??? Whatever happened to the Zone? ???
I didn't notice an interruption of the service. Maybe your connection had a problem with dns solving or something like that?
Nope.... ../zone gave a 404 (I think), cpczone.net/ gave a denial of access error and cpczone.net (without the slash) gave some other error...
I think the Zone is gone forever... :'(
Ouch, seen it now, though I saw a post in the newsgroups yesterday as well. I just sent Malc a message... let's pray otherwise...
To me it looks like it's been hacked and all contents erased. So let's hope Malc has been keeping automated backups. Sigh...
OK, Malc messaged me, things are not as bad as I thought. He said there were problems with mass spamming of the forum and the main mail address, and it may be back shortly. Let's cross fingers!
Cheers Gryzor... a true pillar of the community.
Who me or the Zone? :D :D :D
Hello people.
The site was indeed majorly hacked and spammed to death. Someone managed to install a malware script that took control of the variables passed from page to page and used that to throw malware at your computer. On top of this I personally had 10-20 emails a day from registrations to the forum via email boxes I had already banned! even when the forum was taken down the emails kept coming. I believe all of/ the majority of this was due to a vulnerability in PHPBB.
I have since shut everything down. IF the site makes a return it will be in the bare bones form, just the game data that has been collected (gamebase) for a while. Personally right now I don't have any real time to work on it with my mum being as ill as she is and several other personal things that need my attention.
I apologise for any infection to your computers this may have caused.
Rest assured the database is still in one piece. Whether the site will survive past August of this year is another matter altogether. We shall see.
Hi Malc
Really sorry to hear about the state of CPCZONE.. I really hope that CPCZONE will survive (in one form or another).. Its a real pity that all the forum conversations seems to be lost - those alone constitute a lot of accumulated knowledge. I really hate people that inflict such meaningless destruction.
I think to keep the scene alive, we could make an emergency CPCZONE over here at the CPCWIKI. But its up to Gryzor as this forum was never intended to become a replacement for any other existing cpc forum, and was meant only for discussions about CPCWIKI related matters.
As a temporary solution though harbouring an emergency ZONE might work, until CPCZONE is back online.
Just a suggestion,
/Ygdrazil
Quote from: Malc.Jennings on 18:38, 03 March 09
Hello people.
The site was indeed majorly hacked and spammed to death. Someone managed to install a malware script that took control of the variables passed from page to page and used that to throw malware at your computer. On top of this I personally had 10-20 emails a day from registrations to the forum via email boxes I had already banned! even when the forum was taken down the emails kept coming. I believe all of/ the majority of this was due to a vulnerability in PHPBB.
I have since shut everything down. IF the site makes a return it will be in the bare bones form, just the game data that has been collected (gamebase) for a while. Personally right now I don't have any real time to work on it with my mum being as ill as she is and several other personal things that need my attention.
I apologise for any infection to your computers this may have caused.
Rest assured the database is still in one piece. Whether the site will survive past August of this year is another matter altogether. We shall see.
I think we're at crossroads here. Certainly, it's immensely sad what happened to the Zone. It's not clear (at least to me) if the forum db is still intact, and/or if it can be infused to another forum db.
I've said it before that I don't want the Wiki to antagonize the Zone. On the other hand, should the Zone cease to exist as we know it I think that the Wiki is is positioned in the best possible way to continue in the same path.
That said, I'd much better see the Zone back up again, because Malc has shown amazing dedication and talent and I know I'm no match for him. In that sense, I'd need some help from other community members to run the forum which would probably have much bigger needs. We'll have much more to discuss, like, maybe, transferring the GameBase data to the wiki if Malc would be willing to go that way and so on.
All this is in the case the Zone boards never makes it back. As an emergency meeting point the Wiki forum could easily expand and function this way, but I'd really hate it if we settle down here and then the Zone opens up again - what then?
Regarding the Zone: so, what was being discussed about code injection turned out to be true. How unfortunate... :(
Malc: I feel for you, mate. I hope you get over your troubles soon, and you have my sincerest wishes for your mother.
Oh boy. Certainly all good things must come to an end, but philosophising certainly doesn't make it any easier. Is there any way we could help bring the Zone back on its feet, Malc?
Oh, and one request: could you at least put a placeholder page on the server to let people know what happened and what the status is? Maybe redirect them to this discussion?
