Why Downloads Fail – Part 6 – The Content Server
Everything else can be ok; your browser, download manager, local network, proxy infrastructure, target storage drive, all of it. And then the download you started will inexplicably fail to complete. It may be that the company that is serving you the file has done something wrong.
Gasp. It happens (not to us, no, never!). Distributing large files is not a trivial endeavor. While not “brain surgery” type difficulty, it is specialized knowledge.
Effective file serving requires customized attention to web-server and host machine configurations, both at the software and kernel level. Reliable service requires redundant systems architecture at a number of levels. Publishers of point-release content can see extremely large peaks and valleys to activity and load on distribution servers, that pose challenges in many environments. Planning, or even recognition of this traffic can be difficult inside corporate infrastructures supporting many different services to their consumers.
So, in a discussion of why downloads fail, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention the publisher, or more specifically the server/host setups that originate the content. We’ve been in this business for almost 10 years now, focusing on these issues every day, and the complexities can still surprise us at times.
Shameless plug follows.
If you are an end-user and your downloads are failing, even after checking all of the elements under your control, don’t be afraid to contact the publisher and tell them. They want, and need, your feedback (you can also send them a link to http://www.o-ms.com if you’d like). If you are a publisher, and you are concerned about your customer’s relationship with your content, and don’t have the inclination to invest in learning and maintaining this type of specialized knowledge, we can probably find someone to help you!
