Can you access to Distrowatch.com?

[linuxviolin]

Just a question: can you access to Distrowatch.com? Since some time now, I have no more access to the Distrowatch web site. When I try, the browser seeks for some seconds/minutes and says there is an error, "Oops! This page appears broken. DNS Error - Server cannot be found.". I tried in Windows and in Linux, on a laptop and on a desktop, on a wireless connection and on a wired connection... with the same result every time. Have you the same problem? Is there a problem with Distrowatch since some time now?

[lmintnewb]

Nope ... opened right up for me. Not really sure what that could be, if happening on several OS's. Some setting with your PC(s?) or net connection or summin. Dunno ... odd.

Maybe this will help. It's from a few months ago. But copied the guys email at the bottom of the page on distrowatch. His email is distro@distrowatch.com

37 • RE: Red Hat story and DistroWatch.com access (by ladislav on 2011-03-08 00:16:11 GMT from Taiwan)
If Ladislav had done his diligence about the Red Hat "Obfuscation" story

RE 15: And if you had actually read the news item before posting here, you would have noticed that it linked to the exact same article as your post.

RE 29: If anyone has a problem accessing distrowatch.com please send me an email (my address is mentioned at the bottom of every page, even on mirrors) with you IP address so that I can look through the logs and fix the problem.

and this one from distrowatch too. Mentions a couple mirrors ya might try if you have to get your distrowatch fix.

29 • Distrowatch access (and other stuff) (by eco2geek on 2011-03-07 20:27:28 GMT from United States)
Has anyone else been having difficulty accessing distrowatch.com recently? I'm on Comcast cable, and I've been having to go to the mirrors ("distrowatch.serve-you.net" or "distrowatch.gdsw.at") for the past week.

Don't know if any of this will help ... but did try. Looks like it's hopefully a problem on their end, instead of yours.

[Kevin108]

http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/

[linuxviolin]

I just did another try. I tried with IE9 and Firefox/Aurora/Nightly with the same result, in Linux and in Windows. But right now, I tried with Opera in Windows and here I had no problem. Quite odd... All the other sites are OK, it's just Distrowatch.com

[ilovelinux]

Works fine here.

[aes2011]

I just did another try. I tried with IE9 and Firefox/Aurora/Nightly with the same result, in Linux and in Windows. But right now, I tried with Opera in Windows and here I had no problem. Quite odd... All the other sites are OK, it's just Distrowatch.com

No problem with Aurora/Linux. I didn't try MS Windows.

[The-Wizard]

No problems here using mint+firefox

wizard

[harvi]

Yes distrowatch runs fine, no problem here.

browser: Google Chrome 15
system: Linux Mint 12 Lisa i686

[mank_in]

Try change your DNS with Open DNS or Google DNS :
Open DNS :
208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220
Google DNS :
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4

[linuxviolin]

and this one from distrowatch too. Mentions a couple mirrors ya might try if you have to get your distrowatch fix.

29 • Distrowatch access (and other stuff) (by eco2geek on 2011-03-07 20:27:28 GMT from United States)
Has anyone else been having difficulty accessing distrowatch.com recently? I'm on Comcast cable, and I've been having to go to the mirrors ("distrowatch.serve-you.net" or "distrowatch.gdsw.at") for the past week.

OK, so, I seem not to be the only... The mirrors seem working for some pages but "distrowatch.serve-you.net" seems to give an old page with the last distro shown being Puppy from 2011-10-25 and the last DistroWatch Weekly being "• Issue 428 (2011-10-24): The latest from Ubuntu and Kubuntu, FreeBSD routers, the missing "GNU/". And no access to the comments.

"distrowatch.gdsw.at" seems more current with the last distro shown being Ubuntu from 2011-12-01 and the last DistroWatch Weekly being "• Issue 434 (2011-12-05): Review of antiX M11, Ubuntu vs Mint continued, Mandriva links, Red Hat and syslog" but also no access to the comments, when you must click on the link for them at the bottom of the page.

