Download (from www.ahnenblatt.de)

[Mathemagician]

Greetings to all from Canada!

Although I have not continued with the English Help file (there doesn't seem to be much need or interest), I still track updates to Ahnenblatt and download them from the German site. The English site (www.ahnenblatt.com) caused me some concern in the past (re: versions for download - the following issue, I think), so switched to the German site.

On viewing posts in the German section of the site, re: recent updates, I have observed a common theme. It goes something like this: "Dirk, I tried to download 2.99h, but got 2.99g instead". I KNOW EXACTLY what this issue is - I encountered it in years past, when speaking to the support staff for my (now gone!) personal website. They explained the behaviour and offered fixes - but none worked reliably. So I came up with my OWN fix.

The server for the website keeps multiple backups - in my case 6 - for use in case of server malfunction, maintenance, etc. I would upload a version (using FTP), then download it in my browser; the downloaded copy often was not the recent one! Users would have the same problem, but usually only for a short period (days, a week or two?). The tech guys explained that when the file was the EXACT same name as an "already present" file, it was housed on only 1 of the servers until the automatic backup was made. Until that time, "you never know which server (main or backup) is going to be contacted". I'm sure there's a better (more technical) answer, but that's the general idea.

One of the Ahnenblatt admins (?) Fridolin said you should refresh your page in your browser. That 'may' work, but that doesn't necessarily 'contact the correct server', so I found that it was a unreliable fix for users trying to download.

MY FIX
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I started uploading new versions to a unique folder, with a built-in date. For example, my file may have been housed (on the server) at "Myproject/2019-03-17/myfile.zip". I had to change the links on the webpage access to the new folder each time I uploaded, but the bottom line is that each upload was a UNIQUELY named folder/file combination. I never had that issue again. Periodically, I would delete the older folders and files, just for "good housekeeping".

It's a little more work (i.e. you have to modify the links on the web page each time, and upload it), but I found it worked as expected 100% of the time! By the way, the "browser refresh" suggested by Fridolin DOES work on the WEB PAGE (modified), but didn't seem to have any effect on downloading the actual files. I suppose you could just name the files differently (with a version attached in the name, e.g. "absetup_2.99h.exe"), but you would STILL have to modify the web page and upload that, so the net amount of work is nearly the same.

- Allen (Mathemagician)

[Fridolin]

Hi Allen,

thanks for your help! You describe a server side problem and a solution for that. Which means a little more work for Dirk.

Up to now, I presumed a client side problem with the browser cache: A downloaded page that will be stored and delivered anew when it's re-demanded in a certain delay (and is an old version then). If it's that, all your suggested efforts wouldn't work. So if you tested the case and got 100% success, it can't be a browser cache problem.

News sites usually have a html expire, max-age or no-cache tag in the pages telling the browser to reload a new version every time it's demanded. I only mention this way if it should be a browser cache problem anyway. But I haven't tested that - justed forwarded a solution someone else mentioned years ago.

You probably heard about the beta version of Ahnenblatt 3.0 that is out for more than a year. The final version will be paying in the full edition. I guess, Dirk would need a help file in english for paying users. As he hasn't yet, he didn't mention the beta test version on the english web page. So beside rare requests of help files in the forum, there still should be a need for what you started to create.

Frido (I'm not an admin, just a passionate user)