NineChime forum

Waccoon wrote:

There's so little going on in the oekaki community, I'm quite happy to see any oekaki news being posted here.

Of course, OekakiArt going down is very sad news.  Good luck with finding a host for your board.

Thanks so much for the concern, Wac. As for finding a host for my new oekaki board, can you try listing free webhosts with PHP and mySQL capabilities? I don't know if it is possible for someone to host my Insomnia Oekaki board or not.

Let me know if you do. The list of free webhosts are out of date, because many free webhosts went down without warning.

Waccoon wrote:

Yeah, free hosting with proper support for the Java applets seems to have pretty much vanished.  Everything starts at "less than $5".  My host costs me $17/mo., but it could probably be less if I haggled (since I've been with them for, oh, seven years).  I'd be wary of anything under $8/mo.

One free host you can try is http://www.avafreehost.com

I've read through their FAQ, and, helpfully, they list all the restrictions they apply to their free accounts.  Everything necessary to run the board is there, including input streams, which is a problem with many free hosts.  The only bummer is that they do not support e-mail, so the oekaki registration system will have to approve people immediately, rather than send activation e-mails.

From what I've read, they require Google ads, which is a very reasonable type of ad service.  Naturally, you can also upgrade to paid hosting later.

I recall that my oekaki was hosted on Tripod UK, but although they have increased the disk space to 1 GB, they pretty much stopped accepting new singups. I believe that they're still around even if Lycos discontinued all unprofitable activities back in mid-February of this year.

Is there another free webhost that supports Google advertising and e-mail in which the registration systems requires activation e-mails?

Waccoon wrote:

The base requirements are PHP input streaming and JAR support, and most free hosts don't even tell you in the FAQ/TOS if these features are supported.  I singled out AvaFreeHost because their FAQ clearly states what PHP features they have turned off and left on.  That, combined with other factors, such as explicit bandwidth limits, tell me that these people probably know what they are doing.  E-mail support and ads free of JavaScript are major pluses, but the board can function without them.  Due to the amount of spamming abuse free hosts endure, I don't think you'll find a free host that supports every feature the oekaki uses, even the basic ones.

Free hosts are typically used to host static pages and simple forums that don't need Java or advanced file upload support.  The major reason why free hosts are dying is not because they are free, but because very few people actually make their own web pages anymore.  Most people sign up for a community service or blog of some sort, where the hosting company manages the scripting software, and you can simply worry about your content.  For example, why make your own gallery and deal with FTP, HTML, and CSS, when you can join DeviantArt instead?  Whether DeviantArt is a good service or not is arguable, but that's what people are doing these days.

Even a cheap paid host will offer pretty much everything needed by the board, and without ads, too.  Free hosts are, naturally, crippled by default in the hopes that you'll upgrade to a paid account in the future.

I'll try to get the oekaki working for at least a month at Orgfree.com and if members are complaining that Java is not working at all, I'll have a go with AvaFreeHost if that's okay with you.

No. i did not hosted any website on OekakiArt. But this is very sad news for OekakiArt. I think it will be recovery as soon as early. It is great.

Just for the record guys, checked OA's site recently and, though there's not much there, there's a promise of it coming back eventually, so keep your fingers crossed! 
http://oekakiart.com/

I'm sorry to say this, but OekakiArt development will eventually be on hold for a indefinite period of time until one of the site owner's other projects are finished.