Cheers
Gry
Yeah.. Crap what happend to CPCZONE. Its a real pity! >:(
But I think it would be really damaging to the CPC scene if there is no forum where sceners can meet. I would not like to go back to the days of: comp.sys.amstrad.8bit
Until CPCZONE is back online. The CPCWIKI forum should be the "lifeboat" for the CPCZONE. CPCWIKI was never intended for this, but its an emergency :-\
Regards,
CPCLER
Quote from: Gryzor on 21:14, 03 March 09
I think we're at crossroads here. Certainly, it's immensely sad what happened to the Zone. It's not clear (at least to me) if the forum db is still intact, and/or if it can be infused to another forum db.
I've said it before that I don't want the Wiki to antagonize the Zone. On the other hand, should the Zone cease to exist as we know it I think that the Wiki is is positioned in the best possible way to continue in the same path.
That said, I'd much better see the Zone back up again, because Malc has shown amazing dedication and talent and I know I'm no match for him. In that sense, I'd need some help from other community members to run the forum which would probably have much bigger needs. We'll have much more to discuss, like, maybe, transferring the GameBase data to the wiki if Malc would be willing to go that way and so on.
All this is in the case the Zone boards never makes it back. As an emergency meeting point the Wiki forum could easily expand and function this way, but I'd really hate it if we settle down here and then the Zone opens up again - what then?
Regarding the Zone: so, what was being discussed about code injection turned out to be true. How unfortunate... :(
Malc: I feel for you, mate. I hope you get over your troubles soon, and you have my sincerest wishes for your mother.
Oh boy. Certainly all good things must come to an end, but philosophising certainly doesn't make it any easier. Is there any way we could help bring the Zone back on its feet, Malc?
Oh, and one request: could you at least put a placeholder page on the server to let people know what happened and what the status is? Maybe redirect them to this discussion?
Cheers
Gry
You are certainly right that there MUST be a meeting place for the scene members. That's absolutely right, regardless of whether the Zone reappears or not (which means, regardless whether that place is temporary or not). Whether it should be the Wiki is another issue, but I'm positively inclined - I think that, at least for the english-speaking world it would be enough.
Let me say that I'm not averse to the idea of running a permanent forum - quite the contrary, actually. But I've said it before and I'll say it again, pluralism is not a good thing in our case, and I'd never compete with the Zone, should it reemerge. We have to think about it all.
Thanks for your input, I wish more people joined in and offered theirs...
cpczone was (and hopefully will be once again) a pretty important part of my life.
I've been heavily into computers ever since I received my cpc464 in 1985, at the age of 12.
In the last 5 years or so, I've got back into retro computing in a big way, and cpczone has been at the heart of that.
It has been (for a long time now) one of 3 sites I visit every single day.
I really hope that it can make a comeback, even in a simplified form, as it would be a terrible terrible shame to lose such an amazing resource.
It would also be a real shame to close the door on a truly magnificent piece of work.
Malc, your skills are evident for all to see, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for giving the world such an incredible gift.
Certainly it would be adequate to use cpcwiki for forum duties, but as Gryzor says, the wiki should not clash with the zone, as they serve different functions.
But working together may simplify Malc's duties a lot, and increase the chances of getting the zone resurrected.
CPCZone was the site I visited most in the last 4 or 5 years as well. It's been great as a central place to find out what's going on in the CPC world, as well as picking up ideas/knowledge from discussions on the forum, or just finding games I hadnt come across the first time round. So thank you Malc, for the time & effort you put in to CPCZone.
I'm gonna miss CPC zone :'(
Hope it comes back (as I've got nowhere to go to get my CPC fix)
Question: what was it that you got from the Zone when you say 'CPC fix'?
Quote from: Gryzor on 19:31, 04 March 09
Question: what was it that you got from the Zone when you say 'CPC fix'?
A sense of a community that use CPCs and also the existence of the forum and the reviews of games is what I'll miss the most.
Being able to look up a CPC game or app at the drop of a hat was nice, and if I have any CPC issues, CPC Zone forum was
the place to ask questions.
I was more of a lurker than a poster to be honest, but it was a useful resource for all things CPC.
Ok guys. Here's the latest.
1. The database, at least the most important parts are in-tact and backed up here.
2. The forum posts and registration data is still in tact but I'm not sure (right now) how best to go about getting the forum up and running again. It needs to be the very latest build of phpbb or equivelanet and I cannot afford vbulletin's extortionate licence.
