What is your domain name?



  • So I misspelled the name of the store when I went to search for something.  The site still came up, rather than getting the "Could not find the server at ..."  I actually did not realize I had misspelled the domain until I got this message.

    The Google Maps API key used on thei web site was registered for a different web site  You can generate a new key for this web site at http://code.google.com/apis/maps/.

    So they've devoted the energy to getting the misspelled domain name, making the two sites identical (mirrored or actually using the same files), but haven't tested it to make sure it actually works.   Makes me wonder what other domain names they have that are housing broken websites.  Not to mention that anyone (now knowing this) can go and register a Google Maps API key and not sell it to Micro Center.  Is it that hard to do a redirect?

    I admit, maybe it's not a full WTF, but the I like the lack of QA and thinking in general. 

    PS the new Spectate thread has put my FUCKING HELL tag in competition with the Jam it! tag.



  •  Are you sure that is not a phishing site?

     @belgariontheking said:

    PS the new Spectate thread has put my FUCKING HELL tag in competition with the Jam it! tag.

    Just wait, 'boondoggle' and 'gee-haw!' are coming up too!



  •  I'm sort of ignorant on this point, but wouldn't Google give you the API key if you proved you owned the domain?  Otherwise there would be a black market in registering keys for sites that don't use Google Maps in the hope they will want to in the future.  Maybe I misunderstand.



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

     Are you sure that is not a phishing site?

    Not a phishing site.  Both hostnames resolve to the same IP and the misspelled domain name is using the same NS server as the properly spelled.  Still pretty retarded they didn't test their site, though. 



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

     Are you sure that is not a phishing site?
     

    Hmm all outward appearances are ok, but that surprises me. Just the act of registering a typo of your domain address is retarded, wow...

    Edit: Yep. our timing is impeccable.



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

     Are you sure that is not a phishing site?

    EDIT:  nvm, the question has been answered


  • @morbiuswilters said:

     I'm sort of ignorant on this point, but wouldn't Google give you the API key if you proved you owned the domain?  Otherwise there would be a black market in registering keys for sites that don't use Google Maps in the hope they will want to in the future.  Maybe I misunderstand.

     

    No, it's even simpler than that. Google doesn't restrict keys in that way, they allow anyone to generate a key for any domain, regardless of weather you or somebody else has already generated a key for that domain.

    e.g. I just generated:

    Your key is:

    ABQIAAAAzV7Aw8HP0JTk2OI1pXyGjhSRmQ47K0CxAJRLGt8w7kn3Axv9rhRk0Z7JYxeByaQVE05C7X3BYRDOsQ

    This key is good for all URLs in this directory:

    http://maps.google.com/

     



  • @belgariontheking said:

    @MasterPlanSoftware said:

     Are you sure that is not a phishing site?

    EDIT:  nvm, the question has been answered

     

    I still think you should email them and point them to this thread. They should either know:

    a) How retarded they are.

    or

    b) How broken their site is.

    c) Someone is doing a REALLY good job of phishing their site (or whatever).

    However they choose to take it...



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    Hmm all outward appearances are ok, but that surprises me. Just the act of registering a typo of your domain address is retarded, wow...

     

    No, it's actually pretty common, and a Good Thing, since it keeps phishers, domain squatters, and other scum of the Internet from registering those selfsame typoed addresses and catching some of the actual site's traffic. 



  • @spacecadet said:

    @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    Hmm all outward appearances are ok, but that surprises me. Just the act of registering a typo of your domain address is retarded, wow...

     

    No, it's actually pretty common, and a Good Thing, since it keeps phishers, domain squatters, and other scum of the Internet from registering those selfsame typoed addresses and catching some of the actual site's traffic. 

     

    ...if you parked it, but if you REPLICATE the whole friggin site.... Especially when you fail...

    Ugh. Don't make excuses for this...



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    I still think you should email them and point them to this thread. They should either know:

    Done.  I'll let you know what they say. 



