Znet India – PITA and Worst Hosting Provider

So I have this other website – www.usingwindows7.net - which I manage and I was really hoping to get my friends and others join me via forums too – www.usingwindows7.net/forum – But now the site is pulled down because of the many inconveniences caused by the hosting provider – Znet India 

It all started with this error message

Here is the conversation that has been happening part by part – I think they would explain more than me writing it - Note the time they have taken to respond for each reply

The attachment is what you see at the start of this blog post

Below is the using.jpg they have attached

Now that is strange because my site is up and running for the past 1 month and suddenly Wordpress giving an error establishing database connection? and also wp-config.php is what I would have configured initially when setting up my Wordpress website. The technical team instantly suggest me to check the settings of wp-config.php, but the real drama begins only now

It happens that the technical team had completely moved my files and brought in a fresh Wordpress installation files and thus you see the error establishing database connection. I did check my directories and they indeed had moved my files as my forum was not accessible – My forums were installed in a directory just under the Wordpress directory and so the URL – http://www.usingwindows7.net/forum

I never told these guys to move my files – what sort of a plan is that to identify the issue? – Moving files from the live website! If you calculate the time taken till now by these support people, its more than 15hrs – the issue started off with this

And ended up moving my files from my website!

I also raised a separate ticket for refund due to this and they merged that refund request along with this support ticket, again without intimating me and I was left searching the ticket system to find the ticket as I didn't knew they had merged!

So, they don't delete files without client’s permission but they move client’s files around? Great! Do these guys need to be educated that moving is essentially deleting as the site wont be accessible in both the cases!

Taking Backup is their necessity, but not moving files!

And that was my reply. And what did they reply? – You will find it very interesting

Again, they continue blaming me that my database settings is wrong – I had configured Wordpress with MySql database, but the technical team are too smart to suggest me a SQL Server address – sql5.znetindia.com – aren't these support guys great? ;)

Now they get smart enough to find that I was connecting to MySql and tell me about my database details! What a joke! As if I don't know any of these things! And they did manage to do something to make www.usingwindows7.net site up but they failed again with forums – www.usingwindows7.net/forum

I cant continue when the support is like this! Just calculate the site downtime and the time taken to respond to issues! What sort of a support is this! And Znet India website says,

I would be more than happy to approach anyone from Microsoft regarding this and how these people can be awarded by Microsoft!

And this is not the first issue I am dealing with them in regard to www.usingwindows7.net which is a Wordpress website installed in Windows Server 2008 + IIS 7 – the site was down many times and it was indeed PHP settings which was not configured properly and permission issues!

I did ask for refund and currently I am literally ‘fighting’ with them by making ISD calls (from NZ) regarding this issue – Do you want to see their reply? Why not :)

How bad is that! Blaming the client for everything as if I wanted to make my site down!

I am just getting irritated of not getting no replies and these people just want me to live with it and move on which in first place is unacceptable after this act! Here is the reply I initially got for my refund

Great! Will every client face all the issues within his 30 day money back guarantee? What a lame excuse to steal money from clients!

So, what's happening now? – Silence – I called them yesterday to speak to Mr.Vinod Saxena and as expected I got a reply saying ‘he is not available right now’

Hosting providers like Znet India think they can do whatever they want with client’s files and play with time and my experience is just an example of this act. I wouldn’t recommend Znet India to anyone and also I am expecting them to apologize to me and refund my rest of the money. But still, nobody cares about this at Znet India!

I am also planning to move to another hosting provider here in New Zealand. They are pretty cool here, unlike Znet India! But what about the money that I paid for my hosting/domains at Znet India? Why aren’t they ready to refund?

Please share this with your friends so that they also get to know about Znet India’s technical expertise!

NZTE Website now live on MOSS

So, we at Intergen completed a a very challenging project and it went live this week!

Checkout the New Zealand Trade & Enterprise website which is built using MOSS - Yes, Internet facing MOSS website

Upgraded my blog to BlogEngine.NET from Graffiti CMS

After getting tired of Graffiti CMS not releasing any interesting updates, I thought its high time I upgrade to something robust and stable blogging platform. My immediate choice was BlogEngine.NET :)

The upgrade was not that easy as I had to somehow find a way to import my old graffiti posts into the new BlogEngine.NET. It is a shame that Graffiti CMS does not have any export functionality and only import functionality.

Searching through graffiti forums, I found a post by Curt saying he has developed a small tool which could export graffiti posts to a BlogML file! Something I was looking for! If that worked, I could easily import the contents into my BlogEngine.NET.

With no time to spare, I contacted Curt regarding his application. The application worked really well and converted all of my posts to BlogML format. Thanks a lot Curt :)

There is one problem though - A bug in the BlogEngine.NET's BlogML importer stops it from importing the tags, so you might have to manually tag your posts after an import - Thats certainly not good, but the fact that I was able to import my old posts, is a big thumbs up!

Bye Bye Graffiti CMS, you are good, but not as good as other platforms!

Geekzone: End of Year Drinks (2008)

Thanks to Mauricio for organizing the Geekzone End of Year Drinks yesterday !

It was nice to meet some of the Geekzone ‘geeks’ (like Phil Gale) ;)

Some of my snaps :

Developers, Developers, Developers

This is your chance to tell what you think about Microsoft! Invitation for The Microsoft New Zealand Developers Focus Groups 2008!

Microsoft wants to hear from you. Tell what you love and hate about Microsoft! Every year Microsoft uses your feedback to improve their products and services. This year, in addition to the annual online survey, they are planning to hold focus groups around the country and are looking for NZ developers to have their say.

Scott Wylie , the Director of the Developer and Platform Strategy Team for Microsoft NZ, will be facilitating these sessions. Scott’s role is to listen and understand your feedback which will enable his team to provide better support and resources for NZ developers.

If you would like to participate, please email your interest to nzeditor@microsoft.com with your contact details and preferred focus group (by session number as listed below) you would like to attend.

Christchurch

Christchurch Convention Centre / Tuesday 11th November 2008

Kilmore Street, Christchurch

Session 1: 8:30 -10:00

Session 2: 11:00 -12:30

Wellington

Microsoft New Zealand Wellington Office / Thursday 13th November 2008

Level 12, Vodafone on the Park, Lambton Quay, Wellington

Session 3: 8:30 -10:00

Session 4: 11:00 -12:30

Auckland

Microsoft New Zealand Auckland Office / Wednesday 19th November 2008

Level 5, 22 Viaduct Harbour Avenue, Auckland

Session 5: 8:30 -10:00

Session 6: 11:00 -12:30

Meet you @ Tech Ed and Bloggers Dinner

I will be there at Tech Ed (only tomorrow) and Bloggers Dinner night tomorrow (Monday) :)

If you happen to be there, please give a yell and let us meet :-P

Anniversary Icon in Windows Live Account

I just noticed today in my Windows Live Account section that its been an year since I registered my email with Live Services. The Windows Live Services shows a nice icon and a message to remind you :)

Below is the image :

Intergen is the Microsoft Partner of the Year 2008!

Yesterday night was a big night for Intergen - Intergen won the Microsoft Partner of the Year 2008!

Hear it straight from Tony's words :

At the Microsoft Partner Awards ceremony in Auckland, in front of over 300 attendees, Intergen won the premier award of Partner of the Year for 2008. Microsoft said we won the award because of our commitment to delivering solutions to our clients across the entire Microsoft Application Stack. We were recognised as the only partner who can truly offer solutions that span the breadth from .NET development through MOSS, BI, CRM, NAV etc. Special mention was also made of the work we did in support of the Office Open XML standard.