I just tried with Opera but in Linux this time and no access for distrowatch.com also!!! Quite odd... With Opera in Windows it seems OK and with the same browser in Linux: no access... Maybe I should re-try in Windows, to see. With Firefox/Aurora/Nightly, always no access to distrowatch.com, in Linux and in Windows. And with IE9 in Windows: always no access too.

Try change your DNS with Open DNS or Google DNS :
Open DNS :
208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220
Google DNS :
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4

Why? All web sites on earth work quite well, absolutely no problem, no problem for surfing. It's just/exclusively distrowatch.com. And with different computers, desktop and a laptop, and in two different OS's, Linux and Windows...

All of this is extremely odd.. Specially as this is recent, several days/weeks.

[mank_in]

Try opera in turbo mode in linux.
When Opera Turbo is enabled, webpages are compressed via Opera's servers .

[ilovelinux]

Could you do a traceroute to distrowatch.com and paste it here? I'm still thinking probable DNS routing issues.

[linuxviolin]

I'm still thinking probable DNS routing issues.

Well, excuse me for my maybe silly question, I'm not a specialist about network, but why? As I said, I have no problem for surfing and with my connection, wired or wireless. All sites on earth work well, with no problem. Just distrowatch.com is problematic and this is recent, before these last weeks/days with the same computers and on the same connection I had no problem to access to DistroWatch. And I have changed no setup. So?

And in this case, again why on my laptop in Windows I can access without problem to distrowatch.com with Opera but it's impossible with IE9 for example, on the same computer? And why on my desktop in Linux I have no access at all to this site even with Opera (contrary to in Windows ), and again the problem is exclusively with this site?

[lmintnewb]

Could try this kinda stuff. flushing dns cache or updating dns etc. Might not hurt to go ahead and clear cache/etc in the browsers too. DId you write to that email address posted above ? The site owner has probably seen this kinda thing before and may be able to give ya some tips.

http://support.hostgator.com/articles/h ... /flush-dns

It sounds like a really oddball situation. Funny that one browser works ( doesn't work on another OS.) If flushing dns cache doesn't do it ( in either OS ). Might have to switch dns servers altogether and switch to one that works correctly. I'm definitely not a networking and web browser software developer guru. Google and common sense has always been all the tech support I've ever needed fortunately.

[glas]

I have not been able to load up distrowatch,com for a few days now on any browser or operating system (two mint, one vector).

I figure it must be blocked by my ISP - I'm on talktalk - a UK monopolistic provider.

Anyone else have this problem?

[xenopeek]

Try opening a terminal, and running:

Code: Select all

dig distrowatch.com

Does it look similar to the following? (note especially the parts I highlighted in red)

; <<>> DiG 9.7.3 <<>> distrowatch.com
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 49322
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 2, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;distrowatch.com. IN A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
distrowatch.com. 683 IN A 66.180.174.35

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
distrowatch.com. 62307 IN NS ns1.netsonic.net.
distrowatch.com. 62307 IN NS ns2.netsonic.net.

;; Query time: 21 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.1.254#53(192.168.1.254)
;; WHEN: Thu Jan 19 22:40:14 2012
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 97

[linuxviolin]

Personally, at home I always have the same problem with distrowatch.com... No change. As I said, it's the only site in the universe which has this problem.

[mank_in]

If you think the problem is your ISP, You can try Tor Browser
You don't need installing it. Unzip and run it. It will connect to Tor network and run aurora ( base from FF) browser.

[glas]

OK I booted up on a live Tor using distro I had lying around - Incognito / tails 0.9 - and to my surprise it was able to load up distrowatch.

Unfortunately when I go back to my installed operating systems it's no go.

So if I was wrong and it's not the my ISP blocking the connection - what could it be?

[xenopeek]

I'll repeat, please check the output of the dig command (see above) and share the output. This will let you find out if your current DNS has rerouted distrowatch.com or if your ISP is blocking it.