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Author Topic: Inbox Full so quickly  (Read 15259 times)
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J. M. Pescado
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« Reply #15 on: December 12, 2008, 03:51:52 pm »

Is there a point to this other than to try to cause trouble? Do you WANT to go back to Walt? Not that you CAN, since Walt ineptly blew up his site, but still. The fact of the matter is that the inept technical management is NOT part of what is being carried over, and if sensible numbers are inputted into the entry blanks by people who know what they're doing makes it "look like MATY", well, then, too bad: These numbers are used because the same technical constraints exist everywhere, not because of a specific desire to make the sites the same. The limitations exist because if none were set, users would retain EVERY SINGLE PIECE OF JUNKMAIL EVER RECEIVED. Believe me, this happens. It's a massive mess. On other sites where I've seen the DBs, some users have retained OVER 9000 PMs, nearly all of it utterly meaningless blather with absolutely no value. Half the DB was this crap. This is what we're aiming to prevent.

While your proposal for additional junk management features, such as the removal of dead PMs from dead users, is good, such features supplement, not replace, the existing policy on mailbox bloat.
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Inge Jones
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« Reply #16 on: December 12, 2008, 04:47:59 pm »

It's not so much the mailbox limits, which you have devised due to experience of running forums.  (although I do not accept that 6 year age intervals have any efficiency merit at all - that is purely a Pescadoism)

The issue for me is the discrepancy between expressed intention and outcome.  For many people, your apparent promise of not imposing a Pescado influence on the site was decisive in whether they would support you or Delphy.  And yes, if that's being a troublemaker, then that's what I am.  I am not the only person who is disappointed in you not keeping your word, but I tend to be the one who sticks my neck out furthest.

I am saying this because I am thinking of the people, "lambs" if you like, who latched onto Insimenator.net because they were intimidated by both you and Delphy in different ways and it was a real alternative, where you didn't have any power over them or the staff.  Kathy and Eric may be disgraced scammers, but they produced a forum that was running just like hundreds of people liked it and there was no reason the ambience and visible leadership needed to change so drastically while it was being tidied up.
 
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SimLogical
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Paden
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« Reply #17 on: December 12, 2008, 06:25:13 pm »

I drew the comparison because from what I'm told, the inboxes are twice the size here as on PMBD. The old InSIM site had way bloated PM boxes, I can say that from personal experience. Mine had two hundred all total, which was silly and I don't know why I did that. Now, with as many members as were at the old place, imagine if they also had that number or more. That's quite a lot of space, when you think about it. There's nothing wrong with running a leaner, less bloated forum when there are many users registered. Smaller sites can get away with bigger PM box limits, but it's silly to believe that a bigger site can.
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Delphy
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« Reply #18 on: December 12, 2008, 07:36:21 pm »

Ummmm....

Quote
PMs stored in DB add weight to the DB and slow down all DB operations.

Come on Pescado, you know as well as I do that that statement is complete and utter BS.  More PMs only affects the size of the PM table itself.  It has absolutely zero bearing on the rest of the database or the site.  The only thing that more PMs could possibly slow down is the actual PM inbox listing itself.  The vast majority of members on MTS2 have less than 5, and all told the entire PM table is 412,657 rows.  Does it slow the site down? Nope.  Only if you have a very badly configured mySQL could this even *possibly* have an impact (and even then it's extremely limited)... and we both know that my mySQL skills are a hell of a lot better than yours. 

I don't mean to be difficult but using this as an "excuse" to have miniscule PM inboxes really doesn't fly.  I thought that this was going to be a clone of Insim and setting excessively small PM inbox sizes really isn't anything to do with that. Cutting back the limit really has no bearing on make the site faster - it's just something the so-called "leader" decided.

For creators, having such a small PM box (which is used for both sent and recieved messages) can make it very hard to organise things, or to allow them to be asked permission, etc for items.  You know, things that PMs are actually valuable to be used for and stored.  Putting your own artificially low limits (with a damn poor excuse of why to boot) isn't the best thing to do for this site.
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Shonie
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« Reply #19 on: December 12, 2008, 08:04:18 pm »

Oh Thank you for that Delphy.  When I read this, I went and had a look at my own site set up.  I am no site wiz, but that's what I thought when I looked at it. 

