Problems connecting to HAIF?

[editor]

There have been intermittent reports of people having trouble connecting to HAIF. It's as if the web site has dropped off the face of the Earth and people are getting "Server not found" errors.

I'm working with our hosting company to track down the problem. So far it appears to affect only AT&T business and home DSL customers for about five minutes at a time. Location doesn't seem to matter.

If you ever have trouble connecting to HAIF, send me a message through this web page. It will give me diagnostic information that will hopefully isolate the problem. Be sure to note the date and time of the failure.

[Vertigo58]

So far so good chief!

[KimberlySayWhat]

I started having computer problems today, but this website is running especially slow.

[Trae]

I went into like Road Runner homepage or something. It was weird.

[editor]

I went into like Road Runner homepage or something. It was weird.

As stated above, I need date and time.

[editor]

Even more helpful is if you're having trouble connecting, run a Trace Route to houstonarchitecture.info

On a Mac or Linux, open a terminal window and type

traceroute houstonarchitecture.info

In Windows I think it's

tracert houstonarchitecture.info

but I'm not entirely sure.

Cut-and-paste your results here.

[Trae]

As stated above, I need date and time.

Oh, sorry about that. it was yesterday at around 9:30 PM.

[editor]

I just got an update from the people working on the problem. They've narrowed it down somewhat. I don't understand all the technical bits (that's what I pay them for). The only parts I understood were "Cleveland" and "L.A."

But it sounds like we're getting close to a resolution.

[editor]

So I've been told that everything is better. Mostly. The fault was traced to a circuit at Global Crossing and that company has gotten its act together. You shouldn't have any problems getting to HAIF.

Unless...

There's a thing going on around the internet right now. A flaw has been found in the DNS system. That's the thing that translates web addresses like "HoustonArchitecture.info" into numbers that computers can understand. Malicious people are using the flaw to attack the fabric of the internet. If your connection is unusually slow on and off or you can't reach web sites you used to have no problem with, it could be that your ISP is being attacked.

Some ISPs have patched their systems. Because of the complexity of the flaw, some have not. One of the ones that has not (to date) is AT&T.

The good news is that there is something you can do about it. You can avoid using your ISP's DNS system entirely. There is a free alternative called OpenDNS. It was recommended to me by the company that hosts this web site because OpenDNS has been successfully patched and is not vulnerable to the attacks.

Changing the DNS your computer (or router) uses is pretty easy. I was able to do it on my Airport in under two minutes. I hear in Windows XP it's even easier.

For step-by-step instructions, follow this link: https://www.opendns.com/start

A lot of people say their internet connection is noticeably faster since making the change. I won't claim that web pages load faster, but the initial connection to a web page does seem a little snappier. Your mileage may vary.

So if you aren't having any problems and everything seems fine to you, then you're probably OK leaving things the way you are. If you think things should be faster or sometimes you get errors where you don't think they should be, you might try using this alternate DNS service. It was recommended by people whom I really trust with computer stuff.