On Decemeber 10th, I logged into my website to be greeted by a scary error message

I had not done anything to the site, so I figured something bad more than likely happened.

The work week was busy, so I was not able to start troubleshooting until December 17th. Running the command heroku logs --tail  led to message that stated:

File "/app/my_website/settings.py", line 108, in <module> raise Exception("DATABASE_URL environment variable not defined") Exception: DATABASE_URL environment variable not defined

Reading this, I knew the database had somehow gotten disconnected. Logging into heroku where I host the website and database, I was greeted with a scary red warning label:

At this point, real panic sets in, what happened to my database? I knew that I was paying heroku to host my website, so I thought was just a warning they were putting on all dashboards. At this point, I open up the 10 emails I received from heroku stating that they are removing free hosting and database services. After some research, I realized that I was paying for the server, but not for the database; I was still using the free tier postgres database. 

At this point, I follow heroku's "hey you dummy, you ignored all of our emails and you want to get your website back" tutorial and within 4 hours of opening a ticket and 9 bucks later, my database was restored.

The take away

DONT IGNORE IMPORTANT EMAILS!

Web Dev

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  • Latest Comments
  • retug on Diaphragm Slicer New and Improved -

    Thanks Trenno.

    I will work to get metric units incorporated, that's a great idea.

    On your second point, I think something like that could be done, it's just a bit awkward with how CSI currently has it setup. In order to make section cuts, I need to unlock the model, ...

  • Trenno on Diaphragm Slicer New and Improved -

    Awesome work S&T!

    Firstly, I'd recommend if you're going to feature the tool on CSI's website then maybe incorporate metric units (aka real units!) 

    Secondly, I'm wondering if there would be a way to set up the workflow using something akin to RAM Concept design strips. Perhaps the strip width ...

  • e95kwon on Transfer Diaphragm Design -

    My understanding is that for a 5-story building you would have:

    • (1) load case A (ELF)
    • (1) load case B for each level except the roof so total (4)
    • therefore (4) load combos for diaphragm design

    I believe the intent is to envelope higher mode actions as you mentioned ...