I've been coming to all of these sites for a long time, and I'm sorry to see that the attitude here is going to be the same as Maty and PMDB.  I'm a jaded old gal, I can deal with it, but you know it really gets old reading negative, pushy thread posts.  For all the problems at the old Insim, we had Joy (who lives up to her name), and daily updates, and new young modders spreading their wings.

I would like to see that back.  I'm with Inge on this.  I see people here who used to seem to nice sounding, well, sort of nasty.  We don't all have to play follow the leader into the worst parts of their personality.
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J. M. Pescado
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« Reply #20 on: December 12, 2008, 09:58:39 pm »

Come on Pescado, you know as well as I do that that statement is complete and utter BS.  More PMs only affects the size of the PM table itself.  It has absolutely zero bearing on the rest of the database or the site.
Oh, there's definitely an impact. When the typical user is hoarding up 9000 PMs and it takes 5 minutes just to dump the entire PM table, YOU DEFINITELY NOTICE. Plus, I've operated mailbox limits before MySQL ever existed. Just because your fancy schmancy new methods allow you to generate more bloat without dragging the server to a crawl doesn't mean you SHOULD. This kind of slovenly attitude is exactly why half the TS2 datafiles consists of dead weight that could be purged with no loss of functionality.

For creators, having such a small PM box (which is used for both sent and recieved messages) can make it very hard to organise things, or to allow them to be asked permission, etc for items.
The creators have a larger inbox for that reason.

It's not so much the mailbox limits, which you have devised due to experience of running forums.  (although I do not accept that 6 year age intervals have any efficiency merit at all - that is purely a Pescadoism)
That's just a side effect of the fact that the MATY source code was imported to get this place running. Removing it would make it harder to keep the code synchronized, though.

I've been coming to all of these sites for a long time, and I'm sorry to see that the attitude here is going to be the same as Maty and PMDB.  I'm a jaded old gal, I can deal with it, but you know it really gets old reading negative, pushy thread posts.  For all the problems at the old Insim, we had Joy (who lives up to her name), and daily updates, and new young modders spreading their wings.W
As far as I know, we still do. I don't tell people how to behave, so if the "attitude is the same", it represents an actual shift in thinking, and not anything *I* did. After all, MATY and PMBD have factions which hate each other, despite that I run both sites, and I certainly didn't create THAT. Since I have not changed any of the admins here, if people are becoming nasty, that's something that's up to them to deal with. I just run the code. And while Delphy believes that the PM bloat has no effect, and he may even be mostly right, it hasn't ALWAYS been that way. Just as you don't go spending more money on junk merely because you got a pay raise, you don't increase the level of bloatware just because you can.
« Last Edit: December 13, 2008, 04:25:35 am by J. M. Pescado » Logged
Inge Jones
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« Reply #21 on: December 13, 2008, 04:43:11 am »

I mean, just look at the newsbox:

Quote
News: VIVA LA REVOLUCION! VIVA PRESIDENTE!
Login using your standard IS login, we can haz DB!

We have El Presidente in line one, and typical MATY lolcatspeak in line 2, neither of which featured in the old insim.net

This is not going to have the majority of old users feeling "oh good I am home again!".  The site was meant to have been saved for the old members, not for the glory of the revolutionaries!

Pescado, I *know* you didn't instruct them to write that, or to keep that there.  I am just saying maybe the staff should consider thanking you warmly and sincerely in private messages or chat rather than by flying your flag all over the site!
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SimLogical
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J. M. Pescado
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« Reply #22 on: December 13, 2008, 05:00:03 am »

Okay, yeah, the news is a bit old now. Admittedly, not everyone has gotten the message.
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Ali
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« Reply #23 on: December 13, 2008, 07:23:06 am »

Inge, if you would actually look around the site you'll see that the ambiance is STILL here. Yes, we have some features now that are inherant at MATY and PMBD however as this site is technically supported (run) by Pescado then there are a few things that we have to accept

None of the staff, to my knowledge, have run a site as big as insimenator.net was and indeed, none of us were permitted in anyway to help with the back-office running of it. I know shit about servers and DBs and all that crap so I have to take Pescado's word that a lot of the stuff Kathy was doing at the old site was what contributed to it constantly running like thick treacle. If it means reducing things like PM allocation to keep the site running at this great speed then I would think that a lot of people are more than happy to up with that?

