Site issues

[Golken]

Hey guys. Came across some issues on the site.

• Pressing the Downloads link on the left on the main page will bring you to a non-existent forum.
• Some links to download pages, such as those appearing in download lists/search results, have an onClick JavaScript event in the div element to take you to the download page, presumably to make the entire element clickable. The problem with that is that it breaks certain browser functionality; if you click the link using the middle button, or a normal click with the CTRL button held down, it will open the link in a new tab (SHIFT will open in a new window), but because of the onClick event it will also open it in the current tab. To avoid this you have to either quickly press the stop button or hotkey (ESC) after doing the above to cancel the ongoing navigating to a new page in the current tab, or use a right-click context menu instead. Thankfully, in the case of Firefox, middle-clicking ignores the onClick event, but in Chrome it does not. Very annoying.
  Other links such as the links with images to other download pages at the bottom of the page function correctly.
• If you have JavaScript off, those pages show almost nothing (tested in Firefox), only those bottom images. If there's not going to be a non-JS compatible version, should should at least be a <noscript> tag that informs you that this page requires JS, so that it doesn't look simply broken.
• Why does the Morrowind Modding History site have a robots.txt file that prevents search indexing? It makes Morrowind mods less accessible/findable, and the same for the site itself. I wonder what's the reason for what seems like a large disadvantage. What, does the site need to be underground for some reason?!
• EDIT: Also, some space is wasted for some reason in the post preview page, leading to the preview looking different from the end result. This was observed in Firefox. See here: http://i62.tinypic.com/23t40fd.jpg Also, I'm not allowed to use the URL BBCode, what the...?!

Thanks for reading.

[Drakkmore]

I've informed Fliggerty about your issues, and suggestions. Hopefully he will be able to get to them sooner rather then later. I can sort of maybe answer one of your questions though. The reason that the bots are blocked from MMH is for security reasons. If you want to find a mod on MMH there is a search function that I believe still works at the time of this posting. I do know that id worked 8 hours ago when I went to bed, and should still be working now. I would suggest that maybe you bookmark MMH, and in the future give the MMH search function a try first and if you can not find the mod you are looking for there then try google (or your search engine of choice) as a second resort.


EDIT: I know that Opera is effected by the onclick event issue you are talking about too. where middle mouse button clicking does both opens the new tab, and changes the current tab to the new page too. So it's not only chrome. It may even be more then Chrome,and Opera, but since I only use FF, and Opera (and only have the two installed until my win 10 update happens), I'm afraid I can not test in other browsers at this time.

[Fliggerty]

Pressing the Downloads link on the left on the main page will bring you to a non-existent forum.

That was apparently missed when changing the downloads from being forum-based to using the GHFDL system. Thank you.

Some links to download pages, such as those appearing in download lists/search results, have an onClick JavaScript event in the div element to take you to the download page, presumably to make the entire element clickable. The problem with that is that it breaks certain browser functionality; if you click the link using the middle button, or a normal click with the CTRL button held down, it will open the link in a new tab (SHIFT will open in a new window), but because of the onClick event it will also open it in the current tab. To avoid this you have to either quickly press the stop button or hotkey (ESC) after doing the above to cancel the ongoing navigating to a new page in the current tab, or use a right-click context menu instead. Thankfully, in the case of Firefox, middle-clicking ignores the onClick event, but in Chrome it does not. Very annoying.
Other links such as the links with images to other download pages at the bottom of the page function correctly.

This is known about. MMH was originally designed when AJAX was a relatively new thing, and little of the interface scripting has been updated since. I was unable to find a pure-javascript method by which to accomplish the goal of making the entire row clickable -- it sparked quite the discussion on StackOverflow at the time. While it is certainly feasible and much simpler to do today with HTML5 and CSS3, those haven't been integrated in any way to the current design. I have a new version that has been a long-standing WIP which will eventually come out; I am in the process of rebuilding it with an Angular.js design though.

If you have JavaScript off, those pages show almost nothing (tested in Firefox), only those bottom images. If there's not going to be a non-JS compatible version, should should at least be a <noscript> tag that informs you that this page requires JS, so that it doesn't look simply broken.

See above.
There should be a noscript though; the template framework includes one. If it isn't showing, that is an error.

Why does the Morrowind Modding History site have a robots.txt file that prevents search indexing? It makes Morrowind mods less accessible/findable, and the same for the site itself. I wonder what's the reason for what seems like a large disadvantage. What, does the site need to be underground for some reason?!

The actual reason for this is because Google bots were not honoring the rules which allowed a limited crawl rate and have often hammered the server to point of a near DDoS. Baidu and Yahoo have done the same thing. My only recourse was to restrict bot access entirely and rely upon submitted sitemaps.

EDIT: Also, some space is wasted for some reason in the post preview page, leading to the preview looking different from the end result. This was observed in Firefox. See here: http://i62.tinypic.com/23t40fd.jpg Also, I'm not allowed to use the URL BBCode, what the...?!

phpBB3 by default puts the mini-profile on the right side, but I prefer it on the left. That space is most likely something left over from that switch in this particular theme template.

New members are not allowed to post links until they have made 10 posts. This is an anti-spambot measure.

[Drakkmore]

Why does the Morrowind Modding History site have a robots.txt file that prevents search indexing? It makes Morrowind mods less accessible/findable, and the same for the site itself. I wonder what's the reason for what seems like a large disadvantage. What, does the site need to be underground for some reason?!

The actual reason for this is because Google bots were not honoring the rules which allowed a limited crawl rate and have often hammered the server to point of a near DDoS. Baidu and Yahoo have done the same thing. My only recourse was to restrict bot access entirely and rely upon submitted sitemaps.

