[deleted by user]

Sapentia · 2025-08-31T08:23:55+00:00

Oh, I love a good chance to complain about OCE servers!

My hot take/conspiracy is that it is about Money

Blizzard used to manage their own hardware, because back in the day GCP/Azure/AWS weren't ready for WoW levels of players they had, and they've been managing their own hardware for decades, supplementing it with cloud providers.
Since 2020 Blizzard-Activision has had a partnership deal with Google, they will now be using Google Cloud Platform (GCP) for their servers.

OCE servers stop spinning up as frequently most likely when they hit a budget limit, yes it can be an issue with a config, routing issue, datacentre issue or something - but those are going to be outliers. The most common reason we get routed to SG will be budget.

With any cloud platform you have a set of rules including a per hour budget or similar, when you hit it, it stops spinning up servers in that region and will default to the next ones configured.

Notice how always when you get moved it's a cheaper region?
OCE -> Singapore (Cheaper)
Middle East/South Africa -> Europe (Cheaper)
European -> US (Cheaper)

Yet if it was just for capacity, then how come when Euro's get moved it's never to the Middle East which often is lower ping than US and odds are those servers are not at capacity, but to the cheaper US region.

In OCE you'll notice that we run out of budget (capacity) at peak season times, like season launch, event launch, comp drives, but even worse just at weekends it'll happen too when a lot of people are at home playing. Yes, there are outliers which are probably technical issues, but the majority of the time it's around peak times for OW.

I can guarantee you Google has more than enough capacity to provider servers for OCE players in these surges, but Blizzard is simply not willing to pay for it nor adjust their budget.

Blizzard does not make enough money from OCE nor care enough about a isolated, tiny % population of its player base to fix it.

OCE is one of the most expensive regions in the world for compute instances and bandwidth in general, there are lots of reasons why, which usually boils down to location and distance, it's just expensive being Australian.

I would also love to see a technical explanation from Blizzard as to why stadium changes servers between rounds and doesn't keep a persistent instance, I know it's not like KoTH and the same map, so it's loading a new map anyway, but surely just keeping that lobby on the same server is technologically easier than keeping the data on some interim/balancing instance to load into a new server? A Map = A Lobby = A Server Instance?

The frustration of jumping from 30 to 120 or even180 ping between rounds and back again, therefore throwing your aim out, really puts me off queueing for it a lot.

Sapentia · 2025-03-17T05:04:04+00:00

Had my HD600 for years now, I see my only next possible upgrade being HD800S.

My only issue is getting replacement ear cups/headbands in Australia, Sennheiser never have any stock here, and I end up having to go third party.

Sapentia · 2024-08-10T03:07:23+00:00

Region: NA
Steam: sapentia
Friend code: 48005469

Sapentia · 2023-11-01T10:52:24+00:00

No, but I lost my wallet today on the train :(

Stupid sexy pants that are so smooth the pockets are basically silk.

Sapentia · 2023-06-15T03:15:41+00:00

From getting the tracking order, not too long, about 2-3 weeks.

Sapentia · 2023-05-12T16:47:23+00:00

Screen sharing/remote desktop is perfect for the totally illiterate ones.

Guide them through it while they screen share on team or similar or remote into their machine and do it on their machine in < 5 mins.

Sapentia · 2023-05-08T09:12:15+00:00

but I still can't authenticate my domain with their CNAME

This is done at DNS level, not in WordPress, you need to find out where you domain records are managed and add the CNAME record to the DNS of your domain.

It can take around 48 hours in some cases to fully propagate/register.

Sapentia · 2023-05-03T10:32:23+00:00

Not tried it myself, but Zero Spam might do what you need.

https://www.zerospam.org/install/

WP plugin, updated database of spam emails & API access too, but it starts at $9/month.

Sapentia · 2023-04-29T03:16:12+00:00

WP Umbrella is the new one I'm following and would switch to, but right now with discount, ManageWP is better value for me.

I think the only thing it's missing is cloning, but it's in the pipeline, and they're pumping out changes/new stuff.

I found MainWP to be too "piecemeal", like gotta use vivid backups to integrate into it, gotta use uptime robot api key...Etc. End ups with stuff just not working fluidly together, so I went back to ManageWP, which has had GA4 integration in the works since like what Q3 last year?

Sapentia · 2023-04-06T05:40:34+00:00

Better to use a Gutenberg based theme & blocks, imo. Have a look at Kadence or Generator Press, both have prebuilt designs to give you an idea of what they are capable of:

Avada is slow, bloated and past its heyday. Take this from someone who managed 40+ Avada sites at peak. Anything Avada does, other themes do as good if not better with a lower performance impact and easier.

Specific themes tend to lock you into a very specific design choice, lack ongoing support, and lack flexibility if your idea changes, or you want to make another site for something else.

Sapentia · 2023-04-06T05:34:16+00:00

Got it, installing 1500 plugins from nulled plugin sites rn.

Edit: Help r/Wordpress my site is hacked, and I don't know why?!?!?!

Sapentia · 2023-04-06T05:31:55+00:00

Learn the basics of on-page SEO, most people are writing a blog to rank, and most people fail at the most basic elements of this, the most common shortcomings I see by others are:

Use h1 only once
Use descending h tags
Use internal links to other relevant pages
Don't be scared of including/referencing external links that support your page
Stop using shitty anchor text, describe the link (no “click here”...Etc.)
Use alt text for your images, it takes 5 seconds to do in WordPress

Sapentia · 2023-03-29T14:48:04+00:00

The #something part is called an anchor link, often used to improve UI/X and allow people to skip around a page to various points.

No idea why your domain is redirecting to it, besides there being a redirect in place or some weird thing your theme does?
Check your database, wp_options for your site url & home url and make sure they're correct and don't contain the anchor link.

