"Free" (temporary) file hosters do not work - let's fix it

[tomreyn]

Like so many file hosters with a "free" model before, Rapidshare are going out of business next month, too.

In an attempt to not loose files forever again I dumped the forum to a file, and searched this file for Rapidshare URLs, writing them to a text file.  Once this was done I checked with Rapidshare to find out whether these files are still available (if not, Rapidshare would return an error message).

Here's what I found:

Code: [Select]

$ while read url; do echo $url; wget -qO - $url | grep ^ERROR; done < /tmp/urls_sorted.txt
http://rapidshare.com/files/103825709/Painted.rar.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/125903576/francais_26-06-2008.7z.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/171151473/behemoth_mod_2.zip
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/21404528/wandergart_tile.rar.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/21647117/Canyon_map.rar.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/21702134/portugues.lng.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/22310524/wandergart_scenario.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/22952027/ARIALUNI.TTF.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/23341832/shontuz_luften.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/23534340/map_and_scenario.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/23535010/magic_mod_vampire.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/23680487/gold-units.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/23755749/creaturesbreed.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/23856521/texture_mage_worker.tga.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/272475529/glestTD.zip.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/3743488771/Baradin.rar
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/388565291/Darktide_OST_-_Feeble_Minded_Enemy_of_Mine_160kbps.mp3.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/389204493/Darktide_OST_-_Fight_For_Your_Life__128kbps_.7z
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/390785032/hey.blend.html
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/413919975/lang.7z
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
http://rapidshare.com/files/428082021/karni_omega.7z
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
https://rapidshare.com/files/1522605895/megaglest_3.6.0.3_verbose_1.7z
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
https://rapidshare.com/files/458342535/Movie_0001.wmv
ERROR: File not found. (e029a7af)
An error message is returned for every single of these files. So they are all lost already. Some are, based on their filenames (only), not actually related to (Mega)Glest, some are probably not very relevant anymore, but at least some look as if we would have wanted to preserve those - but they are lost.

So pleeeease, whenever possible please don't use file hosters which host your files only temporarily with terms like "unless there are n requests / day" or "unless we change our mind". Instead, host with some personal cloud storage where you have an account with them and at least get notified before they take down your files. Or with your ISP (they often offer free file storage for a while) where files will at least last until you cancel your contract.

So far I have been hesitant to offer a file upload / hosting service myself since we were not really able to make a (much) better offer (no backups, no data loss prevention) and hosting a file upload site securely (and preventing abuse, restricting how those limited resource can be used by whom) is not that easy. But I am now convinced we really need to change this - and I think we can do it properly by now.

So I'd be happy to set this up but will need someone's help with HTML frontend / web design, optionally also with writing the actual (PHP or other CGI) code.

Is anyone interested in giving this a try?

[Omega]

I don't have time now, but I will come May (I'm taking an internship and finally will only work one job). If this is still pending, I can help out here. I've picked up a great deal of experience in web development in the last few months, particularly with Scala and the Play Framework. I have experience with managing files securely. I work as a full stack developer, so front end is fair game, too. I'd prefer to move away from PHP, though. I'm expecting to be using C# and ASP.NET on the internship, so that's a possibility, too. I have experience in server configuration for Scala and the Play Framework (in fact, it really just needs Java to be installed).