We'd like to thank you for all of your feedback and patience during this difficult week. And, we'd like to apologize for the considerable challenges we’ve been experiencing with the forums. When we brought the forums into the main site last Friday, it caused a complete overload on our servers. Throughout the week, this contributed to slow speeds, log in problems and, at times, the site going down completely. We have been working day and night to solve the problem, and we apologize profusely for the inconvenience you've experienced.
The good news (we hope!) is that we’ve been working hard to fix these issues, and, as of 4 p.m. today (Friday), the slowdowns seem to have stopped. We are continuing to monitor the situation and will keep you posted on new developments. In the meantime, here's what we're doing to address the issues you've raised:
Slow Speeds
The sheer volume of forum posts imported last Friday overloaded our servers. The indexing and sorting resulted in slow performance, and ultimately a series of crashes. The result was very slow response that made it difficult to use the site, and very difficult for us to fix, as well. We have tracked down the issue and have not seen any slowdowns for several hours as of Friday at 4 p.m. We are continuing to monitor the site in case any similar issues resurface.
Overcoming this initial server issue was our first priority, and now that it’s almost resolved, we are committed to addressing your concerns about the interface and function of the forums.
Log In Challenges
Importing the forums into the main site was intended to fix the forum login problems. However, the server slowdown and crashes have made logins extremely slow. Now that the servers seem to be working better, we hope you’ll experience better results. Your houseandhome.com and Forums login are now the same system, so whichever login you’ve been using recently should work. Please let us know if you experience any further problems logging in, providing your log in name and the email you used.
Photo Attachments
We are committed to ensuring that all new photo attachments display within posts, rather than appearing as mere attachments. Unfortunately, photos from posts prior to last Friday’s move came over in one big folder, and are not displaying inline. We apologize for this. All new photographs should show up inline with your posts. Please let us know if you experience any challenges, and we will continue to work on this.
How New Or Latest Posts Display
All users now have the ability to choose how to organize their posts — by thread, from oldest to newest, or from newest to oldest. There is a toolbar that allows you to choose within each post, underneath the big box ad. We can make this more visible. We look forward to reviewing more feedback from you and working to make this as functional as possible.
eg:
Overall Design
Many of you have commented on the type size and white space. As soon as the server situation is stabilized—and we hope it is now—we will tackle these issues one at a time. We want to make this an amazing space for you to connect and we will address these concerns.
Once again, we cannot thank you enough for your patience and hope that you'll continue to support the forums. This community is incredibly valuable and we will be doing everything in our power to fix these challenges. We hear your frustration and look forward to tweaking the look and functionality of the forums so that you can continue to call this space your own.
Thank you again,?
Mike Zimmermann
Comment Guidelines
We welcome your feedback on Houseandhome.com. H&H reserves the right to remove any unsuitable personal remarks made about the bloggers, hosts, homeowners and/or guests we feature. Please keep your comments focused on decorating, design, cooking and other lifestyle topics. Adopt a tone you would be willing to use in person and do not make slanderous remarks or use denigrating language. If you see a comment that you believe violates any of the guidelines outlined above, please click “Alert a Moderator.” Thank you.
The pictures are not showing up in the posts that have them.
Also, at the top it says "You are not allowed to post new content in this forum" .
What am I doing wrong?
Thank you for all the hard work going into this. I'm sure it's been a most difficult time, but I'm sure it will all work out well in the end.
Thank you so much for allowing larger pictures! I just did a test-run and I love that. This is one improvement I will enjoy very much!
Hello-
I'm experiencing a lot of problems with log in...
I can only log in using my full name, not my username (Lisa At Home) that I've been using for some time now. It is frustrating...
Is there a way that I can re-create my profile so that I can continue to use 'Lisa At Home' as my username?
My password did not work and I seem to back to square 1 when I'm trying to have issue resolved.
(re-setting passwords etc)
Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Lisa
Thank-you Mr.Zimmerman for your apology post...I really enjoy this forum and will check in every day as usual as I'm sure everyone else will..We are an understanding bunch..thanks again.
Kudos to the server for delivering much faster speeds. I think I'm almost in love again - with this site that is, and so I hope you fine tune it a bit more and work out the bugs ASAP.
To those who have left - I hope you are peeking and maybe decide to come back. Some people gave up too soon perhaps. I realize that expectations have not been met, but this site has different priorities and we are but a small part.
We don't live in a perfect world and sometimes things just take a little longer. Sure it was frustrating and some people who were looking for advice may have got turned off but the loss of everything, but it's back and I still like the exchanges and the feedback and the IDEAS and I hope that never stops.
As John Lennon said - "Give H&H a chance". Okay so I took a liberty there - bite me!
I commented in the thread that I had originally started, Farewell....., however, seeing this post I feel that I should carry a comment over here as well.
I think that changing a forum as active as this can be quite a challenge, that I recognize, but I also feel that it is important that you have people field-testing this site and providing you with direct feedback. I do hope that you are getting feedback since it is not evident by the comments of active members posting on this site.
Of course being a forum on design and decorating you certainly have a greater challenge of meeting the visual demands of these members. Take the time to reach out to them for opinions. You will be surprised, Mr. Zimmermann, at how supportive they will be.