Problem Logging On

600stu

I have a Samsung galaxy s3 running android 4.2.2 and using Google chrome.

When I try replying to this thread this morning I was still shown as logged in on the forum but when I clicked 'post reply' button it took me to the front page of the site. The menu did load this time and also showed me as logged in so tried going back to the thread and clicking post reply again. Same thing happened.
Had to log out completely and log back in to reply.

Chris

600stu wrote:

I have a Samsung galaxy s3 running android 4.2.2 and using Google chrome.

When I try replying to this thread this morning I was still shown as logged in on the forum but when I clicked 'post reply' button it took me to the front page of the site. The menu did load this time and also showed me as logged in so tried going back to the thread and clicking post reply again. Same thing happened.
Had to log out completely and log back in to reply.

Thanks for the reply. I'll take a look.

In the mean time, if you do the following it may help you out in the short term if you've not done so already:

1 - Tap the three little dots in top right of browser
2 - Select History
3 - Press 'Clear browsing data'
4 - Tick the 'Clear the cache' and 'Clear cookies, site data' boxes
5 - Press Clear

mfin

Guys, I do UI testing quite often on all major PC and Mac browsers (so I know all the clear cache problems).

It appears (as of right now) that your login IS working in all fully updated versions of:

PC (Win 7/Win 8 )
---
Firefox
Chrome
IE

Mac (Yosemite)
----
Firefox
Safari
Chrome

(I believe all of these browsers were having problems at some point in the last few days, as I'd tried them all).

BUT... just so you know, if the Firefox Plugin Ad-Block-Plus (currently version 2.6.6) is installed the Login pop-up does not appear in Firefox. You probably aren't worried about this as you want the advertising revenue, but this could well account for a proportion of people still saying the login does not work/appear (it has not interfered with the logins in the past).

Hope that little bit of information is of use. Remember, that Firefox Plugin is the most used plugin in Firefox with over 20 million people using it https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/extensions/?sort=users, at least if you are aware of the above you can let other people know.

The situation with Ad-Block-Plus will probably change when your code/their code changes I would expect. I have noted this kind of behavior before with various 3rd party code I have been involved with implementing.

Cheers.

bompington

Wouldn't put it past site owners who rely on advertising revenue to make sure that "the plugin that Shall Not Be Named" messes up vital functionality, it's not that hard.

600stu

Well I followed the advice and cleared cookies etc on my phone and login works.

On my PC though it still doesn't. Windows 7, IE8 and cleared cookies and offline files etc.
Can't upgrade browser as it's a work machine.

Clicking the helmet on the to of the main site just seems to reload the page but in mobile format for fraction of a second which then reverts to the normal desktop site. IE8 says error on page in the status bar at the bottom of the browser.

Chris

mfin wrote:

BUT... just so you know, if the Firefox Plugin **Nobody likes ads but they pay for the site so please have the class not to whine about them** (currently version 2.6.6) is installed the Login pop-up does not appear in Firefox. You probably aren't worried about this as you want the advertising revenue, but this could well account for a proportion of people still saying the login does not work/appear (it has not interfered with the logins in the past).

I've reproduced this here, too. So if bits of the website aren't working, it's worth turning off any Software Which We Shall Not Mention and seeing if that fixes it.

This isn't intentional on our part, we're not deliberately breaking it for people using such software. We just rely on the good nature of people using the website to disable it for our site, as really it is adverts which are enabling us to actually try and fix the many issues you guys are currently having, as well as keep building and improving the website into the future.

600stu wrote:

Well I followed the advice and cleared cookies etc on my phone and login works.

On my PC though it still doesn't. Windows 7, IE8 and cleared cookies and offline files etc.
Can't upgrade browser as it's a work machine.

Clicking the helmet on the to of the main site just seems to reload the page but in mobile format for fraction of a second which then reverts to the normal desktop site. IE8 says error on page in the status bar at the bottom of the browser.

I'm glad it worked for your mobile at least! IE8 I shall also have a look at. Have you tried going to www.BikeRadar.com and then hitting CTRL+F5? This may flush out any other cached files which could be causing issues.

markhewitt1978

Dork Knight wrote:

When I click Login or Join BikeRadar it takes me to the main site, when I then click on the picture of the head with helmet a white bar appears which only covers the blue menu bar.

