Achievements and Accomplishments Thread

[bwt1213]

One more thing: Since you don't have TV, I suggest you investigate Pluto. It's FAST (Free Ad-Supported Television) and you can view it on your computer. All the news feeds are available, but without the talking heads and special shows -- it's just the news feed. But there's a lot more you can view if you wish. I like America's Test Kitchen, Antiques RoadShow (BBC version) and Antiques Road Trip (BBC again). PBS is also free and available on line. I doubt sincerely that you will come anywhere near your maximum download limit as long as you're watching on your computer. You can even watch movies on your computer. Or cooking shows about Korean/Japanese/French/Italian cuisine. Or lecture/documentary shows about how to correctly don a Roman toga and life in Rome at the height of the empire, Greek myths, ancient military strategies, battles in the various world wars, the life of Alexander the Great, and a thousand other things. I like shows in foreign languages, especially if they have subtitles that can help my understanding.

The internet can be like a firehose, but you can filter it down to something a little more manageable. Your download speed is certainly sufficient. Yes, you're overpaying for what you're getting. But it is sufficient, and that's what matters.

[bwt1213]

As a rule, if a service tech does an especially good job (I've done this for furnace repair, plumbers, electricians, waiters/waitresses, phone support, as well as electronic specialties), praise them. Praise them in writing and make it specific and if someone calls you back repeat the praise and amplify it.

Life is short, and anyone who will make it more pleasant along the way ought to be encouraged. As I age, that is something I always knew and never appreciated nearly as much as I should have. The goal: THE GOOD GUYS ALWAYS WIN.

[mcdonna]

The Xfinity tech showed up on time yesterday and spent 1.5 hours. He inspected the line from pole to my house, replacing a couple of connectors that he said were old and questionable, and also replaced the modem/router/hub box with one that is newer and has a much smaller footprint, which is nice. He didn't find a smoking gun but I've seen no more drops in the past 24 hours which is a great improvement as it had been dropping at least once or twice per hour. I give him 5 stars for courtesy, diligence, competence, and results.

I'm in Corvallis, Oregon, a university town of around 50k residents including students. I started with what was then Comcast back in 2005, and over the years the speed has increased, reliability has been good, and price hasn't varied much. I pay a little over $60/month for Xfinity cable Internet service, with speed from 50-80 Mbps download and around 5 upload. I have a 1229GB monthly limit but my maximum usage has been less than 100GB, as I have no TV or streaming service other than occasional YouTube or Amazon Prime. Now that I'm mostly retired the price is a stretch for me but this is the cheapest plan they offer. Phone line DSL is roughly the same price for much lower speed and the only other viable option is cellular. Other than price, my only complaint is their support system which seems to be focused on protecting technicians from us customers.

I am grateful to have the option for high-speed access. Prior to returning to Oregon, I was in rural Coloma, California. When I first moved there in 1995 I tried to telecommute and was only able to get 14.4k as my phone wiring wasn't of high enough quality for the new 28.8k modems, so I returned to work in the Bay Area until 1997, when I could move to a different neighborhood and get ISDN at 56/128k. I switched to StarBand satellite in 2002, which offered 1.5 Mbps/256 kbps, but its drivers didn't support Macintosh OS so I was using a shareware patched up driver that didn't always keep up with changes. A year later they introduced a Mac version. Being able to get fast Internet was a factor in deciding to leave there in 2005. Nowadays most of my Coloma friends have service via small local towers that transmit from one ridgetop to another and it is still expensive, slow, and erratic.

Just another reminder of the privileges I take for granted!

[bwt1213]

My neighbor used to have Direct TV using a dish on his roof. Well during Superbowl sunday one year it SNOWED & I mean like more than 8" & yep, his dish was full of snow & he didn't have any reception whatsoever. As you can imagine he was pissed. He ingeniously hooked up a hose to the hot water facet inside his home, added a sprayer to it & stood outside 'spraying the dish' with HOT WATER to remove the snow & thus be able to continue enjoying TV. Needless to say, he got rid of Direct TV & switched to Fios by Verizon not too long after that.

I don't think Spectrum is available in my area, I must admit I've never even heard of it before now. Yes, I do live near 2 big cities, yet I wouldn't consider my service 'cheap', actually I think its quite expensive. There is no 'cheap' option, unless you count having no internet & just reading books for entertainment.

It's not just snow that will knock satellite TV out. Ice, heavy rain, and the wrong time of the year (your satellite is covered by the sun during the equinoxes) will do it, too. And some of those outages can take a while to resolve, too. I had satellite TV for years and I can verify all those things, because they all happened to me.

