GoDaddy hosts my personal Web site for cheap. Last week while on vacation they decided to move it to a new server, then asked *me* to test it. Sure enough: 401.3 Unauthorized due to ACL on resource. My research indicates it is a NTFS permissions problem.
Every time I navigated to the Web site I was prompted by a login screen. Sweet.
Yesterday I called GoDaddy’s normally excellent tech support from an airport as I was waiting for a flight. They told me I had to uninstall and reinstall FrontPage extensions, then republish the entire Web site. How is this related to a permissions problem?
OK, this is a hardware problem so I am not the authority here so I follow along. Uninstall and wait for 30 minutes. Fly home, eat dinner, reinstall. Same problem. Too tired from travel so I hit the sack. Get up, same problem. Have you heard how much I love hardware?
I call back today and get the same story. This time I mention I did a little research on the issue and it *could* be related to NTFS permissions. On and off hold for 30 minutes. GoDaddy tech support calls advanced tech support. New advice: reinstall FrontPage extensions and republish Web site. What?!?!
Sure enough it seem to work without the republishing of the Web site so I suspect some advanced tech support dude fixed the NTFS permissions in the 30 minutes it took to reinstall the extensions.
Anyway, I only meant to post a test post to see if I can. I can’t imagine slapping up a smoke screen to my customers while I fix something behind their back. GoDaddy should have tested my site before telling me it was ready. It would have saved me lots of time I don’t have.
This is normal for GoDaddy’s hosting service. Their policy seems to be:
- Let’s change things without telling our customers.
- Don’t worry that customer’s sites are down for sometimes weeks
- When they call, eventually promote to advanced tech support
- Fix what we broke
All reasons why I no longer host with GoDaddy
In this case they warned me they were moving the site, they told me when it was moved, and they fixed it within minutes of me calling. While I am not happy with this one painful incident, it is one of only two times my site has been down in all the years I have been with them. The only other time I can remember was when the credit card I had on file was expired. That time they did not email me about it. Now I get emails months in advance so I can make the change.
GoDaddy’s tech support has always been pretty decent for me. But what’s amazing to me is how BAD their domain management software/CRM website is. It’s on the verge of unusable.