3. The first priority should the actual site return is getting the game entries up to some degree as it took a long time to collect that information and it's currently doing nothing but sit here.
As for design. Obviously with it all being cut back I need to look at a new visual appearance even if temporary. This itself is time consuming.
Only thing I can say is hang on before declaring it 100% dead. The site IS up for renewal in August however as the hosting runs out. We'll see closer to that data, and there's months before then. Under no circumstances will I destroy the data I collected so one way or another I'm sure it will live on.
Thanks to everyone so far for your kind words and for not blaming the site itself for the trouble that has gone down lately. CPC Zone has lost an arse load of links from similar sites as a result of all this and I can honestly say I don't blame them.
Heya Malc, glad to see that you're following the discussion and that there is something moving :)
It's also great that the data is intact... no way we could ever replace that amount!
Regarding the forum: aren't there solutions that you can migrate to and that may have an import facility? I'd bet there would be some as phpbb is so popular...
I'm not sure I understand what you mean by the August deadline; I do understand that the hosting service is up for renewal then, but does this mean that this is when you'll take the decision? Because it'd certainly be a long time with no forum by then :(
I don't see how anyone could blame you or the site. There was an ongoing discussion on the forum about the code injection and I had toyed with the idea of contacting you and letting you know, but I figured that you'd have some pretty good reasons for staying away and I respected that.
Cheers
Gryzor
(http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/9810/cpczbasicmed.jpg)
This is the basic idea of a revival. Knocked up only in Photoshop, no code has been completed or even started.
Re: the "Moonwalker" graphic, it will change between 10 random games from the gamebase and may be replaced with a large screen shot rather than the artwork. Twitter may also *not* become part of the site. I've not decided.
Also disregard the christmas hats etc. It's the only PSD of the header I still had.
2Malc
First of all, i'd like to add my sincerest wishes to what the rest of the people here have already expressed about your mother. Personal matters like that are the most (if not the only) important things in our lives and i really hope whatever the problem is, she can overcome it and be healthy again.
As far as CPCZone is concerned, it is really a part of my life. I may not be very active in it but i really like having such a place i can hang around and remember my youth days. The important thing that the data painfully collected so far are safe. As for the rest, everything can be rebuilt in good time. The wiki can temporarily serve as a meeting point until you find the time (if you decide it) to cleanup and re-setup CPCZone. Though i have a rather limited knowledge of how web-things work, just send a PM if you need any help. I'll be happy to help any way i can.
Very very nice indeed Malc.
That's a really impressive design.
Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help.
I don't know... turn your back for five minutes and everything goes tits up!
;)
Still about... kinda... time is limited with real life stuff but still willing ready and able to do my bit if I can - you know how to get hold of me if you need me Malc.
Liking the design never ceases to amaze me what you can knock up in relatively short spaces of time.
Anyway, toodle pip peeps for now guess this ole mod has to get back to living a civillian life without the endless power and ego trips!
Well, guess this is as good a time to join up here also. ;D
Here's to hoping that CPCZone gets back to normal soon. :)
Hope your mum gets better.
As for the website , well, It's a damn shame :'(
Whoa, I leave for a day and look at that - a site mockup!!! But, if I read this correctly, this is a full-blown come-back, am I correct?
I guess there's still hope :)
Soooo, guys, should we set up some sub-forums to work with? If so, which ones would you like?
Hmmm. Given the fact that CPCZone was for all of us the place to hang out, it you're planning to emulate it, perhaps it would be nice to add some of the forums it had, otherwise a simple "CPCZone" might be enough. Who knows, if it comes up again perhaps the messages posted here could be transferred there (with some effort).
Hi there
God idea.. I think we should have a new general category called the 'The CPCZONE lifeboat' or something like that, and have a replica of the most used forum topics in there.... As wanderer wrote it will then be possible with some effort to reflect the changes back to the CPCZONE when it goes back online hopefully ;D
/Ygdrazil
Quote from: Wanderer on 17:54, 06 March 09
Hmmm. Given the fact that CPCZone was for all of us the place to hang out, it you're planning to emulate it, perhaps it would be nice to add some of the forums it had, otherwise a simple "CPCZone" might be enough. Who knows, if it comes up again perhaps the messages posted here could be transferred there (with some effort).
I hope, that CPCZone will be online again! It is the greatest CPC website ever!
So, Malc, keep on working, pleaseeeeeeeeeeee
I miss it!
