Monash server down

[Jim Breen]

The Monash WWWJDIC server stopped working a few hours ago. I have replaced the code with a script suggesting people use another server.

It's a wierd problem - the iconv code conversion library routine is returning an error. I'm travelling with just a tablet so it will be difficult to work on. It could be some weeks before I can get into it.

Jim

[Ben Bullock]

On Wed, 29 Jun 2022 at 07:26, Jim Breen <jimb...@gmail.com> wrote:

The Monash WWWJDIC server stopped working a few hours ago. I have replaced the code with a script suggesting people use another server.

I've redirected kanji.sljfaq.org to go to edrdg.org for the time being, I hope that's OK.

 

[Jim Breen]

A bit of background. The Monash nihongo server is an instance on a cloud system running RedHat Linux. About once a month the sysadmins do a software upgrade followed by a reboot. That happened about 10 hours ago, so I'm guessing something broke. I have to go through a formal fault logging process, which I've done. It's no use me poking at the dictionary server code until I get a response.

Jim

[Jim Breen]

The Monash WWWJDIC server is back in operation.

TL;DR stuff....
The dictionary lookups use binary indices built using 32-bit numbers.
Since virtually all computers these days default to 64-bit numbers,
the server is compiled invoking a 32-bit option. It turns out that the
"upgrade" a couple of weeks back broke the 32-bit libraries in some
way so that the main code-conversion package (iconv) no longer worked
in that mode. Reinstalling the 32-bit libraries fixed the problem.

Jim

--
Jim Breen
Adjunct Snr Research Fellow, Japanese Studies Centre, Monash University
http://www.jimbreen.org/
http://nihongo.monash.edu/