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State of the Bugs
There have been a few threads about myTPM problems. I'd like to use this post to share our official bug list with readers, and collect other issues you are experiencing. Most of what you telling us are already known issues. But if other bugs crop up, I'd like to hear about them. Here's what we're working on:
Also - for the best user experience, I highly highly recommend using the latest version of Firefox or Safari. A few of these bugs (mostly style and layout issues) only affect Internet Explorer users, and using a modern browser will give you a much better web experience in general.
- The footer of the site sometimes floats up to the top when logged on IE7
- Layout and dashboard avatar grid problems with IE6
- Archives not updating on the All Reader Posts page (I can mitigate this somewhat by posting occasional archive rescue entries, but we're working on a real solution)
- YOUR BLOG button in the top nav bar not working if your username has spaces in it. (In the meantime, you can get to your blog with this url pattern: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/your_username_with_spaces). We're working on making this automatic.
- Certain non-blog content showing up in dashboard e.g. headlines, polls, etc.
- HTML code showing up in the dashboard
- Comments and Recommends tabs on blogs not updating
Also - for the best user experience, I highly highly recommend using the latest version of Firefox or Safari. A few of these bugs (mostly style and layout issues) only affect Internet Explorer users, and using a modern browser will give you a much better web experience in general.
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Hey Al. On the avatar grid, it seems a little more complicated. If I try to use IE6 (which I never do except for multimedia), I have no sidebar in my dash or profile. But I'm regularly using Firefox and still only view a line of the 8 most recently "followed" users in my profile, with no "See All" link. This isn't a big deal, I just get there through my profile, but figured you should know.
You obviously know the comments thing. The other thing is that I get a movable type error when I click on certain poster's profiles. I think I saw this on at least 2 peoples' profiles but I can only find one now:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/julian_smith/
However, if you change the underline to the old %20, it actually takes you to a page:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/julian%20smith/
Only the only thing that is updated are the recs, not the comments. I'm assuming that's somehow tied into the issues with the users who have spaces in their names.
Also, this is random and not really related to the software switch, but why is it that some posters manage to post more than two links in their comments and other's only 2?
October 24, 2008 10:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, scratch that first half. You were right Al, I hadn't updated Firefox. So the avatar grid is right in FF3. (Sorry about that!)
Still get those couple movable type errors though.
October 24, 2008 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
As you suspected Hilary, that's connected to the users w/ spaces in their names problem.
October 24, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks, I'll go back and check with FF2 and earlier. Those movable type errors are related to spaces in usernames, which we're trying to clear up.
October 24, 2008 10:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Very few of the menu options in the drop down lists for the tool bar buttons at the top (create, manage, design, etc.) are not active for my editor.
October 24, 2008 10:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
Very few are active or very few are not? Or, to be more specific, which buttons *are* active?
October 24, 2008 10:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry Andrew. I am a notoriously terrible editor.
Very few are active.
Under:
Create - only 'entry' is active
Manage - only 'homepage', 'entries', 'comments', and 'trackbacks' are active
Design - none are active
Preferences - none active
Tools - none are active
Thanks for all that you all do.
October 24, 2008 10:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
By the way I am using FF2 and Windows Vista. I tried IE7 and the same buttons are active.
October 24, 2008 10:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good to know, thanks for the update, Al. I do often like to just fall back on Firefox when IE is giving me headaches.
October 24, 2008 11:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hi Al, thanks for starting this thread.
Could you please please please tell me why I cannot load my avatar on to my profile page? Every time I try, it kicks me way out and I have to log on again.
I really do hope you will give me a reply on this thread.
October 24, 2008 11:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hi Evainne. What do you mean, specifically? What are you doing when it kicks you out?
October 24, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for replying, Al. When I go into My Profiles to load my avatar and then when I click on save, it kicks me out with a "movabletype session has ended" page. And then I have to log in all over again. I hope you can help me. Clearing cookies and cache does not help. Tried it already.
October 24, 2008 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
What is the format of the image you are trying to upload?
October 24, 2008 6:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Not sure if my blog is gonna show up:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/therap/2008/10/october-surprise-its-viral.php
I can see it in my "blog" - but not seeing it in the Cafe list. Or on "all reader posts" either.
Thanks for any help!
October 24, 2008 11:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
I see it in all three places: your blog, cafe sidebar and reader blog.
October 24, 2008 11:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
Re: "I highly highly recommend using the latest version of Firefox or Safari. A few of these bugs (mostly style and layout issues) only affect Internet Explorer users, and using a modern browser will give you a much better web experience in general."
A "modern browser"???!!! Really? My web design customers would fire me if I suggested something like that. Really!
It seems that TPM is more interested in servicing a market segment, rather than the whole of internet users. To suggest that users switch to some other browser to accommodate the inadequacies of your software is, well, ludicrous. Responsible development dictates that your system should work with the standard systems used by real people and not just those used by a select group. This statement fails to take into account users who may be visiting TPM on office computers or other systems where they are not at liberty to install alternative browswers or other tools.
For recent usage statistics from one group click the link.
W3Schools is a website for people with an interest for web technologies. These people are more interested in using alternative browsers than the average user. The average user tends to use Internet Explorer, since it comes preinstalled with Windows. Most do not seek out other browsers.
These facts indicate that the browser figures above are not 100% realistic. Other web sites have statistics showing that Internet Explorer is used by at least 80% of the users.
TPM can establish "minimum" standards or sys configs that you will support, but do recognize that if you put a product out for general use on the internet, it needs to work for general use. Your test beds need to support real-world users -- many of whom have settled on configs that work for all of the tasks they use their computers for and not just blogging at TPM.
Sorry to be bitching about this, but someone must.
October 24, 2008 11:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Jade, we know what percentage of our readers use what browsers, and we're doing everything we can do accommodate all of the user cases.
Al was just saying that in general older browswers are harder to code for because they aren't as good and are less frequently used. It's not an issue of giving up on others, it's just an issue of letting you know what we think the best way to experience the site is free of the glitches we're working every day to kill.
October 24, 2008 12:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have on three occasions upgraded to FF 3 and three times I have uninstalled it and reloaded FF 2. Many FF Add-ons I use have not been upgraded to work with FF3, my bank's bill pay function doesn't wok with FF 3, and I had problems at other websites which I don't experience with FF 2.
October 24, 2008 2:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
You might start worrying about your bank's website security. It might also be a good idea to try IE7 for you bank's business. In my experience, banks have been slow moving to web standards and cross browser compatibility.
Which plug-ins are you using that do not work in FF3? Have you attempted to find analogs for them? Are they no longer being actively developed?
October 24, 2008 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
There is another side to this argument. Why should my web experience be hamstrung by persons who do not upgrade their software? There is something to be said for coding websites with backwards compatibility, but it can only look so far into the past. No one would be happy if this site were coded for compatibility with NS4 or IE4. I do not think any website should be expected to write code that will run in IE5 anymore either.
You find a lot of FireFox/Safari evangelicalism amongst web coders, because they are tired of having to deal with Microsoft's arrogance about web standards. MS is a member of W3C. They should at the very least put an honest effort into complying with web standards in their browser releases, instead of adding to a preexistent buggy platform, and playing around with proprietary software plug-ins. Pressure from the web coding side will be felt by MS if it's applied properly. This isn't an anti MS screed. I still use Windows as my default OS at home. I also keep a linux/apache box setup for a sandboxed server implementation. Still, MS should quit waging browser war, and start coding a decent browser platform that approaches web standards compliance.
There can be no Web 2.0 without forgetting about Web 1.0 browsers.
October 24, 2008 3:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks, pseudo. Couldn't have said it better myself.
October 24, 2008 5:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've seen some of the html code showing up, but haven't been attempting to analyse it. Where I've remeber seeing it so far:
- poorly coded RSS feeds
- an html tag into a post title (only remember "i", but "b" probably does it too)
- html img tags in comments read via MyTPM
I'll watch for more specific cases.Some of these problems are bound to be caused by client-side anti-spyware programs. A few days ago, helping someone who lost access on a board somewhere else, required that they shut down a module in the for pay version of AVG anti-virus. (AVG was right, BTW, the site uses a promiscuous ad partner for some pop-unders--last month a diferent user clicked that nasty win update trojan being served in it--FYI, Spybot Search and Destroy nails it without having to reset Win restore points, i think...)
The IE7 float bug is ironic to me. Does style="position:fixed;" work in IE7? You might try initiating something akin to
Yahoo! UI Library: Reset CSS
and see if that solves any bugs. Browsers do unpredictable weirdness with CSS from the ether, when encountering html tags that have no CSS code to go with them on a page. I haven't been back here long enough to have been looking at this site's includes, but suspect there are entirely different CSS includes being served when one visits the MyTPM pages. If you reproduce bugs tha may be CSS related, try toggling on/off the CSS within the browser to see if that solves the issue.
October 24, 2008 2:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Al,
here's a weird one:
screenshot
TPM Link to post.
A quick glance at the page code indicates that this is a rich text paste from MS Word, and the style code wasn't stripped out. what a mess, have fun...
October 24, 2008 9:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
My comments and Recommends lists have not been updated on my user profile for four days now. The last one currently on my list is October 21, 2008 2:51 PM.
I made several of them on Reed Hundt's thread starting October 23, 2008 9:14 AM. That's just one I happened to remember being on.
For a short while before the 21st they were being updated a bit more frequently, though still not immmediately.
Until updating of profiles works in a timely manner, makes it impossible to come back and follow a conversation with anyone on any threads but one's own. The chat-room-like quickly scrolling Dashboard function is fun, and will eventually serve as a good way to filter for all users. But it doesn't help track continued discussion. You really need that updating of profiles to go beyond the "hit with a comment and run," and also to go beyond "everyone write their own blog on the same topic and not talk to each other" thing.
October 25, 2008 2:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
My comment RSS feed's last update was:
2008-10-23T00:01:01Z
Artappriaiser, you can obtain that timestamp by mousing over the RSS Feed link, rightClick-Save link as, and then open it up in a text editor. You find the data after the tag:
October 25, 2008 3:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, I am freaked out now. I see your reply on the Dashbaord, check the comments on my profile, and all of a sudden they have all been updated to my last comment! After they have been stuck on October 21 every day since then, every time I have checked!
I don't understand totally what you are saying. Are you saying there is an update button on my comments RSS feed that will update my comments? That you just udpated my comments by hitting it?
If that's the case, does that mean it's each user's responsibility to update their own comments? If so, if that's the system we are dealing with here, shouldn't there be a link right on each Profile page that says "update this user's comments if you want to see their current ones instead of their old ones"?
October 25, 2008 3:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, I never looked at your RSS Feed. RSS feeds are not updated when you look at them. My RSS feed still has the same 10/23 datestamp. I cannot be say for sure if the RSS feed has a direct correlation to your comments in MyTPM, but on cursory reflection, it seems to be likely.
What I was attempting to explain to you is how to extract the datestamp for the last update of your RSS feed. This works the same for anybody's RSS Feed. Right-Click on the link, and a context box appears. If you use Internet Explorer, Highlight:
and right-click it. If you use Firefox, Hightlight: The file will be saved to your hardrive named: Open that up in a text editor, and look for The first entry after that will show the last time your RSS Feed was updated. The reason I'm telling you to open this up in a text editor is because I doubt that you have a default XML editor, but if you do, just click on the file, and it will open up within that program.This probably has something to do with the way the database is updating. Recent comments are not being put into the table they are extracted from for display on the site instantly, and some update process that moves the data to the proper table is not happening very often. If you are still confused, it's my fault for using unintelligible jargon, so just keep asking questions until I can de-geekify a response.
October 25, 2008 4:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
my bad. After you right-click and highlight the choice of the RSS link , left-click it.
October 25, 2008 4:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here's a possible correlation: I just published a blog post, and both My Posts and Comments RSS feeds were updated at the same time. Maybe this is a key to understanding the update process. I'll keep an eye on it.
October 26, 2008 8:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
Certainly that correlation was the case with my own post about comments not updating (my second last blog post.) If you look at it, my first comment there right after posting the blog is along the lines "squeaky wheel gets the grease, my comments have updated." They were updated shortly after I posted that.
October 26, 2008 11:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Al, there is a problem which needs to be addressed. Someone, using the ID truthseeker, put up a blog - see below for link - publicly slamming Ms Joanne, another Cafe blogger.
However, and this is the reason I'm writing you now, when you go to comment to truthseeker's offensive blog, you accidentally might (as I did) recommend the blog. Because comments have been disabled by truthseeker!
I didn't even realize a user could disable comments.
Thankfully, another blog has now been set up by Aunt Sam, so Cafe users can at the very least, as I did, express their distress at the first blog as well the lack of ability to comment to that blog.
Here's the blog in question where there is no way to comment (and where I am willing to bet just about every rec'd is an accidental rec'd by someone who intended to express displeasure instead):
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/truthseeker77/2008/10/clueless-msjoanne-wants-my-ret.php
And here's the "good citizen" blog where, thanks to Aunt Sam, it's possible to discuss the offensive blog and apologize to the user for truthteller's behavior:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/aunt_sam/2008/10/comment-for-truthseeker---apol.php
I hope this isn't too confusing. But truly I find this whole thing very distressing. And it seems like a bug in the system to me - if someone can write something offensive and then disable comments to their offensive post, while at the same time making it likely that the offensive post gets on the rec list!
Seems to me Cafe management needs to put a stop to this somehow. Ban truthseeker and/or fix the problem, which he or she is taking advantage of.
Thanks for your assistance.
October 27, 2008 12:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
TheraP, in the "Write Entry" screen of MyTPM, lower right column, under the heading, "Feedback", there are radio button choices for disabling comments and track-backs in a post. The default choice for both is enabled. It is exceedingly unlikely that either your or I would ever choose to disable comments in our blog posts, but others may very well have a different opinion about that function, and there may be valid reasons why someone would do so.
If truthseeker has disabled comments to do nastiness, then simply make note of this, along with mention of this user's cowardice by disabling comments, in your own blog. There is much more freedom within your own blog than as a commenter to another's blog anyway.
October 27, 2008 12:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, I went in to the "blog now" and saw that right before I noticed your comment here.
Given the fact that it's so easy for someone to accidentally "recommend" when comments have been disabled, I still think you'd have to call this a "bug" in the system. Unless there is an "un-recommend" option, it allows a user to disable comments and get their blog on the rec list, as a kind of "error default."
It's interesting how problems in the larger society show up in smaller communities.
So good to have you here, PCA!!!! I really mean that.
October 27, 2008 1:35 AM | Reply | Permalink