Website issues
jrglass
Registered Users Posts: 39 Big grins
Is it just me or are others having problems with smugmug today? Right now I can't view any photos/galleries in Smugmug style. When I changed styles, the photos would appear. Also, when I log in and go to my homepage, everything appears to be normal. However, when I click on a gallery (in an effort to add photos), it is as if I logged out and none of my tool drop down lists appear.:dunno
My site is:
www.jrglassphotography.com
Thanks,
Jr.
My site is:
www.jrglassphotography.com
Thanks,
Jr.
0
Comments
More details - please. Can you run a traceroute from you to us, www.smugmug.com
Holler if you need instructions.
There are no issues with the site at the moment.
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I am at work at this time and I am not aware of any new security settings, etc.
I am not familiar with the traceroute. What do I need to do?
Here I have IE6. Things were working fine this AM, other than uploading pics being very slow.
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I will check at home.
Jr.
It's not just you, and it's not your connection/firewall issues. (Well I can't be sure of that, but I am sure there are smugmug issues along the lines that you mentioned.) I've "noticed" (i.e. been slapped in the face with a frozen fish) similar problems not only with my site, but with many others', especially in the default smugmug style. It was worse late last night/early this morning--NOBODY'S site worked in smugmug style but all other styles worked fine. (Which is bad for me since I forbid changing viewing style to further reduce the incredible option overload for novice users.)
And that's on five different browsers (three distinct brand/versions), three different OSes, and lots of clearing of cookies, .js and other temp files, etc. All on a connection and computers and browsers whose configs have not changed at all since smugmug worked just fine earlier yesterday. (Or indeed since the last time I ran OS patches on them a few weeks ago.)
I just assumed that smugmug would have been immediately aware of this and all over it. (And for benefit of the doubt, maybe they are.)
Here's an email I sent to help@smugmug.com this morning, including the specifics of browser brand/versions, custom domain, clearing of cookies, .js, and other temp files, etc.
Hi there, my site quit working properly in IE 7 (fine on Firefox), when invoked from my custom domain name. It worked fine yesterday (and the year prior), and I have changed nothing in terms of templates, CSS, etc. since then. I have changed nothing with my DNS settings either.
Details:
- Custom domain: http://photo.jimcollier.com/gallery/2611976#137798763
- Worked yesterday (and for the last year) on IE 6>7, and Firefox 1.5 + 2.0.
- Works today on Firefox 1.5 + 2.0.
- Broken today on IE 7: The standard Smugmug gallery style doesn't display the photo on the right. The icons show, the photos don't.
- smugmug domain: http://jimcollier.smugmug.com/gallery/2611976#137798763
- Everything works fine on IE 7, and Firefox 1.5 + 2.0.
- If you jump right into a gallery (via direct link off of custom domain like the first one), after having deleted all temp files [inc. cookies and .js], without hitting the homepage first, you get an IE error (see attached PNG). This doesn't happen with Firefox, nor does it happen if you use the smugmug domain instead. (This problem also didn't exist before.)
Peripheral details:Any advice or look-into-it-ness would be appreciated!
Although I'm not a software tester by profession, I have worked very closely with software testers and testing orgs. And to excel at my job I must be a keen and scientific tester myself, and well-versed in testing methodologies. (And I am.) I also used to be a developer so I understand bug isolation, reproducibility, etc. I'm "preety preety preety sure" it is/was a smugmug problem.
So we'll see where this gets us.
Today I've noticed that some other smugmug sites--that I have never visited before--particularly with custom domain names, are having other random problems. Such as custom nav tabs not rendering (have to gues and click blindly, then they show up), etc. Unfortunately I did not make a log of all of these and their URLs, that might have been useful.
Jim
(Sorry for the spacing issues. I'm very much a not-fan of web-based rich-text editors. Esp. ones that don't at least give you access to the HTML.)
is working fine for us, IE7, all supported browses. We have to find out what's changed on your end. Is this from home or work?
Has anything changed on your end? Ad blockers, plugins, firefwall, security software, anything?
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The problems continued on my work computer for most of the day, so I assumed it was a problem on this end due to some security change, etc. However, at one point this afternoon, my site started loading without any IE errors and smugmug viewing style was available/worked again. This lasted for an hour or so and then the errors started again.
One error I am getting says 'session cookie' undefined. Another error says "syntax error."
Also, with IE7, my drop down submenus on my navigation bar go away when you try to select them. You can mouse back and forth numerous times and the submenu will eventually stay up so you can select.
I have found a workaround here but not sure if others are having the same issues with my site.
It seems like these issues (at least the loading errors) are related to my custom domain name. I can log in and proceed as normal if I go through www.jrglassphotography.smugmug.com. If I log in from www.jrglassphotography.com, and then select a gallery, it seems to log me out and my gallery tools disappear.
Thanks for looking!
