Seriously.

It is really sad that one of the biggest PDGA events is going on and the site takes minutes to load each page! Could this not have been a bigger priority to get fixed?? So very sad......

they could fix it if they wanted to but dont, if it cost 30k to get the website this slow maybe they can get a refund to speed it up,i was going to post here last night but after 15 minutes and 20+ page refreshes i gave up.
does anyone think a potential sponser that came to this site to check up on what they were going to sponser would,after 10-15 minutes without being able to access anything,would even concider sponsership,i wouldnt

I agree with the other posters, extremely disappointed that during our premier event the website was bogged down and worried how this would impact current and future sponsors.

However maybe the silver lining is the sport is now so popular that this popularity created an unexpected surge in traffic which caused the issue? I'm not a network engineer so I don't know what caused the issue, it could have been something unrelated to the site itself but I am surprised there wasn't something posted from the PDGA on the home page offering an explanation/apology.

frank- this website sucks all the time, not just during worlds...it just sucks more when more people are trying to access it.

As a player, I agree with you all here...

As a TD, imagine my frustration when I was unable to upload TEE TIMES for the following morning after the first day of the Beaver State Fling because the website was down. Here I am trying to run a successful NT and I can't even post tee times for the players. I finally gave up on the PDGA site, and found a way to get them posted to the BSF site, but that got me to bed at 3:00am and I still had to be up and out by 5:30am the next morning.

I did my best to weather both the ensuing chaos and the player's complaints, but at the end of the day I really felt bad about it even though it was totally out of my control.

I'm not here to dump on the PDGA... I'm just here to add another voice to those already here pleading for an improvement.

I feel your pain Jeff and I was surprised to hear Brian Graham's reaction to our concerns during the event when we could not get the tee times to load.

The idea that an event as large for us as worlds could bring the site to its knees is laughable and probably has more to do with the construction of the database system for tournaments and ratings. The website was redesigned but what about the back end database. If you redesign the shell with a buggy database architecture then you will still have a buggy but pretty user interface. Is the PDGA still using a Microsoft Access database schema?

Websites like the US Masters in ball golf have ten fold more viewers watching live HD video feeds and checking on players stats, handicapps and historical play and background information and never the hangups we deal with. Trust me it would not cost that much to rebuild the database, but it depends on who you hire to do it.

So what did BG have to say about the slow site?

It was extremely annoying the first day of worlds. So much so that I waited til Sunday to see the results.

I've concluded that the site kicks butt as long as no one uses it.

The next scheduled slow down is August 29. I wish the parts of the site used as a TD resource (membership info, tournament admin, event results, etc.) were separate from the parts for publicity so that when we need to run events, we can get our job done without waiting for everyone trying to watch a video.

This website is not good. Simple as that. The site was just
not a good deal for PDGA members.

Getting Worlds information was sad. We deserve better. We also
deserve some answers on why our site is so lacking.

I think this should really call for someone to get fired. The website not working is totally unacceptable. I mean seriously, there couldn't be more than a few thousand people trying ot access the site, that should be no big deal. It must be related to how the site is programmed. If the websites I ran where handled in this fashion, I'd be fired.

I agree, these website issues are a real pain... Go to pga.com, nba.com, mlb.com, etc... They all function nicely, load quick, contain lots of easily found/viewed information, and look professional. The PDGA course directory and tournament schedule both need major reworking in my opinion.

Usability issues with the event schedule on pdga.com were the primary reason I created dgmapper.com (http://dgmapper.com), as an alternative place to find PDGA (and other) events, and get to them MUCH quicker than sifting through the "advanced" search on pdga.com. Hopefully my project only increases the likelihood of a pdga.com event schedule revamp.

Recent announcement from HQ:

http://www.pdga.com/new-pdga-com

I hope they are correct it will be optimized for iPad because right now it isn't.
Top story when viewed from my iPad is Pro Worlds Day 3.

I'm looking forward to seeing the new website in 2-3 months. I just hope the current website lasts that long.

