Bad Post Reports

Is it just me again or is there something wrong with the "Send Report" button for reporting bad posts. I've tried it a couple of times in the past couple of weeks and it just times out.

No it happens to me as well
I'd like to know why this stalls too(?) and also why sometimes a Reply seems to stall as well?
Eventually, it goes through though. But because I'm always concerned I always copy my entire post to clipboard before submitting ;)

mailpup, we have indeed received your reported posts in the last couple of weeks, a few of them have been attended by myself and others by other mods who caught them earlier than me.

As for the site timing out, that's really strange. Shouldn't be happening at all and certainly hasn't happened to me, though we have been keeping a close eye to server resources and usage due to a number of problems that presented a few months back and still have not been able to overcome in full.

Would you say this is a daily/regular occurrence?

To the rest of the community members: Is anybody else is experiencing timeouts?

Thanks in advance for your feedback.

In the last two times I reported a post I had this problem. It could have happened once before but I may not have taken particular notice of a problem. If you received duplicate reports, it was because it appeared to me that it didn't go through. The last time, I had lots of time so I waited until it timed out, twice I think. The previous time I gave up and manually terminated it although I may have tried again with the same result on my end.

Hmm, that is strange to hear
If it is something that is repeatable? If so can you please tell me how long time it takes for it either to time out, or go through?
I am assuming you have tried clearing your browser cache and or another browser?

And if there are any errors generated could you please send those to me in a PM?
And also if you do experience difficulties and it generates an error please write down at what time it occurred, and PM me, your external IP address would also be very helpful!
Thanks in advance

Per, I'll take note of future events and let you know. The only problem is that I don't know when the next report might occur but we'll see.

I haven't actually seen 'timed out', but for the past 2 days, intermittently, I have been on 'waiting'. Earlier today, I left the computer after 10 minutes or 'waiting' for a post to send. It eventually posted.

As I said, it is intermittent, but I can pin it to the last 2 days.

I have only been in the Virus and Malware forum.

It could just be traffic taking a toll on server resources. Per, we must continue work on that nginx transition :)

Just reported a post just then
After pressing reply (or whatever the button was) it took 1 minute exactly to go through
I thought it was going to time out.

No error messages
My IP is known already (but I don't think its just me anyway)
All my temp files and cache are cleaned ... say every hour or so (so not that)
Using Firefox latest version

Okay, thanks for your reports
Indeed I think we will wait to do something about this
Because we are in the final testing stages of transitioning to a new webserver software (Nginx as Julio hinted above)

Last night we doubled our web server RAM to 8GB, we've also performed a number of new optimizations in our cron jobs and updated vBulletin to its latest version.

This should definitely contribute to keep a lean operation and avoid slow page serving, but please if you come across any issues or slowdowns let us know here.

Nope, still the same
I reported a post and it still took about 1 minute to go through
At least its constant

I'm using the Advanced Reply in most of my post. There is a significant delay in getting it through.

I'm really puzzled about your feedback. Are you saying the site slowdowns when you report a post/use advanced reply all the time? Or is it at certain times of the day only?

As you can imagine I check the site throughout the day and load hundreds of different pages every day, and 99% of the time the site flies here (and my net connection is not state of the art).

When the site feels slow to you, could you try loading pages from the main site (a review, a download, news story, etc.) and let me know if that also happens there?

Thanks!

I'll keep a time and place record as much as I can today. All of my work lately has been in the Virus and Malware Forum. And some of the replies I send are lengthy, so I understand they may take a bit longer.

Last night I sent a few using Quick Reply. It posted the second I hit send. For the Advanced replies, I actually left the site while it was waiting to go through and opened another email feedback and accessed the site. By that time, it had gone through.

bad post? test it on mine.

No need to test, there's enough out there already :)

Anyway...

Did a "Report Bad Post" just now (on an actual bad post (http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic137143.html#post811164))
Wrote in the info then clicked: "Send Report" (note no other options to select "advanced" or anything)
I waited and waited for 1 minute


During the "1 minute", of waiting time, I went to the front page, viewed a topic, then I went to the forums, opened a subforum, and then opened a thread and viewed it. This all whilst waiting for the report to send

Then (after 1+ minute) received: "Database error" (on the "Send Report" window only)


Then I clicked "refresh" (listed in the Database error screen) and got:
"kimsland, you do not have permission to access this page"

?

I then click back on the firefox twice to get back to my "reported post" window
I then clicked: "Send Report" (again)
Ho hum, guess what? "Waiting for Techspot.com..." Waiting Waiting.... I get: "Database error" again !

