Sciencemadness Discussion Board - The return of lost attachments

The return of lost attachments

Polverone - 15-1-2010 at 21:51

Members have noted that some file attachments apparently disappeared without reason. I do not have a good explanation for why this happened. I suspect, but cannot prove, that there were host problems on Micfo that somehow led to disappearing attachments. There were certainly other mysterious problems when we were still using it as the site web host.

I found 187 attachments in old database backups that were no longer available, even though the posts they were once attached to still existed in the live database. I cannot tell if an attachment was deleted deliberately or just "lost," but I have restored them all. For example, up until 5 minutes ago the first post by LSD25 in this thread was missing the PDF excerpt from Brauer.

I found an additional 238 attachments in old database backups that were attached to posts that no longer exist in the live database. From examining these posts, I think most of these attachments were from reference-request threads. The posts and attachments were removed by the original author after a reference request had been fulfilled. Nevertheless, to ensure nothing is accidentally omitted, I have restored the attachments here.

I am sure I have not restored all missing attachments. I typically save full forum backups only every couple of months, and I periodically delete the oldest backups to make room for newer ones. Still, I hope that this effort fills most of the gaps that had crept into attached files.

In order to prevent future problems, I wrote a program that will scan the forum attachments database table each day and note when attachments change or disappear. It is my hope that no more attachments will be accidentally lost, but if they are at least I will have a better chance of quickly noticing and tracing the problem.

Eliteforum - 17-1-2010 at 13:19

How long are you tied in to this host your currently using?

solo - 17-1-2010 at 13:27

it would be nice if peoeple getting reference requests would label them with the title of the article, hence we would see all titiles of articles instead of what we see.... 4.pdf what is that ? well i will keep on hoping peolple that get references would do this ......solo

sonogashira - 19-1-2010 at 07:00

Sir, I thought I was helping you out as you seem to do all of the work! If it bothers you the way I do it then I will leave it to you. Please don't think I am taking offense, I am not - but I thought you may like some help. If it doesn't bother you to get all of the references (which it seems it does not) then I shall leave it to you...

(And where can one see a list of all the attachments? I didn't know this was possible)

[Edited on 19-1-2010 by sonogashira]

unome - 24-1-2010 at 02:46

Quote: Originally posted by solo

it would be nice if peoeple getting reference requests would label them with the title of the article, hence we would see all titiles of articles instead of what we see.... 4.pdf what is that ? well i will keep on hoping peolple that get references would do this ......solo

Songashira, Java isn't bitching about being helped - it is just extremely fucking tiring to try and sort through references when the title gives no fucking clue of what it is... Thus nobody can find the reference they are requesting - EVEN WITH THE SEARCH ENGINE, so articles get requested multiple times

Personally, when I do a reference request I like to add the title, authors, journal name/doi and where possible the abstract (or first paragraph from the JACS page)... It allows for it to be found again by the search engine.

un0me2 - 6-2-2010 at 14:09

Quote: Originally posted by solo

Please, please, try and follow this advice... Uploads that have no explanation whether in the title/the name are of no use whatever to anyone else who tries to find information.