Jr.
www.ivarborst.nl & smugmug
Hi Andy and thanks. To answer your questions (in probably more detail than you wanted):
- I have tested from home bypassing firewall, and work. As for work, I work for a software company, my group does alot of ajax work. We are constantly evaluating the competition--alot of other ajax-heavy websites (nothing remotely photo hosting related ;-). Although ajax by design works just fine through the most severe firewalls (as long as it allows HHTP and isn't rediculously picky on stateful inspection), we happen to have virtually no firewall restrictions, for a variety of other reasons. (E.g., you can play any online game you'd like here...)
- Nothing at all has changed on my config--OS or browsers. This problem is reproducible on three different machines and OSes:
- A server running win 2k3 and utterly, totally bare and void of anything remotely firewall-ish, AV-ish, anti-spyware-ish, SMS-ish, etc., and with only one application loaded--SQL Server. Patched up-to-date and with IE7. (Tested with and without SQL Server started.)
- A notebook running a fairly lean install of XP SP2/IE7. Windows Firewall enabled, eTrust AV, corp SMS. About half of the other default but non-essential services disabled (e.g. remote registry.) I have a script that closes/kills off the AV/SMS/etc--with same smugmug result. Firefox 1.5 installed.
- A PC running Vista. Patched and up-to-date. Standard office apps, Visual Studio, IIS enabled (but svcs off), SQL Server Express installed (also turned off). Firefox 2.0 installed.
In all cases, the configs on all three OS'es and five browser instances have been the same for at least two weeks, during which time I have accessed my site many times. No changes to AV/spyware/etc. Only "changes" have been deleting cookies, .js files, and other temp files. And plus some work going on, on my notebook occasionally ;-)I can tell you this if you haven't gleaned it already (I'm assuming you don't do any of the dev), debugging ajax apps are *EXTREMELY* complex. Using a framework helps, but the fact is, you have quite a bit of extremely flakey code running on a nearly infinite array of client machines and browsers, none of which you have no control over, that you kind of have to just cross your fingers and hope it works. The worst part is that it's javascript, which is poorly defined to begin with, has hugely varying implimentations accross browsers (you thought CSS was a nightmare) that has to be served up from a single source, it is an extremely poor language in terms of error-checking, type-safety, performance [e.g. precompilation], and on and on...The fact that we now have ajax websites has only recently become a possibility, because you have to have lots of CPU horsepower just to read through it line-by-painstaking-line, parse it, interpret it, and act on it--all fast enough to not scare off users.
That doesn't mean that ajax apps can't be debugged. Of course they can and absolutely must be, it's just alot harder than it needs to be. In the future this will all seem so primitive.
Anyway. You know the error I mentioned? That I get on my browser when I nav directoy to a gallery by URL, after clearing out all js files, cookies, etc.? And have never received before (and don't get in Firefox)? It's an ajax error. Well not a dedicated ajax error, but it happens alot with ajax development, and to my knowledge only on IE. (See attached.)
BTW, my wife is NOT seeing this problem. The link above works just fine for here. Three differences I can think of:
- She is on IE6 (required for in-house apps), which is considerably different in it's internal workflow than IE7.
- She is behind a rediculously restrictive firewall, and
- Her corp notebook is loaded to the gills with IT management crap, to the point where it barely runs.
Another data point that we can't ignore: others have experienced problems just recently with the images not appearing in smugmug viewing style for either their galleries and/or others.So I don't know what the problem is, nor do I know enough to say it's definitely a smugmug problem. But given the known evidence (e.g. very broad test matrix, stable environments, precisely known configs, high reproducibility, and the known vagaries and complexities of ajax development), Occam's razor says the simplest explanation to explain the available evidence, is it's a smugmug ajax problem. But your dev guy(s?) will have their own set of knowns and unknowns, and I'm sure the equation seems (or is) different from their perspective. We'll see. Fortunately I haven't invested a great deal yet in spreading the word about my site (friends and family at least still hit pbase), so I can afford to wait a few days and see what happens.
I'm also willing to assist in debugging if necessary (e.g. being an eyeball/mouse button on the client side...or this particular client side).
I received a "we're looking into it" reply from John Young which was appreciated. This might be relevant info for him so FYI I'm going to reply with the body of this text.
Anyway, sorry for the ajax rant. That at least is no fault of smugmug! And I know they're working very hard. (Truth be told, I never ceased to be amazed as hell that such an ajax-heavy site even works at all!)
Thanks,
Jim
It's working now. Yea! Did you guys change anything? I found out by a fluke. I had a tab open from a previous try (with the same custom domain URL as I've listed before), where the icons were visible and the image wasn't. I don't remember if I hit F5 or just clicked on an image (I wasn't in "testing" mode so I didn't mentally note it), but the image popped up. (Sorry, I know that would be useful info.)
All galleries work, on all three OS'es tested, FF 1.5, 2.0, and IE7.
No caches/temp files/cookies/js files were cleared, and in three tested cases the browsers were still open. Nothing special was done--it just works.
If you guys fixed something, then the responsiveness is impressive and appreciated. If not, then...well, thanks for nothing ;-) Seriously, thanks either way.
Jim
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