News
Update Issue
There's a pretty big issue affecting the site since upgrade. New story chapters (including the first one of a new story) are not working. I have turned off submissions while I work on this issue.--Chaos on 08/29/21 02:47 pm 1 Comments
Upgrade Update
As I suspected, the upgrade occurred sooner than originally expected and I didn't have time to alert anyone that the deadline was HERE to back things up. I do have a complete backup from prior to the move, but it does appear that stories did make the move successfully. Whew. I didn't have time to go through and thoroughly test everything prior to the upgrade go-live, so if you notice anything quirky that needs to be checked out, please let me know in the comments. Initial testing, though, has looked good!
KNOWN ISSUE FOUND: New chapters/stories are not posting but getting a DB error. I'm working on this as soon as possible, but alas it will likely take some time unless it happens to be an easy issue.
One of the first things that happened while I was working to prepare the site for an upgrade is a "cleaning" of some of the database files to remove "obvious" spam. Unfortunately a few legit things could have been caught up in that (i.e. anonymous reviews from back in the day if they contained links...). If you happened to be a member that signed up in Feb-May of 2018 and your bio referred to Coffee, Supplements, or Weight and you'd posted no stories...yeah, your membership was removed. I don't think that would catch any "legit" members, but...if it did, sorry, you were a casualty of about 25000 spam membership removals. Sign back up if you want, though any account used solely to spam or advertise a product will be removed...again.
--Chaos on 08/27/21 12:58 pm 0 Comments
If you're seeing this...
You're on the upgraded server. Congratulations! Of course this also means that they made the change before they were supposed to and I may not have had time to get everything working, soooo be warned that there may be some glitches, and it's possible that I'll have to restore from backups, so anything new (updates, new stories, etc) might be rolled back. So be sure to back things up!--Chaos on 08/26/21 07:01 pm 2 Comments
ATTENTION: Important Site Update
TLDR: Back up your stories. ASAP. A forced server update might break the site software. If it does, it might not be recoverable. Prior to the update, I'm going to attempt a few trial runs of backing up and restoring the site, so you may run into increased "maintenance" modes.
Long version:
It's been a year since Mare last posted news about backing up your stories. I must reiterate that now. The efiction software this site runs on is pretty dated, and unfortunately now the server's operating system and its database software are at "End of Life" and a forced upgrade is going to occur in the next few weeks. While I'm doing as much as I can to try and make the site's move/update work, I can make no guarantees. Unfortunately, if the software is not compatible with the new operating system, it might not be recoverable if it does go down. That's the worst case scenerio. I'm hoping it won't happen that way, but I'd hate for anyone to lose their stories if it does. If it does happen, I will TRY (again no guarantees) to at least make the stories visible in a read-only mode, but it'd be best if you back up your stuff!
Unfortunately, the server upgrade might also impact the fictalk forum. I'm again hoping that it can survive the move intact.
Though they're supposed to tell me with enough time to make an announcement when the actual update will occur, the last time the server moved they did so without warning and about 2 weeks before they said they would. So...be aware that could happen and the site may experience outage(s) before I make that announcement.
--Chaos on 08/18/21 03:46 am 3 Comments
Site Issues
As you may be aware, over the years, this site has had a lot of issues when it comes to spamming etc. Unfortunately, that is why we had to shut off the reviews. We are also aware of instances where people’s stories have disappeared or their entire accounts. We are not sure why this is happening but we are trying to figure it out. This is a very old and outdated database and some things are just not working anymore. In the meantime, I highly suggest any of you who have stories on this site and don’t want to permanently lose them, you should consider sharing them on another platform such as ao3.
We have been around for decades and it breaks my heart that these problems are worsening, but it would really break my heart to see all of your stuff lost as well.
Please consider joining our forum. It’s still a place fanfic authors and readers can get together and discuss things.
Thanks for reading!
--Mare on 08/03/20 10:56 am 0 Comments
100th Featured Story!
As you all know, every month we feature a story right here on this page. We have been doing this for a very long time and have finally gotten to story number one hundred! In honour of this we asked everyone to vote for who you considered to be the top ten authors of all time on AC!
Coming in at #1 on our list, with the 100th featured story is Mare with "Hope is the Last Thing Ever Lost" To learn more about Mare and to read along and particpate in her thread, head over to the forum and under Featured Authors look for her thread.
Congrats to her and thanks for participating in the Top 10 countdown! Check back soon for June's featured story.
--Julilly on 05/01/15 04:15 pm 0 Comments
The Felix Awards are underway!!
For information on the First Annual Felix Awards for the Absolute Chaos site, go here:
http://absolutechaos.net/fictalk/index.php?board=43.0
--Mare on 10/11/07 12:41 am 0 Comments
Awards judges chosen!
As I'm sure you all have heard over the past little while, there is a fanfic awards on the way! Absolute Chaos will be hosting the Felix Awards.Last week we canvassed for judges, you put your hand up and now we are on our way to getting the awards party started!
Please, a round of applause, for your judges!
blueleeryan, RokofAges75, MonkeyAbu, nicksgal, LenniluvsBrian!! And me!
I want to thank everyone for their applications, and please keep checking back for more updates and information on the Felix Awards!
Have a good long weekend for those who have one, and for those who don't happy Monday!!
