Getting IE Error on Photo.Net

[jdrose]

This is strange and just a touch frustrating; IE is generating error

messages as a page from Photo.Net is done downloading.

 

This does not happen with any other website I visit.

 

Can you tell me what I am doing wrong with Internet Explorer and

Photo.net?

[jdrose]

Image.<div></div>

[v.anisimov]

I've been getting the same error for the past few days - on different PCs. Other sites fine, so there's nothing wrong with IE, as othere I'm sure will be quick to speculate

[andreas d.]

I got similar problems and after i changed browser at the suggestion of Brian everything is OK.

[mottershead]

With IE, these kinds of problems are often resolved by clearing your browser cache.

 

But you might want to get a different browser. IE is what comes with Windows, of course, but it is simple to install a better one, such as Firefox.

[v.anisimov]

Bran - there are sites wtitten for the IE version of HTML and there are sites written for the Netscape/Mozzilla one. Which one is PN?

[alan_olander1664878205]

Brian,

I've been having these same problems. Why should I have to install a "better" browser just so we can view photo.net when it works with every other site I visit?

[mottershead]

photo.net is written for "standards compliant" browsers such as Firefox, plus IE version 6, which is not "standards compliant", but gets some deference because it is common.

 

However, it is impossible to test everything. In forum threads, for example, we allow people to make attachments to their posts, and IE is known to have problems with some image formats. Another problem is that sometimes the IE browser cache is full, and this results in odd behaviour. IE is also more prone to be made flaky by spyware/adware, etc, than other browsers, and you might be having problems because of that.

 

If clearing the cache doesn't work, and you give me the URLs of the threads that are causing problems, then I can see if I can reproduce the problem with my copy of IE.

[v.anisimov]

Brian - I'm involved in the development of e-commerce applications and I can relate to what you're saying.

 

<<...."standards compliant" browsers such as Firefox, plus IE version 6, which is not "standards compliant"...>>

 

Sorry, what standards? Like I said, there are two flavours - one from Microsoft (used by 95% of my corporate customers) and Mozilla (5%). Nonetheless, our applications are written for BOTH Mozilla/Firefox and IE.

 

You can't walk away from this site's recent bugs by telling customers to "get Firefox". Even if I do, I still have to use IE during the day.

 

Fix the problem with the PN site. The problems are easy to replicate. Use a properly configured IE machine and you will see the pop up message.

 

I hope the fashinable dislike of MS/IE won't interfere with professional judgment.

[mottershead]

I'm not walking away from the problem. If people report the specific threads that are causing problems, and I can reproduce them, I will see what I can do. As I said, sometimes the problems are due to things that people attach to their posts. There may also be problems sometimes with the ads, which often include Javascript. If people are seeing problems with some forum threads but not all, the problem is likely to be something that photo.net doesn't fully control. And, as I said, IE is a flaky browser. A lot of problems will go away just by clearing the browser cache.

 

Incidentally, IE accounts for "only" about 80% of the visitors, not 95%. But 80% is still a lot. And this is another reason why I suspect that the problems are caused by something localized, like the browser cache being full or a problem with one of the ads. If we had done something that generally broke IE, I think there would be more reports of it in this forum.

[v.anisimov]

Brian - I've just spoken with our programmers. They confirm the IE 6 doesn't comply with the "standards" as rigorously as Firefox, however:

</p>

 

- Given the size of PN's IE-based customer base, your programmers should test for both IE and Firefox.</br>

- There are millions of commercial sites optimised for both IE and Firefox. Most don't have the "clear your cache" problem.</br>

- The upcoming IE 7 is reportedly more versatile when it comes to "standards". Have you tested PN with IE 7 yet?</br>

- PN users don't have to provide you with a full list of "aborted" PN threads. The original poster provided you with a sample of a thread (with its URL). It happens intermittently (my favorite type of errors!), all you have to do to replicate is to use what 95% of Internet users have - IE.</br>

- Repeting the "flakey IE! flakey IE!" mantra doesn't alter the overwhelming evidence of faults in the PN system that should be easy to fix. </br>

[mottershead]

Vladimir, as I said (twice already in this very thread, and also a few times in the other threads on this topic), if someone can provide me with a URL to a broken thread, I will try to reproduce the problem. There is a URL in the other thread, but it has a typo in it, apparently, in precisely the place where I can't guess what the correct URL should be, namely the forum thread "msg_id".

 

I need someone to point me to a specific thread that shows this behaviour in order to have any chance of finding and fixing this. Even then, I suspect that the problem is an interaction with something else on the page that is transitory, such as an attachment to a post, or Javascript associated with an ad, rather than something that is a persistent feature of forum threads. If it was a persistent feature, you would expect to see it on every thread, or a sizeable number of them. Leaving aside attachments and ads, there aren't that many thread variations, and all of the variations have been around for years.

 

If the problem is something like an attachment, there is some hope of finding the problem, since once a thread is poisoned by a weird attachment (etc) it probably stays that way. But if it is an ad that is causing a problem, that is going to be very hard to find, because which ads appear on pages is very much randomized. Also if the problem is an ad, even if it is found, we have to either block the ad (which could be costly if it is from a big campaign) or get the advertiser to fix it, which may not be very quickly.

[bill_b2]

From an IE6 user:

 

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00GPP4&tag= is a URL it occurred on, this thread.

 

Here is what I have learned. After I press "OK" and the "this page cannot be found" page comes up, if I press the F5 key to reload the page, it works.

 

If I keep the cursor at the top of the window, while the page is loading, there is no problem.

 

I hope this helps you, Brian. Proble has been going on for a week or so. Even with a clean cache.

 

Bill

[bill_b2]

F5 reload not a sure thing now. Cursor at top of window still works to avoid problem.

[dmurphy]

The cursor-at-the-top-of-the-window workaround immediately makes me think of that IntelliTXT stuff. (Since it uses mouse-overs, the code that tracks the position of the cursor while it's on the page could be bad?)