Cannot connect to new Altervista site either via HTTP or FTP. Maybe a DNS issue?

[duanebowker]

I established my site yesterday and used FTP to populate it with my files. It was working just great for a couple of hours and then stopped being accessible, either via a browser (duanebowker.altervista.org) or via an FTP client (ftp.duanebowker.altervista.org). I thought it might have been a DNS problem but when I ran an "nslookup", it resolved the URL duanebowker.altervista.org to IP 78.129.205.42. When I try changing the access URL to use the raw IP address, I get the same behavior that I cannot connect to my website or to the FTP service. It looks like my site simply stopped working. I was able to get to my files with the Altervista "File Management" application. That indicated that not all files could be displayed because there were too many files in the top level directory. It said I should be able to get to them via an FTP client but I'm no longer able to do that. I was well below the 1 GB storage limit. I deleted my files using the File Management application and confirmed that that worked. I am still unable to connect to the site via browser or FTP client. Why would it work for a couple of hours and then stop working?

[Gianluca]

Your website looks ok even if your webspace is currently empty.

Please perform the test you can find here: http://forum.en.altervista.org/issue...-problems.html , you can also try to enable cloudflare in your control panel.

[duanebowker]

Thank you Gianluca. I ran the test and looked at the output. The DNS seems to have worked fine but the traceroute got hung up at my ISP (Comcast). It made a number of attempts and they all timed out at my ISP so that seems to be the culprit. I even went down the street to my local library and used their internet service and was able to get to the URL (and I got the empty website message but that's as expected). I am assuming the ISP's routing tables do not cover the 78.129.205.42 IP address. I know sometimes routing tables can take a while to update across the net but that wouldn't explain why I was able to access that IP address for a few hours before it stopped working. If the problem doesn't clear up in a day or two, I'll contact their tech support (I have low expectations).

[Gianluca]

Yes you should contact them. Also you can try to enable cloudflare in your control panel, it may resolve the issue with your provider.

[duanebowker]

I enabled CloudFlare this morning. It said it might take 24 hours to take effect. I'm running an experiment with my Facebook friends seeing who can reach the page and who can't. So far we have 4 who can't (including me) and 16 who can. Last night I uploaded my files to the site so there's something there to see at least. Some of the ones who can get to the site are also on Comcast ISP. One of the others who can't is on Verizon wireless (though he can get to it from Verizon FIOS). The other two who can't are at work and they don't know the ISP, though they are in geographically different areas of the US). I'm hoping the problem is one of network routing tables that are missing a route to the destination IP and that those will eventually be updated. That doesn't explain why I was able to reach the site for a couple of hours and then haven't been able to reach it since.

[duanebowker]

I found some entries on the Comcast support site where people had run into similar problems, esp. when working on developing remote websites, of the remote site becoming unreachable. One suggested solution was to just clear the local Comcast router's cache by disconnecting power for a few minutes. I cleared that one then did the same for my own private network routers, then restarted my host, cleared its cache, etc. Now at least my browser can get to my altervista website. Running tracert from the command line works as well. The bad news is my FTP client continues to timeout when attempting to connect. It seems to give upfairly quickly and I'm trying to reconfigure it to wait a little longer before giving up.