Known Issue: Browsing Galleries with WC Browser & SD Central
Monday, February 5, 2007 by Zoomba | Discussion: WinCustomize Site Issues
We are currently working on improvements to how the WC Browser/Stardock Central connect to our servers and fetch data. For the time being, we've had to disable WC Browser/SDC usage as we work through performance tweaking. As we continue to work on this particular feature, please, for the time being, use the website to browse the galleries.
Thank You
-Z
Thank You
-Z
krunchnik
Reply #2 Tuesday, February 6, 2007 5:51 PM
Reply #2 Tuesday, February 6, 2007 5:51 PM
mrtee makes a good point,i also thought there was a different problem,i could not find any info as to why i could not download libraries.Thought perhaps it should have been posted elsewhere before now.
larryf666
Reply #3 Thursday, February 8, 2007 7:10 AM
Reply #3 Thursday, February 8, 2007 7:10 AM
WHEN IS IT GOING TO BE SORTED WOULD BE CLOSER TO THE TRUTH
chewtoy0
Reply #4 Thursday, February 8, 2007 11:04 AM
Reply #4 Thursday, February 8, 2007 11:04 AM
I am having the same issue, and have been since late January.
Zoomba
Reply #5 Thursday, February 8, 2007 11:34 AM
Reply #5 Thursday, February 8, 2007 11:34 AM
When upgrading to the new WinCustomize 2007, a lot of the underlying code changed, resulting in much faster connection speeds for most users. We optimized a lot of things, and the result was traffic took a very significant jump. To this end, the site upgrade was incredibly successful. However, that spike in traffic caused an increased load on our servers and exposed performance issues that simply didn't exist when we were getting less traffic. The WC Browser/SDC site connection issues are not trivial and are requiring a fair bit of development research and implementation time. A fix is coming, but we can't give any sort of timeline at the moment.
We were faced with two options:
1. Deactivate the browser hooks to WinCustomize
2. Let WC Browser/SDC users bring the entire site to a crawl
We chose the option that would leave the site available to everyone. Even if you prefer the browser, the content is still readily available to you via the web. If we had not deactivated the browser hooks, no one, not even WC browser users, would have been able to access the libraries.
This is a consequence of higher traffic and was not something we could guess at or adequately simulate. Mark it up to growing pains.
We were faced with two options:
1. Deactivate the browser hooks to WinCustomize
2. Let WC Browser/SDC users bring the entire site to a crawl
We chose the option that would leave the site available to everyone. Even if you prefer the browser, the content is still readily available to you via the web. If we had not deactivated the browser hooks, no one, not even WC browser users, would have been able to access the libraries.
This is a consequence of higher traffic and was not something we could guess at or adequately simulate. Mark it up to growing pains.
RogerCale
Reply #6 Friday, February 9, 2007 12:28 PM
Reply #6 Friday, February 9, 2007 12:28 PM
Zoomba we understand what you are saying, but it would have been nice if that information was announced to the community. I have had the same problems for a few weeks now and even went as far as reformatting my hard drive and reinstalling windowsxp thinking I had installed something on my end causing the problem. I know you are going to say why did'nt you contact customer support, I did three times. I finialy got a reply this morning. One part of it had a link to this thread, and the last part the one that makes me mad says this:
I understand your frustration and would suggest contacting [email protected] if you would like to file a complaint.
I have no gripe and don't want to file a complaint. I don't even know why or what prompted that teck to put this in his reply. I've valued my subscription to stardock very much and have come to need their products on my computer. I guess what I'm saying is if there was some kind of notice to the community, I wouldn't have reformatted my hard drive nor had a need to contact customer support.
thanks for listining. Roger Cale
I understand your frustration and would suggest contacting [email protected] if you would like to file a complaint.
