Is MEF down?

[glebert]

Hi all,

New member, usually I frequency music-electronics-forum.com. I haven't been able to access it for a month, I get the "Your connection might not be private" message. This happens on whatever platform I have tried. Also used some websites that test site availability and they say it is down. At some point I did get an email from the site about someone replying to a thread, which implied the site was up, but still couldn't access it. There haven't been any announcements to the MEF twitter account or any place I can find. Anyone know what what is going on?

Thanks in advance,
Greg

[dak]

To quote from the diagnostics I get for that site:

Websites prove their identity via certificates, which are valid for a set time period. The certificate for music-electronics-forum.com expired on 5/28/2023.

So it's likely your web browser that refuses to visit the site due to an expired HTTPS certificate. The site administrator will have to renew the certificate to have this problem disappear.

[glebert]

Thanks for the reply. I found that I could access MEF by using an incognito window in Chrome, and when it gives the certificate warning going to advanced and clicking on the "proceed to ..." link. There is a thread there that gives some details, apparently the site admin has been sick and the site is running on autopilot for now. It's a good lesson if you value a forum be willing to step up and help with the upkeep if you can, or find some other way to contribute.

[j0nsnell]

It seems they don't want to be bothered to purchase a new certificate, so unless you use a private browser you will not be able to get around the issue.
FireFox won't even let you use the dodgy but go for it anyway option.

Screenshot 2023-06-14 at 18.13.01.png (274.16 KiB) Viewed 8129 times

I contacted the administrators last week when it forst went out and have heard nothing back or even an acknowledgement. Very shoddy.

[dak]

It seems they don't want to be bothered to purchase a new certificate, so unless you use a private browser you will not be able to get around the issue.
FireFox won't even let you use the dodgy but go for it anyway option.

It will, but it's under the "Advanced" options. Websites can specifically signal "don't use with outdated certificate" in which case Firefox indeed terminally refuses. But that's not the case with this one.

[j0nsnell]

FireFox 115.0b5 will not allow viewing, however if one selects "New private window" from the extended menu, one can proceed and ignore the policy.
Snag is, logging in each time and remembering many passwords can be time consuming.
The insert password option is not available in a private window.

[j0nsnell]

MEF is completely screwed and has been for a few weeks.
All I get is System error when attempting to enter the site.

"A System Error has occured.

The software is experiencing a systems error.

You should attempt to repeat your last action. If this error occurs again, please contact the site administrator."