markopolo2002 Posted August 27, 2011 Share Posted August 27, 2011 OK, this isn't a rant from me, but I'm confident it will turn into such by the time others are finished with it - I'm more interested in highlighting the upgrade problems a lot of people have had across the v3 and the way things are dealt with here at Invision. Firstly, accepted - nobody forces anyone to upgrade, but it's natural to see all the goodies on offer with new versions and want them, it's also accepted that there will be some bugs and those who kick-off about every single minor bug are just silly, although there have been a couple of bugs around for a while now, one of them being the photo rebuild issue and while somewhat annoying, it's not a killer by any means. All that aside, I've seen something with the entire upgrade process that concerns me. Order! or at least, the lack of it. Now I'm not trying to hurl stones here at Invision, but I consider myself a long time user of Invision and it's apps, but even I can't figure what's been reported, where, and what the hell is happening with it. We have forums, feedbacks, trackers and all manner of other area's where these snippets of information "could be". Over the past few months, I've probably spent more time at Invision trying to find answers to problems than I have on my own site!!. Brandon will probably vouch for the fact that even I've wasted some of their time raising duplicates in the tracker that are just impossible to find, it's not that I'm not looking for them, but more a case of it's impossible sometimes to find them. When that happens, I often post in the forums to ascertain whether it's a bug or not, but often no replies are forthcoming which means either the developers are too busy to answer them or no-one knows!. Why can't we have a specific area, or even a thread concerning all the raised bugs sorted by app, for example, IPBoard bugs, IPDownload Bugs, etc - I know we can sort stuff from the tracker but it's not the most friendly of places and a lot of people raise a bug using technical references that mean absolutely nothing to a lot of us, hence the reason for a lot of duplicate trackers and wasted time. People get frustrated when they can't confirm something is a bug, and then even more frustrated when their tracker is simply marked as a 'duplicate' with no reference to the original tracker. I'm also becoming concerned that the staff here at Invision are getting stretched to their limit, as it's often the case now that the guys at the root of the apps are unable to provide support in the forums, probably because they are too busy trying to work on all the bug reports and going round in circles all day marking duplicates and answering questions which could be collated better elsewhere. Again, I'm not having a go at Invision although sometimes it's tempting, but I realise you guys are doing what you feel is best for us all with the upgrades and it's appreciated, but we need some serious consideration on how things are ordered at Invision, more transparency and simpler processes for obtaining information. My suggestion may not be the answer, but at this point I think something close to it may very well provide a little respite for confused clients and more time for staff to concentrate on more important issues. Cheers Marko Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyF Posted August 27, 2011 Share Posted August 27, 2011 'Cannot reproduce' just means that the developer cannot duplicate it, its possible certain server environment setups could cause it though. Usually they will ask you to submit a ticket if needed, or you should if its a supported / non beta version and you can reproduce it on your board. :) 'Duplicates' I'll partly agree a link would be nice although it would take time away to find / post the link to it in some cases where the developer does not have it immediately to hand. I would not worry too much about your report being posted as duplicate, I'm sure they would rather have two / three reports for one issue than none at all and it slipped by. I've posted quite a few duplicates accidentally too, so I would not worry too much about that. Photo issue, this is actually something I've posted one detailed bug report on today after some testing yesterday evening. I do intend to do some more testing with this now I have a few more ideas too, so hopefully if there is anything really amiss (there is a minor issue from what I have tested) I'll have some data sets of before / after where a dev can see it and know what the test accounts had before / after too. This is more complicated than it sounds as I have to have identical databases with known avatar / photo choices (all the permutations of none / upload / linked) and then two upgrade sessions to cover both avatars and photos. I think I made it sound more work than it is though, and that's going off topic. :) I'm confused by the request of an area for bug discussion ? :unsure: :) , unless I've misunderstood. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 27, 2011 Author Share Posted August 27, 2011 Can always rely on you for a prompt response Andy :thumbsup: It's not that I, or others, don't know what the various tags mean but more ....... let me give you an example of a recent situation ... I had new members sign up on the site, everything went well, a few made posts, still great .. then they made replies to a number of existing threads and I noticed from the "follow this topic" that although there had been something like 8 replies, only me and another existing member had "followed". That got me wondering why people were unsubscribing from the threads, as the default was to subscribe them. A few PMs to the relevant members and it turned out they were not being subscribed automatically. I raised a thread on Invision after not finding anything relating to this in the tracker, and wasn't able to determine if this was a bug or not. After admitting defeat with no positive responses in the forums I raised a tracker, and Brandon marked it as a duplicate. Basically, I wasted my own time and Brandon's, but more frustrating was the fact I couldn't