24,859
Since the last PMC news post, we've been working hard to speed the site up, reduce downtime and block spam.
Moved off tired but honorable servers
After the crash on Easter, we decided to move. PMC is a user-generated community and everything on the site is constantly changing and being accessed millions of times a day. Overtime, all that reading and writing takes a toll on hardware.
Moving a live site as active and large as PMC took 6 full days AFTER a failed 3 day attempt, sigh. Of course, the bandwidth and resources required to move... slowed the site down. Fun! The move completed last weekend, we're unpacked and settling in. Mmm... that new hardware smell.
To the Clouds!
Since April 13th, PMC is using Cloudflare services to help secure and accelerate our community on top of our existing structure. Their primary goal is to help filter traffic, cutting off the bad and speeding up the good. In past 7 days, PMC received 20 million regular visits, 1.1 million crawlers/bots visits and Cloudflare blocked over 600,000 threats. In addition, we will be experimenting with their Content Distribution Network (CDN) services to supplement or replace our current CDNs which serve our images and downloadable files, ~1,142 Gigs a day!
Forum Update
The forums are the only section on the site created by a third party, phpbb. Because of the integration with PMC system, upgrading is tricky and we're eventually planning to write our own forums, so... I've delayed update to focus on more important issues. However, overtime the outdated system has become more and more of a burden on PMC resources. We still plan on replacing them completely but the phpbb software and database were updated yesterday to the latest version 3.0.11. The upgrade reduces resource use and allows us to provide users and moderators with more controls. You won't see much / any difference on the surface right now as the majority of the benefit is under the hood. Vroom.
So, with these powers COMBINED!!!.... PMC is faster.
Spam vs Ham?
We're continuing the battle. Because of a recent flood of particularly lame spam, we are now testing new member submissions, comments and forum posts through a large reputable Anti-Spam service, Akismet. Their system analyzes the text and tells our site whether they think it's Spam or Ham. If you haven't guessed, Ham is good, especially with a spicy mustard and a side of corn on the cob, but I digress. If the great Aksimet says it's Spam and not Ham, then we either log it, block it or ship it to the Moderators or all three. Moderators are resident experts at sorting Spam from Ham. Sometimes, they can't resist eating the Ham though and that explains moderating mistakes.
As PMC traffic has grown, so has its attractiveness to spam in many flavors. From automated bots looking to hook you up with something with absolutely 0 relevance to Minecraft, gaming, or anything really, to people trying to make easy money online or seo purposes. It seems there's always a new type of spam or tactic showing up. Since their motive is money, the trick is to make it not worth their time and that can be difficult when it doesn't take much time to copy, paste. However, if it's caught and removed before many see it, there's no point in posting. There are many automated and systematic restrictions in place to reduce spam / discourage the process. We'll continue to introduce methods to prevent it. Please stick a flag in any spam that slimes through and a moderator will smite it.
Helping to improve the Skin Section
I've rewritten and enabled the dupe skin detector script and it's busy blocking the endless Steve, Red Dwarf and Assassin Creed skins as we speak. It compares new skins to all existing skins.
We're considering an automated simple skin blocking script but have to be careful not to block simple skins that are awesome, so that's not live yet.
Revamping the Site Rules!
Oh and we hit 1 million members. Ding!
The cake will be ready. Soon.
Moved off tired but honorable servers
After the crash on Easter, we decided to move. PMC is a user-generated community and everything on the site is constantly changing and being accessed millions of times a day. Overtime, all that reading and writing takes a toll on hardware.
Moving a live site as active and large as PMC took 6 full days AFTER a failed 3 day attempt, sigh. Of course, the bandwidth and resources required to move... slowed the site down. Fun! The move completed last weekend, we're unpacked and settling in. Mmm... that new hardware smell.
To the Clouds!
Since April 13th, PMC is using Cloudflare services to help secure and accelerate our community on top of our existing structure. Their primary goal is to help filter traffic, cutting off the bad and speeding up the good. In past 7 days, PMC received 20 million regular visits, 1.1 million crawlers/bots visits and Cloudflare blocked over 600,000 threats. In addition, we will be experimenting with their Content Distribution Network (CDN) services to supplement or replace our current CDNs which serve our images and downloadable files, ~1,142 Gigs a day!
Forum Update
The forums are the only section on the site created by a third party, phpbb. Because of the integration with PMC system, upgrading is tricky and we're eventually planning to write our own forums, so... I've delayed update to focus on more important issues. However, overtime the outdated system has become more and more of a burden on PMC resources. We still plan on replacing them completely but the phpbb software and database were updated yesterday to the latest version 3.0.11. The upgrade reduces resource use and allows us to provide users and moderators with more controls. You won't see much / any difference on the surface right now as the majority of the benefit is under the hood. Vroom.
So, with these powers COMBINED!!!.... PMC is faster.
Spam vs Ham?
We're continuing the battle. Because of a recent flood of particularly lame spam, we are now testing new member submissions, comments and forum posts through a large reputable Anti-Spam service, Akismet. Their system analyzes the text and tells our site whether they think it's Spam or Ham. If you haven't guessed, Ham is good, especially with a spicy mustard and a side of corn on the cob, but I digress. If the great Aksimet says it's Spam and not Ham, then we either log it, block it or ship it to the Moderators or all three. Moderators are resident experts at sorting Spam from Ham. Sometimes, they can't resist eating the Ham though and that explains moderating mistakes.
As PMC traffic has grown, so has its attractiveness to spam in many flavors. From automated bots looking to hook you up with something with absolutely 0 relevance to Minecraft, gaming, or anything really, to people trying to make easy money online or seo purposes. It seems there's always a new type of spam or tactic showing up. Since their motive is money, the trick is to make it not worth their time and that can be difficult when it doesn't take much time to copy, paste. However, if it's caught and removed before many see it, there's no point in posting. There are many automated and systematic restrictions in place to reduce spam / discourage the process. We'll continue to introduce methods to prevent it. Please stick a flag in any spam that slimes through and a moderator will smite it.
Helping to improve the Skin Section
I've rewritten and enabled the dupe skin detector script and it's busy blocking the endless Steve, Red Dwarf and Assassin Creed skins as we speak. It compares new skins to all existing skins.
We're considering an automated simple skin blocking script but have to be careful not to block simple skins that are awesome, so that's not live yet.
Revamping the Site Rules!
Paril and the moderating team have been hard at work rewriting and organizing all of the site rules into a system that is easier for everyone to navigate and more importantly reference & comprehend. Once complete, a link and page will be added to the main site rather than having it on the forums.
Oh and we hit 1 million members. Ding!
The cake will be ready. Soon.
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*gives cake*
Om nom nom nom nom
On a serious note,
I'm still waiting for my cake :/
hue hue hue hue