  • @mallard said:

    No, it's even simpler than that. Google doesn't restrict keys in that way, they allow anyone to generate a key for any domain, regardless of weather you or somebody else has already generated a key for that domain.

    e.g. I just generated:

    Your key is:

    ABQIAAAAzV7Aw8HP0JTk2OI1pXyGjhSRmQ47K0CxAJRLGt8w7kn3Axv9rhRk0Z7JYxeByaQVE05C7X3BYRDOsQ

    This key is good for all URLs in this directory:

    http://maps.google.com/

    That makes much more sense.

     

    Edit: Thanks for the info!



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    @spacecadet said:

    No, it's actually pretty common, and a Good Thing, since it keeps phishers, domain squatters, and other scum of the Internet from registering those selfsame typoed addresses and catching some of the actual site's traffic. 

     

    ...if you parked it, but if you REPLICATE the whole friggin site.... Especially when you fail...

    Ugh. Don't make excuses for this...

    Agreed.  It's probably just an additional virtual host, but it's still stupid.  The typo domains should send an HTTP redirect to the real site.  As it is, people will bookmark their typo domain and it generates more crap for proxies to cache.  Meanwhile, they will be competing with themselves for search engine results.  Hmm.. I wonder if Googlebot is actually smart enough to detect stupidity like this and disregard the copied site?  I actually wish they didn't because it protects morons from their own errors, meaning they never learn, but it probably would be in Google's best interests to weed out junk from its index.



  • @morbiuswilters said:


    Agreed.  It's probably just an additional virtual host, but it's still stupid.  The typo domains should send an HTTP redirect to the real site.  As it is, people will bookmark their typo domain and it generates more crap for proxies to cache.  Meanwhile, they will be competing with themselves for search engine results.  Hmm.. I wonder if Googlebot is actually smart enough to detect stupidity like this and disregard the copied site?  I actually wish they didn't because it protects morons from their own errors, meaning they never learn, but it probably would be in Google's best interests to weed out junk from its index.

     

    Right, a simple "Did you mean http://www.microwhatever.com? I will redirect in 10 seconds." would be fine. But instead, they went the dumbest way possible.



  • @belgariontheking said:

    @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    I still think you should email them and point them to this thread. They should either know:

    Done.  I'll let you know what they say. 

     

    Cool, I think that is the 'right' thing to do.

    Hopefully they learn from it, and aren't a bunch of arrogant pricks like equalssolved was.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    Hmm.. I wonder if Googlebot is actually smart enough to detect stupidity like this and disregard the copied site?

    Doesn't look like it, there's 1,690 Google results for site:mircocenter.com (there's 24,000 for site:microcenter.com)



  • @belgariontheking said:

    The Google Maps API key used on thei web site was registered for a different web site  You can generate a new key for this web site at http://code.google.com/apis/maps/.

    Having had worked with Google Maps, I know what this message is. For you to have google maps on your website, you must register your site with google and you get a key to use. If you use the wrong key for a website (i.e you registered it for foo.com, but your accessing bar.com), you get this message. Moreover it's a programmers stuff up.

     



  • @ZiggyFish said:

    Having had worked with Google Maps, I know what this message is. For you to have google maps on your website, you must register your site with google and you get a key to use. If you use the wrong key for a website (i.e you registered it for foo.com, but your accessing bar.com), you get this message. Moreover it's a programmers stuff up.

    Not to be a jerk, but we already know this.  That's why it's a WTF, because they mirrored their entire site on the typo domain instead of redirecting to their real domain and because they didn't even bother to test that it worked in the first place.  Thanks for the info, though.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    Not to be a jerk, but we already know this. 

    You're not bein a jerk.  He's just a n00b. 

    There was nothing in any of the posts in the thread (including the OP) that would indicate that we don't know that. 



