After the upgrade - post issues here

Arlette,

Compared to some I'm a relative newbie here but since I joined every change that has been made to the forum has been a complete and utter screw up of one form or another. Once you've been around a bit longer you get as frustrated and pessimistic as the rest of us.

Dom

Arlette,

Is two years long enough to fix the forum.. ?

Arlette, excuse me, but I think you have no idea what you are talking about. This forum has a history of success, but ever since Vai took it over three years ago, it has been going steadily downhill with regards to user experience, management, people skills and communications. You've been a member for less than 6 months and I find that in your posts so far you always strongly lean towards Vai's position. Maybe it's a regional thing. Maybe a cultural one. To me, you sound very much like a claqueur. But this is an international forum and Vai is riding it into the ground.

< I need to take a walk around the block, otherwise, I won't be allowed to post here anymore ..... >

Hi guys when you have a mo check this out http://www.excelforum.com/showthread...=1#post2675451 and the last 4 - 5 posts of that thread

@ teylyn

I too have experienced this

I'v written a post, with lots of descriptions and a train of thought, clearly structured and addressing several issues in the OP's question.

I've taken to writing my posts in NotePad, saving NotePad, copy/paste NotePad to the Forum. Long way around, more than frustrating, but not NEARLY as frustrating as losing it all. Let's hope they can get this fixed...soon.

@Jaslake, i'd be interested to hear how you go on over the next day or two as Vai has taken my advice and is working towards doing this right

@Simon Lloyd...I'll be happy to accommodate as I can...been feeling quite punky for the last several days and, as a result, have not been terribly active on the Forum. Today the Doc gave me some good drugs...perhaps that'll help me get back in the saddle.

(wrote this directly, without NotePad)

I would be remiss if I did not admit I developed the habit a year ago of COPYING the text of my posts before hitting the SUBMIT button, I'm so used to having to retrieve them and try again....

@JB
In interest of full disclosure...the practice as described that I use has also been in place for some time...well before the upgrade.

Where are my recent posts?

Originally Posted by teylyn

Vai, for the umpteenth time in a week now, I'v written a post, with lots of descriptions and a train of thought, clearly structured and addressing several issues in the OP's question.

I submit it and get a Database error. No way to get my text back. It's gone

I've just about had it.

Do something about the forum reliability. This is an insult to anybody who contributes here.

Your full-mouthed, big fonted announcements that everything is running smoothly now, that the bugs have been fixed now are worth NOTHING!
Your Alexa ratings are dropping dramatically. Can you see why?

I have just about had it. I too have written code for people only to get a database error and lose everything.

Why is such a simple process being screwed up so badly? I love this forum, or should I say its members, as they have helped me so much, but at the current rate I am inclined to go else where.

I hope I am not out of line, but please get someone who knows what they are doing to get the site functional.

Fair play to you for continuing to try. If I've understood correctly Vai has accepted his team are out of their depth and is getting a bit of help from Simon so hopefully things will improve soon. As it's just taken me over 5 minutes to log on and post this I won't be trying to answer anything for a bit yet.

Dom

Is everything fixed now then? Haven't seen an update for a few days.

Dom

I've not had any major problems so far this week

I had DB errors yesterday.

@arthurbr
Things appear to be MUCH improved over the last several days. Not perfect (but we weren't perfect before). I'd encourage you to give it a try...see what you think.

wrong icon
EF_skype.GIF

I had DB errors briefly this morning at about 09:45-10:00, give or take.

Maybe I am missing something, but before when you performed a search you could narrow the search to a particular section of the forum. I do not see this as an option anymore or have I overlooked something?

Hi Jeff,

In the Advanced Search screen, it defaults to the "Search Multiple Content Types" tab. (Can't say I find a use for it..) If you click the "Search Single Content Type" tab, you'll see a listbox where you can select one or more sub-forums.

Originally Posted by e4excel

I think the search is finally functional however there are certain things which i am not able to follow such as the Order of the Searched THreads..

Now THey dont seeem to follow any order or is there something that I am missing as I remember very clearly what was my first thread but its not coming up at all..

I've found the same with the dates and have posted in the forum search thread.

@Marcol: wouldn't have expected any less. What would be good, and is becoming increasingly necessary, is the ability to address and resolve the posts without having to log into the forum.

Regards, TMS

@Marcol: wouldn't have expected any less. What would be good, and is becoming increasingly necessary, is the ability to address and resolve the posts without having to log into the forum.

Regards, TMS

who said we have no readers minds?! ))

I am getting so sick of seeing this ...

Leave the Page.jpg

When this happens, I have to confirm that I want to leave the page, close that tab, again confirm that I want to leave the page and then close down any other tabs connected to the forum ... sometimes even having to close Internet Explorerer (IE9). Then after opening up IE9 again, checking in to the forum and opening up my CP, I generally find that the post was accepted. It's so easy to end up with duplicate posts, it's ridiculous.

As I've been using the forum for about 18 months, I'm familiar with should and shouldn't happen. GH any new users who don't know what's going on. Oddly enough, my ipad seems to cope better so maybe it's IE9 that's contributing to the problem

TMS

Good grief: it actually happened when I was posting the last message.

No, it's not IE9, I am using Firefox 6 and getting the exact same issues.....

.... let's see how long this one takes to post!

I am really getting sick and tired of this... it's been over a month!!!! WTF does it take to get it right!

I'm on FireFox and getting that exact same thing, taking multiple multiple multiple (did I say multiple?) attempts to get the page to refresh... the site is stalling for up to five minutes at a time when this happens....

....which gives me time to go work on other Excel forums, guess that's a good thing.

Same issues on Chrome.

I'm starting to wonder if Vai just thinks there's enough previously answered questions in the history that a forum that works isn't important and he can just rake in the advertising profits from the non-members. Let's face it if you knew how cr@p things were you certainly wouldn't join with the intention of helping out around here now.

Dom

I wonder if the people who post the most take longer? My MO has been to attach a file, as an example, to show my answer. I'm concerned that any new attached file needs to be extracted from the message and put somewhere else, that takes extra time.

I to have waited more than 10 seconds with the spinning hourglass, waiting to get to another place in the forum. It seems that closing my browser and starting it again is the only way to check to see if my post/answer was accepted. I've started to copy and paste my post into notepad, just in case the post wasn't accepted and I need to submit it again.

All this makes me go elsewhere to help others.

I also have noticed that Rep points aren't being accumulated correctly. It seems I had a number that didn't increase after a few positive reps and comments were submitted.

I'd like to know how long I may need to wait after attaching a file, using Advanced formatting and having multiple tabs from my browser looking at the same post. What is taking so long???

Edit - this post was recognized and came back in less than 2 seconds.. Now can they all be like this one?

I suppose we need to rename this subforum into the 'water boiler'

This is nothing! If you want to see some proper moaning head over to a Leeds United forum

Dom

PS Bates Out!!!

Originally Posted by Marcol

I think the upgrade is magical
I solved this one within 9 minutes without even looking!!! ...

And that thread has two posts but no views???????

Originally Posted by TMShucks

I am getting so sick of seeing this ...

Attachment 137867

When this happens, ..........TMS

It's to do with the way the forum runs it's HTML/Javascript with the current version of PHP, there's some subtle changes that need making to make this go away!

Originally Posted by JBeaucaire

I'm on FireFox and getting that exact same thing, taking multiple multiple multiple (did I say multiple?) attempts to get the page to refresh... the site is stalling for up to five minutes at a time when this happens....

....which gives me time to go work on other Excel forums, guess that's a good thing.

It will happen in all browsers unfortunately!

@Vai, i'm still not getting notifications when i should, sometimes i get double notification and then others i get nothing.


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

@MarvinP:

I also have noticed that Rep points aren't being accumulated correctly. It seems I had a number that didn't increase after a few positive reps and comments were submitted.

Do the rep points have a green box or a grey box. Seems a grey box indicates an OP doesn't have "rep power". Strange that I've been posting for over 18 months and never experienced this before. Doesn't seem quite right that if I fix something for someone who is very new to the forum, they can't reward me with rep points.

Regards, TMS

In case Vai is interested here's the fix for the annoying pop up, in clientscript/vbulletin_textedit.js file change it this:

{YAHOO.util.Event.addListener(window,"beforeunload",this.exit_prompt,this,true)}

to:

{YAHOO.util.Event.addListener(window,"beforeunload",this.exit_prompt,this,false)}

And all should be well!


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

Seem like an easy enough fix that this "magic" team of Vai's should know how to fix, isn't it?

Also, I am getting "grey" reputations too... so probably another programming screw up by the "team"

Andrew opened a thread for the magic grey rep!
http://www.excelforum.com/the-water-...s-of-grey.html

To whom it may concern:

OK, I give in ... I really enjoy answering questions and get a great sense of satisfaction from helping people. It keeps my brain active ... there's only so many sudoku puzzles you can do ... and I learn as I go.

However, the frustration caused by all the problems, in particular the "Leave This Page" debacle leaves me speechless ... almost.

Anyway, I'm going to take a week or two out and see if things improve. My wife will think it's because she keeps telling me to "get a life" but I can live with that; no reason for her to think anything else And, who knows, it might break the habit and I can find something else to occupy my time

Shame, because I've enjoyed the atmosphere here. But it seems a lot of the people who "make the forum" are voting with their keyboards, so I think I will follow their lead.

Regards, TMS

TMS, before you bow out how about a small experiment?, unless the "Team" have changed other code this should give you a small release, turn off javascript in your browser (or install another browser and turn off that JS if you dont want to chnage the settings of your current one), the vBulletin family of software were always built to cater for those that dont have JS turned on, naturally some nice things may not be available to you but back in days of old you could hardly tell the difference if JS was on or not.

Give it a go before you go elsewhere or have a break


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

That seems to temporarily fix it, Simon. Thanks.

I will have to remember to re-instate it or decide if it is worth it to keep it off after browsing elsewhere....

Originally Posted by NBVC

That seems to temporarily fix it, Simon. Thanks.

I will have to remember to re-instate it or decide if it is worth it to keep it off after browsing elsewhere....

As you can see it doesn't affect too much in the way of operation here and i'm glad it worked for you, but as you say it is only temporary, and yes it may affect your browsing pleasure elsewhere. If the fix i posted gets done then everyone can be happier


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

Hi Simon.

Thanks for encouraging me to stay but I think I'm going to pass for the moment.

Currently, I have Safari running with JavaScript switched off. I tried to update a post with some example data embedded in HTML tags. When I saved it, it thought about it for a long time before apearing not to do anything. I tried again and thought it had been successful only to find my nicely aligned example is now all on one line. Not quite what I intended.

You have my email address, or the means to get it, so, if you want to talk to me offline at some point, let's do that.

I commend you on you remarkable patience which doesn't seem to be appreciated.

Regards, TMS

Arthurbr, thanks for the accolade , funny enough it just took around 90 secs for the forum to load for me!


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

......and 30 secs to make that last post!


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

Vai time to make Simon head of your team .. you need to .. arr.. i'm wasting my breath .. Vai will do what he wants when he wants .. stuff what any one else thinks or how the forum performs!

A post worth reading from one of our users....

http://www.excelforum.com/excel-prog...book-2.html#16

Originally Posted by JBeaucaire

A post worth reading from one of our users....

http://www.excelforum.com/excel-prog...book-2.html#16

I don't think thats issues with the forum, my corporate firewall is just as strict, some JS driven items it won't allow and then some HTML it wont allow!


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

Originally Posted by Simon Lloyd

TMS, before you bow out how about a small experiment?, unless the "Team" have changed other code this should give you a small release, turn off javascript in your browser (or install another browser and turn off that JS if you dont want to chnage the settings of your current one), the vBulletin family of software were always built to cater for those that dont have JS turned on, naturally some nice things may not be available to you but back in days of old you could hardly tell the difference if JS was on or not.

This seems to be excellent advice! I have just installed Firefox with the NoScript addon and so far the forum seems much better. It may be coincidence but it is certainly worthwhile testing.

@Simon: early days but Firefox with the NoScript addon does seem to help. Better than Safari with scripts blocked, anyway. I'm not getting my hopes up though.

I'll see how it goes for the moment ... but next DB error or general crash, I'll be taking some R&R time.

Regards

The most remarkable thing is the complete absence of any comment from the owner of the forum over the last few days.

I'm sure he'll eventually come around and assure us that his team is working hard and that all issues are now fixed.

For me, this forum has degraded to banana software. And I think this should be its theme song:

http://youtu.be/Sdn3O6aaMNc

cheers,

We got the irritating popup (more of an eyesore wasnt it?)

To be honest, no it wasn't more of an eyesore, and it wasn't just irritating. It was frustrating and, I would have thought, a cause for concern for you. It damaged any confidence that might have been growing, was/is keeping away some of your best contributors and is wasting resources in duplicated and triplicated posts ... amongst other things.

How you can just gloss over it is beyond me.

And the grey reps isn't something to be ignored either. It's recognition, a tick in the box for effort. You need to sort it out, and quickly.

Let's hope the negative rep's work correctly; I just send Vai a neg rep because of his disregarding member's comments.

Vai i'm glad you employed the Yahoo JS fix i posted, now if you'll take a look at the settings you should be able to clear up any further issues with the rep system (as long as the template coding hasn't been compromised).


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

Simon, I wonder: If you do all the work sorting out their problems, why don't you get the credit?

I sincerely hope that Vai will compensate you in real value for your contributions to fixing the forum issues.

At the very least, he should void forum rule #13, which has never been agreed by any moderator, and you should be allowed to link to http://www.thecodecage.com in your signature.

Posts per user don't display correctly.

A user has 2 posts on the forum. Clicking on the user name to display the forum posts lists only one post; the most recent one is missing. This is useless. It used to show ALL posts by the user, even the most recent one.

Vai, whatever indexing you are using right now does not work.

Vai,

TRY TESTING SOME OF THESE CHANGES YOU ARE MAKING RATHER THAN IRRITATING PEOPLE MORE AND MAKING THIS JOKE OF AN UPGRADE EVEN MORE TIRESOME AND EMBARASSING!!!

Dom

I've posted this before. It has been deleted. I'll keep posting it.

production.jpg

I don't know how many times I have posted a response with a file uploaded only to get a database error and have to do it all over again. Are the database errors being sorted out?

Apparently not...

Originally Posted by Vaibhav

You should not be receiving any dbase errors on the forum, however if you do, feel free to get back to us and we will sort it out immediately.

Dom

Is this an upgrade issue or is it me. For me this Thread will only appear in Printable View...http://www.excelforum.com/excel-prog...int-print.html

I think it is because the title ends with 'print'.

It is because the thread title ends in "print". I've adjusted the title so it will now appear correctly.

http://www.excelforum.com/excel-prog...-the-list.html

Originally Posted by jaslake

Is this an upgrade issue or is it me. For me this Thread will only appear in Printable View...http://www.excelforum.com/excel-prog...int-print.html

I can see that in standard format (not using your link) so it must be an issue local to you.


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

@ Simon
Seems Paul has fixed my issue

It is because the thread title ends in "print". I've adjusted the title so it will now appear correctly

@ Paul
I'm now able to access the Thread and download the attachment...thank you.

@ On ErrorGoTo0
Yes, you appear to have been correct...thanks

@Vai: please fix the grey rep count problem. It shouldn't be that difficult and shouldn't have any major impact on other key functionality.

I enjoy the challenge of resolving problems and the gratitude of the people I help ... but I also enjoy the recognition.

I have continued to persevere through your difficult times but I'm going to stop posting in this forum until this is resolved.

I'm lost with where to post this ...

The message about navigating away from the page seems to have gone to some extent.
However it has been replaced with

This forum requires that you wait 30 seconds between posts. Please try again in 15 seconds.

If anybody can post twice within 30secs on this forum I'd be very surprised.
Why does the Forum want to post twice, it's certainly not me?

Hey Val,

I don't know what TMShucks means by grey rep but I just got two "thanks" on my rep settings page and the total went down. Did you try to fix the Reputation totals and put a negative sign in front of new entries? For your info, I went from 1691 (or so) to 1683 (or so) after the last two positive reps.

Do I get negative rep for looking at the settings page to see what my rep is? It does seem a little punative to get rep points subtracted for people saying thanks. I wonder if TMS has posted since his last one above? Please fix this reputation summation problem!!

Another question. I'm an awful speller. Does the spell check icon work above the message boxes?

@MarvinP: actually, I have ... I felt guilty about leaving an OP in limbo, so I answered the question. My rep has also gone down from around 2096 to 2087.

I guess this is a case of "be careful for what you wish for"

@Vai ... WTF???????????????

@MarvinP: actually, I have ... I felt guilty about leaving an OP in limbo, so I answered the question. My rep has also gone down from around 2096 to 2087.

I guess this is a case of "be careful for what you wish for"

@Vai ... WTF???????????????

I think they have perhaps incorporated a randomiser so the rep system is now a lucky (or unlucky) dip. they probably need to adapt the tag lines too - "MarvinP is unsure where he stands now" and so on.

I cannot wait to see the status when I return from dealing with my clients next week. Iwonder if the forum will still be here.

Given that the search option doesn't apply anymore, I thought I would keep track of one of the threads that I responded to by subscribing to it. I was not notified when there were more posts added to it. Seriously, wtf?

@ Alf
I believe I lost 10 points.

well, someone has taken 9 points from me!
I'm wondering if the tech team knows something about'em....hi guys, I want'em back!

I lost 9 points..

Originally Posted by Mordred

Given that the search option doesn't apply anymore, I thought I would keep track of one of the threads that I responded to by subscribing to it. I was not notified when there were more posts added to it. Seriously, wtf?

Just a note, you only get notification of new posts once you revisit the thread, until then you only get one, so scenario is:
You post and leave>Op posts (notification sent)>New Helper posts>Op posts>New Helper posts>You visit after reading notification, go "WTF?" (notification sending reset)>Op posts (as long as you're not currently viewing thread new notification sent)

You can code a solution whereby folk are notified every time as i have one but to be honest if you are a busy poster your inbox would fill up quick


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

Guess what, i got my reps back.....i just checked...

wow!
yeap, I rcvd them back too! Merlin is in action! )

I have a possible reason for grey rep squares.....

If the reputation dialog is brought up and no radio button is clicked then Val doesn't know if it is green or red. It then comes out as grey. If a user clicks on the radio button then it goes to green.???

I think it is a problem with the initial state of the rep radio buttons and not being captured by the program. ???

I also got my rep back in my settings screen. Now I wonder if it is really correct?

Mine have been reinstated.

let's test it...

My rep count is mended ... I did think about a happy smiley but, you know what, I can't be ar$ed

Hey all,

The negative rep came in due to a slight change in one of the settings. This has been restored. All the reps have been reversed to their original value.

Also, the grey reps have always been a part of the rep system. Its due to rep power.

Vai, have you ever wondered why all mods and staff details (underneath your username) appear bold and blue? the html is poorly formed, take a look at the forum home you'll see that any user that appears after a mod or admin appears bold...etc!


Google Me
Find me located here Simon Lloyd and what i'm about Here
The above is NOT a link to a forum so is NOT against Rule 13

HEY - I just did about 6 answers and NO PROBLEMS!!!

Could it be adding more memory was the answer?

Good Job VAL!!!!

I have had problems with all workbooks of any size over (I guess) 100KB. Testing a small xls attachment.

test attachment

No problem attaching .xls for me

Testing over 100KB.

And over 200KB?

Internal server error (that could just be coincidence of course!)

Testing huge attachment....not happening...i get the attached error...

I'm happy to announce that the wizkids from India managed to screw up a new thing in the forum:

In this post it's indicated 16 posts have been posted, 2 pages in total.
Clicking on the '2' button of the pages, or 'last' button of the pages only shows page 1.