Other than the rule of 6 and the pm thingy (and all the damn BLUE everywhere!) this site feels nothing like MATY or PMDB to me. Paden just happened to be making a comment that other sites have less PM space. She could just have easily picked a different site to compare with but she didn't because PMDB is a site that she's familiar with, so WTH are YOU getting your knickers in such a twist?

If you think this site is PHAIL then that's your prerogative but there are plenty here that don't and are more than happy just to have the site back
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Inge Jones
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« Reply #24 on: December 13, 2008, 08:07:37 am »

Ali, I don't think you have been reading my posts in detail.  I haven't called the site "phail", I was talking about one stated aim of the operation.  I have also addressed the issue of your understandable gratitude to Pescado and how that, as well as his very kind continued help, doesn't require PMBD or MATY influences, or Presidential stamps to be in evidence as soon as one connects to the site.  Pescado himself does seem to understand what I was saying.
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SimLogical
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Delphy
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« Reply #25 on: December 13, 2008, 08:40:42 am »

Pescado, it is highly unlikely that every user would have "over 9000" PMs in thier inbox.  At MTS2 I am the person with the most PMs and I have some 4000 odd.  Like I said the vast majority have less than 5.  The point here is not neccesarily technical (although people seem to believe whatever you say blindly with no asking of whether it's actually true, and you admitted yourself that it doesn't really affect things).  The point is that you are applying your own "explanations" onto things to "justify" them with faulty logic.  Just becuase you *may* have run a mail server in the past really has little comparison with running a large site.  Some things apply, but you said yourself that mySQL is "my" thing and not yours - but somehow I am in the wrong when I point out the flaws in your argument?   If you wanna talk security, fine, but leave the actual technical database knowledge transfer to somebody who knows what they are talking about, please.

You said that utting the PM limit too high would affect the *entire* site and slow it down, but then you said it would only affect the PM inbox.  Which is it?  I know full well that a large PM inbox doesn't slow anything down other than, well, the PM inbox.  It has no effect on the other tables at all, especially not with good indexes and well written SQL code.  Using it as an excuse that it would slow everything down is, quite frankly, incorrect.

Instead of putting your draconian miniscule limits on everybody, you should have actually kept it at the levels they where at before - after all, this *is* supposed to be a clone and not another instance of Pescado-land.  Isn't it?

Ali, let me tell you this - reducing the PM inbox will have little to no impact on the site "speed".  What *wouild* is optimising the mySQL configuration parameters and having good database indexes, key buffers and so on.  Your "esteemed" leader really doesn't know much about all of that - but thats fine, his server, your site. 

If, however, you want some *actual* expertise, feel free to ask.  Otherwise, carry on.
« Last Edit: December 13, 2008, 08:52:04 am by Delphy » Logged
J. M. Pescado
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« Reply #26 on: December 13, 2008, 10:12:42 am »

Pescado, it is highly unlikely that every user would have "over 9000" PMs in thier inbox.  At MTS2 I am the person with the most PMs and I have some 4000 odd.  Like I said the vast majority have less than 5.
*4000*?!? Are you mad? What POSSIBLE reason could you have to retain 4000 messages?

The point here is not neccesarily technical (although people seem to believe whatever you say blindly with no asking of whether it's actually true, and you admitted yourself that it doesn't really affect things).
No, I didn't. YOU said it wasn't true. I expressed some guarded skepticism at this view, as it most certainly DOES have a perceptible effect on how long it takes to dump the DB, but you have more experience in the specific MySQL implementations. I WILL, however, point out that your claim has NOT been historically true in regards to how excessive PM accumulation affects database efficiency.

The point is that you are applying your own "explanations" onto things to "justify" them with faulty logic.  Just becuase you *may* have run a mail server in the past really has little comparison with running a large site.
So you claim. I argue that the "mailserver" functionality is simply a subset of the functionality involved in a site with additional functionality, and if users retaining 9000 messages was enough to significantly impact the performance of the mailserver back then, it will similarly continue to impact performance now. Perhaps not to same degree, given that computers 20 years ago were significantly less powerful, but this does not matter. Just as a only fool increases his spending merely because he has managed to acquire more money, what represents a good personal expenditure policy for a beggar is as solid an expenditure policy for a billionaire.

The fact remains that if we were to allow users to retain, say, 1000 messages, the amount of DB space devoted to storing useless PM garbage would exceed the amount of DB space used for the actual USEFUL forum by an order of magnitude! You can't possibly be denying that this has NO effect, and the effect on dump time will NOT be insignificant.

