17:00 CET (11 AM EST)
We need to replace a disk in the server responsible for delivering outgoing email, which means that email sent by our users will be delayed a few minutes while the server is down.
Everything should work normally in Webmail and in your email client, but email you send will be queued on other servers until the server is brought back online.
No email will be lost or rejected during this routine operation, which should only last a few minutes.
Earlier this year you will remember that we moved the servers that handle your email to a new data center. At the same time we partnered with a new systems management partner (Copyleft Solutions) and have spent some time since then getting used to working together and getting all the documentation and routines in order.
We have now started a maintenance phase where we will perform various behind the scenes configuration improvements and minor upgrades. This will make the systems easier to maintain, improve service snappiness and lay the foundation for future development of our services.
The maintenance phase will last approximately 2 months, and to allow for the flexibility needed during this phase we are likely to schedule minor downtimes with relatively short notice.
We will try to give at least 2 days notice on our website, and on each occasion the downtime is expected to be less than 15 minutes.
We understand that service disruption can be a problem, but will be grateful for your patience while we work to make Runbox a better and more responsive service.
Here are some pictures from the move showing our old and new Data Center, our servers, and some of our sysadmins.
All in all the process involved around 2 weeks of planning, 10 people, 3 cars, a few hundred feet of cable, 10 hours of deracking, driving, and installing, and a week cleaning up afterwards.
It’s good to know that Perdita, Pongo, Patch, Penny, Pepper, Taishi, Rambo, Takara, Tinkerbell, Chernushka, Strelka, Bars, Pink, Oscar, Fenris, Greyhound, Odie, Marmaduke, and Sirius are all running smoothly in their new pound!
We have been busy cleaning up after yesterday’s big (and long) move and want to thank everyone for your patience while we got everything running the way it should.
Currently the status is:
Our new sysadmin team is already hard at work making the service more reliable, and once we have all the support systems and routines in place across our organizations we will work more efficiently together.
Server Relocation and Email Downtime – Tuesday June 14 10-14 CET (08-12 GMT / 05-09 AM EDT / 02-06 AM PDT)
We’re excited to announce that Runbox is partnering with a new server hosting and management company, Copyleft Solutions. As part of this change we will move our email server park to a new Data Center on Tuesday June 14 between approximately 10 and 14 CET.
Our email services, including Webmail, POP, IMAP, and SMTP, will be inaccessible for about 4 hours while the servers are being moved. Incoming email will normally be queued on the sending servers, but users of mailing list services such as Yahoo Groups might want to suspend those to avoid bouncing of incoming email.
The Runbox Web Hosting services will *not* be affected as they are hosted in a different location. All web sites and domains hosted with Runbox will continue to work normally.
We apologize for any inconvenience caused by the relocation.
We recommend that you check your email before the scheduled downtime. While we are migrating it will not be possible for you to access your email.
You will not need to change any settings in your email client. It will work normally once our servers are online again.
(For those who have been using our IP address (87.238.52.70) instead of a regular server name, please change this to 91.220.196.211.)
To get updates about the relocation and when the services will be online again, please check this page, Twitter, or http://status.runbox.net
If you have any questions, please use the Support Center at http://support.runbox.com
Runbox is partnering with Copyleft Solutions, a Norwegian company focusing on secure hosting and open source software. Copyleft Solutions shares Runbox’ values and core principles, and we will be their preferred email provider going forward.
The partnership will strengthen both companies in the long-term as we also share many goals and interests — first and foremost to provide the best possible email services for our users.
The Runbox email server park will be moved to Copyleft Solution’s data center at Digiplex. Digiplex offers state of the art facilities with secure, climate controlled environments and full power and telecom redundancy.
In the future, this move will improve the quality and responsiveness of our services, as the servers will be hosted on a higher capacity network by a company committed to further developing the platform.
The HTML editor in Compose is now upgraded to the latest version. Also, when adding contacts to the recipient fields, their full name as registered in Contacts will be included in the sent message.
We’re working on more Compose upgrades that we hope to implement in the near future.
We’re very happy to announce that Runbox now offers integrated domain registration!
This means that you can host both your domain name, your website, and your email in one place with the same user-friendly interface.
Just open Account: Domain Hosting Administration to get started with a new domain name!
Currently we only support the main top level domains .com, .net, and .org, but plan to add more soon. We also plan to support transfers of domains from/to other providers.
To find out more about how Runbox Domain Hosting works, please see our Help section.
By popular request we’ve now added a function to change font size in Runbox.
Just scroll down to the bottom of the page after logging in, and click one of the icons at the bottom left that look like this:
This will hopefully make Runbox more legible for everyone!
We’re now extending our Web Hosting services with Web Design assistance — we can help you with everything from setting up a simple website to custom design.
Ever wonder how to write email effectively, how the pro’s use email, or how email actually works?
Find out at the Runbox Email School, a growing collection of articles about all aspects of email!
