del.icio.us not so delicious anymore

You know, I've been using the del.icio.us online bookmarking service for a while. And while it's been slow sometimes, it's never spewed system errors like I started seeing this week:

System error
error: Can't call method "prepare" on an undefined value at /www/del.icio.us/comp/user/get line 13.
context:
...
9: my $usedb = 'master';
10: my $ret;
11:
12: if (!$auth_user) { $usedb = 'user' }
13: if (!exists ($db->{$usedb})) { $usedb = 'master' }
14: $user_name_q->{$usedb} = $db->{$usedb}->prepare('select * from users where user_name = ?');
15: my $query = $user_name_q->{$usedb};
16: $query->execute(lc($user_name));
17:
...
code stack: /www/del.icio.us/comp/user/get:13
/www/del.icio.us/site/dhandler:194
/www/del.icio.us/site/autohandler:110
raw error

Can't call method "prepare" on an undefined value at /www/del.icio.us/comp/user/get line 13.


Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 131
HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "prepare" on an undefined value at /www/del.icio.us/comp/user/get line 13.^J') called at /www/del.icio.us/comp/user/get line 13
HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__('dbh', undef, 'user_name', 'sparckl', 'auth_user', 'sparckl') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 134
HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x1d323e0)', 'dbh', undef, 'user_name', 'sparckl', 'auth_user', 'sparckl') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1069
eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1068
HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, 'dbh', undef, 'user_name', 'sparckl', 'auth_user', 'sparckl') called at /www/del.icio.us/site/dhandler line 194
HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__('dbh', undef, 'auth_user', 'sparckl', 'items', 100, 'tagview', 'list', 'tagsort', 'alpha', 'bundleview', 'show', 'cookies', 'HASH(0x1d81370)', 'browser', 'ff') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 134
HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x1d23730)', 'dbh', undef, 'auth_user', 'sparckl', 'items', 100, 'tagview', 'list', 'tagsort', 'alpha', 'bundleview', 'show', 'cookies', 'HASH(0x1d81370)', 'browser', 'ff') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1074
eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1068
HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, 'dbh', undef, 'auth_user', 'sparckl', 'items', 100, 'tagview', 'list', 'tagsort', 'alpha', 'bundleview', 'show', 'cookies', 'HASH(0x1d81370)', 'browser', 'ff') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 760
HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x1ed82a0)', 'dbh', undef, 'auth_user', 'sparckl', 'items', 100, 'tagview', 'list', 'tagsort', 'alpha', 'bundleview', 'show', 'cookies', 'HASH(0x1d81370)', 'browser', 'ff') called at /www/del.icio.us/site/autohandler line 110
HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 134
HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x1af7990)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1069
eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1068
HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 338
eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 338
eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 297
HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x1ed82a0)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 134
eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 134
HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x1ed82a0)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 793
HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x1ab5610)', 'Apache=SCALAR(0x1efda90)') called at (eval 43) line 8
HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache=SCALAR(0x1efda90)') called at /dev/null line 0
eval {...} at /dev/null line 0

Now, without implying any sort of causal relationship, I'd also like to point out that Yahoo! bought del.icio.us last week. Perhaps the del.icio.us servers just weren't ready to withstand the onslaught of new users and gawkers attracted by the publicity. Perhaps del.icio.us should have expected and prepared for such an eventuality.

Yahoo! bought del.icio.us, and now del.icio.us has begun to suck.

I'm just saying.