The site has been offline for the last few days due to several issues, some of which I am still trying to resolve. NBNCo did some work on the cable node I am attached to and that is where the problems began. After sorting that out and rebooting everything, the network switch (basically an ADSL modem with the modem part turned off) then decided to act up and after setting up a duplicate (I always keep a new spare handy) the same symptoms were apparent. Oddly enough, when I would disconnect the web server (where this and other websites are hosted) most of the rest of the network would come good and when I reconnected the web server, everything would drop off again, almost like what happens when two machines on the one network have the same IP address, except that this wasn't what caused the problem.

Some time at work the night before last was spent at the workbench repairing the server and it is now in working order. The last task is to repair the WIFI function. It's not as urgent and I come to you through my phone for now. I'll make sure everything has settled down first before looking at whatever the WIFI issue is.

My apologies for the outage and I am glad that at least VR is working once again.

UPDATE: As can be seen, the big comeback did not last long and I cannot yet give any guarantee that the site will remain reachable. These are just 21st century issues which sometimes cannot be easily resolved.

Thanks for all your efforts Brad.
A few months ago I received a new Foxtel box remote control. Follow this simple procedure. Didn't work. Ended up needing a complete Foxtel box reboot taking three days to sort out.
So when one of my wife's friends asked me to instal the replacement for her box I feared the worst - but in the end just a delay while she remembered where she had put her wifi password. Joys of the 21st century indeed.
Certainly good to have the forum back.

I just hope it stays up. I get this feeling sometimes that machinery adjusts itself to its surroundings and ends up being more affected by OCD than any human.

As an aside, it was also sad to hear about the death of Bob Rogers, once billed as the world's oldest radio announcer. I miss both Bob and 2CH. Rest in peace, Bob.

Well done Brad in getting VR back up again.

This IT stuff gets weirder by the day the way things interact and I well know the feeling of relief when FINALLY after much head scratching etc things get sorted out.

What I thought was just a simple process to re-locate our Internet streaming modem from the TX site to the Studios became an absolute nightmare in getting is going again.

Thanks for the effort! I imagined that you were off camping somewhere which, it seems, is often when the gremlins strike.

Some time at work the night before last was spent at the workbench repairing the server

What did that repair involve?

The server is okay, but full of dust. I'm thinking the outage was a conglomeration of many issues, with each one solved not necessarily making anything work correctly. She's as clean as a new one now. I've also replaced the modem, even though both the existing one and the new one were exhibiting the same symptoms earlier in the week.

The whole episode has been a bit confusing to be honest. This has been the biggest outage since TPG refused to fix my phone line at the last place I lived back in the ADSL days. This was pre-NBN but they did have their FTTB service available and that would have been great if they offered static IP addresses with it.

One by now realises that we, with NBN, Telstra & privatisation of service industry in general have been sold a pup.

NBN here is wireless The signal strength has been going from one green bar to two orange ones in a continues cycle for weeks.

The Landline spent a large part of February & April and most of March, breaking down.

Marc

I was wondering what had happened to give the timeout message, and after it had been going for a week I supposed something had happened to you, or you were away and unaware.

Anyway it's good that the site is back. Thanks for the work you put in to fix it.

"Like nailing jam to a tree"

Thanks Brad for your efforts with the site.

Thanks to everyone who provided their feedback and opinions.

I am still having some trouble with my network, which has prevented me uploading some photos and documents that have been submitted in the last week or so but I will try and find a way to get them onto the site tonight. Fortunately the trouble that still exists doesn't affect the running of the site.

Brad: I emailed you a reminder about renewing the site's certificate. Did you get that? My email account has been migrated to a mob in QLD and I'm not sure it's reliable anymore.

Yes, I got it. Things are quite hectic at work at the moment so I've had little time to deal with other things unfortuantely. The certificate needs to be renewed before the 8th August (from memory) so I should have it done by then.