> Am I wrong to be as pissed off as I am right now? Will I ever > get over this and calm down enough to get on with life? Ok, I'm over it... Sorry if I upset anyone by posting this here... Apparently it was a language issue. The rest of the post was so well written (the English was perfect) that it didn't occur to me to wonder. Rather than saying "...another site that has banned Israeli access completely..." he had intended to say "...another site, one that has banned Israeli access completely, ..." For any none English speakers, it is a very different meaning. "commas, not just for lisp anymore..." So just to recap: There may be some problem that prevents some people from accessing the piclist.com web site. It does not affect the email server. This has nothing to do with the search engine not allowing more than one search request every 30 seconds or so, or with people being blocked due to site ripping attempts. Each of those cases, you would still get a screen that explains exactly what is happening and why. I do NOT EVER block access for any reason related to country, race, sex, height, etc.... This problem results in no response from the server. If you use telnet or something that allows you to see the response, it typically has a header and no more. This problem is NOT caused by piclist.com's server, configuration, or anything else here. How do I know? Because most people (1.3M hits, 16GB bandwidth, 120k unique Ips PER MONTH) can access the site just fine AND because it makes no difference if I run IIS 4.0, Apache, or even a little Win32ASM server, inside or outside a router/firewall. The result is the same. Also, the entire response leaves MY network including the header AND the content. Something between me and them causes part or all of the response to be dropped. My server never gets a nack (or an ack) from the remote and it sits there waiting for some response for a few seconds and then drops the connection (as it should). I would really love to have someone who really knows what they are doing help troubleshoot this. So far I've come up with the following script to aid in troubleshooting: ------------------------------------ If you were blocked, you would get a message saying that your IP was blocked and explaining why. Can you reach: http://66.13.172.18/techref/index.htm ? If so, the problem is DNS. Can you reach: http://www.quickstepper.com ? If so, the problem is with the headers sent back by the PICList site. Quickstepper is on the same server but is a very simple, "out of the box" configuration of IIS. PICList has a batch of stuff installed. Why some people can deal with it and other can't is an ongoing mystery. It may be caused by a problem with some node in the route between your ISP and mine, or by your browser, or god knows what. If you can't reach any of them, your ISP or something between your ISP and mine is messed up. They will never believe this, but you can prove it to them by using a proxy server on another network. For example: After you click on this link, it will ask you for some configuration info and you should check the URL in the lower left corner to ensure it is still http://www.piclist.com/techref/piclist/index.htm (sometimes the "http:" turns into "http%3A" or the "//" becomes a "/") then press the "Start Surfing" button. If you see the web site, search the page for the text "local time: " and make a note of the servers clock setting. It should show PDT (Pacific Daylight Time) or PST after daylight savings ends. Hit refresh and verify that it is changing. If it is changing, then the server IS up and you are NOT viewing a cached copy. If you see the web site, and the time is updating, the web server is UP. If you cant see the site directly, then your ISP, or their upstream and nothing else, is the problem. Do a tracert 66.13.172.18 from the command prompt and email the result to your ISP's tech support along with your findings to the questions above and this email. ----------------------------------- I hope that with enough tracert listings, I can see what node the problem traffic always is using. Just for general interest... Here is what is popular on the site: url Viewed size piclist/ 36,506,793,104 24.29_KB io/stepper/linistep/ 194,225,108 38.60_KB piclist/weedfreq.htm 37,184,916 28.69_KB io/lcd/pic.htm 28,714,922 26.45_KB microchip/routines.htm 4,624,400 22.11_KB ecommerce/routeno.htm 938,326 45.09_KB microchip/devprogs.htm 118,129 48.74_KB postbot.asp 88,940 10.59_KB microchip/ios.htm 65,500 19.57_KB language/pcls.htm 65,438 63.45_KB piclist/begin.htm 41,312 23.65_KB postsearch.asp 27,562 8.98_KB microchip/ 24,823 16.36_KB io/serial/rs232.htm 18,995 22.77_KB piclist/projects.htm 13,041 15.89_KB language/html/ 4,134 9.06_KB Page views are since the first of this year. --- James (hothead) Newton: PICList webmaster/Admin mailto:jamesnewton@piclist.com 1-619-652-0593 phone http://www.piclist.com/member/JMN-EFP-786 PIC/PICList FAQ: http://www.piclist.com -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist