Re: X0301fc/ Refresh Data

[Carroll Slemaker <cslemaker1@xxxxxxxx>]

Dear Mr. Capel,

This is not a complaint nor a plea for help.  But I thought you might be
interested in what I have found concerning your data-refresh site.

I did finally succeed in getting the refresh files I needed, but it was
a lengthy and tedious process which finally completed sometime after
midnight last night.

I don't know exactly how your ftp server is set up (nor am I an expert
on such matters), but it seems that the problem is due to a combination
of user overload and timeout parameters.  In setting up for a file
transfer, there obviously is much handshaking between your server and
the user's system.  What I found was that during the day and well into
the evening, there was almost always a lengthy delay between successive
steps in the process:  in establishing the connection, in acknowledging
receipt of the user ID, likewise for the password, in setting to the
specified download directory, in listing the contents of the directory. 
On most attempts, it seems that these delays were so lengthy in
aggregate that a timeout occurred on your server before the operation
completed.  Depending upon the exact lengths of individual delays, the
abort on different attempts occurred at different points in the process,
resulting in different symptoms in the user's browser or ftp client. 
Given this behavior, it's easy to see how many users have concluded that
(a) you're no longer providing refresh data, or (b) your site is flawed.

Watching debug messages appearing in WS_FTP sometimes showed that your
server terminated the connection.  At other times I saw that some
function returned a result of zero (presumably an error result) and the
process seemed just to go into limbo.

During the early evening, only rarely could I get even as far as a
listing of the files in the download directory, but as the evening wore
on the delays became less.  Finally, after about 11:00 p.m. Pacific
time, files began to download - one would download but the next would
abort.  After about midnight, all the files of a multi-file request
downloaded successfully.

In summary, your server seems woefully inadequate for the user load. 
(Curiously, up until a few months ago, the last time I downloaded, I had
never had any such problems.  Is it possible that the user load on your
ftp server has increased THAT much in just a couple of months???)  Also
contributing to the problem, as perceived by the user, is the ungraceful
way that the server discontinues a request.  But that may be an
inescapable consequence of the TCP/IP protocol - as I say, I'm not an
expert.

Thanks for assuring me that the site was still operating and encouraging
me to keep trying.

Regards,
Carroll Slemaker