Good News - We May Be Moving Soon!

[Gary Lewis]

This is to update you on the plans to move to the AWS servers.  Basically we have only two things that need to be worked out before we move:

Security Certificate: We need to acquire an https security certificate which we will then install.  This shouldn't take too long but needs to be in place before we move.

Joining Process: One of the reasons we are moving is because the powers-that-be at Nabble made changes that broke our joining process.  We've been limping along with the broken one for over a year now, but we recently installed a previous version of Nabble that removed the changes and we are testing to make sure the process is what we want.

I can't really give you a precise time when we will move, but it should be essentially transparent to you as the old URL's will still work to get you here.  But in order to effect the change we will have to shut the forum down for a few hours so I can download a backup of what we have on the Nabble servers, upload that backup to the AWS servers, and redirect the internet to the AWS servers.

We will give you plenty of notice.  And we plan to do it at a time when it won't cause problems for many people.

[85lebaront2]

Sounds good sir!

[grumpin]

Thank you Gary and all involved!

[BigBrother-84]

Hi Gary,
Thanks for all this time and effort.  Even this forum is labelled "Free Nabble Forum", I suppose there are some basic fees the forum has to front.
Is there a way we can financially participate to help maintaining it (hosting, certificates, or some other recurring fees)?
Can hardly imagine it is really and totally "free"...

[Gary Lewis]

Thanks, guys.  It has taken a lot of behind-the-scenes work to get us where we are with the AWS servers, and I certainly appreciate all that have been involved.  I couldn't have done any of it w/o the others.

As for costs, yes they are starting to mount up.  Every time we've turned a corner we've found another expense.  But I didn't want to say anything until we knew what they are and that it is going to work.  Pretty sure it is going to work, but don't yet have a handle on the https certificate cost so we don't quite know the total cost.

When I do I'll check with my banker (Janey) and see if we need help.  Thanks!

[ARM Ashby]

Thank You Gary

[Gary Lewis]

Welcome.  It is a labor of love.

As an update, I think we have the joining process nailed and we are now just working on the security certificate.  But we've discovered some other minor glitches so need to sort those as well.

Also, the "Free forum by Nabble" is gone.  

[ckuske]

Thanks for all your work, Gary!  

I'm not sure if you have mulled this over before, but have you considered a "Coffee Fund" or a Patreon account?  I've certainly gotten enough from this site to justify a contribution to keeping the site up.  Just a thought.

[Gary Lewis]

Thanks, Chris.  I have thought about it and haven't come to a conclusion if I need to ask, or even allow, for help.  One reason for that is that I don't yet know what it is going to cost.  But when we get over on the AWS servers I probably will pretty quickly.

Another is the suggestion by my son, the lawyer, to create a separate entity for the funds to go into.  In other words, don't mix them with our personal funds.  And that is going to take some research.  I know creating such an entity in some states can have a significant cost, and we don't want to add cost.

Anyway, when the dust settles after the migration I'll rack and stack the costs and check with my "manager" regarding what we think needs to be done.  And then I'll let y'all know.  But I certainly appreciate the offer.  

[ckuske]

Those AWS bills can sneak up on you, so be sure to say something!

[Gary Lewis]

Thanks, Chris.  I'm watching the AWS bills, but so far the servers are just idling, although that will change as we start truly using them.  However there are also the domain name costs, SMTP2GO for email, and Weebly for the website itself.  Plus probably some I'm forgetting.

But I'll rack and stack the costs when we get to a steady state.

[ckuske]

I'm not sure if it is a direct fit, but AWS has SES (Simple Email Service) for SMTP, maybe it'll be cheaper for you?  

[Gary Lewis]

Chris - It might be less expensive than SMTP2GO, but Pedro got the latter working and I don't think he has the time to figure out how to make SES do the same thing.  The reason we went with SMTP2GO was that a guy at Nabble set up an instance of Nabble on his own server and tied it to SMTP2GO and then let Pedro look under the hood at the settings.

And since we still need Pedro to figure out https using LetsEncrypt, and then teach me to manage Nabble forums on AWS, I don't want to ask him to do anything else.  At least not at the moment.  He said he is really busy at the moment, but will see if he can carve out time to look at https this week.

Anyway, thanks!  Maybe later?

[ckuske]

No worries at all, just making you aware of options in case you hadn't seen them already.  Carry on!

[BigBrother-84]

Hi,
Don't know if the move is responsible, but the "literature" link seems broken (error 404).

[Gary Lewis]

I'm guessing that you have a bookmark to the Literature page?  If so, that page was renamed Manuals & Literature.

But when I made that change I didn't do what I should have done and create a 301 redirect from Literature to Manuals & Literature so everyone's bookmarks would work.  I have now so your bookmark should work.

Sorry.  

[BigBrother-84]

Hi Gary,
I got "error 404" earlier this morning...  And now it works!
Tested from computer and iPhone, everything is OK.
Thanks!

[Gary Lewis]

Yes, that was my bad.  Any time I change a page's title it changes the URL, so I should always redirect the old URL to the new.  I usually do, but didn't then.  Glad you caught it.