Usenet still up the spout after upgrades.

[#1]

Same for me. I deleted my account just now and find authentification is required before I can start restoring my 60 odd newsgroups. This is what I get....
480 authentication required
Configuration:
  Account: news.plus.net
  Server: news.plus.net

I had been hoping to sort things out this morning so I hope Bob can get Giganews to get their finger out.

[#2]

Same here, usenet as dead as a door nail. I note Service Status is only at amber!!!

[#3]

Quote from: mbeenham

I guess your Usenet access is not typical of PN users then and therefore not a reliable yardstick - something to bear in mind for the future? I'm not sure anybody other PN staff are able to get news from PN news servers and the portal web interface is also down.

I didn't know about the web interface so thanks to bringing that to our attention. There have been 7 posts in p.s.customer-feedback since Giganews completed their maintenance so I'm not the only person able to access the servers. My account is in no way different to a customer's either. I'm on the legacy broadband Premier Option 1 offering.

Quote

Outsourcing problems? I would have been creamed for outsourcing a service without having an appropriate SLA in place. Please tell me that PN don't have a SLA with Giganews/Supernews that allows for a 24hr outage.

I've no idea but I shall ask that question.

[#4]

Quote from: pittdj

Same here, usenet as dead as a door nail. I note Service Status is only at amber!!!

It is not broken for everybody.

[#5]

Quote from: Bob

It is not broken for everybody.

How many? Maybe not for people on legacy PN offerings? Can't you tell how many service requests are being refused? It's even refusing requests from your own web based newsreader!
Service status should be red with a more helpful message e.g.
PN Usenet is unavailable for some/many/nearly all users due to recent activity by Gaganews.
Please do not adjust your newsreader settings. Normal service will be resumed (insert estimated service restoration here).
Hope this helps.

[#6]

I am on legacy PAYG with a fixed IP and I require authentification.

[#7]

It is and isn't broken for me! I have PAYG RIN available.
Originally yesterday it worked - I think I had an IP in the 217 or somewhere around there range (Bob can you check that from any logs?).
After reconnecting for a different reason and finding it failed I've tried reconnecting many times to try different IPs. The following all fail (I've had multiple IP's in each of these rnages:
86.134.*.*
86.137.*.*
86.138.*.*
If I go back to non-RIN 80.229.7.* it works.

[#8]

Quote from: mbeenham

How many? Maybe not for people on legacy PN offerings? Can't you tell how many service requests are being refused? It's even refusing requests from your own web based newsreader!

The legacy offerings are assigned IPs from the same pool as the BBYW accounts if you have a static IP (This can be activated via the portal). No we can't tell how many service requests are being refused. The servers aren't ours, they're Giganews'.

Quote

Service status should be red with a more helpful message e.g. PN Usenet is unavailable for some/many/nearly all users due to recent activity by Gaganews. Please do not adjust your newsreader settings. Normal service will be resumed (insert estimated service restoration here).

All well and good if you have an ETA, which we don't. I'll post an interim update now but it will be along the same lines as the current messaging.

[#9]

Just as an aside to all this, what NNTP server should we be using. I have been using sn-ip.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net following the switch to supernews. However it appears that other are still using PNs old news.plus.net. Have I missed something here?

[#10]

You'll probably need to switch to news.plus.net, this pointed to the supernews servers anyway.

[#11]

Quote from: praethon

Just as an aside to all this, what NNTP server should we be using. I have been using sn-ip.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net following the switch to supernews. However it appears that other are still using PNs old news.plus.net. Have I missed something here?