find this information. If we had a thread concerning all the confirmed bug reports, listed by apps, chances are I would have been able to spot this a mile away, would have confirmed the issue and I wouldn't have posted a seperate thread in the forums asking for confirmation or in the tracker causing a duplicate. The thread in question wouldn't necessarily be open to members to 'discuss' anything, it could just be a confirmed list of bugs which have been marked as known and fixed if you get what I mean. I just think keeping a central repository (other than the tracker) of an ordered list would alleviate a lot of unecessary posts from frustrated members and duplicates in the tracker, thus freeing up you guys to concentrate on the bugs in question. :thumbsup: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyF Posted August 27, 2011 Share Posted August 27, 2011 You're welcome, will be good to read what staff members post too. :) Its easy to generate a report of bugs in one version fixed in another although this only really provides a link and the report title (so its usefulness depends on the report title being meaningful) , not quite sure what could be done although I do like your idea but its implementation I'm not sure about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 27, 2011 Author Share Posted August 27, 2011 As I say Andy, my suggestion may not be the answer, but it's just to raise the question with both staff and members alike - there has to be at least some way to collate the information in a more 'user friendly' and legible manner ?? :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rgf100 Posted August 27, 2011 Share Posted August 27, 2011 We have forums, feedbacks, trackers and all manner of other area's where these snippets of information "could be". Over the past few months, I've probably spent more time at Invision trying to find answers to problems than I have on my own site!! Snap. And I find it deeply worrying when you have issues like this being reported, getting tagged as 'could not reproduce' and left for three weeks before anyone notices that actually, something is wrong. There's actual data going missing there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dmacleo Posted August 29, 2011 Share Posted August 29, 2011 if I understand right the tracker is almost ready to do most of this as it it, granted user does have to click 2 buttons but maybe an rss setup for versions and status could work? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 30, 2011 Author Share Posted August 30, 2011 if I understand right the tracker is almost ready to do most of this as it it, granted user does have to click 2 buttons but maybe an rss setup for versions and status could work? One of the biggest problems I think we have on the board, and probably a lot of boards have this same issue is topic titles. I've lost count of the amount of times I've looked for something here on Invision and couldn't find it, only to discover at a later date that the same question or issue does actually exist. Problem is, some people post using ridiculous titles, like "is this possible?" or "how do I do this?" or "what's wrong with this?"- basically means nothing to anyone viewing titles and something which I personally would feel deserves a "-1". This just throws the entire search system into chaos, I mean, a search system is really on as good as the descriptions we choose to use. The same applies to the tracker when people use technical references, trouble is, they know what the problem is and will sometimes use this technical jargon for the title, but again, it means very little to some of us and so we don't even see it. I suppose I'm almost asking for a double negative here when I think a little more about it, I'm suggesting something which could potentially save staff time and members frustration, but if the staff were to start creating list's in forums that would probably take up more of their time ... double edged sword then?. Better still, let's just ban those members who can't write a proper title!! - seriously, though, I'm a tad dissapointed the staff haven't responded to this thread (other than our man Andy, 3 cheers for Andy :thumbsup: ) with their views or take on the matter, I know you guys are busy but I've seen you all respond to flamings quick enough - give the one's who want to work WITH you a little more of your time too :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 We don't mind if you report a bug and it gets marked duplicate - if you think you've found a bug, and can't find a duplicate report, go ahead and create it - we appreciate it :smile: The nature of the tracker is that we do move through them our own way (unlike tickets, where we always give a formal response), and so it's not always possible to find the duplicate report. More often than not, I just think "I've already fixed that" - I might not even recall where it was from (another bug report, a ticket, etc.) Similarly with "Cannot Reproduce" - if we can't reproduce, it gets marked Cannot Reproduce - but that doesn't mean we've dismissed it, it just means we can't confirm it, and at that point you should submit a ticket so we can see it on your site. As always, if you need to *discuss* something with us, a ticket is the way to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 30, 2011 Author Share Posted August 30, 2011 Well, it's good of you to pacify our concerns of raising duplicate trackers Mark, thanks for that - as for the topic titles, well I guess we'll never see an end to the silliness there!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marcher Technologies Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 Well, it's good of you to pacify our concerns of raising duplicate trackers Mark, thanks for that - as for the topic titles, well I guess we'll never see an end to the silliness there!! offtopic, But could forced pre-determined tagging not... like, be helpful HERE?... Honestly quite tired of digging though ... eesh, pages of topics for something not even a month back, that couldve been tagged and easily findable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
