Geocaching Australia

Error: Access Forbidden

I haven't been access GCA for a while and surprised to find GCA refused my access when I tried to open. The message was displayed as follows:

Error: Access Forbidden
Your do not have Permission to access/stats/caches/au/wa/?&y=2009&m=10 on this server

It includes declining my log on

It applies the same to all GCA except Forum.

Your advice to solve this would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

What sort of browser are you using?
We have been overrun with bots lately and we've been filtering them out.
We may have been a little overzealous in the filtering.

I'll have a look in the logs and drop the filtering for now.

Can you also do me a favour and go here:
http://whatsmyuseragent.com/

Tell me what your useragent string is.
It should come up on that page.

caughtatwork wrote:What sort of browser are you using?
We have been overrun with bots lately and we've been filtering them out.
We may have been a little overzealous in the filtering.

I'll have a look in the logs and drop the filtering for now.

Can you also do me a favour and go here:
http://whatsmyuseragent.com/

Tell me what your useragent string is.
It should come up on that page.

I think I've found the problem.

Your browser has the following useragent string. FunWebProducts is a web crawler / bot / malware attack vector / search bar that attaches itself to a broswer.
We have recently seen a significant volume of data sucked off the GCA website due to that bot.
As such, we sought to block it to ensure that YOUR website resources are there for YOUR enjoyment and not some blood sucking, bandwidth hogging malware program.

It appears that you have (intentionally or not) installed the FunWebProducts search bar in your browser (probably internet explorer). As such we saw that string in the useragent string and assumed you were a bot coming for some more data extraction fun.

FunWebProducts does not respect the robots.txt file so we can't keep it out by legitimate means. i.e. It ignore what we ask, and just come in and slups away, regardless of our desires to tell them to piss off.

I've disabled the bot checker for FunWebProducts so you should be able to get back in. I highly recommend you remove FunWebProducts from your machine. It's evil and a method that that company use to deliver malware.

However, given the volume of data that FunWebProducts sucks off the site, we can't continue to let them in and if we block them, we block you. Remove FunWebProducts from your browser, check http://whatsmyuseragent.com/ until it says that you no longer have it installed and let me know.

I will look for a different way to check the browser vs. the bot, but you'd be better off uninstalling it anyway.

A couple of issues with GA2086 The Autism Awareness Moveable Cache.

1. I have ignored it but still got an email telling me it had moved. Not such a big issue just letting you know that this happens occasionally.

2. Reading the log that caused the email seems to show another issue where the co-ords aren't updating on the map.

McPhan wrote:A couple of issues with GA2086 The Autism Awareness Moveable Cache.

1. I have ignored it but still got an email telling me it had moved. Not such a big issue just letting you know that this happens occasionally.

2. Reading the log that caused the email seems to show another issue where the co-ords aren't updating on the map.

Gotcha.
The locale wasn't being escaped, so it was failing.
O'Connell has that pesky ' in it.
All fixed now.

The log you're getting, is that an alert type email telling you there's a new (moved) cache around?
I hope so, 'cos I've fixed that as well.

As always you're on the ball and correctly corrected.

Thank you

Not sure if this is a "site issue" as such but many archived gc.com caches are still showing on GCA over a month after they were archived...

Here are just some I have found:
GC2AGTE
GC175QA
GC1NVBF
GC1V2HF
GC19T7B
GC2M94R (the GCA dual listing of this one is still active???)
GC2N6W2
GC2PK0J

And this one GCVZ6V

It takes a while for them to dissapear

We basically archive them after a few weeks from when they stop appearing in the feeds.

I'll fix these

Twice today I have got this error after posting:

ERROR

The requested URL could not be retrieved

While trying to retrieve the URL: http://forum.geocaching.com.au/viewtopic.php?

The following error was encountered:

Zero Sized Reply
Squid did not receive any data for this request.

Your cache administrator is webmaster.
Generated Thu, 18 Aug 2011 18:43:03 GMT by localhost (squid/3.0.PRE5)

Who is Squid and why does he not like data?

Squid will be the proxy at your end.
Nothing we can do about your end I'm afraid.

Hello Mr Tatwork,

I noticed today that my CBD cache "Welcome to Melbourne" has only got 343 finds according to the GCA databsae, but CG says that it has 363. Is that just the normal lag for database updates at CGA, or is something more a-happening?

http://geocaching.com.au/cache/gc2gvr5/graph

Thanks Caugh, the site is awesome for getting my stats fix and to feed my graph habit. Much appreciated.

Cheers,

Alex Garner

We get a maximum of 5 logs a day. Sometimes the feed goes wonky. There may be an option to backfill the missing logs. I'll have a look tonight.

Imported.

Do you use GSAK?
Do you have GSAK BETA 8?
Go get it.
Update the logs for your cache.
Export a GPX file (no child waypoints).
Import it.
Tada

caughtatwork wrote:Imported.

Cheers!

caughtatwork wrote: Do you use GSAK?
Do you have GSAK BETA 8?
Go get it.
Update the logs for your cache.
Export a GPX file (no child waypoints).

Yep. Yep. Already have it. Done. Done.

caughtatwork wrote:Import it.
Tada

I can do this to the CGA database? My next inclination was to ask where and how. However I shall use the power of my pointing device and my browser's ability to interpret and render HTML so you don't have to answer that lazy question.

Thanks again Mr Tatwork.