I will miss the discussion board on the new site though

For the past day I have not been able to get future events to load. All events that have already taken place seem to load however. Very annoying :(

no message board on new site= one less thing the pdga does to make it worth the $ to join/re-up. this balance is slipping rapidly downhill.

No message board is a step backwards.

What's really amazing is how the new website has been pushed back so many times already this year:



From the Minutes from the April 27-29 2011 Spring Summit (http://www.pdga.com/pdga-documents/minutes-from-2011-spring-summit): "ACTION ITEM:...to have website upgraded to Drupal 7 within 30-60 days."

From the Minutes from May 2011 Teleconference (http://www.pdga.com/pdga-documents/minutes-from-may-2011-teleconference): "New Website Update We are still on track to launch the new website by June 28th."

From the Minutes from June 2011 Teleconference (http://www.pdga.com/pdga-documents/minutes-from-june-2011-teleconference): "We are going to miss our original projected launch date of June 28th. I had a detailed meeting with Ciphent / Accuvant last week and our new launch date is Thursday July 8th"

From the Minutes from July 2011 Teleconference (http://www.pdga.com/pdga-documents/bod/bod-minutes/bod-minutes-2011/minutes-from-july-2011-teleconference): " As you can clearly tell we did not launch on July 8th as expected...The revised plan is to have the new site ready for beta testers on July 23rd and to give the beta testers a week...Provided the beta testing goes well the plan is to launch the new site in early August (somewhere between the 1st and 3rd) which will give us a faster and more robust site in time for the Pro Worlds in Santa Cruz.

From the new PDGA.com article (http://www.pdga.com/new-pdga-com): "We are happy to announce that a new leaner and faster website is scheduled to launch in late September!"


I've got no background or experience in IT, but intuitively, the bottom line is that whatever we're paying Ciphent / Accuvant, it's too much. Trying to run Pro Worlds two weeks ago was one of the most frustrating & embarrassing weeks of my life, and I'm now confronted with the realization that the next two National Tour events in Pittsburgh & Massachusetts (which I'll be supporting) may be intolerably slow again.

I'm already at the point where I never want to hear the words Ciphent or Drupal again. http://www.pdga.com/discussion/images/icons/icon13.gif

It was extremely annoying the first day of worlds. So much so that I waited til Sunday to see the results.

I've concluded that the site kicks butt as long as no one uses it.

The Legend has spoken.

This is unacceptable. I am helping run an this coming weekend. The players list has not been loading and therefore our TD has been flooded with calls and e-mails about people confirming that they are registered. Isn't this an essential function of this website? This is terrible. I have had to send e-mails to people who registered confirming their spot as well as posting the players list on FB. There is no excuse for this.

The complaints are nothing new, and certainly MORE THAN deserved. However, what I find the most reprehensible action involved here is the FAILURE of the PDGA to address/respond/deflect or otherwise make a "PEEP" regarding this issue.

Why isn't there a response to this thread from the PDGA? This issue isn't going away, it's only getting worse.

The complaints are nothing new, and certainly MORE THAN deserved. However, what I find the most reprehensible action involved here is the FAILURE of the PDGA to address/respond/deflect or otherwise make a "PEEP" regarding this issue.

Why isn't there a response to this thread from the PDGA? This issue isn't going away, it's only getting worse.

as stated before they dont have time to check on this board ...there too busy stacking $ from the $10 fees for officials tests

as stated before they dont have time to check on this board ...there too busy stacking $ from the $10 fees for officials tests

I was thinking they just couldn't get the pages to load. And then by the time they do get in, it's time to go home for the day.

who/where said there will not be discussion on the new site?

who/where said there will not be discussion on the new site?

From the Minutes from May 2011 Teleconference (http://www.pdga.com/pdga-documents/minutes-from-may-2011-teleconference):

Social Media & Discussion Board Update
The new social media functionality, which is primarily blogging, will be ready for the new website launch. We are also planning on having �featured bloggers� that will have more exposure than our normal users. These featured bloggers should ideally be disc golf insiders who are willing to share their thoughts and experiences. I haven�t started the search process yet but if you have any suggestions please don�t hesitate to ask me.

