Trading during upload?

[NeilMartin]

Am I worrying unnecessarily?

What will happen if a user is using the site whilst I try to upload changes?

Is there a way of finding out if anyone is accessing the catalogue or trying to checkout before deciding to proceed with an upload?

Thanks
Neil

[cdicken]

Users don't get affected by uploads at all. If they have a product in their shopping cart that is removed by an upload then they will just get a message saying 'this product is no longer available'.

If they do hit a serious problem then a message come up saying "the store is currently being updated by the owner, please come back later".

[NeilMartin]

Not ideal, but ...

Chris,

Many thanks for the information.

Ideally, I'd like to have a little more control over what is going on. Putting my end-user hat on, I'd be a little unhappy if I suddenly found out that something I had been able to add to my basket was now "unavailable".

Actually, I'm more concerned about what might happen if the server tries to serve a page that has just started being uploaded and might therefore be empty...

The best that the hosting company could come up with is suggesting I check the page request logs before starting an update.

I'm also thinking about a 'coming down at 12:00am for shop fitting' type holding page to alert users beforehand.

I have other things to do, so I'm not going to lose any sleep over this one for the moment!

Thanks again
Neil

[Neo_ad]

why dont u export a snapshot and import it at home then upload just before u go to bed.

Just and idea...

Reagrds,

Stewart

[Jan]

If you only sell to tehe UK you could upload in the middle of the night, there are automation products on my web site that would allow you to do this.

Regards,

[NeilMartin]

Concurrent access and all that...

Hi,

Thanks for your continued input! I'm already expecting to do the uploads in the wee small hours - not a problem for me as I'm a bit of a night owl. I tend to do lots of internet stuff then anyway. That is not to say that I'm dead keen to do everything by hand - I'll take a look at the automation tools!

However, my point is that if I'm up, then somebody else might be too. If they want to buy, while I want to upload, then ...what will happen. I'd rather know beforehand what the consequences of this situation are likely to be and not just trust to luck.

I suppose its my background (IT Professional accustomed to working on mission critical systems) that makes me nervous about this.

Since there does not appear to be a cast-iron method of checking for user access, I'll just place an info message warning users about the 'upcoming maintenance'. If any issues arise then I'll deal with them on a case-by-case basis.

Thanks again
Neil

[andyk]

Hiya,

I freelance for speeding.co.uk which is a large car accessory site. Our site has a splash page, which links through to the acatalog folder.

When we're doing major upgrades that we feel might effect the end user (not just normal product updates), we replace the splash page with a "maintenace in progress page" until we're happy things are working again.

Unfortunatly that doesnt stop people that come in through the search engines direct to product pages... but its the best you can hope for really...

Andy

[NeilMartin]

Thanks for the info

Andyk,

Thanks for sharing your experiences. As a matter of interest, have you ever had any user complaints/feedback that could possibly be attributed to a side effect of trading during upload?

Cheers
Neil

[Darren B]

I find the simple way is to use WS_FTP to log on to my server, open the acatalog folder view the files by date and at the top you will see all the people currently logged into you site.

The files will look something like 232Z159Z22Z165ZCOMA1026548932B18856.SESSION if you do not have any open at the same time as you are looking then there is none around

Also if the order.num file is near the top then someone has checked out or is checking out

I hope this help
Darren

[andyk]

Re: Thanks for the info

Originally posted by NeilMartin
Andyk,

Thanks for sharing your experiences. As a matter of interest, have you ever had any user complaints/feedback that could possibly be attributed to a side effect of trading during upload?

Cheers
Neil

I can't really say i have... but we normally do the big updates late on a friday night when it's pretty quiet anyway...

[NeilMartin]

Eureka!

Darren,

Many thanks - that is exactly the kind of information I was looking for! I'll look out for those files before starting any maintenance work.

Cheers
Neil