Update: After further investigation, we found that a power disruption caused some servers to go down or fail. It is unlikely that the leap second directly affected VCN's services.

On Saturday, June 30th, 2012, VCN's web site, other WebGUI sites, and VCN's dial-up service went down. Due to the time that the problem occurred, it was probably caused by a bug related to the leap second on Saturday, June 30th, 2012. Email, mailing lists, and non-WebGUI web sites such as HTML and PHP sites were not affected.

Afterwards, the WebGUI server was unable to start due to a hardware issue. Dial-up service was restored on Sunday, July 1st but some users still had issues connecting to sites outside of VCN. At this time there are no known issues related to dial-up service.

A WebGUI replacement server has been created and all web sites have been restored as of Wednesday, July 4th, 2012 at 1pm.

Between Friday, June 15th 11PM and Monday, June 18th 10AM, an old email backup server was retrieving emails while the main email server was down.

The backup server had some old emails so people would have received these old emails along with any new emails that was sent during the weekend.

VCN will be restoring emails sent between Friday, June 15th 11PM and Monday, June 18th 10AM. If you require any urgent emails please email [email protected] with your VCN user name and the subject "Restore weekend emails".

If you forward your emails then your messages do not need to be restore because they would have been forwarded automatically.

During the planned power maintenance on Friday, June 15th, 2012, the emergency backup power failed to keep VCN's server operational. As a result, all servers lost power during the maintenance. Due to a faulty battery, VCN's main server was unable to startup automatically after the power failure and required maintenance.

Dial-up and web sites were operational on Monday, June 15th, 2012 at 11pm. Other services such as email were resolved in the early afternoon.

A planned server maintenance to replace the faulty battery will happen on Wednesday, June 20th, 2012 between 10am and noon. There will be a short 10 minute downtime between this time.

We have received word that the Vancouver Public Library, where the main VCN servers are located, will have its electricity turned off for maintenance. The blackout will occur between 11PM Friday, June 15 2012 and 5AM Saturday, June 16, 2012.

During the blackout, an emergency power generator will kick in to keep the main VCN servers powered on. Unfortunately, the VPL Internet gateway will lose its power for the entire six hours. As a onsequence, users will not be able to connect to the Internet and outside users will not be able to access any websites hosted by the VCN. Also, incoming mail from the Internet will be interrupted for the time period; they will be queued on neighbouring servers until the gateway comes back up.

We apologize for the service disruption.

Greetings VCN members,

The VCN help desk will be moving to 333 Terminal Avenue between Thursday, April 26th and Monday, April 30th. During this time the help desk phone number, 604-257-3811, will be temporarily disconnected so it can be moved to the new office. An alternative number to reach the VCN help desk is 778-724-0826 (778-724-0-VCN). Both 604-257-3811 and 778-724-0826 will be active after the phone lines have been moved.

During the move the VCN help desk will still offer support via email and phone. Please expect response delays between Thursday, April 26th and Monday, May 7th as we setup the new office. Until the new office is open to the public, in-person support will continue to be by appointment only. An appointment can be scheduled at 778-724-0826.

Cash and cheque donations should be made at 280 – 111 West Hastings St. Please call 604-257-3804 to make sure someone is available to take your donation or drop by Monday to Friday between 10am and 3pm.

All other VCN services will remain fully operational during this time and are not affected by the move.

Thank you for your patience.

On Good Friday, April 6th, VCN and all other Community Access Program (CAP) networks across Canada received word that the Federal Government has decided to cease its funding of CAP. They have determined that they have "successfully met their objective to bring computer and Internet technologies to Canadians across the country", and have decided that this program was not a priority while trying to balance the budget.

While the letter indicated that the CAP Youth Internship (CAP YI) program will remain funded, it is still unclear how this will happen without federally funding CAP sites.

VCN and other CAP network administrators across Canada are hoping that CAP funding will be reinstated over the coming weeks, but given the current political climate we need your help to make that happen! Some of the other CAP networks have launched websites to aid our endeavours, which you may be interested in visiting and/or contributing towards. Please visit the following website to find out more about how you can help save CAP.

The Nova Scotia CAP Association has begun an information and advocacy website to save CAP: http://www.savecap.ca/ The Pacific Coast Network Association has begun a survey to gather feedback from CAP users about why CAP is still very much needed, which will then be used to advocate for the funding to be re-instated: http://forms.pcna.ca/email.htm

Greetings members!

The Vancouver Community Network would like invite you to a free event at which VCN President, Jim Sayre, will be speaking next week.  Please join us to learn how Bill C-30 is a violation of our privacy and measures we can all take to stop it in its tracks!

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:: There's Still Time to STOP Bill C-30 ::
A public forum on internet surveillance and your privacy.

WHEN: Wednesday, March 21 2012 at 7pm
WHERE: W2 @ The Woodwards Building (111 Hasting Street West)

Moderated by Libby Davies, with special guests:

* Jasbir Sandhu (NDP Public Safety Critic)
* Lindsey Pinto (Open Media)
* Jim Sayre (Vancouver Community Network)
* Michael Vonn (BC Civil Liberties Association)

Find out how the Conservatives' Bill C-30 violates our privacy and what YOU can do to STOP IT.

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