The New Sudoku Players' Forum

[StrmCkr]

Wasn't that forum originally on the late Michael Mepham's site? Or am I thinking of another forum?

sudoku.org.uk was Mchael mepham's forum.

It was plagued by a multiple spam bots, they didn't develop anti spamming bots like a few people here did to combat it + a few other things, eventually the site conceded to the onslaught and closed the forums down: on-top of that the forums where also aggressively hacked and multiple posts/threads where either hit with spam or out right deleted, which made it impossible to restore content and many discussions where completely lost.

[enxio27]

It was plagued by a multiple spam bots, they didn't develop anti spamming bots like a few people here did to combat it + a few other things, eventually the site conceded to the onslaught and closed the forums down: on-top of that the forums where also aggressively hacked and multiple posts/threads where either hit with spam or out right deleted, which made it impossible to restore content and many discussions where completely lost.

This is referring to the programmer's forum (vice Michael Mepham's site)?

[JasonLion]

I assume StrmCkr was talking about sudoku.org.uk, which did have the problems he describes. The Sudoku Programmer's Forum never had any serious problems with spam, nor was any content lost prior to the site vanishing.

[tarek]

I've just checked. I have what appears to a backup. I'm not sure how deep or comprehensive. It dates back to April 27, 2010 with about 1.06 GB of Html files

I can see why I made the backup. At that time the players forum had gone down. The players were using the programmer's forum to discuss ways to revive the site. That when Jason mentioned he was in the process of starting this site.

I'm guessing that everyone thought that if the players forum went down then it could also happen to the programmer's forum too.

I can't be the only one who made a backup.I double checked and the backup is not complete as it only covered to depth 2. So any pages that required pressing three links to see will not be there!!!

[enxio27]

I've just checked. I have what appears to a backup. I'm not sure how deep or comprehensive. It dates back to April 27, 2010 with about 1.06 GB of Html files

That's better than nothing! Jason, can you do something with this?

[JasonLion]

I'd be happy to look at it. I'm worried that depth 2 is going to miss most of the interesting stuff.

[dobrichev]

https://web.archive.org/web/20120901212519/http://www.setbb.com/sudoku/viewforum.php?f=3&sid=d83a13d8428059794e6304aefdef98a2&mforum=sudoku

Actually there is no content, but the ad is there

COMPULSORY UPGRADE!!! Request an upgrade NOW! 32+ Pre-installed Modifications! 3 Server Locations to choose from: USA, UK and JAPAN.

[rjamil]

Don't know how much useful it is, but this link says, "1,100 URLs have been captured for this domain."

Links started with "http://www.setbb.com:80/sudoku/viewtopic.php?" have some useful information.

R. Jamil

[JasonLion]

I wandered through the WayBackMachine archive for a while and found that there is really not very much there, and what is there is very difficult to wade through. There are session IDs in most of the URLs, which change all the time and thus break most links. This makes finding things extremely difficult. Half the pages that are present seem to be free of any actual content. What little content I could find seemed to consist of only the first page of what is usually a multi-page discussion.

[tarek]

I still have that half-hearted backup (depth 2) of the site from April 2010.

I can try uploading to a sharing website Jason. For for you to look into. You can then add it as "a closed forum" for viewing purposes to this forum if you think that it would be appropriate!!!

I still think that there are members of this community who have a better backup though!!

Tarek

[Pat]

Don't know how much useful it is, but this link says, "1,100 URLs have been captured for this domain."

Links started with "http://www.setbb.com:80/sudoku/viewtopic.php?" have some useful information.

i didn't recognize the Topic number -- t=103 -- that's the old discussion on "what is the hardest known suduko ?"

thus i just chanced upon an old discussion which in 2010 happened to revolve around a 15x15 (box-size; puzzle-size = 225-squared) puzzle by m_b_metcalf (originally posted at www.setbb.com/sudoku/viewtopic.php?t=1830) (re-posted here)

[tarek]

I still have that half-hearted backup (depth 2) of the site from April 2010.

I can try uploading to a sharing website Jason. For for you to look into. You can then add it as "a closed forum" for viewing purposes to this forum if you think that it would be appropriate!!!

I still think that there are members of this community who have a better backup though!!

Tarek

Still got the backup. It is on an old laptop that runs windows XP. Battery died so running from the power cable. The screen is non functional so using a VGA cable. Luckily I still have a screen that accepts a VGA cables. Better copy it on an external drive before anything else goes wrong

The snapshot is from Tue Apr 27 2010. The last post being from ronk in the thread "Players Forums, anything wrong ?!"

Tarek

[JasonLion]

There was a lot of good information there.

If you send me a copy of what you have, I'll be happy to setup a static website with whatever material you, and anyone else who has backups of any kind, can contribute.

[tarek]

Hi Jason,

Let me know the bast way to send you 1.1GB of HTML files. I'll try to do that in the next 24 hours

tarek

[JasonLion]

tarek, I sent you a private message.