PHP as fastcgi connection timing out with apache2

Lately I have been trying to test a WordPress plugin I have been working on. Unfortunately I couldn't test it on my live server, as the build software on the webserver was too out of date to build the GeoIP apache module I needed to test with.

I thought oh well, I can at least partially test it in my local dev environment. But after getting that all set up, I kept getting timeouts when connecting to the dev site (PHP wasn't responding in time).

I tried installing the latest PHP (7 beta 2), which took about a day. (No point building the latest version of PHP without also building the latest version of its dependencies). But still the same issue!

I tried playing around with the php.ini settings, running apache with nginx off, etc. various things to try and debug the issue. Eventually I found the issue. For my PHP proxy in the Apache config I had:

<Proxy fcgi://localhost/ enablereuse=on max=10>
</Proxy>

I had copied this from a page on setting up apache with PHP running as fastcgi. I didn't know what the enablereuse=on max=10 bits actually meant. I removed them, and now it seems to be working fine.

Now I can get on with the actual testing / debugging of my script!

eBay Watchlist clean up

Yesterday I added some items to my eBay watch list, but when I later checked my watchlist, they weren't there. It seems that you can't have more than 200 items in your watchlist (I'm sure I found this out before). The problem is that when you click 'Add to Watch list' on an item, the 'Add to Watch list' link disappears, and you don't get a notification that the item wasn't added because your Watch list is full. Having said that, you don't get a message saying that the item has been added to the Watch list either, but I think it's easy to misintepret the lack of message combined with the positive action of the link being removed as meaning that the item was added to the Watch list.

Anyway, as usual, here's some info from my Watch list before I clean it up:

• Samyang 14mm f/2.8 lens seems to sell on average for around £200 now. There have been quite a few auctions ending at less than that though (all prices including P&P):
  • Nikon Cine version £175
  • Nikon version £165
  • Canon version ended at 142EUR + postage (around £101) but didn't meet the reserve price)
  • Pentax version £131.49
  • Canon version (brand new) 255USD ~ £163.27
  • Nikon version £158
  • Canon version £123 - however although described as 'good condition' the photo of the rear element looked like it was covered in scratches
  And bear in mind that the Pentax and Nikon versions can be adapted to Canon with a £5 adapter. So if you wanted the Canon model, rather than paying £280 for the lens new from Amazon, you could have bought a second hand Pentax version plus an adapter for £136.50.
• A Fuji 14mm lens didn't sell for £400 (inc. P&P) on Sunday evening, but one did sell on Thursday evening for £457 (inc. P&P). Yet it's generally held that Saturday and Sunday evenings are the best times to end your auctions for a good price.
• Cokin 3 Head Detachable Flash with Filters, Manual, and Case sold for £34.90 (I think that's probably pretty cheap?)
• Adobe Production Premium CS5 for Windows sold for £225. Seems like a pretty good deal, is a few years old now but would have been over £1000 when new, and unlike CC, you don't need to worry about keep paying to keep the software working.
• A load of large size (72mm, 77mm, Tiffen 9) star and haze filters plus various caps sold for $1 plus postage (unfortunately postage to the UK was $35.93). Stupidly good deal for the buyer if they were in the US.
• And of course, as usual, there were quite a few items that were withdrawn before the auction ended, presumably because the people selling didn't think the item was going to sell for as much as they wanted.
• ROLLEI PREGO 90 AF film camera with Box, Instructions & Case sold for £14 inc P&P. I wish I'd bid a bit higher on it now.
• HYPERKIN RETRON 3 TRIPLE SYSTEM (RED) SNES / MEGADRIVE / NES with one wireless controller, 2 SNES controllers, 3 SNES games, and 3 Mega drive games sold for £54.44. I guess that's quite a good deal?
• Paramo Halcon Traveller - New - Large - Grey sold for £80 inc P&P - not an amazing deal, but pretty good as far as these jackets go.
• Canon EF 500 mm f/4.0 L IS USM Lens sold for £2520 inc. P&P - very good price for this lens
• Novoflex Castel Cross Q Macro focusing rail sold for £148.90 and £125 - both good prices for this piece of gear.
• X-Rite i1 Display PRO sold for £92 - normally this will be in the £130+ range.
• Zeiss 12mm for Fuji sold for £373.77 - a very good price for this lens in the UK. (In the UK it retails for around £700).

As for what I've been doing lately, I've mainly just been writing article for my photo tips website. It's currently taking me approximately a day and a half per article. For one article I really need to find a sleeping (or at least inactive) bee to photograph to illustrate the article, but I haven't been able to find any yet.

I've also been pretty hay feverish.