Users will also have the ability to comment on a user�s posts if we enable that functionality. I can see it being a useful tool but I can also see it easily abused. I really need to research comments and moderation capabilities in depth and will come back with a recommendation for the June teleconference. In regards to the discussion board we do have one stumbling block. After some research we determined that it will be difficult to share users between the two systems due to conflicting password encryption methods. Initial conversion won�t be difficult but afterwards the choices are to either allow users to be created independently in both the new website and the discussion board or to shut down the ability to create new users in the discussion board. My assumption is that since we will be phasing out the discussion board that shutting down the ability to create new users is the best decision.


- End of IT Report


Nobody said that there won't be "discussion" on the new website, but we will no longer communicate through a traditional message board interface in the vein of the message boards produced by vBulletin, phpBB, bbPress, Simple Machines forums, etc. which are the ones most commonly utilized on the internet these days. It will be a social media based environment.

So will TD's still be able to hype their events, or update info as it becomes necessary?

So will TD's still be able to hype their events, or update info as it becomes necessary?

Tournament Directors already do that sort of thing on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Blogs, etc., and my (admittedly limited) understanding of the new "social media based environment" is that the new PDGA communications area will encompass all those things, plus an additional blog environment, for TDs to hype their events and update information.

Tournament Directors already do that sort of thing on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Blogs, etc., and my (admittedly limited) understanding of the new "social media based environment" is that the new PDGA communications area will encompass all those things, plus an additional blog environment, for TDs to hype their events and update information.



Well, I'm not set up for these other areas, and I'm not really interested in them. I'm interested in promoting my events on the site that I'm a dues-paying member of. I'm curious if I'll still be able to add info about events as it becomes available. But thank you very much for the response.

John, I believe the goal is to provide more options to spread your information once a revised version of the Tournament information and scoring page gets completed as part of this website overhaul process.

Is there any thought to archiving or even allowing another DG site to take over this discussion board if the new site will be phasing it out?

There's a lot of historical documentation in some of these threads that would be a shame to lose

I've spoken with the PDGA office concerning this issue - there is no definite timeline for this decision yet, when the new website launches it will contain both a "blogging section" & the D-Board - with their plan being to phase out this board - mainly to do with technical difficulty of registering for blogging and registering for the D-Board not working together

there are people on the Board and in the Office that don't necessarily like this decision also

I have been asked to pass along this info:

Please send E-Mails, these can be taken to the BOD to be considered - if enough of us do this, something can hopefully be worked out

please...Don't cuss them out and be mean about it, state your case, why you like and use this board and ask them to not phase it out, it has been considered a benefit of being a member and we don't need benefits taken away, heck we need more

A lot of us know incoming BOD Kevin McCoy, Peter Shive has also ran on a platform for standing up for the membership - this incoming BOD might be the best we've had in a long time that might actually do something about it

if you don't like this decision, here's a link to send emails (please be civil): [email protected] (http://www.pdga.com/discussion/../contact)

I won't be officially on the Board until September 1, so I don't yet know all the details of the "phaseout" plan. I am concerned about it. There ought to be a forum for open discussion of issues. The Discussion Board has provided this, but a system with "featured bloggers" and limits on commentary would probably not.

At this point I would prefer that the Discussion Board (with access to archival posts) be continued in much the present form. I might in the future be persuaded that the PDGA cannot or should not continue it, but then I would argue that it should be outsourced. A suitable open forum should be available to us somewhere.

Well, I'm not set up for these other areas, and I'm not really interested in them. I'm interested in promoting my events on the site that I'm a dues-paying member of. I'm curious if I'll still be able to add info about events as it becomes available. But thank you very much for the response.

This is how I feel about it as well. If the decision is made to phase out the message boards I hope it is a slow approach. I'm not a fan of other social media platforms just yet and don't see that changing anytime soon. I do like that they are including the other platforms because I know how often they are used and how easy it is to reach people but I prefer the oldschool forums.

This is unacceptable. I am helping run an this coming weekend. The players list has not been loading and therefore our TD has been flooded with calls and e-mails about people confirming that they are registered. Isn't this an essential function of this website? This is terrible. I have had to send e-mails to people who registered confirming their spot as well as posting the players list on FB. There is no excuse for this.


You should try discgolfscene.com. The site is great for TDs. There are currently 300 people paid and registered via DGS for the MI State Champs this weekend and there are no communication issues. Check it out-

http://www.discgolfscene.com/tournaments/2011_Michigan_State_Championship

You should try discgolfscene.com. The site is great for TDs. There are currently 300 people paid and registered via DGS for the MI State Champs this weekend and there are no communication issues. Check it out-

http://www.discgolfscene.com/tournaments/2011_Michigan_State_Championship

I also highly recommend discgolfscene (http://discgolfscene.com). Not only is their site slick and easy to use (best league/bagtag/social disc golf site IMO), they happen to be a large contributor to the success and comprehensiveness of dgmapper (http://dgmapper.com).

Recent announcement from HQ:

http://www.pdga.com/new-pdga-com

It's getting to be late September, eh? :-)

I really don't get it. How can your website be down all weekend during your most coveted event? It almost seems suiting that this happened. Maybe it will be the final straw for some to realize what a joke of an organization we really have to guide us into this so-called "professional" sport. And I don't know which is worse yet, the fact the site was down all this time or the lack of any communication what so ever to explain this.

I've tried to be supportive of the PDGA during all of it's conundrems this year, but this has finally pushed me over the edge from deniability to reality to see the true face why this sport has not risen to it's potential after so many years. If we ever expect our sport to rise to the level we desire, there has to be a complete dismantling of the PDGA or the birth of a new professional organization that has the desire to act professionally in the interest of it's players.

I really don't get it. How can your website be down all weekend during your most coveted event? It almost seems suiting that this happened. Maybe it will be the final straw for some to realize what a joke of an organization we really have to guide us into this so-called "professional" sport. And I don't know which is worse yet, the fact the site was down all this time or the lack of any communication what so ever to explain this.

I've tried to be supportive of the PDGA during all of it's conundrems this year, but this has finally pushed me over the edge from deniability to reality to see the true face why this sport has not risen to it's potential after so many years. If we ever expect our sport to rise to the level we desire, there has to be a complete dismantling of the PDGA or the birth of a new professional organization that has the desire to act professionally in the interest of it's players.

We had a major breakthrough this weekend, after struggling with the website stability on Friday and early Saturday morning. I found a problem that seems to have cropped up when the server was switched to the Amazon cloud in February. The problem has been resolved, and we should see much more consistent response time now, even during higher traffic periods.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed, and we'll continue to look at other ways to improve the performance of the website.

-Theo Pozzy

We had a major breakthrough this weekend, after struggling with the website stability on Friday and early Saturday morning. I found a problem that seems to have cropped up when the server was switched to the Amazon cloud in February. The problem has been resolved, and we should see much more consistent response time now, even during higher traffic periods.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed, and we'll continue to look at other ways to improve the performance of the website.

-Theo Pozzy

lol key phrase "in February" really it took that long to figure out the website had a problem i could point you to 10-15 threads that have been saying that since Feb. And a good 500+ post other places saying it.

better ? why fix it at all now when the "new improved website should roll out by the end of September " right? it took 5-6 months to give us 1 week of good service before the switch?

Is there something goin on with the membership database? I noticed ppl are showing up non-current on my pre reg list for an upcoming tourney.

We had a major breakthrough this weekend, after struggling with the website stability on Friday and early Saturday morning. I found a problem that seems to have cropped up when the server was switched to the Amazon cloud in February. The problem has been resolved, and we should see much more consistent response time now, even during higher traffic periods.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed, and we'll continue to look at other ways to improve the performance of the website.