Some things apply, but you said yourself that mySQL is "my" thing and not yours - but somehow I am in the wrong when I point out the flaws in your argument?   If you wanna talk security, fine, but leave the actual technical database knowledge transfer to somebody who knows what they are talking about, please.
The fact remains that you can argue that the impact may be negligible, and I am willing to believe you, but it is entirely immaterial. The impact woul most certainly NOT be negligible if every user behaved as you did. And, as I pointed out, there are clear security ramifications on a global level to encouraging this sort of irresponsible mail behavior. I'd know. You want to know how I managed to even get this in the first place? A SIGNIFICANT part of this can be blamed specifically on IRRESPONSIBLE MAIL RETENTION. Irresponsible mail retention is perhaps the second-largest security threat to a site, second only to "morons for admins". Of course, the two tend to go hand-in-hand...

You said that utting the PM limit too high would affect the *entire* site and slow it down, but then you said it would only affect the PM inbox.  Which is it?
No, you said that. What I WILL point out is that if the PM inbox is bloated, the site will take that much longer to dump and transfer during routine backups and maintenance. And, in fact, large PM counts DEFINITELY impact the time it takes to run the SMF DB maintenance, and that sufficient volumes of DB bloat will turn it from an operation that is atomic to an operation that takes several seconds to complete. THAT part is clear empirical fact.

Suffice it to say that I believe there are plenty of technical reasons for clamping down on mailbox bloat policies, and I *KNOW* from direct, personal experience in exploiting such that allowing and encouraging mail retention is a massive security threat. You wouldn't believe the stuff people conveniently leave in their bloated Gmail inboxes. An anti-PM-hoarding policy has historically been technically sound and remains EXTREMELY sound from a security perspective.
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Inge Jones
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« Reply #27 on: December 13, 2008, 10:23:53 am »

What have the amount of PMs per box got to do with security exploits?  You could allow just one PM in one box and it could be the one that has the problem.  Sorry, but I am calling waffle on this Cheesy

However, this wasn't my point; my original point is now largely satisfied.

All I was trying to say is that staff and president alike should remember *who* they saved this forum for, and it wasn't for people who already have their primary online home at MATY or PMBD.
« Last Edit: December 13, 2008, 10:29:04 am by Inge Jones » Logged

SimLogical
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J. M. Pescado
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« Reply #28 on: December 13, 2008, 10:35:11 am »

What have the amount of PMs per box got to do with security exploits?  You could allow just one PM in one box and it could be the one that has the problem.  Sorry, but I am calling waffle on this Cheesy
Certainly, that one PM could be the significant one. But if that one message blocks the user's inbox, he will be forced to delete it soon enough. It will no longer be a bomb we are holding. Any decision about security is a tradeoff against usability: The most secure computer is the one that you reduce to component subatomic particles. But it is not very usable in such a state. The PM limit is chosen as a balance between usability and reduction of security threat: A 10 PM limit for standard members should be adequate enough for any NORMAL purpose that doesn't involve hoarding tons of pointless nattering interpersed with dangerous information. By forcing the user to be concious of the limits, he becomes concious of exactly what he is keeping. Call waffle all you like, but let's not forget that I KNOW security exploits. Security is my life.

All I was trying to say is that staff and president alike should remember *who* they saved this forum for, and it wasn't for people who already have their primary online home at MATY or PMBD.
Certainly: Some of the behaviors are simply artifacts created by the importation of the forum code. There is no specific reason they are retained, other than the lack of replacement, and the fact that using the same codebase makes it easier to maintain. Others are strictly technical and security concerns, like the PM limits, and do not specifically pertain to the codebase. The staff are already working on different themes, anyway: I myself have no involvement in this because I do not really comprehend aesthetics. Suffice it to say if you don't like the look, someone else will probably make a different one soon enough. It just won't be me, because to me, everything looks the same. Tongue
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ISCelesta
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« Reply #29 on: December 13, 2008, 12:39:03 pm »

Just a little tip that I have found to be useful.  The outbox has unlimited capacity.  If there is a message you want to save, you can click quote, send it to yourself, click to save it to your outbox, then delete both the original and the one you sent yourself from the inbox, and you will have a quoted copy of the original message in your outbox.  cool
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