As far as "cheap" or "expensive" is concerned, in my on-line chats with people in cities like Chicago, LA, and NYC (and other large cities) their charge for gigabyte internet is about half what I'm paying and I have a tenth of what they do. I live about 80 miles from Chicago and 50 miles from Milwaukee, but I used to live about 45 miles from each of them and I had the same deal I have now. To get really fast internet, I'd have had to live in Chicago or one of the close suburbs -- and not all of them had it, either.

I'd have to check to be sure, but I think Spectrum and ComCast are the same thing; one owns the other or they're both owned by something else. If you don't have Spectrum, you probably have ComCast. In markets where there is no competition, you will be paying the same as I am. I verified that, too, with customers from Washington to Georgia. Same plans, same prices, same push to get their cable TV service, etc. And, as you pointed out, not cheap.

[2cute]

All those problems with Xfinity! I have Spectrum and they're not perfect, either. But their faults aren't at all like yours. With Spectrum, they'll sometimes just go down for a half-hour or an hour and if you call them an automated message will tell you that it was scheduled upgrade or service downtime. But you are never notified about it beforehand, so it either wasn't scheduled or they don't care to tell you. Fortunately, those outages are maybe three or four times a year. And their cost is pretty high, I think. For 100 MBPs I pay $75 a month plus taxes. And they're the only game in town that will give you anywhere near that speed, too. Cellphone carriers are trying to get into the act now, too, but they have data caps. And if you stream your TV as I do, you really don't want data caps. Ever. That's the downside of living in a rural community.

If you're really rural around here -- out on a farm, far out of town -- your best bet is satellite internet. You can get 25 MBPs down, but the uploading speed will probably be less than 1 MBPs. And then bad weather can mean no internet. Cheap and fast internet generally requires you to live in a big city. I would never do that. I have, and it's not for me.

My neighbor used to have Direct TV using a dish on his roof. Well during Superbowl sunday one year it SNOWED & I mean like more than 8" & yep, his dish was full of snow & he didn't have any reception whatsoever. As you can imagine he was pissed. He ingeniously hooked up a hose to the hot water facet inside his home, added a sprayer to it & stood outside 'spraying the dish' with HOT WATER to remove the snow & thus be able to continue enjoying TV. Needless to say, he got rid of Direct TV & switched to Fios by Verizon not too long after that.

I don't think Spectrum is available in my area, I must admit I've never even heard of it before now. Yes, I do live near 2 big cities, yet I wouldn't consider my service 'cheap', actually I think its quite expensive. There is no 'cheap' option, unless you count having no internet & just reading books for entertainment.

[Spike1007]

I did put something in the "Reason for Edit" field. No idea if that made a difference.

[2cute]

I'm not sure I've ever seen an flagged post that got approved either. However, I know I've managed small edits in the not-too-distant past without getting flagged. I tried a second edit once before (after the first one slipped through) & that was apparently too much.

By the way, on my post that did get through, I just cut & pasted my previous "spam" post into it & that worked. Anyway, it would be nice to know the rules (aside from "don't edit").

Yes, I agree a set of rules or legend would be most helpful.

You're lucky to have been able to edit. I've certainly given up trying.

[bwt1213]

All those problems with Xfinity! I have Spectrum and they're not perfect, either. But their faults aren't at all like yours. With Spectrum, they'll sometimes just go down for a half-hour or an hour and if you call them an automated message will tell you that it was scheduled upgrade or service downtime. But you are never notified about it beforehand, so it either wasn't scheduled or they don't care to tell you. Fortunately, those outages are maybe three or four times a year. And their cost is pretty high, I think. For 100 MBPs I pay $75 a month plus taxes. And they're the only game in town that will give you anywhere near that speed, too. Cellphone carriers are trying to get into the act now, too, but they have data caps. And if you stream your TV as I do, you really don't want data caps. Ever. That's the downside of living in a rural community.

If you're really rural around here -- out on a farm, far out of town -- your best bet is satellite internet. You can get 25 MBPs down, but the uploading speed will probably be less than 1 MBPs. And then bad weather can mean no internet. Cheap and fast internet generally requires you to live in a big city. I would never do that. I have, and it's not for me.

[Spike1007]

I'm not sure I've ever seen an flagged post that got approved either. However, I know I've managed small edits in the not-too-distant past without getting flagged. I tried a second edit once before (after the first one slipped through) & that was apparently too much.

By the way, on my post that did get through, I just cut & pasted my previous "spam" post into it & that worked. Anyway, it would be nice to know the rules (aside from "don't edit").