  •  @morbiuswilters said:

    @ZiggyFish said:

    Having had worked with Google Maps, I know what this message is. For you to have google maps on your website, you must register your site with google and you get a key to use. If you use the wrong key for a website (i.e you registered it for foo.com, but your accessing bar.com), you get this message. Moreover it's a programmers stuff up.

    Not to be a jerk, but we already know this.  That's why it's a WTF, because they mirrored their entire site on the typo domain instead of redirecting to their real domain and because they didn't even bother to test that it worked in the first place.  Thanks for the info, though.

    Having had posted on The Daily WTF forums, I know what this acronym is.  It stands for "worse than failure."  Happy to help.



  • @bstorer said:

     @morbiuswilters said:

    @ZiggyFish said:

    Having had worked with Google Maps, I know what this message is. For you to have google maps on your website, you must register your site with google and you get a key to use. If you use the wrong key for a website (i.e you registered it for foo.com, but your accessing bar.com), you get this message. Moreover it's a programmers stuff up.

    Not to be a jerk, but we already know this.  That's why it's a WTF, because they mirrored their entire site on the typo domain instead of redirecting to their real domain and because they didn't even bother to test that it worked in the first place.  Thanks for the info, though.

    Having had posted on The Daily WTF forums, I know what this acronym is.  It stands for "worse than failure."  Happy to help.

    Actually, the acronym doesn't stand for "Worse than Failure". That was the failed attempt at political correctness. Unfortunately, I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.



  • @Kyanar said:

    @bstorer said:

     @morbiuswilters said:

    @ZiggyFish said:

    Having had worked with Google Maps, I know what this message is. For you to have google maps on your website, you must register your site with google and you get a key to use. If you use the wrong key for a website (i.e you registered it for foo.com, but your accessing bar.com), you get this message. Moreover it's a programmers stuff up.

    Not to be a jerk, but we already know this.  That's why it's a WTF, because they mirrored their entire site on the typo domain instead of redirecting to their real domain and because they didn't even bother to test that it worked in the first place.  Thanks for the info, though.

    Having had posted on The Daily WTF forums, I know what this acronym is.  It stands for "worse than failure."  Happy to help.

    Actually, the acronym doesn't stand for "Worse than Failure". That was the failed attempt at political correctness. Unfortunately, I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

     

    How very sad for you, then.  (Here, let me help you this time.)



  • @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    @spacecadet said:

    @MasterPlanSoftware said:

    Hmm all outward appearances are ok, but that surprises me. Just the act of registering a typo of your domain address is retarded, wow...

    No, it's actually pretty common, and a Good Thing, since it keeps phishers, domain squatters, and other scum of the Internet from registering those selfsame typoed addresses and catching some of the actual site's traffic.
    ...if you parked it, but if you REPLICATE the whole friggin site.... Especially when you fail...

    Ugh. Don't make excuses for this...

    To be fair, there's no actual "replication" going on, just a couple of extra lines in a DNS server (and Apache) config file somewhere.  And it does mostly work -- except for the Google API, which, for its own reasons, is being excessively suspicious of hostnames.  Indeed, the fact that it's the same site, just under a different hostname, is exactly why it does fail: it it was a separate copy, it'd presumably have its own separate Google API key.

     Indeed, a lot of web hosting services work like this by default.  Taking my own web site as an example, www.vyznev.net is just a CNAME for vyznev.net, and would, by default, serve up exactly the same web pages.  The fact that it, in fact, does serve redirects to the shorter hostname instead is something I had to set up myself using Apache mod_rewrite in an .htaccess file.

    Of course, the fact that I did take the time and effort to set it up that way myself, even for just a simple personal site, should indicate which method I think is better.  (Hint: it's the same as you do.)  But they do both work, at least as long as you're careful with Google API keys, SSL certificates and other hostname-pedantic things, and there are even circumstances -- granted, probably mostly involving porn sites and the like, but still -- where the redirectless method might actually be preferable.



  • @vyznev said:

    ...

     

    Thanks for explaining how web hosting works.

    You missed the point.


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