The Login Process Needs Improvement

[Waltah]

When I notice something this blatant I've usually got a broken cupholder or 'any' key to show for it. If this is such a case I hope someone will enlighten me.

Scenario: I read a post and decide to reply. Having been previously burned, I have my userid and password written down; I now enter them. I then spend maybe 15 minutes writing. I press 'ENTER' and -- POOF! All gone. 'No registered user by that ID' or some such. We can stipulate that regardless of my care in copying, I have made some mistake, but:

1. I don't see a need for this site to have ANY password scheme and if indeed there's an issue I don't understand, I can't see why the userid and password I use in other places shouldn't be allowed here. The only issue I can think of is someone a little ruder than I feel at the momement who might need to be identified and banned.

2. If a password scheme is required, why is it wrapped around the posting process? Put it out in front, at least as an option, and validate the data when entered. I have *never* encountered such a nasty way of handling such a simple mistake.

I have a workaround -- post a 'test' message before doing anything that requires thought -- but that's a lot uglier than fixing the process.



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Walt
Proving daily that the Peter Principle applies even to acolyte geeks ...

[bassman]

Hello Waltah,
I'm a little confused. Are you saying you have a login problem on your first attempt but it then works after that (thus the Test forum workaround).
Or are you having a problem with actualy posting, as in, it fails to post your response the first attempt.

As for the need for a user name and password scheme, this insures you will always be able to use the same name, and allows us to identify with you.
It also allows the site owners and management to better control the site and it's users. If we had someone causing trouble, they could be blocked by way of their user name and password.

The only reason you can't use the same name here as in other sites is that it is already being used. The password would not make a difference.

Just a recommendation, write your response in a word processor (Word, WordPerfect), then copy and paste it into the message field of your post. That way if there is a problem with the posting process, then you still have your message and can C&P again.

Let us know more detail about whats happening and we can go from there http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

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A real Christian is one who can give his pet parrot to the town gossip.
Frank's Place (http://dreamwater.net/tech/frankscomp/)

[kayofcircles]

Waltah: Bassman's right..we need the ID process to "know" each other. And I just clicked on a link posted here, and went and browsed through another forum. They have it set up the same as here, which is good because I don't want to register with them just to be able to read posts and replies. There are places where they demand your user ID just to "look"..so I don't get to look at all.

More specifically..recently I deleted all my cookies and was having some problems here on my first post of the day. What was happening, though, was that after I entered name and password, I would go off and get a link I wanted to insert into my post and then when I went to Submit (and you are using the Submit button, right?)..I would get the Error page because the name and password erased while I was off getting the link. Paul told me to delete my cookie in Preferences..thus getting a "new" one and that has worked for my problem. Bassman is also correct in that it makes sense to type in something like Works..but truthfully, I don't, I just post. On those occasions where I get an error message, I am usually able to use the Back button, and then copy/paste my post into a New Message in OE, hit Control S..which sticks it in my Drafts folder until I can make sure the post actually got posted.

Sorry that you are having problems..and agree with bassman. We're only too happy to help if we can. Paul also pointed out to me that I can change the original password assigned to me here to something more easily remembered..just passing that along.

[Vic 970]

Waltah,

I can see where you're coming from as the same thing has happened to me in the past.

A 'Log in' screen as you suggest would of course eradicate the problem, but it would possible also ban nonmembers (guests) from viewing the site, and that I would assume is where we get most of our membership from.

Maybe there is a way of doing this, but for the time being, I have found the following workaround of benefit (particularly for long posts with lots of links)

Open a new notepad doc, name it something like 'notes' and save to desktop, right click and drag to quick launch bar. that is always ready for service.

You now have the advantage of somewhere to jot down notes & links as you surf, and when replying to a post you can do a reply whilst you still have the post on the screen. when your ready, click on 'reply' (to post) click select all on notepad & paste.

I've been using it a while now and find it very useful, both on this forum & off. & if you lose your reply all is not lost, just paste again http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

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for every question there's an answer. Then a load more questions.
Definition of Upgrade "A means of introducing new bugs to a program to replace the ones that you have eventually found fixes for"

Regards..,
Vic.

[Paleo Pete]

This has been mostly explained but I thought I'd add a couple of comments.

I don't see a need for this site to have ANY password scheme and if indeed there's an issue I don't understand, I can't see why the userid and password I use in other places shouldn't be allowed here. The only issue I can think of is someone a little ruder than I feel at the momement who might need to be identified and banned.

Bold text mine.

The section in bold is part of the reason for the username and password scheme. It's very effective in keeping this place peaceful and friendly. Also, we want to KNOW only one person can use a particular username. What kind of shape would we be in if anyone could post messages using any username they wished? Chaos...