Cheers,
Markus
Good news, CPC Zone should be back online soon (not giving a date).
Bad news, it will be cut down, there won't be a news section (not right away), the forum will still not be available and the reviews are still hidden (for now) BUT you will be able to browse the GameBase as part 1 of the rebuild nears completion.
The rest will follow.
Great news Malc. :) Thanks.
In fact, the GameBase could be up again before monday.
GameBase is back. See how we go from here.
Great to see!
Nice work, Malc!
A Idea to prevent spam/hacks:
secure the admin area also with a .htaccess and .htpasswd file
(for example if you have this: root/cpczone/html/admin/) make sure that admin directory is also secured with .htaccess and .htpasswd
But check, if the rest of the site is still working well then. Some CMS systems need data from admin directory, too, to show in the page.
If it would work with .htaccess you would have double security. - Admin account + this protection
There's no CMS on the system right now. It's running entirely on my own code, though the CMS that was there previously was one I built and was also secured.
Heh, good stuff :)
Hey Malc, should I open some sub-fora here or wait for yours??
You can make a temporary one I guess. Not sure when I'll get the zone forum back up and running.
Ok then, guys, make a list of fora and I'll create them.
Let's see:
*Hardware
*Games
*Applications
*Programming
*Off-topic
*General discussion
...am I missing something?
*Emulators
Mmmyes! So:
*Hardware
*Games
*Applications
*Programming
*Off-topic
*General discussion
*Emulators
Heya Malc, just saw through Analytics (duh) the link on the Zone. Thanks...
So, guys, you think we need any other forum to be set-up?
Hi all im new on here i was wondering how to get games to play one the winape emulator i downloaded football director and really want to play it?
Quote from: Gryzor on 16:20, 24 May 07
??? Whatever happened to the Zone? ???
Hi there and welcome. Try these two links...
http://cpc.devilmarkus.de/ (online java emulator)
http://tacgr.emuunlim.com/ (amstrad games archives)
I'm going to try and bring the forums back at some point this week but am currently working on new features for the gamebase and a series of guides.
As usual I shall keep everyone informed.
Hello mate, and welcome to our community :)
Running games is quite easy. I assume you have downloaded a zip or dsk file with your game in it. I assume Winape is running correctly? Now press ctrl+F1 (or go to File->Drive A->Insert Disk Image...) and find your zip or dsk file. Then type:
cat
this will list the contents of the disk, and you need to run the correct file. There's no way to know the right file beforehand, but usually it's a file resembling the title of the game or is something like game.bas or game.bin. Generally speaking, bas (basic) and bin (binary) files are executables, so except for the game.bas/game.bin you can look for other files with those extensions, like director.bas or director.bin.
I hope this helps? If not, let us know if you ever owned an actual Amstrad and where you downloaded football director from (or you can attach the file here)...
Cheers
Gryzor
Quote from: Wanderer on 20:42, 10 March 09
Hi there and welcome. Try these two links...
http://cpc.devilmarkus.de/ (http://cpc.devilmarkus.de/) (online java emulator)
http://tacgr.emuunlim.com/ (http://tacgr.emuunlim.com/) (amstrad games archives)
Hi Wanderer,
cpc.devilmarkus.de is outdated and not longer supported.
visit http://cpc-live.com (http://cpc-live.com) instead or for online gaming:
http://java.cpc-live.com (http://java.cpc-live.com) ;)
I think I will close cpc.devilmarkus.de soon. I am not sure. Opinions please.
Ah i see. I have to update my bookmarks. Thanks for the info.
Hi Malc,
re hosting and security issues - I can be of some help here.
Drop me a mail - xyphoe [at] gx 4000 . co . uk
and I'll tell you more.
Quote from: goldy on 20:06, 10 March 09
Hi all im new on here i was wondering how to get games to play one the winape emulator i downloaded football director and really want to play it?
More here on loading games:
http://cpcwiki.eu/index.php/A_guide_to_running_software_on_a_real_Amstrad_CPC/CPC_Plus_computer (http://cpcwiki.eu/index.php/A_guide_to_running_software_on_a_real_Amstrad_CPC/CPC_Plus_computer)
Running discs (video):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh_yKtUYhwU (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh_yKtUYhwU)
Running tapes (video):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NUGmLj3GXQ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NUGmLj3GXQ)
Hi people!
