usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

Something's wonky with the website right now, so the link http://www.usfirst.org will lead to nowhere.

Use http://usfirst.org without the www. or visit http://63.251.142.250/

Hope this helps.

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

The link with the "www." works as of Jan 3, 11:37 PST, so I guess they fixed it.

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

These site always has problems around this time. It sees alot of hits. FIRST did a great job this year dealing with it though and getting all the service restored in a fast time manner

Help can't get to usfirst.org
 

Trying to get to the FIRST web site usfirst.org and getting site not found this morning. Was working yesterday. Anybody else having this problem. Any suggestions??
panic
Bruce

Re: Help can't get to usfirst.org
 

They're probably updating or uploading something.
Give them an hour and try again.

Re: Help can't get to usfirst.org
 

Works fine here

Re: Help can't get to usfirst.org
 

The problem is with http://www.usfirst.org/
Try http://usfirst.org/

Re: Help can't get to usfirst.org
 

Wow, //usfirst.org works. Whats with the www problem?
Bruce

FIRST website crashed?
 

can anyone access FIRST website? www.usfirst.org?

i can't at the moment, and i couldn't for like last 1 or 2 hrs.

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

http://usfirst.org/community/frc/default.aspx?id=966

works here

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

Fine here as well. Main page anyways.

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

Ditto. I haven't been able to access the site either.

Edit: Just accessed via the link from JohnBoucher above. Thanks.

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

Can't access www.usfirst.org, but it works if I leave the www off.

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

Oh, hey.. look at that. I wouldn't think that makes a difference, but that's the same case for me.
Very odd. HA!

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

No, it did not crash, but the DNS entry evaporated. Try accessing it through its IP address, http://63.251.142.250

Don

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

http://www.usfirst.org does not work from here. But, http://usfirst.org does. (Take out the www)

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

The www is not resolving. If you Google first they show a www version of the URI. Clicking on it will throw the DNS error.

Both versions should resolve to the same IP. Must be a DNS problem somewhere

Re: FIRST website crashed?
 

Thanks it works fine for me without the www. I will upload the game manuals without the encryption code to our site.:D Currently you can download the whole package with the encryption code here

FIRST webpage
 

is something up with the FIRST website or sever?
I can't log on to any of their pages

Re: FIRST webpage
 

Its been going in and out for me most of the day. That post Kickoff traffic surge you know.

Re: FIRST webpage
 

Use http://usfirst.org/ instead. For some reason it looks like http://www.usfirst.org/ is not working - but I'm able to get onto the FIRST sites via http://usfirst.org/

Ron
Team 2607 Software Mentor

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

Just to let ya'll know whats up.

I merged

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=71214
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=71204
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=71120
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=71309
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=71475

So they are all here.


Please guys search before you post!

USFIRST site down???
 

I noticed that it was unreachable last night. I still can't reach it this morning. Is the site down or is it just me??:o

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

I cannot reach it either.

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

Site has been problematic all weekend. Down again this morning. Hopefully they will get it up and running soon. We need it!!

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

THANK YOU!!!
So glad I wasn't being stupid!:ahh:

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

Accessing the site through www.usfirst.org still seems to be down as of when I am posting this. I'm going to pass this information along on the conference call that I have in a few minutes.

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

FYI - you can still access the site through http://usfirst.org (drop the www)

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

that doesn't work for me

now it does

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

Yes indeed, that does work! Thanks!

This sounds more like a DNS issue than the site actually being down.

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

i dont know why but yes it is down

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

10:27am its still down, this sucks when your trying to show the game off to your boss!!!

now is the time i put in vacation days!!

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

USE http://usfirst.org for access for now - it seems to work. Why they would choose to mess with DNS NOW seems sort of silly....

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

Any changes to the DNS would be done outside of FIRST. It is quite often at the ISP level. Someone with a more specific knowledge of the workings of ISP's and the Internet may be able to give more details, HINT, HINT.

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

The FIRST site is back up and running.

FIRST Website problems???
 

Anybody having issues with accessing www.usfirst.org?

Re: FIRST Website problems???
 

I have....the only way i got in last night was through a thread here.

Re: FIRST Website problems???
 