Putting the username and password on a "front door" page would negate one of the best features of this Internet community. Anyone, anywhere can read and learn from the information we post. I think if that type of login policy were implemented we would have half the membership we have now, very possibly a lot less.

The user name you use elsewhere may not be available here besause it has already been registered by someone else. They probably wouldn't like having you use their chosen username any more than you would like them using yours. You can always try putting an underscore between two_words or something of that nature and possibly get close to your accustomed user name. That's a moot point now, you already have a user name, but I do understand your frustration on that issue, I've had the same problem before, but not with Paleo Pete.

I don't understand what the actual problem is with posting messages so I don't have any good suggestions, maybe I missed something...but please use the Testing forum for test posts, that's what it's there for. I deleted the test post in Suggestion box. That's no real problem, I understand why you did it, but please use the Testing forum in the future.

If I can figure out what the trouble is I'll be glad to try and figure out a solution, but I really don't understand what's happening. And thanks for not being obnoxious about it, some people would have...

Are you positive you didn't originally enter your password with the Caps Lock key on or something of that nature? Passwords are case sensitive. Once you enter your username and password into the edit box it should stay put, if you get a message saying "no such username or password" it was probably entered wrong. I've hit two keys at once while entering my password quite a few times and lost posts...it's not fun especially when I just spent a half hour digging for info then composing and proofreading a post...GRRRR..I've also put in PAleo Pete by mistake, same results...



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If your nose runs and your feet smell...
You're built upside down!
Note: Please post your questions on the forums, not in my email.

Computer Information Links (http://www.dreamwater.com/paleopete/computer.htm) has been moved, please update your bookmarks.

[Vic 970]

Hi Pete,

The problem as I understand (as it happened to me) is that if you lose your connection, or go to another site to grab a link, then the password box goes blank, not realising this quickly enough you click on 'post reply' & of course the password (which has dissapeared) is not accepted.

Sometimes its possible to hit the 'back' button, enter password & reply again, but other times the reply has dissapeared as well. Quite frustrating if you've spent a lot of time & effort to reply to someones post.

As I said, if I start out on a long reply, with links & things , I pop them onto notepad first then paste into the reply. I know it's a workaround but it does save the situation & have its other uses.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

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for every question there's an answer. Then a load more questions.
Definition of Upgrade "A means of introducing new bugs to a program to replace the ones that you have eventually found fixes for"

Regards..,
Vic.

[ErnieK]

Hi All
I have come up against this problem in the past. After I delete cookies (once a week) I then have to re-enter user name and password - this is as it should be.
But if I try to post a reply and then go looking for a link and come back to thread user name and \ or password is missing from the reply page. My work around for this is to open up a second page and look for the link from that, then, if I find what I am looking for I copy the link address and close second page, then paste link into still open thread. WALLA! no probs, no lost username and password

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Ernie

[bassman]

one tip on the notepad thing fellas (and ladies http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif ), please make sure wordwrap is turned on in notepad before copying. This is what makes some of the threads here real wide. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/cool.gif

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A real Christian is one who can give his pet parrot to the town gossip.
Frank's Place (http://dreamwater.net/tech/frankscomp/)

[ixl]

I'm not responding to this in detail since Waltah sent me an email that is about the same and I already replied to him and have not heard back.

Short version: login/password necessity has been covered by others already.

As for the "disappearing text" issue: I can't really determine what the issue is because it seems to be browser-dependent. It doesn't do that if I mistype a password on any of my systems.

There are also several tools to help avoid the problem. You can change the password to something easy to remember. There is the cookie that can be set. Most versions of Windows will also offer to remember user names and passwords.

In short, I am sensitive to this issue but don't really know what I can do about it. Remember that this board is a mostly-stock UBB install and I am not about to start rewriting it.

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Charles M. Kozierok
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...
Note: Please reply to my forum postings here on the forums. Thanks.

[Vic 970]

bassman

Glad you posted that, I've been wondering why some of the posts got to be so wide, (& it's a pain when they are) but did'nt get around to asking. I always have word wrap on with mine, but it's worth pointing out to others when we do get a 'wide' page, as I'm sure many members don't know why.

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for every question there's an answer. Then a load more questions.
Definition of Upgrade "A means of introducing new bugs to a program to replace the ones that you have eventually found fixes for"

Regards..,
Vic.

[Waltah]

First, thanks for everyone's patience. When I'm this far away from the majority view I'm nearly always wrong but sixty-some years haven't taught me to just shut up so it's prob'ly not gonna happen.