-Theo Pozzy

PDGA website loading time for me here in Chicago is still around 15-20 seconds when the site is not already in my browser cache. The first 12-15 seconds are purely waiting on a response from the pdga.com server.

Huge waste of members money, spot on.

I've mentioned this to the PDGA before and got no response (not to be confused with trying to load the site), and I hope whoever is developing the new website has taken it into account... But, I'll reiterate now because this is fundamental to the site's performance, and could be done for the existing site for the time being while the new one is being developed. This change should literally take your webmaster all of 5 minutes or less. Drum roll please...

ENABLE RESPONSE CACHING ON YOUR WEBSERVER!!!

Thank you, this has been the introductory lecture for Basic Webmastering 101. Please pick up a syllabus on your way out.

im so happy today the website should change to the new one since no one has posted anything about postponing it from the PDGA..all our prayers will be answered.

sarcasm off..i wish they would not lay out a timeline that they know they will not follow!!
Im guessing there will be an anouncement soon saying the new website will be out by the end of Oct or Nov.

Very unproffesional of the PDGA!!
hope no-one promoted this "new improved website" to a potential sponser just to have to explain why its not up-yet again!!

This website absolutely blows. simple as that. slow as crap. nobody is here. i used to post here but have since moved on. came back to the site to check something and it took me 5 min just to be able to post this message.

I've mentioned this to the PDGA before and got no response (not to be confused with trying to load the site), and I hope whoever is developing the new website has taken it into account... But, I'll reiterate now because this is fundamental to the site's performance, and could be done for the existing site for the time being while the new one is being developed. This change should literally take your webmaster all of 5 minutes or less. Drum roll please...

ENABLE RESPONSE CACHING ON YOUR WEBSERVER!!!

Thank you, this has been the introductory lecture for Basic Webmastering 101. Please pick up a syllabus on your way out.

Congrats to the PDGA on finally enabling response caching. That wasn't so hard, was it? Look how nice and fast the site works now!

^are fn kidding me? it took 10 min for me to pull up this page.

^are fn kidding me? it took 10 min for me to pull up this page.

I believe this discussion board is on a separate server, or at least doesn't follow the same server cache settings... The main pdga.com site is performing quite fast for me today.

And now response caching appears to have been disabled on pdga.com once again, and the site is back to it's usual brand of slowness. For those few days it was enabled, the site was much faster... Although I think I noticed that database-requesting pages were still quite slow, I'm assuming that is a major part of the speed issue. Still, there is absolutely no reason the webserver should need to serve every image, stylesheet, script, etc for every single page load. Not only does this impact site performance for the user, but it is just generally bad for the internet; using up bandwidth that doesn't need to be used up.

There's a good reason that web caching was invented. Take advantage of it!!! I'd love to hear the reasons that response caching was briefly enabled over the last week and then disabled again. I'm starting to think the PDGA wants a slow site.

And now response caching appears to have been disabled on pdga.com once again, and the site is back to it's usual brand of slowness. For those few days it was enabled, the site was much faster... Although I think I noticed that database-requesting pages were still quite slow, I'm assuming that is a major part of the speed issue. Still, there is absolutely no reason the webserver should need to serve every image, stylesheet, script, etc for every single page load. Not only does this impact site performance for the user, but it is just generally bad for the internet; using up bandwidth that doesn't need to be used up.

There's a good reason that web caching was invented. Take advantage of it!!! I'd love to hear the reasons that response caching was briefly enabled over the last week and then disabled again. I'm starting to think the PDGA wants a slow site.

Well if they can get the membership so angry about the slowness of the discussion board, it makes it that much easier to get rid of it altogether.

[/B]

Well if they can get the membership so angry about the slowness of the discussion board, it makes it that much easier to get rid of "it" altogether.

the "it" being the board or the membership???

PDGA - any update on the timetable of the new website? Last we heard it was going to be late September...

Be patient. That is only 11 short months away.

Be patient. That is only 11 short months away.

Ha! Well played, sir.