How Do We Root-Cause Site Outages?
Find short and irregular site outages with external monitoring, log correlation, and cron; a practical guide for site administrators.
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Blog & Learn
Category Hosting & Servers
Practical articles on hosting, servers, security, SEO and online business — in plain, useful language.
Server Error Log: Finding Errors Without Getting Lost
When a site throws an error, the first thing to do is find the server error log. This guide shows where to look, how to trace a specific request, and how to keep error_log separate from access_log.
Read moreDiagnosing Connection Timed Out: Network or Server?
A connection timed out error can come from the firewall, DNS, or the server itself. With the right order of ping, traceroute, and port testing, find the definitive source.
Read moreRedirect Loop: Fixing the ERR_TOO_MANY_REDIRECTS Error
Site won't load and the browser says ERR_TOO_MANY_REDIRECTS? Use curl to inspect the redirect chain and break the www or SSL loop in a few minutes.
Read moreFixing the 403 Error: Four Origins You Need to Know
A 403 Forbidden error doesn't always mean an access problem; sometimes ModSecurity or a missing index is to blame. This guide helps you quickly find the origin.
Read moreFixing the 504 Gateway Timeout Error on Hosting and Servers
A 504 error isn't always your server's fault; sometimes Cloudflare or a proxy cuts the connection first. Here you'll learn how to trace the timeout chain step by step.
Read more503 Error: The Difference Between Deliberate Outage and Real Failure
A 503 error doesn't always mean a failure. Learn how to tell a deliberate 503 from an unwanted one, read the right log, and bring your site back without harming SEO.
Read more502 Bad Gateway Error; Cause and Quick Fix
A 502 error means the proxy didn't get a response from the backend. Here you'll learn how to find and fix the source of the error in just a few minutes.
Read moreWebsite Compression with Gzip or Brotli; Which One Should You Enable?
A practical comparison of Gzip and Brotli for website compression: real compression ratios, CPU cost, how to enable them on Apache, Nginx, and cPanel, and a common mistake that makes your website slower.
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