vortex reporting "extension failed to load" with timeout

[anjenthedog]

Hi,

 

I loaded vortex this morning to find it wanted to install a new extension. (first time I think I've ever seen it do that). At which point it automatically started whatever the download/install process was and encountered a timeout error and froze

 

tried it three times

 

SO...

 

1) what is this extension

 

2) why is there a timeout?

 

thanks

[Guest deleted34304850]

a number of game extensions have been released, presumably it was one of them.

timeouts - welcome to the internet.

[HellFreezer]

Every user request sent to a server on the Internet starts a timer clock that will reach a predetermined limit then "time out' if the server fails to respond in a timely manner, for any of a number of various reasons. By design, every pending request MUST expire when the designated time limit is reached by the running clock. The time limit may vary slightly depending on factors such as the number of "simultaneous" requests received and queued up waiting, the bandwidth of the connection, the number of parallel servers connected to divide up and share the traffic load, etc. The timer clock typically runs in units of milliseconds. The time out interval might vary from seconds to a minute or two. The user side can't wait indefinitely, forever, and should not. A request should not knock on a door ceaselessly for an unreasonably long period unanswered, especially if it is one of hundreds or thousands knocking on the same portal every second. If the waiting requests don't expire and so automatically cease, then the service will quickly grind to a halt and functionally go off line. That is the nature and purpose of the common "denial of service" (DOS) hacker attacks against a targeted Web server that overwhelms the bandwidth limit by orders of magnitude to cripple it within seconds to minutes. You may have heard of that phenomenon.

 

So normally your client software should report back to you, IF well designed, that the request "timed out" (default setting?) or more helpfully in layman's terms, something like "the server failed to respond in a timely manner. Please try your request again at a later time." A poorly designed "client" app, might not respond in text at all, but just spin away endlessly long after the failure and the connection was actually dropped. That would obviously be confusing and frustrating, but it's not rare unfortunately. Perhaps you've witnessed a perpetually spinning hourglass or unending progress bar creeping imperceptibly across a screen, perhaps inducing you to conclude "it's locked up" or frozen. It may be a case where the software is failing to recognize and appropriately "handle" a failure state. Indeed the Internet while robust and durable by design, is nevertheless an imperfect system, like everything in the world. We're all in the same boat, if that's any consolation.

 

Your option is to try again "later" at a supposed "less busy" time. In reality that might be any time from immediately, to hours later ("off hours"), to days later if the specific service or serving host entity actually experienced a catastrophic failure such as being forced off line by a successful ransomware attack, data security breach, DOS, etc, etc.

Good luck

[HellFreezer]

BTW, in your example, Vortex client app responded succinctly with the very basic minimal required facts, thusly:

1. the request was to download an (unnamed) extension (from the nexusmods servers assigned to Vortex, for automatic processing), and...

2. the request timed out, unserved.