Drop the www to access the first website. http://usfirst.org

Re: FIRST Website problems???
 

So according to the computer and internet that I am currently using, the website www.usfirst.org does not exist.

So I guess their server must be down.

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

if you try to link it through Google or the Virginia First site it does'nt work, but you can back door your way in using this link....

http://usfirst.org/what/frc/default.aspx?id=366

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

Either or works for me.....and has been for the past couple days

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

Blaugh. Where hath the DNS server gone?

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

it must have ivaporated!!! :o

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

ivapor? but that stuff smells!

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

ya better plug your nose than! XD

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

Wow, I've never seen a thread become so completely repetitive and useless in my life. :rolleyes:

Re: USFIRST site down???
 

If you'd like a quick breakdown, here is how it works (being an ISP I do this stuff all the time).

Step one is the Registrar - think of registrars as a collection of entities that keep the main card catalog of the internet. They are the ones responsible for reserving a particular domain name for a company. Once you've reserved a domain name with a registrar, no one else should be able to buy that name and use it. If you have reserved a name it goes into the main catalog and no one else can have it. There is some registration information on the card, and a space to enter DNS servers.

Step two (performed on the Registrar's website) is to set the DNS server (Domain Name Server) names. Usually you have more than one of these for redundancy's sake in case one goes down it will use the other. This is like if you pulled the card out of the catalog to find out where to look for the actual sites or services associated with that domain name. When you type in your browser a domain name (www.usfirst.org) the first thing that happens is it finds the domain in the registrar database and looks up where the DNS servers are.

Step three is to set up various records on the DNS server. Sometimes DNS is maintained by the registrar, or it could be maintained by the ISP or even the end user. Each record on the DNS server has a very specific format, but basically it defines the alias to be used (say www.usfirst.org, or no alias usfirst.org), what kind of service you're providing (name lookup, Mail Exchange record etc) and an IP address. So for instance if the ip address of your main web server was 10.0.0.1 your "A" record for the web server would be:

www A 10.0.0.1

This means add WWW. to the beginning of the main domain name, and if someone is looking for that particular name within the domain return to the browser the address 10.0.0.1 to lookup the address. (BTW 10.0.0.1 is only valid as a local address).

If you have an FTP Server at 10.0.0.2 it might be:

ftp A 10.0.0.2

You can also have an alias. So if you wanted MYFTP.usfirst.org to point to the same address as ftp you could use:

MYFTP CNAME ftp.usfirst.org

Probably what happened is that that WWW A record got misdirected, but the main record for the host did not. This sounds like a change at the DNS level (rather than a registrar level which would redirect ALL the DNS to a new dns server name). Someone may have fumblefingered the IP address entry or left out the www CNAME or A record.

When you type www.usfirst.org into the browser your computer checks the registry, looks up the alias in the dns server, and returns an ip address to your browser, which proceeds to request the data you originally asked for from the server at that IP address. It actually queries a local DNS server, which has a copy of your IP address. If that copy is too old (set by the DNS timeout) the server will request a fresh copy from the root server, if not it will provide the cached copy. There is a serial number which is incremented each time the DNS record changes so it knows whether to refresh the local copy or not.

In any case while this information is maintained at the ISP or Registrar it should only be being changed if are actually changing something like the location of a server.

Hope that wasn't more information than you asked for and helped with an understanding of the DNS issues that may have happened.

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

Could someone also muck this up by playing with .htaccess ?

Re: usfirst.org down? Nope.
 

I'm pretty sure that you can. If they were adjust or adding something to the site, I think it's possible to mess up those settings.

Also, thanks for the brief explanation of DNS, Mr. Drake. I've always wanted to know how those worked. :)

FRC Website Problems
 

Is anyone else having problems accessing the first website today (1/7/08 9am EST)? I have tried www.usfirst.org and www.usfirst.org/robotics etc.

And nothing gets to the page. It's either my browser/firewall or it's down.

Thanks

MS
Co Founder of ComBBAT Team 21! and the KSC Regional Competition (Now Cent Fla Comp)

Re: FRC Website Problems
 

Please use the search feature, this has been addressed multiple times. First is having issues with there name server go to http://usfirst.org (drop the www).