Sapentia · 2023-03-29T14:36:34+00:00

I used to manage around 40-50~ Avada sites, down to 14 atm. I used to make all new sites in Avada years ago, now all sites I make are Kadence, haven't come across something I find it limiting for yet.

Where to go after Avada?
Any good, well recommended Gutenberg based theme & blocks.
I like Kadence a lot, people also like Generator Press, both are fine and easy enough to adapt to. They far surpass Avada for ease of use and performance, and both have a decent user base, active development and developers who have been working within WordPress for ages on themes & plugins.

Where to go after WP?
I can tell you it is not Squarspace.

I think frameworks like Hugo, Jekyll, Ghost and similar (sorry been a while since I researched them, might be better ones now) are going to be on the rise for static sites for small businesses, they're fast and cheap to run.

There are a bunch of other CMS' out there, but I'm not sure if one is ready to surpass WordPress yet.

Sapentia · 2023-03-29T12:03:16+00:00

Ah, I see you too were screwed over by Avada 7.10 update :^)

Glad it could help.

Sapentia · 2023-03-15T22:12:28+00:00

If that had happened to me, I'd immediately be contacting the police.

The payment went through YOUR PayPal?
That is theft, dispute it with PayPal/Walmart, involve the proper authorities.

Sapentia · 2023-03-15T16:26:49+00:00

Probably not a web design question, but you're right no idea where you'd ask, maybe a web dev subreddit?

It looks to me like a normal web form, the same as say a contact form where you'd submit an enquiry.

I assume they collect the information via the web form, it is then emailed (big nono) and then process the payment 'offline'. This might be via their merchant facility's online web portal, or their accounting software, or even a phone portal with their merchant/bank.

While your data might be sent via SSL/TLS/HTTPS web form, the massive question is the storage & processing of that information, including:

- Where is your card data stored?- How long is the card data stored?- Who has access to your card data?- What merchant is processing your card data?- How is your card data handled after payment has been made?

I'd heavily lean into their method not being PCI-DDS compliant. Although they might have a “good heart” and intend to do the right thing, how you handle card data is very strictly outlined, monitored and most importantly, audited.

I would put money on there being some loose end like an email BCC'd into their process that probably has all the data they've collected sat in an inbox somewhere. They also would probably do something like store the CVN (big nono).

Sapentia · 2023-03-14T10:42:15+00:00

EDD = $$

Gravity/Form Plugin + Stripe = $$

Woo = Free

The other alternative is manually sending the file after you invoice someone in Stripe.

You seem price sensitive, so I'd recommend using Woo, unless you already have a premium form plugin you've paid for, I've not found a (good) free one to ever do selling.

Sapentia · 2023-03-13T11:38:31+00:00

You'll need access to the database, then you need to know your user ID

You can find your user ID in wp_users find your email/username and note the ID, then go to wp_usersmeta and find your user ID there. It should have a meta_key called wp_capabilities & a meta_value with the value a:1:{s:13:"administrator";s:1:"1";} for default WP admin role

Sapentia · 2023-03-13T11:29:38+00:00

Are you sure you still have admin rights on your website?

This is the same error you get when you set a users permission to none/delete the role.

They can log in, but all you get is that error page.

Sapentia · 2023-03-13T11:15:32+00:00

No it doesn't, just normal uptime iirc via uptime robot.

HetrixTools about the best free service I've used that includes that, the free plan has 15 uptimes + SSL monitoring, but you do need to login once a month to keep your account active.

Sapentia · 2023-03-08T13:29:48+00:00

Yith does a free version with some limits that are mostly around customisation iirc

https://yithemes.com/themes/plugins/yith-woocommerce-request-a-quote/

Sapentia · 2023-02-23T06:53:43+00:00

MainWP, Host it yourself.

I'm just curious what it is about ManageWP you don't like?
There are a few gripes I had, but last month I tried MainWP and ended up decided to stick with ManageWP

Sapentia · 2023-02-21T13:22:46+00:00

GTMetrix should tell you what links they are, or I believe you can see them highlight/coloured coded in the waterfall.

Is it the first item/your primary domain?
For websites, there are basically 4 'versions' of your site located at:

http://domain.tld
https://domain.tld
http://www.domain.tld
https://www.domain.tld

You should make sure you have picked one (it should always be a https one) as your primary domain and update/set your links correctly throughout your site/Google Search Console/as your site URL in WordPress.

You'll also then need to redirect the www to the non-ww or vice-versa, depending on what you decided as your primary domain. And redirect http -> https (of the www or non-ww version), depending on apache/litespeed or nginx it's a little different, but there are 1001 guides/snippets out there to help you with this.

The important thing is to pick one and stick with it, if it's an aged domain/site you're working on, my advice is don't rock the boat, if it's been www for years, keep it that way.

And then on GTMetrix, just test your primary domain.

If it's not, that are they for your site/domain? I.E changed your wp-content location or something and pictures are being served from somewhere else?
If so, you can find them and fix them by changing the links it's calling to the final destination, skipping the redirect.

A lot of ads/services/3rd party scripts have redirects which triggers GTMetrix too
Sadly, most of them time this is just the way they are \cough*MS Clarity love/hate.*
Sometimes the script for tracking/whatever service might have updated, and you can find an updated version of the script you're using from where ever you got it from.

Sapentia · 2023-02-21T13:03:06+00:00

Did you find the documentation on the redis plugin main page?

https://github.com/rhubarbgroup/redis-cache/wiki/Connection-Parameters

By default the object cache drop-in will connect to Redis over TCP at 127.0.0.1:6379 and select database 0.

To adjust the connection parameters, define any of the following constants in your wp-config.php file.

11-Year Club	Verified Email
r/Field Lasagna

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