Forget it I won't send the report then!
By the way, this post went through quickly

Ok, so that narrows things down.

The incessant wait/timeout happened when sending the bad post report, but in the meantime you could load all kind of pages, in the main site, in the forum and even a new post? Correct me if I'm wrong.

That is great feedback :)

And I can pin the delay down almost without exception when I use the Advanced Reply in the V&M forum.

Just attempted to Report a Bad Post. Got the following after 3 min:

Database error
The TechSpot OpenBoards database has encountered a problem.


Time on board was 9:29 GMT-4

Went back and attempted to post again- my clock shows 5 min. later. Clock on TS board still shows 9:29

Abandoning attempt to report.

Bobbye, but similar to my question to kimsland, you could load pages and navigate throughout the site without a problem?

Also, when you experience a slowdown when advance replying, does it happen when you post or when you click "Go Advanced"?

Yes, I am able to do everything else without delay. And I can access "Go Advanced" without delay. But when I have finished the post and try to submit it, there is always a prolonged delay.

Today was the only time recently that I tried to report bad post, but it was x3 and none when through.

I guess I'm impatient because it can take me a while to assemble the post and check it- but I am leaving it on that tab, hoping it will go through eventually

Ok, thanks for the clarification.
BTW, I did receive the reported posts, but something else is failing obviously.

Currently our databases are set to a wait_timeout of max 90 seconds
This means that if you try to do something and it stalls, after 90 seconds you will indeed get a database error

Can you confirm if the error you got was indeed generated 90 seconds after you pressed the submit/report button, and not 60 seconds?

Oh, actually it was likely 90 seconds
My other posts on report posts, they were 60, but they went through (well according to Julio even the timeout ones did, even though it looked as if no)
I'll say it was 90 on the message: "Database error" ones, sorry about that.

Anyway isn't this happening to everyone? Or is it only a certain group or location or something of the same?
Have you guys at least tested it yourself? (ie sent a test report or something?)

Anyway, I'll leave it in your capable hands, these days I'm not blocking anything (I thought it may be one of these "sites" that seem to flash past or something (like board reader sites that Firefox shows on bottom left of screen, hmm, I'll check now when I post (although reply posts always works)

Edit:
Got them:
Collective-media.com (or something)
addthis.com (or something, ie they're too quick)
And some "track.com" (or something or other)
netsheller.com
kono.kontera.com (I think)
Hmm, they flash past so quickly (then this message posts)

I have another 'report bad post' "loading" now. I'm off to do other things. I'll leave it and see if an error comes up or if it eventually posts.

Okay- checked back and got this:
Database error
The TechSpot OpenBoards database has encountered a problem.

Seems like this came up in less time than last night. I left at 1 min.

Thanks kimsland
I used the "report post" feature on this thread right after making my post above and experienced exactly the problem you describe, since I never have used the feature before (since I'm a supermod) I had not had any problems before obviously

But this is great, now I have somthing atleast do tests with!

As a member, if you came on a reply that you thought was abusive on otherwise inappropriate-spam, advertising, inappropriate language, etc., you could report it as a bad post-

As for someone posting on the wrong board, you could make a suggestion to the poster that it might be better in 'X' Forum. But that is not a 'bad post'. There are moderators who handle moving posts.

I just happen to still be subscribed to this thread. But I'm not sure I've covered exactly what you mean about 3G.

hmm; sounds to me like DB corruption or performance on a given table is stalling the backend.

suggest offload the DB and then reload it and reindex is in order

Bobbye: I'm pretty sure his post was intended for the News around the web: Why Ad Blocking is devastating to the sites you love (http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic144151.html)

Especially considering 8 hours ago he posted this in that thread:
As I have only a mediocre income I struggle to pay the bills I do have, this is an expensive new world by the way. I don't understand why I should be willing to pay advertising that I have to download (pay for as content). I do understand the reasons for Advertising as my father earned 'all his lot' directly out of the Advertising PIE. But with mobile phones being used more commonly as internet viewing tools and Netbooks becoming more prevalent why don't sites have "Flash content" and "non-flash content" buttons so that I can choose what clogs my 3G mobile dongle?

Edit: I've moved his post to that thread now, we can probably safely delete the last 3 posts in this thread now. I just left them for the time being so you guys (bobbye and jobeard) could see.

Recently I have noticed that reporting bad posts seems to be working. At least it doesn't time out or give an error message. Most of the time there is no way to tell if it actually went through.