What's the deal with the demo?

[cbtrussell]

I keep trying to give eSupport a fair shake, but it seems the demo constantly reverts to v2.... what's up with that?

Yesterday, for the first time in weeks the v3 demo was available but only for the admin demo, the staff demo did not work. Now this morning the v2 admin demo is back and the staff demo link produces a 404.

It's almost funny really, this has been going on for MONTHS. If Kayako can't keep their v3 demo online, how could a prospective customer ever expect them to support their product?

[Racked Hosting]

I suggest you try out the 7 day free trial.

http://www.kayako.com/freetrial.php

[Digital Mayhem]

It doesn't have to do with Kayako keeping v3 demo online... It has to do with it being a DNS Issue.. Only a small percentage of people its affecting...

[supportskins]

This issue is not with Kayako but your ISP which is using the old DNS. You can fix the issue by setting demo.kayako.com is your Windows 'hosts' file which can be found in the system32\drivers\etc directory

[cbtrussell]

You guys are kidding, right?

It's not like the site changed yesterday and this is a temporary DNS caching issue... this has been going on for months. Literally MONTHS.

First, thanks for the hosts file tip but if you're going to suggest that approach, it would be helpful if you included the correct IP.

Second, my ISP returns 69.56.168.90, as does two other remote lookups. I did get a third remote lookup to return 67.19.223.250 which appears to be the correct IP.

Any of you guys care to venture a guess as to why this zone has been bouncing back and forth between two IP's for so long? Clearly this isn't an ISP issue, virtually no ISP caches lookups for more than 24 hours these days.

[netFusion]

Hehe... Yep, I just tested it as well. demo.kayako.com returns v2.3.

Hmmm... I would have been glad to be helpful and tell them how to fix it, but I can't open a support ticket to tell them it's broken! Go figure... :-)


It's because Kayako has their DNS servers configured improperly. It has probably been that way since they launched their new site last year. Here's what is happening.

Kayako has name servers NS1.KAYAKO.NET and NS2.KAYAKO.NET defined for KAYAKO.COM at the root servers.

Your DNS server goes to the root servers, looks up the appropriate name servers for KAYAKO.COM and gets directed to one of those two servers, and downloads the records it's looking for, INCLUDING the IP addresses that it shows as being the valid name servers for KAYAKO.COM.

Kayako's NS1 and NS2 name servers have lame delegations in them for NS.KAYAKO.COM, NS1.KAYAKO.COM and NS2.KAYAKO.COM with the wrong IP addresses. (Notice the .COM instead of .NET. The root shows .NET but their own servers show both .NET and .COM.)

Now your DNS server has the lame name servers and IP's listed in it's cache as being valid name servers because they came from NS1.KAYAKO.NET and NS2.KAYAKO.NET.

The second and subsequent times that you do a DNS lookup, it's a **** shoot which DNS server IP address will be pulled from your own cache. You may get a correct one, you may not. Logic would give you a 2 out of 5 chance of getting to the correct IP address.

When your cache times out, it will go back to the root servers and get the correct IP addresses one time, and then fluctuate again until it times out again... Thus the loop will continue...

Eddie

[supportskins]

demo.kayako.com shows up the v3 demo for me. I suggest changing the hosts file as I suggested in the earlier post. That will definately fix the issue.

[cbtrussell]

Originally Posted by supportskins

demo.kayako.com shows up the v3 demo for me. I suggest changing the hosts file as I suggested in the earlier post. That will definately fix the issue.

I think you're missing the point. I understand you don't work for Kayako, but the simple fact you're suggesting every potential customer out there make a manual entry into their local host file to be able to reach the demo is absurd. netFusion has clearly illustrated where the problem lies, perhaps you can pass his findings on to Varun?

While you're doing that, tell him the staff demo doesn't work either. Even when the DNS resolves correctly, the password doesn't work. Similarly, if you login as admin, most of the time ticket view is not available. Try it if you don't believe me.

The software is beautiful, I would *really* like to give it a try. But again, when issues like these persist with the DEMO, it lends significant credibility to all of the complaints that persist in the community about Kayako's incompentent support and total lack of quality assurance in their product.

[netFusion]

Originally Posted by Raghav Arora

From: Raghav Arora
Sent: Tue 10/31/2006 1:29 AM
To: Eddie
Subject: [SUPPORT #ZYQ-251478]: Your DNS is broken, see details in...


Hi Eddie,
Thanks for your interest. I have forwarded this to Varun and it will be fixed shortly.

Let me know if there is anything else.

Regards,

Raghav Arora
----------------------
Kayako Infotech Ltd.
http://www.kayako.com

Ticket Details
===================
Ticket ID: ZYQ-251478
Department: Support
Priority: High
Status: On Hold

Raghav notified Varun that it needed to be fixed on 10-31-2006. It got put on hold and is still broken though...

Click for DNS Report on Kayako.com

[smith]

that is not a problem with kayako,i think you got a problem with ur isp,old DSN server.once you try with trailer version,you can get clear idea.

[Racked Hosting]

it actually is a confirmed bug in the DNS server of kayako. For some reason it reports different IPs to different people..