I do see the reasons for a userid/password scheme. I did not know I could change the password -- that will help. And I also understand the reasoning behind allowing reading of the forum without login.

I am sorry I didn't respond to the personal message on this topic; guess I just needed a few days to cool down about it.

I may not have made clear exactly what happens. Using Win 95/IE 5.5, I hit 'reply'. Get a screen with places for username and password, enter same, but make some mistake. THE INFORMATION I GIVE IS NOT VALIDATED WHEN ENTERED. I procede to enter a post. Press 'Submit', get a screen that says something amounting to 'sorry, you blew it'. THE POST IS GONE. This is a tacky approach to solving a problem I can't identify; there's no darn reason the info can't be validated when entered. I can't think of another place on the net that has such a 'feature'. I do understand that forum operators usually don't write the software and as the co-operator of a few such, I also understand that there isn't time in the current lifetime to do everything you think needs to be done.

I didn't notice the problem on the machine I used to use but on this one, I do regular cleanups -- cookies and all that. I'm currently trying to determine just which cleaning causes the lack of memory; if I figure it out, I'll consider doing without that.

I do occasionally use another editor to construct replies, most often for very detailed posts on other forums when research and thought (and/or a spelling checker!) is required. Here there are so many people more experienced than I that I only post if it's an easy question for me -- where are the screws holding the keyboard on a TI-4000M notebook? Well, I most recently removed those four screws yesterday ...

I have a better workaround now -- post a one-word 'test' which confirms that I got through the password window and then immediately edit it to the real message. I note that there's only an hour in which one can edit -- I hope not to discover if that's measured to the time when the edit is submitted, rather than to when it begins ... although the discipline is probably useful. Anything that can't be said in an hour may not be worth saying. Lincoln took what -- 237 words? -- at Gettysburg.

Thanks again folks.
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Walt
Proving daily that the Peter Principle applies even to acolyte geeks ...

[This message has been edited by Waltah (edited 04-10-2002).]

[This message has been edited by Waltah (edited 04-10-2002).]

[ixl]

Originally posted by Waltah:
I may not have made clear exactly what happens. Using Win 95/IE 5.5, I hit 'reply'. Get a screen with places for username and password, enter same, but make some mistake. THE INFORMATION I GIVE IS NOT VALIDATED WHEN ENTERED.

There isn't any way to do that unless I hack in some Javascript nonsense, which would be non-trivial. In general, on the web, nothing happens when you just enter something in a field; you have to hit a button to "make it go".
I procede to enter a post. Press 'Submit', get a screen that says something amounting to 'sorry, you blew it'. THE POST IS GONE.

I think this may be the issue here: the post isn't really gone. Have you tried, in this situation, hitting the "Back" button on your browser? In every browser I have, this takes me back to the page where I just was, with the post still there.

If hitting "Back" doesn't work on your system, it may be the browser you are using, or perhaps you have caching disabled.

This is a tacky approach to solving a problem I can't identify; there's no darn reason the info can't be validated when entered. I can't think of another place on the net that has such a 'feature'.

I can think of, oh, tens of thousands, such as every site that has a stock UBB/vBulletin/etc bulletin board system. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

The best solution is to use a password that is easy for you to remember, without being trivially simple (we aren't dealing with the nuclear launch codes here) and using a browser that lets you backup if you mistype it.

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Charles M. Kozierok
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...
Note: Please reply to my forum postings here on the forums. Thanks.

[tmwhalens]

test

[RKBA]

I think what Waltah is referring to is that unlike most UBB forums, the PC Guide Forum doesn't give any indication of whether you're logged in or not. This may be because the PC Guide Forum is running UBB version 5.46 (I noticed this in the little tiny almost invisible print at the bottom of the page), whereas the latest version of UBB Classic is 6.3.0.

For example, if you go to http://community.infopop.net you'll see a message like one of the following in the top left hand corner of the page:


» You are not logged in. Login or register
» Hello RKBA [logout]


This gives you a positive (or negative) indication of whether or not you're logged in. If you aren't logged in, you can read messages but you cannot post. If you are logged in, then you have positive confirmation that you can post without needing to supply your user ID or password.

Maybe someday in Pete or ixl's "copious" spare time http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif, they could upgrade the forum code to Version 6.3.0 ?

-- Ron

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Centerfire (http://home.pacbell.net/rsdotson/) "The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." -- Thomas Jefferson

[ixl]

Something is in the works to address a bunch of different forum issues all at the same time. Unfortunately it will take some time to implement. I can't really say more than that at the present time.

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Charles M. Kozierok
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...
Note: Please reply to my forum postings here on the forums. Thanks.