Great to see the Zone gamebase back up, great work Malc ;)
Well, I'll be damned - CPCZone is again (or still?) infected by two virii?? :(
I have finally migrated into this place from the CPCZone (not that I didn't know how before :P)
You are not alone, Gryzor. I just went on the site and was attacked by a trojan downloader.
What the hell
Damn... Really hope this will be fixed!
/Ygdrazil
Quote from: Gryzor on 09:11, 18 June 09
Well, I'll be damned - CPCZone is again (or still?) infected by two virii?? :(
Funny. I was not attacked by anything. I guess i owe it to Mozilla and NoScript. I have scripts active in cpczone.net but it seems there are other scripts in the page, coming from "go00ogle.net". :)
It's not about being attacked. I use Opera myself so I'm pretty safe (out of the box, too! :p ), however Antivir does pick up the virus when Opera downloads the page. Your antivirus should pick it up too, regardless of NoScript... because NoScript acts after the page has been downloaded and before it is rendered.
Quote from: Gryzor on 11:05, 21 June 09
It's not about being attacked. I use Opera myself so I'm pretty safe (out of the box, too! :p ), however Antivir does pick up the virus when Opera downloads the page. Your antivirus should pick it up too, regardless of NoScript... because NoScript acts after the page has been downloaded and before it is rendered.
Yes, that's the only thing that worries me. I have KIS 7 and it didn't even blink...
Hmmm I just reloaded the page in Opera and FF and Antivir didn't give me a warning... Unless it has permanently blocked those scripts for the domain? Or maybe Malc is reading this and cleaned it? :)
Hmmm, it seems this virus is known already...
http://www.google.gr/search?q=go00ogle.net
http://google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site=go00ogle.net/
Quote from: Gryzor on 11:15, 21 June 09Or maybe Malc is reading this and cleaned it? :)
Nope, i don't think so. go00ogle.net is still appearing in my noscript menu...
Darn, it doesn't show up in my Antivir log. I even opened the site with Chrome and it doesn't say anything (I think it did back when the problem first started)... Weird? Is there an online scanner for web pages???
[EDIT] I saved it as an mht archive, then scanned it online, it appears to be fine??!!
Just went there again and my scanner picked up a virus. It was removed, just like before.
So far, my scanner came across:
-a trojan downloader (don't remember name)
-VirTool:JS/Obfuscator.K
Havnt picked anything up with either Mcafee or Spyware Doctor ::)
My scanner (Avira) also detected a virus: HTML/Malicious.PDF.Gen
Fact is, it's still potentially unsafe to go to until the admin checks out the site's code or whatever.
Is it my idea, or is it coming and going??? I just revisited it and god "EXP/CVE-2009-0837" from Antivir...
Quote from: Gryzor on 10:29, 26 June 09
Is it my idea, or is it coming and going??? I just revisited it and god "EXP/CVE-2009-0837" from Antivir...
I also noticed that. It doesn't happen always... (In fact, I only once got a virus message)
Interesting behavior, maybe they're turning it on and off in order to avoid detection by some protection schemes? Didn't Google use to mark it as unsafe through Chrome? Now it's in the clear!
Who's the owner again? Couldn't he be contacted?
Also, trust me, it isn't just simply ideal to lurk the site carefree just because the scanner didn't turn up.
Malc Jennings, but I think that especially after MJ's death he'll not be much motivated... :(
I know, not all scanners pick up everything, but I'm pretty safe as long as I'm using Opera I think...
You guess correctly re: my motivation.
I don't know what is going on with it, I don't particularly care what is going on with it at this point either. The site is up for a hosting renewal in just over 4 weeks and with all this plus other stuff I'm not entirely sure that's going to happen. For one it's v.expensive and for another my motivation has been completely removed from me through the course of this year.
Anyone that knows me via facebook will definitely be fully aware of the damage this has done to MJ fans worldwide. I was always a fan of his first and foremost and am therefore utterly devastated.
Yeah, I've followed your status update and sympathize... :(
But, at least, couldn't you send the material to somebody so that it can be mirrored someplace else? Such a pity for it to get lost...
Gry
PS What about his doctor then, was he alive when he found him or not? Are there suspicions of foul play?
Quote from: Gryzor on 14:05, 03 July 09
PS What about his doctor then, was he alive when he found him or not? Are there suspicions of foul play?
I don't even want to go there just yet. I've avoided all tabloid speculation and rumour. I just want to be able to say goodbye when I go to London next week.