Thanks! I managed to login now. A note for the website team it's not obvious at all that the helmet fellow is the login link. I had to come on here to find out how to login to your website! Very very very very bad design.

Chris

I think we're in agreement with you that the helmet button isn't very obvious, it's on our to-do list to change it to something more intuitive.

bompington

Is it just me or do other people feel that the fad for minimalist, "flat" design is creating a lot of inscrutable interfaces? I'm currently finding my new phone - 4.4 rather than 4.1 - has a few features that are pretty thoroughly unintuitive, and a lot of buttons whose purpose can only really be deduced by clicking on them to see.

markhewitt1978

bompington wrote:

Is it just me or do other people feel that the fad for minimalist, "flat" design is creating a lot of inscrutable interfaces? I'm currently finding my new phone - 4.4 rather than 4.1 - has a few features that are pretty thoroughly unintuitive, and a lot of buttons whose purpose can only really be deduced by clicking on them to see.

Yes a move away from things representing what they are in 'real' life. But the helmet thing is the opposite if the minimal flat design, if it was then it would just say "Login". After all on the forum itself there is a green button with the word "Login", you'd think they'd carry that across to the rest of the site.

Jeff Jones

markhewitt1978 wrote:

Dork Knight wrote:

When I click Login or Join BikeRadar it takes me to the main site, when I then click on the picture of the head with helmet a white bar appears which only covers the blue menu bar.

Thanks! I managed to login now. A note for the website team it's not obvious at all that the helmet fellow is the login link. I had to come on here to find out how to login to your website! Very very very very bad design.

We know that there are a number of things that need improving on the site, and the login is what we're working on now.

Getting it to work properly across all devices is the main priority. We'll also tackle the user experience and design aspects of it.

We're in an imposed development freeze until early January so nothing will be released live until then.

Immediate have invested in a fully specced development team which is still growing and we expect to pick up the pace in January. As of this week we have a full time QA tester (ChrisIM), a role we've needed for while.

markhewitt1978

One aspect is clicking on login on the forum and then it dumps you on the home page; whereas you'd expect to take you to the login page.

Jeff Jones

markhewitt1978 wrote:

One aspect is clicking on login on the forum and then it dumps you on the home page; whereas you'd expect to take you to the login page.

Yep. That was a hangover from when the site login (for commenting on articles) was tied to the forum login. Any login action had to kick you back to the home page then back into the forum to ensure you were logged in to both the site and the forum.

Now we don't have commenting at all (it will return) that whole process does not make sense.

We may unstitch it completely or at least make it less of a mousetrap experience.

nicklouse

Jeff Jones wrote:

Now we don't have commenting at all (it will return)

re this.

an anomaly that I noticed before was this.
I could moderate comments. but there was no way of seeing who had posted what in other articles etc.
also there was no idea as to how many posts they had made.

so spam posted on the main site was only found by chance.

you may want to have a rethink on how it works and how it is moderated as some thread comments are as bad a some on the forum. (you know how some like to go off on one).

markhewitt1978

On some forums I've seen their comments are actually forum threads, so they can be moderated in exactly the same way.

Jeff Jones

nicklouse wrote:

Jeff Jones wrote:

Now we don't have commenting at all (it will return)

re this.

an anomaly that I noticed before was this.
I could moderate comments. but there was no way of seeing who had posted what in other articles etc.
also there was no idea as to how many posts they had made.

so spam posted on the main site was only found by chance.

you may want to have a rethink on how it works and how it is moderated as some thread comments are as bad a some on the forum. (you know how some like to go off on one).

markhewitt1978 wrote:

On some forums I've seen their comments are actually forum threads, so they can be moderated in exactly the same way.

This is an option we're seriously considering.

600stu

So although Jeff said that nothing development-wise will be released until early January, log in doesn't work for me again on android using Google chrome.

Had to log in on an iPhone to post this which also has issues of its own. On iPhone the main site renders at the mobile version but then double tapping the screen zooms in, which shouldn't happen on a mobile version site.

I understand what your saying Jeff about immediate investing in a dev team and pace should pick up in January but the login issues are fundamental to any site which has registered users and although users don't pay directly to use the site, it's incredibly frustrating as a forum which mostly won't allow you to participate.

I would be interested to see stats on site participation since login was broken vs before...

Is it part of a long game to get rid of the forum and just keep the main site, articles etc etc?