[2cute]

I just posted & then edited my post (adding the word "how"), and the system flagged it as potential spam. It's getting pickier. This time though, it actually told me that & highlighted my post in green, telling me that it won't be visible to others until the moderator OKs it.

Spike the moderator never reads it & we never see it. I think they should remove the edit button because I haven't been able to edit my comments now over 2 years. That green box is annoying & I've actually deleted the entire post & tried to repost the corrected version & nope, it won't let me. I've even rewritten it, so it says about the same thing but in a different way, nope, it won't let me do that either. Its like once I try to edit in that discussion, I'm blocked out of interacting at all. So now I just reread what I've written before I post reply, if there's a mistake, it stays & everyone will just have to guess what I meant so I can continue participating in the given discussion.

[2cute]

So this is a brag and a wail. I've been a member since 2009, and just set a new word record today:
QUINQUANONAGINTILLIONTH (23 letters, 48 points)

Wordtwist-lost-QUINQUANONAGINTILLIONTH.png
BUT my Xfinity Internet connection has been flaky the past month and when I pressed SUBMIT the little ball spun and spun and spun ... and finally gave up.

wordtwist__FAIL.png

So I am recording my accomplishment and my frustration here!

And after one hour and 20 minutes of effort (and two more dropped connections) I have an appointment for an Xfinity tech to appear at my home on Monday afternoon to try to fix the problem.

Donna

I also have Xfinity & have noticed problems just streaming TV shows.

I suspect for you, they will give you a new router. You are very lucky to have a tech come to your home to help you. When I changed routers, I had to go to the 'store' & get one myself, then when I couldn't figure out how to set it up & called to talk to someone, the guy just kept on telling me to reboot my computer over & over since he had no idea how to help me. I got frustrated w/him & gave him the boot. It took me a few hours to figure out how to set it up by just guessing. Finally once I did, my internet improved.

Sorry that happened to you. Yes, taking a screen print you at least have proof you achieved it, but of course its not the same as having it added to your 'My Scores' section.

[mcdonna]

Thanks, Spike! I'll keep that in mind.

[Spike1007]

mcdonna, there may be a small bit of hope if this happens to you again. After some tests, I decided that communication between your computer & the WordTwist server happens just twice per game. When you start a game, all necessary info is sent to your computer. From then until the end, you & your computer basically play autonomously, no communication needed. When time runs out, your computer wants to send results and the server waits to get them. However, there doesn't seem to be a real deadline for this. The server will just wait. I started a game, disconnected from the internet, then waited (as much as half an hour) to reconnect, then I refreshed the page. At that point, game results were reported to the server and I got the usual screen showing my play results, with all my words counting. Anyway, if your Xfinity connectivity is intermittent & you lose it during a game, you may be able to wait, hitting "refresh" occasionally, until your connection comes back. With luck, the game will count.

[mcdonna]

Thanks, Spike, for the sympathy. I hate to suffer silently. If it had only been a board record or my best for the month, it wouldn't have bothered much, but it's hard to let go of a PR!

I've been switching over to my phone's "personal hotspot" (Verizon) when Xfinity goes down and am almost ready to just cancel Xfinity altogether. At 71 I'm mostly retired. But I'm still doing some web development here and there, and the extra speed comes in handy sometimes.

I'll let you know what we find out at the tech visit.

[Spike1007]

I just posted & then edited my post (adding the word "how"), and the system flagged it as potential spam. It's getting pickier. This time though, it actually told me that & highlighted my post in green, telling me that it won't be visible to others until the moderator OKs it. Anyway, here's my post in case the earlier one doesn't show up:

mcdonna, you have my sympathies (and congratulations just for finding the word).

I have Xfinity too and have intermittent problems where my modem somehow loses the connection to the internet, usually in the mornings. My problem is kind of the opposite though. I'll try to drop a game to maintain my APPW after entering some low-value word, the little spinning ball shows up, the board times out, and the game counts, tanking my average.

Then again, the problem is probably the same, and our symptoms are just different. From what I can tell, once you start a game, it's running both on your computer and the server, with some (but not constant) communication between the two. (I have deliberately disconnected the internet during play, and the game seems to play normally (at least until time is out). It still counts down and I'm able to enter words on my end.) Anyway, if you lose connection before playing a word, it's gone (unless communication does start up again before the game is over). At least some times though, if you lose connection after playing the word, it seems to count, and I assume that communication has taken place somewhere along the line. Now I'm tempted to do some more tests (probably on 4x4 so that I don't screw up my 5x5 stats), and learn more about when communication takes place.

This stuff is probably irrelevant (I just like trying to figure out how things work), but I hope Xfinity fixes things for you. I'd like to know what the tech finds.