--Julilly on 10/08/07 03:37 am 0 Comments
Fanfic Awards on the way! Judges needed!
Absolute Chaos is going to be putting on their very own fanfic awards, and we need help from you!
I am taking applications for judges, to be responsible for reading, grading, and choosing fics to be winners in our very first awards!
Note: Judges will NOT be judging categories in which they may be nominated, will NOT get to choose what genres/categories they judge, though I will keep in mind what you read and try to accomodate (awards are open to all fics/all fandoms), MUST be willing to be fair, honest, keep to rules, and keep to deadlines set by the ringleaders..e r..Mods (will be annoyed by me on a regular basis).
If you feel that you have all of those qualities, then please fill out the following form and email it to:
mods@absolutechaos.net, Re: Judges!
Name: (Please list your name or nickname, and your AC/board usernames)
Preferred method of contact: (email? through the board? through AC? msn?)
Favourite...
-genres:
-fandom:
-writers on AC:
Have you ever judged an awards before?:
What will make you a good judge?:
What is your availability like?: (We need to know people will see this through.)
I hope that many of you are interested, and I'm sure it will be great fun, but keep in mind that if we do get many applications we may not need everyone! I will let you all know on October 7, 2007 via the AC Discussion Boards who our judges are!
--Julilly on 10/01/07 01:54 am 1 Comments
For those having problems with the skins...
For some reason on some computers on some stories the skin seems to "disappear". I'm still trying to figure out what's causing that (I can't get the problem to duplicate on my own computer...) and hope to have a resolution so that all the skins are actually usable. Until then, I've created what I *think* should work on those computers having problems. I will try to create a "light background" version of it as well, but for right now, the FireDark skin I think should work for those who are having problems with the other skins. (FireLight should now mostly work--though it still has a few more quirks than FireDark does...)
Please comment here if you are having problems with that skin--and let me know what the problems are: I admit I was in a bit of a rush and didn't test everything, so may have missed some things. I'll correct them as soon as possible. Thanks!
(The reviews page should be fixed for both these skins; let me know if you're still having issues with that...)
--Chaos on 09/29/07 08:53 pm 7 Comments
Fire Skin...
The fire skin has been updated and seems (from my computer) to be working better (still a few quirks) on IE and Firefox. If you're using that skin and having problems, please let me know by leaving a comment. Thanks!(If it gives you an error when you first log in, it seems to work after refreshing the page or hitting one of the links. Am still working on that glitch...)
--Chaos on 09/23/07 02:58 am 10 Comments
New Skin#s1 and 2...Crayons-by-Kali and Paint
Okay, so some people have reported having problems with the "Fire", "FireLight", and "Lightning" skins since the upgrade (since they're currently all the same thing not surprising that they're all causing the same problem...) I will still be working on those skins to make them (hopefully) usable, but in the meantime, I have uploaded the first 2 of what I hope will be several alternate skins. I did some testing and it appears that they're working on both IE and Firefox (sorry did not try any other browsers yet...). If, however, you are experiencing problems with it, please leave a comment (please include which browser you're using and a problem discription). (Note: The Paint skin does not really work well with desktop settings of 800x600; I'm not sure how many out there use that setting, but...thought I'd throw that out there...)
--Chaos on 09/22/07 01:48 pm 15 Comments
Site Update...
The upgrade should be pretty much complete (except for the skins...) Submissions should be turned back on. Be sure to keep a copy of anything that you post over the next few days (actually you should always keep a copy!!!) I've done some testing, and think everything should be working just fine, but if there are unforseen problems, I might have to "roll back" to the previous version in which case anything new that's been posted would be lost.
--Chaos on 09/21/07 05:19 am 7 Comments
Upgrade Attempt #701...
Erm...okay, the number is an exaggeration, but finally after months (of me being able to work on it only minimally...) I was able to successfully upgrade a "mirror" copy of this site to a new version of the e-fiction script. I believe that the upgrade will help with the spamming issue we've been experiencing and add some nifty features as well.The site may look a little odd over the next few days as I do the upgrade and "tweak" the appearance of the page.
When I am about to begin the upgrade, I will be turning off the "new submissions" (including updates to stories). I will keep them down only as long as necessary to complete the upgrade and do some testing to be sure that it's working.
When the upgrade is complete, I will put another message here to let ya'll know. I will add, however, that once the site is back up you will want to make sure that you save copies of anything you submit for the next week or two--if any unforseen bugs pop up, I will have to revert back to the old site and any new submissions will be deleted. (I will try my best to be sure that doesn't happen, but I like to prepare for "the worst", too...)
I hope to complete the upgrade tonight (Thurs) but may continue working on it on Fri and this weekend as well if necessary.
--Chaos on 09/20/07 06:54 pm 7 Comments
Spam
It has come to our attention that there has been a lot of spam type reviews showing up on this site. While I managed to stop the major spamming from happening on the forum, it's not quite as easy on this site with the huge amount of people signing up everyday.
If you find a spam review, please leave a comment here with the story link and one of us will delete them as soon as possible. I know it's annoying, especially when you get all excited seeing an email for a new review, but for now there's really nothing more we can do. If it makes you feel any better, it's equally annoying for us to have to go delete them lol
Sorry about that!
--Mare on 09/04/07 03:15 am 7 Comments