If you have, I've missed it too..
$ host usenet.plus.net
usenet.plus.net is an alias for plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net.
plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net has address 138.199.67.64
$ host news.plus.net
news.plus.net is an alias for usenet.plus.net.
usenet.plus.net is an alias for plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net.
plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net has address 138.199.67.64
Another observation for the benefit of the Support bods; while some of us are suffering from authentication issues, non-Plusnet subscribers are able to read posts to
plusnet.service.customer-feedback (and possibly others), again.
This from Astraweb:
Path: news.astraweb.com!mrouter3.a.astraweb.com!news.astraweb.com!border1.a.newsrouter.astraweb.com!club-internet.fr!feedme-small.clubint.net!zen.net.uk!demorgan.zen.co.uk!nx01.iad01.newshosting.com!newshosting.com!216.196.98.167.MISMATCH!local02.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.plusnet!news.plusnet.POSTED!not-for-mail
NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 31 Mar 2008 10:42:14 -0500
Date: Mon, 31 Mar 2008 16:41:32 +0100
From: PlusNet Support Team <support@plus.net>
User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.12 (Windows/20080213)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Newsgroups: plusnet.service.customer-feedback
Subject: Re: Usenet server and RIN
References: <f-ednbXyx61sa23aRVnyvQA@plusnet>
In-Reply-To: <f-ednbXyx61sa23aRVnyvQA@plusnet>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Message-ID: <gJSdnahWF_DLm2zanZ2dneKdnZydnZ2d@plusnet>
Lines: 20
X-Usenet-Provider: http://www.giganews.com
NNTP-Posting-Host: 80.229.150.170
X-Trace: sv3-29BnAFbPh70ClJ8pko277iVDO4WwBr2RBoZDpPpibgCZqYc+obl1+PvGdtuKtCqGOlJdTXBwptmi0ap!N6+/0W3lxAPRdoV0ScpGr+H/HgG/Ge5oH+6ARY4OyerYij1XK6PQbjoT8Jxa2wZJFDMGxFT15CYI!GN0=
X-Complaints-To: abuse@plusnet
X-DMCA-Complaints-To: abuse@plusnet
X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers
X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly
X-Postfilter: 1.3.37

[#12]

Quote from: praethon

Just as an aside to all this, what NNTP server should we be using. I have been using sn-ip.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net

I doubt that will work any more. I'll factor it into the Service Status update.

[#13]

Quote from: Waldo

If you have, I've missed it too.. $ host usenet.plus.net usenet.plus.net is an alias for plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net. plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net has address 138.199.67.64 $ host news.plus.net news.plus.net is an alias for usenet.plus.net. usenet.plus.net is an alias for plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net. plusnet.vsrv-ams.supernews.net has address 138.199.67.64

Ignore what I said earlier. If both hosts point to the same IP then the Supernews address should work.

Quote

Another observation for the benefit of the Support bods; while some of us are suffering from authentication issues, non-Plusnet subscribers are able to read posts to plusnet.service.customer-feedback (and possibly others), again.

Thanks for pointing that out. I wasn't aware.

[#14]

Perhaps Giganews is authenticating access based on ip address and they have dropped out or not been informed of all the PN ranges?
In case it helps my address is currently 87.112.5.xxx
Since PN are unable to tell who can connect to Usenet and there is a fair bit of evidence from this forum that there is probably a fair cross-section unable to do so  it would be more honest to mark it as red for now, if only to highlight it within PN organisation and maybe galvanise somebody to sit on Giganews until it is fixed.
A service update would be nice - just checked and still the same message from 17:59 yesterday
From Plusnet Newsreader on the portal which is failing also:
List of Newsgroups Number of Postings
 
  plusnet.announce   authentication
  plusnet.chat   authentication
  plusnet.games.general   authentication
  plusnet.games.halflife   authentication
  plusnet.games.quake   authentication
  plusnet.games.unreal   authentication
  plusnet.service.announce   authentication
  plusnet.service.customer-feedback   authentication
  plusnet.service.status   authentication
  plusnet.social.chat   authentication
  plusnet.social.forsale   authentication
  plusnet.tech.dialup   authentication
  plusnet.tech.e-commerce   authentication
  plusnet.tech.general   authentication
  plusnet.tech.hardware   authentication
  plusnet.tech.linux   authentication
  plusnet.tech.mysql   authentication
  plusnet.tech.software   authentication
  plusnet.tech.usenet   authentication
  plusnet.technical-journal   authentication
  plusnet.test   authentication
  plusnet.test.customer-feedback   authentication
  plusnet.www.announce   authentication
  plusnet.www.cgi   authentication
  plusnet.www.frontpage   authentication
  plusnet.www.webdesign   authentication
Presumably this does not relate to my ip address...
Do you (Bob) confirm this from your account?
Cheers,
Martin

[#15]

Quote from: Bob

Quote Another observation for the benefit of the Support bods; while some of us are suffering from authentication issues, non-Plusnet subscribers are able to read posts to plusnet.service.customer-feedback (and possibly others), again. Thanks for pointing that out. I wasn't aware.

I've re-opened PUGIT 379 to cover this.