We are back - sort of

[nicanary]

Many grateful thanks to everyone for their hard work.  It's been like living in a black hole without AP.

(BTW one of my images in the "Advertising Automobiles" feature didn't appear!  ;D I'll see if I can find it and do the necessary transfer)

[mekubb]

Yesterday I manually uploaded many photos but I see now that there are double pics in my posts. I just read Pal's comment and stop uploading now until further notice. Glad to see that 'Operation Recovery' was successful !!

[Allemano]

Just today my HD is on strike!  >:(
Do I get it right that there's a routine going on that reconnects the old pics automatically?

[pnegyesi]

Yes, about 46,000 pictures have been reconnected. There are some duplicities and there are some errors. But the majority of the images are now okay.

Please don't re-upload images. The matching function has also been stopped.

If possible, please don't upload new puzzles until further notice.

[Allemano]

:thumbsup:

[Otto Puzzell]

The other thing that's really, really sad, is the "Featured imagery" section. Puzzling may be fun, but some guys (and mostly Otto), had started to build there an invaluable library of  XXth century automotive imagery. I only had uploaded maybe 5% of it.
To me this is the main loss.

Thanks, Ray. If they had been lost here, I do have the pictures I've been posting cataloged on my system at home. I started the task of re-uploading yesterday, but have stopped, with these latest developments. The motorcycle and Joe's thread now have a lot of duplicate pics, but that's easy enough to weed out.

Unfortunately, the system's re-naming of the pics has wiped out my often witty and urbane captions.   ;)

[pnegyesi]

Unfortunately, the system's re-naming of the pics has wiped out my often witty and urbane captions.   ;)

Oh, well, nothing is perfect. But I am so relieved that most of the pictures are back.

If you can hold on for just 1 or 2 more days, then we will also try to sort out duplicities. What is even more important and I can't stress that enough, please don't upload any new puzzles and for that matter, any new photos until further notice. Thanks

[Otto Puzzell]

Roger that.

I'm happy to weed out duplicates of my own pics.

[nicanary]

Unfortunately, the system's re-naming of the pics has wiped out my often witty and urbane captions.   ;)

Oh, well, nothing is perfect. But I am so relieved that most of the pictures are back.

If you can hold on for just 1 or 2 more days, then we will also try to sort out duplicities. What is even more important and I can't stress that enough, please don't upload any new puzzles and for that matter, any new photos until further notice. Thanks

Sorry - I got a bit excited yesterday and posted some new puzzles. I will hold back now until you give the go-ahead.

[Allemano]

Pal: again thank you so much for your (and your brother's) efforts! :applause: :applause: :applause:

[oko94]

If you can hold on for just 1 or 2 more days, then we will also try to sort out duplicities. What is even more important and I can't stress that enough, please don't upload any new puzzles and for that matter, any new photos until further notice. Thanks

I suggest that you post this warning as a sticky topic in each puzzle sub-forum, not every user reads this thread before posting.

[Ultra]

A Herculean effort by Karoly and Pal. I don't have words to express my gratitude. 

[sixtee5cuda]

Is it OK to weed out duplicate images in our puzzles?  Or will that mess up the matching process?

Should we report errors here, or ignore them?  Image 27b3d32c59b7d2c28b4a3076a8ed40b2f7c3dffe.jpg was incorrectly attached to one of my puzzles.

[pnegyesi]

Is it OK to weed out duplicate images in our puzzles?  Or will that mess up the matching process?

Should we report errors here, or ignore them?  Image 27b3d32c59b7d2c28b4a3076a8ed40b2f7c3dffe.jpg was incorrectly attached to one of my puzzles.

Please don't weed yet. Thanks

[faksta]

Oh..I have deleted several of my duplicates earlier today already :bag:

[pnegyesi]

Oh..I have deleted several of my duplicates earlier today already :bag:

It is not a problem (hopefully). Are the remaining pictures visible?

[faksta]

Yes, I have deleted only those I have uploaded yesterday, in just about 5-6 topics.

[serra]

A Herculean effort by Karoly and Pal. I don't have words to express my gratitude.

Thanks :applause: :applause: :applause:

[Allan L]

Pal: again thank you so much for your (and your brother's) efforts! :applause: :applause: :applause:

I certainly agree with that!
I also agree with Otto in that in my group puzzles the photo names were used as the only reference numbers, so the system number withdraws that help.

What also puzzles me is that when we uploaded a picture its name had to be unique within the site and we got an error message if it was not. It seems that the system now knows the images by totally different names, but has all trace of our original names been discarded?

[pnegyesi]

What also puzzles me is that when we uploaded a picture its name had to be unique within the site and we got an error message if it was not. It seems that the system now knows the images by totally different names, but has all trace of our original names been discarded?

"Original names" were just character strings stored in the database. Pictures were given an ID followed by a random character string - so at the end there were two columns for picture names: "original name" and stored name. Unfortunately the connections between a certain message (or topic) and the picture names were lost. Therefore the attribute "original name" also disappeared.

What we did earlier today is really simple. We took the creation time of a message made a tolerance of 35 seconds and looked for images made at the same time. It is a bit crude, but worked - in 46,500 cases :)

Next up, when my bro will have time again, we'll do something with duplicities and we also need to do an internal adjustment so we can start adding pictures and puzzles again without causing any more confusion

[pnegyesi]

If you see a picture appearing in a message/topic where it should not be, please do one of the following:
- send me a link to the topic
- if you have permission modify the message and uncheck the attachment, so it will not be visible

Thanks

[Carnut]

Wow - I just logged in at a hotel in France where I'm on holiday and I can't believe how much has been going on in my absence.
I'm not back until next Monday 25/08 so am not in a position to do anything until then..

Looking forward to knuckling down and doing what I can with my puzzles if it's necessary.

What a job the Negyesi brothers have done!  More than slap on the back is deserved..

[pguillem]

What a tremendous amf frustrating job ! I Wonder how a malware could do such a disaster ub the database.  Congratulations for your eggicacity.  I'm so happy to find the puzzles again

Take plenty of rest !

:applause: :applause: :applause:

[pnegyesi]

Rest is out of the question as my 3-year-old daughter decided not to sleep tonight, so we are up since 1:30 AM

It was not a malware. It was a simple hardware error combined with a lack of a proper database backup.

And you can now upload puzzles and pictures again

[D-type]

A very hearty Thank You to both of you for all your work.  :applause: :drink: