General Discussion (Model Railroader)

I think I've got this working now.  I have Vista and Internet Explorer 7.  Everything was working properly prior to the forum change.  But after the forum change whenever I wanted to post a message, reply to a post, or send an email through the forum the subject line would be filled out when I made the post but the text in the message body would disappear.

Note that the text would appear on screen, but would not be there when I did a message preview.  When I left the preview screen and went back to the compose screen, the text would still be there.

I did notice that I was getting a message on the lower left corner of the IE7 browser screen that said "done, but with errors on the page" message.

After some experimenting I think I found out that the computer was trying to protect me from all the bad things that can appear on this forum, such as sex, nudity, drugs, violence, etc.  I looked on the browser tools menu for internet options.  There is a "content" tab.  In that tab is something called "content advisor", which has ratings "to help you control the internet content that can be viewed on this computer".  There is an enable/disable option.  I had to disable the content advisor to be able to post.

So, it wasn't invisible pixels or stealth rhetoric.  It was just big brother or big sister trying to protect this poor sinner.  Thank you Tom and Mr. Beesley for trying to assist.

Now as to my questions, which I'm now almost too embarrassed to ask.  All I wanted to know was what the heck that email subscription enable/disable button on the top of the screen was for, and why did it look like I was changing the status for someone else?

Now there is a second question.  How come there are some posts that show up with zero views, but have multipe replies?  I would think that the number of views would have to at least equal the number of replies.

Yes, I know the questions are a let down, but at least I solved another problem trying to ask them.

Regards 

maxman,

I'm pleased to hear that you finally figured it out.  That was a stumper for me.

As per your second question, I noticed that phenomenon, too.  I think that these "bugs" will slowly get worked out of the system over the next week or two.  I'm still trying to figure out what some stuff is and does.

Tom

maxman:

Now as to my questions, which I'm now almost too embarrassed to ask.  All I wanted to know was what the heck that email subscription enable/disable button on the top of the screen was for, and why did it look like I was changing the status for someone else?

That little button is so that you can be notified by email when posts are made to the topic you're reading when "enabled".

Now there is a second question.  How come there are some posts that show up with zero views, but have multipe replies?  I would think that the number of views would have to at least equal the number of replies.

I noticed that too, and find it odd that people can reply to a post without viewing it.    Must be one of those fancy new features of the redesigned forum web site. 

bpickering:

MisterBeasley:

Same here.  Is there a pixel color called "invisible?"

 

Depending on the graphics format, actually, YES! It's actually called "Transparent", but it will allow whatever is "underneath" to show through. Useful in one of the on-line board games I play, where different types of terrain can "overlay" the basic mapboard.

Back on-topic, I would lay odds that the actual problem is NOT a lack of a content, but something like NoScript (a VERY useful addition to Firefox) denying some abilities to the webpages. Can't say I really am fond of the new site format, and little quirks like this are a periodic pain to me (for example, the latest update to NoScript has "broken" the ability to mark a message as a Phishing attempt in GMail's web interface. Whose fault is that- NoScript, for being over-protective, GMail for trying to accomplish too much in a web page, or the idiots who are sending all the Phishing/Cracking attempts that make NoScript and reporting phishing so vital?)

I can't understand much of what was said in this reply, but I can sympathize with the "over-protective" part!  I lost my computer last year, got a windfall, and replaced it in October with a Compaq Presario---with Vista, so I know about being over-protective.  Compounding this, I recently managed to get a good deal on Cable Internet and its Security Suite keeps trying to block Internet Explorer's updates and even functions, and it even blocked a Google Update!  I suppose the intentions are good, but I discovered years ago that the more I used a computer the lazier I got: I was always trying to find shortcuts and hate having to pause and click on such basic stuff as IE and Google!

I, too, had to play with the Forum log-on and other controls before I could Reply, so the originator of this post should follow advice and long off then back on the Forum and see if that frees things up.

Dean-58:

I, too, had to play with the Forum log-on and other controls before I could Reply, so the originator of this post should follow advice and long off then back on the Forum and see if that frees things up.

Unfortunately, the logging in and logging out thing is not the answer to every problem being encountered.  I know for a fact that I was logged in when I was having the problem.  This is because the upper right corner of the screen said "welcome back, Mr. ....", and the bottom of the screen had my screen name as being on line.

There is definitely some bad interaction between the forum change and the "content advisor" function in Internet Explorer 7.  As a matter of fact, while logged in to reply to this post I went back to enable the content advisor and got the error problem again.  Without logging out, I disabled it and am now able to reply.

I don't know why it does this, and if someone has a clue I'd appreciate knowing the solution.  But in the interim the darn thing works and with a computer that's all you can ask for.

Regards

The idea behind the logging out/in sequence is to clear the cookies/cache from your browser.  It has worked for me everywhere (home/work/school) that I generally have the session saved (ie, where I don't have to log back in).

 While it admittedly doesn't clear every problem, that's a really good starting place if you use multiple computers, or if your browser doesn't clear the cookies/cache when you close it.