Faramir Fiction Archive

This is a static copy of the site!

Jan 29, 2020

The site you’re looking at right now, is a static copy of faramirfiction.com, which means it’s not fully functional. Most notably, all forms – comments, thanks, searches – won’t work.

Why is this happening?

The core code of faramirfiction.com was written back in 2006. A lot has happened since then: the internet has evolved, but – due to a lack of time from yours truly – this site has not. Our host has now switched off an outdated version of PHP, the software that underpins much of the internet. To get the site to work with a current version of PHP will take quite some time and effort — and nowadays spare time simply isn’t as freely available as it was back in 2006.

But the site looks pretty much the same?

What you’re looking at now is a static snapshot.

Basically, what PHP does is compile a page on the fly by gathering information out of a database and from files. Normally, the pages of the site that you look at on the site, don’t exist on the server: they’ve been created especially for you.

That’s not the case for the site you’re looking at now. You’ll notice the URLs end in .html where they didn’t before. Now all those pages actually exist on the server – just like back in the 1990s. They’re not compiled just for you: they were compiled earlier, by a script that made what is essentially a snapshot. As a result, the site doesn’t need to use PHP to pull information out of the database etc. But also as a result, the pages are static: no new information can be added, for example by a new comment or thanks.

What if I want to contribute something?

If you enjoyed a story or work of art, please let the author / artist know by writing them an email instead of posting a comment. Often email addresses are posted with the work. If not, write to us at admin@faramirfiction.com and we’ll forward your message.

If you are an author or artist and want to post your work, please also get in touch with us at admin@faramirfiction.com and we’ll see what we can do for the time being.

Will it stay like this from now on?

I’ll get to work on updating the site as soon as I can. Unfortunately, I won’t make it before the deadline, ie, when the host disables the outdated PHP version. It’s difficult to assess just how much work is needed – sometimes these things are very easy to fix, while at other times it seems like an endless game of whack-a-mole where you run into one problem after the other. But I intend for this static version to be a temporary measure.

Cheers,
Iris
admin@faramirfiction.com