Jeff Jones

Hi 600stu,

What happens when you hit login on the android? If it doesn't look like it's done anything, you may actually be logged in so you can then click on 'forum' and you'll see. We'll post an announcement on this soon.

Our QA Chris has being doing a very thorough bug check on the login across all devices. There are a lot - we're only finding them now because we actually have a QA. These will take time to fix but I'm hopeful they'll all be done by the time we are able do a live release in early January. Yes it's very frustrating for us not to be able to deploy fixes as soon as they're done but that will change next year.

We know most people can log in and post as forum traffic is quite stable. But this probably means the login has been broken for quite some time!

It's definitely not the plan to get rid of the forum, quite the opposite, which is why we are (finally) investing time in fixing things. Until things are fixed I can only apologise to you on behalf of the team that it's taken this long.

markyone

I cant log in on my lap top at home, pc in work and also my I phone ever since I logged out this week.
I am using another pc In my other office and if I log out I might not ever get to use the forum again.
Any ideas whats wrong?

Chris

markyone wrote:

I cant log in on my lap top at home, pc in work and also my I phone ever since I logged out this week.
I am using another pc In my other office and if I log out I might not ever get to use the forum again.
Any ideas whats wrong?

Which internet browser are you using? It sounds like you probably need to clear your browser cookies. If you need a hand with how to do that, let me know if you're using Internet Explorer/Chrome/Firefox/Safari and I'll talk you through it.

markyone

internet explorer and I phone,the I phone has been a problem for months but the lap tops only doing it in the last couple of days.
If you could help that would be great, as I am not up to scratch with all this IT stuff.

dork_knight

Try clearing your Temp Internet Files, with I.E. open try the keyboard shortcut; Ctrl + Shift + Delete

I usually leave Password & Tracking Protection Unchecked.

Chris

markyone wrote:

internet explorer and I phone,the I phone has been a problem for months but the lap tops only doing it in the last couple of days.
If you could help that would be great, as I am not up to scratch with all this IT stuff.

No problem - here's how to do it for both.

Internet Explorer (older version)
1. Open internet explorer
2. Go to the tools menu (little cog icon)
3. Click on the General tab
4. Click 'Delete' under Browsing history



Internet Explorer 11 (You will have this if you are using Windows 8 )
1. Follow this guide as it explains it way better than I can! http://www.allaboutcookies.org/manage-cookies/internet-explorer11.html


iPhone (Safari)
1. Press the Settings icon on your iPhone
2. Scroll down to Safari and press that
3. Press 'Clear History and Website Data' (A word of warning: in latest version of iOS this will delete your browsing history and all your username/passwords saved for websites so you will need to log in to these websites again)
4. Follow prompts until success message saying it is cleared

Let me know how you get on!

Thanks,

Chris

markyone

thanks I will try it when I get home

markyone

I phone now sorted

Chris

Hooray! Glad it worked. Let us know if you get any more issues.

dork_knight

Returned to work after two weeks off and cannot log on:

Windows 7 Ultimate SP1
Google Chrome Version 39.0.2171.95 m (64-bit)

Cleared cache, disabled the ad blocking software and still cannot log on (currently using firefox which has me logged in).

When I disable the ad blocking software the column at the far right hand side of the page will flash between the following every one/two seconds or so:
Video,
Shopping Partners: Deals of the Week,
Recommend this week

After a good couple of minutes I may then get the ads appear between the blue header bar and the main page content.

If I re-enable the ad blocking stuff the blank ad disappears and the right hand column settles down.

No log on option though.

Chris

Hi Dork Knight,

Have you tried clearing your browser cache and cookies? It could be that there's something cached which we've amended style sheet wise.

To do this press CTRL + SHIFT + DEL, select the 'Cache' and 'Cookies' tick boxes and 'Beginning of time' from the drop down, then click Clear.

It sounds like it could be a cacheing issue coupled with a slow loading ad of some kind.

Let me know how you get on!

Chris

dork_knight

Hi Chris,

Sorry I should have been more clear ~ I had tried that before posting but just gave it another go, still the same.

My options are;
Obliterate the following items from: the beginning of time
All options ticked EXCEPT: Passwords

Cheers,

Jason

Chris

Ah, righto no problem.

When you say 'no log on option', how far do you get with the process? I mean, can you see the login (helmet) button, or is the navigation menu not loading for you? Is it hanging when you try to submit the login details?

Any little details will be much appreciated.

Many thanks,

Chris