• Jay • Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 offtopic, But could forced pre-determined tagging not... like, be helpful HERE?... Honestly quite tired of digging though ... eesh, pages of topics for something not even a month back, that couldve been tagged and easily findable. Search still works even without a one click option. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bfarber Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 seriously, though, I'm a tad dissapointed the staff haven't responded to this thread (other than our man Andy, 3 cheers for Andy :thumbsup: ) with their views or take on the matter, I know you guys are busy but I've seen you all respond to flamings quick enough - give the one's who want to work WITH you a little more of your time too :) I've read the entire topic but didn't have anything to add. An ongoing list of "these are the open bugs" and "these are the fixed" bugs is unrealistic in my opinion, but other ideas could still come up in the topic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 30, 2011 Author Share Posted August 30, 2011 One area which could possibly be food for thought is the search system itself, problem comes when we're trying to search for something like an error message either in the tracker or elsewhere on the board and we can't use 3 letter words which can then exclude a major chunk of the error itself and render the results useless. I know this is more to do with MySQL than Invision, but it highlights a further possible weakness in the process of finding the relevant information, I personally have had to simply remove the search system from our site in favour of google site search, the amount of irrelevant results generated on our site were staggering!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyF Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 If it helps there's an error code search available. :) Click the Documentation link at the top of this page, then at the bottom of the docs page there's a link to it. Here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 30, 2011 Author Share Posted August 30, 2011 Ahh, this is handy Andy (sorry, purely unintentional pun!) - obviously, in that case it's more a question of visibility than anything else, didn't even know something like that existed!! :thumbsup: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyF Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 I find it helpful for support topics sometimes as you can ask those requesting assistance to provide the code along with the error message then you can look up the relevant section of code to determine a likely solution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dmacleo Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 I know this is more to do with MySQL than Invision, but it highlights a further possible weakness in the process of finding the relevant information, I personally have had to simply remove the search system from our site in favour of google site search, the amount of irrelevant results generated on our site were staggering!! they say they use sphinx though, which allows 2 letter and wildcard. but then we are told has to be 3 letter/more due to mysql search. who knows ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markopolo2002 Posted August 30, 2011 Author Share Posted August 30, 2011 sphinx is basically the same thing from what I remember, doesn't do much more than standard traditional search other than to offer better performance, though I had some trouble justifying that even!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bfarber Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 MySQL fulltext search is limited to 4 characters by default. This can be changed in MySQL configuration file, but MySQL does not recommend doing so, because it hurts fulltext search performance greatly. Sphinx by default is 3, although this is configurable in the sphinx.conf file. We have not customized our file to allow 2 letter searches. Lastly, there's a "minimum search word length" setting in the ACP that IPB itself checks, and I'm not sure what ours is set to right now. There's a lot of settings at play. :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dmacleo Posted August 30, 2011 Share Posted August 30, 2011 would make it easier to search. either allow 3 or make all your acp (including acp) settings use 4 letters. when you call a setting Ad Code and we are searching Ad Code we are screwed cause of BOTH words. but that is another topic, I digress :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NickDorazio Posted September 14, 2012 Share Posted September 14, 2012 MySQL fulltext search is limited to 4 characters by default. This can be changed in MySQL configuration file, but MySQL does not recommend doing so, because it hurts fulltext search performance greatly. Can I assume then that for hosted forums this is not an option we can change? I am unsure because at http://community.invisionpower.com/resources/documentation/index.html/_/documentation/administrator-control-panel/system-tab/system-settings/system-search-setup-r77 it sounds like I might be able to change this. From the link above and the warning that turning off "fulltext" in ACP > System Settings > System > Search Set-Up will make the search extremely slow and server intensive, it sounds like IPB's preference is that we always use fulltext. But in my industry there must be a thousand three letter acronyms that my members can't search for using fulltext. So I have 3 questions: 1. What is the risk of turning off fulltext? 2. I would estimate that in 5 years we might have 10,000 users and 100,000 posts. So with numbers that small (compared to many of your customers) do I really have to worry about the potential for extremely slow searches? 3. If I turn off fulltext search, are there any input operators or configuration tweaks that will permit something other than the "exact match" type search that the non-fulltext search does? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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