AHA!!!!
I was told by other members of the Moderation team that had been here longer then I have that it was a security measure. I apologize for my misinformed misinforming, and I hope that it does not happen again. I will definitely try to not let it happen my self, but sometimes when one trusts the information one is given sometimes they don't question.

[Golken]

Thanks for the very quick responses, both of you! You're welcome for the reports. And Fliggerty, I love your work, and I learned from it, too. Some of your highly appreciable work goes beyond modding itself, such as maintaining this site and ModHistory. I should thank you, and the collaborators as well.

Speaking of your WIPs, is there any update or info on Better Battles? Just wondering, I know you're (rightfully, obviously) busy with family, do not wish to pester, I just remember reading you've had a lot of it done many years ago. At any case, AI should eventually be directly modifiable in OpenMW.

It's really a shame on the robots.txt situation, causing many Morrowind mods not to appear on Google, but if that is the case then I can understand. Hopefully the situation has improved since the decision was made or at least will improve in the future... spamming by multiple engines you say. :/

Drakk, I guess Firefox might be the exception, when it comes to middle-clicks not triggering onClick. But at least this issue is less annoying there at the moment, so it's worth mentioning. And don't sweat it for for knowing less about the site than the webmaster, that's only expected. Appreciate your help, at any case.

On the <noscript>, I don't seem to get it on a download page using Firefox with the NoScript extension (which disables JS for the page, without ever breaking such tags AFAIK):
Another thing, in this image you can see that it says 2011. You can also see one of Drakk's nice mods.

[Leonardo]

New members are not allowed to post links until they have made 10 posts. This is an anti-spambot measure.

This rule needs to be added into GHF guide lines in the forum content section.

[MacBone]

One problem I've had is being unable to make a weapon mod through the Foundry.  I've gone all the way through the process with short blades and long blades, but when the file is ready, it begins downloading but never actually does.  I've tried using Chrome, Firefox, and IE.

[Drakkmore]

There are some minor issues with the servers currently. Fliggerty is doing what he can to fix the issues. Please be patient with us for the next day or so. then try again. If your problem continues after a few days please do not hesitate to inform us.

[MacBone]

I'm not having any problems creating and downloading Foundry mods now.  Thank you!

[Leonardo]

When I click on Submit for this post the server was just spinning and nothing happen, I even had to cancel the browser since the browser itself simply stop responding in Windows 7.

[Drakkmore]

I'm not certain that is an issue with the site itself Leo. When you had to close the browser did you have to re-write the post?
Perhaps the issue was on your end of the connection. Sometimes through no fault of anybody involved computers just have a little hiccup.
I'll see if Fliggerty will look into it.

[Leonardo]

I'm not certain that is an issue with the site itself Leo. When you had to close the browser did you have to re-write the post?
Perhaps the issue was on your end of the connection. Sometimes through no fault of anybody involved computers just have a little hiccup.
I'll see if Fliggerty will look into it.

I didn't say I close the browser, I had to cancel what the browser was trying to do.

FYI, I had exactly same spinning before the post editor got loaded with your quote.  Just in case it is important to know.

[Drakkmore]

Leo are you still having this issue? I've not yet experienced it, and nobody else has mentioned it. I want to get this figured out.

[Leonardo]

Well, I haven't been active since I posted that, so I am not really sure if it had stop and was just temporary.

[Drakkmore]

Okay
Just checking to see if it was persisting.
Anybody else that has been active have this issue?

[Darkelfguy]

Don't know if this is similar to Leo's issue, but I have been having issues with pages loading, like the request never goes through and it just spins forever until I cancel it and refresh, often I have to refresh several times. I haven't had this issue with any other website, so it could be a GHF issue. I haven't tried it with a different browser yet though (still using Chrome).

[Drakkmore]

Okay guys Fliggerty is looking at the server, so when he figures out the issue you all should have no problem loading pages.

[Leonardo]

Does the linked social media icons really need to be in the bottom?

Why I ask this is because just before I posted this the server was just spinning since the FB-site had some traffic.  Removing the linked social media icons in the bottom would increase the performance for the server.

[Leonardo]

I had just submit my post then I get the message saying that I need to login in order to post, but after I login a second time my post was gone.

This has never happen for years and I dunno if it has happen at all.

[Drakkmore]

Hmmmm. I don't know what to think about that Leo. I'll have to tell Fliggerty about it.

[Leonardo]

Maybe it's time for GHF to do a re-organization of the whole forum and doing that might solve other issues at the same time.  So if Fliggerty decides to do that and he needs help then I volunteer to help.

[Leonardo]

I'm fairly certain of what is causing a "spinning server" issue and I think it has to do with the forum database, because I just tested with two links in the same thread and twice in a row I had to do the same thing a second time.

What I mean is that if I let say click on the next page the server seems just to do, you guess it spinning, but when I do exactly the same thing a second and now I get the next page loaded as it should have been in the first place.

So that tells me that the database probably need to test run via a SQL command and doing that could correct any error the database might have.

[Drakkmore]

I don't know what's going on with this issue. I've never had it happen to me, and I have 129+ tabs open at any point in time whilst I roam Webternetz. As I've stated before this issue has been brought up to Fliggerty, and he is looking into it. That is all I can do about it, besides sit and wait for the issue to become sorted out by Fliggerty.

[Wolf undefined]

and I have 129+ tabs open

Wait we're not gonna just breeze past this are we?  129 tabs?  I sometimes have like 10-15 open and I feel like half of them shouldn't be there.  How much RAM is required for such a feat?

[Drakkmore]

I've only got 16gb of ram in my current build, Though I did it with only 8gb of ram up until this past winter.