side, my turn did seem to run properly last night, so it may not be causing too much of a problem. Players in my game #427 should check their TRs extra carefully though, just in case...

I'll respond the the various emails you all started throwing at me individually. :wink:
Chris.