I have no gripe and don't want to file a complaint. I don't even know why or what prompted that teck to put this in his reply. I've valued my subscription to stardock very much and have come to need their products on my computer. I guess what I'm saying is if there was some kind of notice to the community, I wouldn't have reformatted my hard drive nor had a need to contact customer support.
thanks for listining. Roger Cale
sparklplenty
Reply #7 Saturday, February 10, 2007 11:42 AM
Reply #7 Saturday, February 10, 2007 11:42 AM
So does this mean that we will no longer be able to access Stardock Central or Wincustomize browser? I too reinstalled these programs several times and even reinstalled the whole computer (losing all of my saved skins, cursors etc) I didn't save any of these things because I was concerned about an infected file somewhere within the whole program. Now I get an email from Stardock support telling me to check this thread and if I wanted to I could send a complaint to gripline. I thought the remark was flip and I didnt like it.[B] 
Hankers
Reply #8 Saturday, February 10, 2007 11:48 AM
It is only temporary that updates to the Skins and Themes section in the WinCustomize Browser and Stardock Central is not working.
All other features in Stardock Central and the WinCustomize Browser are working.
Reply #8 Saturday, February 10, 2007 11:48 AM
So does this mean that we will no longer be able to access Stardock Central or Wincustomize browser?
It is only temporary that updates to the Skins and Themes section in the WinCustomize Browser and Stardock Central is not working.
A fix is coming, but we can't give any sort of timeline at the moment.
All other features in Stardock Central and the WinCustomize Browser are working.
T-Man
Reply #10 Monday, February 12, 2007 11:54 AM
Reply #10 Monday, February 12, 2007 11:54 AM
The servers for WinCustomize Browser (and Stardock Central Skin & Themes) are now back on line. And again we apologize for any inconveniences this may have caused.
If you are still experiencing any difficulties with the WinCustomize Browser please let us know.
orthocross
Reply #11 Monday, February 12, 2007 1:39 PM
Reply #11 Monday, February 12, 2007 1:39 PM
While they are working, it seems that Stardock Central is not displaying correctly (at least on my new installation of Vista Home Premium. Once the XML is downloaded, the thumbnails do not display until I use the Scroll bars to scroll down at least a full screen before they all display. By the way, HOW does one enter a EOL/new paragraph in these reply forms? It's kind of hard to properly format a reply this way... Donald McDaniel
Mark Bennison
Reply #12 Monday, February 12, 2007 2:02 PM
Reply #12 Monday, February 12, 2007 2:02 PM
Not for me its not! I get nothing - the update process claims there is nothing new in the libraries. For example in the windowsblinds library the most recent entry is GUI zero posted on 02/11/2007 - nothing since which is not true!
Edit - GAH!! American date format has fooled me!! I took this as 2nd November, not 11th February - I guess the year should have made me look again!!
I don't get anything being highlighted in bold for the new stuff, perhaps tomorrow when I check again.
Edit - GAH!! American date format has fooled me!! I took this as 2nd November, not 11th February - I guess the year should have made me look again!!
I don't get anything being highlighted in bold for the new stuff, perhaps tomorrow when I check again.
Cazzie
Reply #14 Monday, February 12, 2007 5:09 PM
Reply #14 Monday, February 12, 2007 5:09 PM
Yay, you beaut it's going great again now. Thank you 
Mark Bennison
Reply #16 Tuesday, February 20, 2007 3:20 PM
Reply #16 Tuesday, February 20, 2007 3:20 PM
Here's something I have been noticing recently...
Whenever the Skin Updates Manager is running it takes something like 3 to 4 seconds per item to appear; I also note that the System process is funning at 35 to 45% of the CPU with the browser taking another 14%. Once the update is complete everything drops back to normal and browsing (and preview) is quick and responsive.
Anyone else seen this? Any clues? I haven't changed or added any software recently apart from "Patch Tuesday" collection of XP fixes...
Cheers,
Mark.
Whenever the Skin Updates Manager is running it takes something like 3 to 4 seconds per item to appear; I also note that the System process is funning at 35 to 45% of the CPU with the browser taking another 14%. Once the update is complete everything drops back to normal and browsing (and preview) is quick and responsive.
Anyone else seen this? Any clues? I haven't changed or added any software recently apart from "Patch Tuesday" collection of XP fixes...
Cheers,
Mark.
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Reply #1 Monday, February 5, 2007 4:59 PM