Not a bug Thread Title Prevents Posting

[Ghan_04]

Greetings,

This is an error that I have brought up before, though I did not report it as a bug at the time, but I have encountered it again and it appears to still exist here on xenforo.com. This is the old thread:

http://xenforo.com/community/threads/this-thread-title-makes-me-unable-to-post.44307/

The referenced test thread still does not work with my current version of Chrome: Version 31.0.1650.63 m
We have had a user report this issue on a thread for a board where I manage the server. This board is still on xenForo 1.1, so it appears to be an issue in both 1.1 and 1.2. This is the reported thread:

http://rpg-directory.com/threads/au...e-seeking-advertising-guru.66601/#post-693044

The thread here on xenforo.com had a few replies starting to get at the issue, but I am not enough of web coding guy to know what kind of validation error there is here. Any help would be great.

Thanks!

 

[xf_phantom]

Do you use an adblocker? The word "advertising" is AFAIK causing this problem

 

[Ghan_04]

Could be, though the problem initially occurred with this thread: http://xenforo.com/community/thread...te-the-small-one-on-the-sponsored-area.44306/

Would "sponsored" also be an issue? Why would an adblocker care about the form being submitted to the server? This really seems like an issue with how xenForo handles things as opposed to an adblocker issue. I've never heard about this being reported somewhere like Web Hosting Talk, which uses vBulletin, and I'm sure tons of people use an adblocker over there.

I was able to reproduce the issue in several other threads with "advertising" in the name, but did not encounter the issue in this one: http://rpg-directory.com/threads/whats-the-point-in-advertising.59989/

And I also tried a thread with just "advertise" and I was able to reply just fine.

 

[Paul B]

If you are able to post the thread here without issue then it is more than likely browser, browser add-on or server related.

 

[Ghan_04]

The problem still exists here, but it seems to only occur in certain browsers. Yes, it looks to be an adblocker issue, but it's still a problem somewhere in how xenForo handles thread posts.

 

[Jeremy]

Do you have ad blockers installed?

 

[Ghan_04]

Yes I do. That still does not explain why this happens. An ad blocker should not affect your ability to post. It certainly doesn't on vBulletin. The issue is also very inconsistent with regard to what triggers it.

 

[Paul B]

If it is due to ad blockers then it's not a bug.

 

[Jeremy]

vBulletin doesn't include pretty URLs which include keywords that trigger ad blockers in the URLs. Disable ad blockers and attempt again.

 

[The Dark Wizard]

If it is due to ad blockers then it's not a bug.

How ever millions of people use adblockers.

You can't ask them to turn it off, to fix this.

 

[Ghan_04]

This has been confirmed to be an issue in Firefox and Chrome. I assume in both cases that some kind of adblock is turned on. Trying to tell your users that they need to disable adblock just to POST on your site is a pretty poor way to handle it, in my opinion. I have never heard of this issue with any other piece of software before, but it sounds like it's a problem with some kind of javascript/ajax request made to the server when posting. Somehow, adblock is stopping something that is needed, but I have no idea what it is. It obviously doesn't block the keywords everywhere it finds them because you can still have thread titles with the keyword itself and posts with the keyword. Some combination of xenForo code is causing the adblock to flag it as "bad". There should be a way to prevent this in the software itself, no?

 

[Liam W]

Why are you so content on blaming the software?

The adblocker is blocking the software from posting the relevant content to the server, the software can't do anything about it.

Turn of adblocker, problem solved.

Liam

 

[The Dark Wizard]

Why are you so content on blaming the software?

The adblocker is blocking the software from posting the relevant content to the server, the software can't do anything about it.

Turn of adblocker, problem solved.

Liam

The issue is not with adblocker. Atleast you don't want to see it that way because Adblocker is not something that is "rare". Adblocker is something that is extremely popular and widespread.

You can either tackle it from xF's side or ask millions of people to turn it off.

I know for a fact that I'd lose lots of site members if I had to ask them to turn off adblocker(not that we run ads, but that still doesn't mean people will turn it off and on just to visit my site)

 

[Ghan_04]

> Why are you so content on blaming the software?

Because fixing it in the software is the logical and most practical solution to the issue.

> the software can't do anything about it.

I would like some proof of this claim. Are you telling me that no matter how the software structures its request that it's impossible to keep adblocker from interfering? I find that extraordinarily unlikely.

> Turn of adblocker, problem solved.

For me in one instance, perhaps. However, when your community consists of hundreds or maybe thousands of members, it's not exactly feasible to tell them they must turn off adblock or they might not even be able to post in some threads. That's patently absurd. No one wants to hear it, and the majority of people will be content to leave your site and not post new content.

 

[Liam W]

The issue is not with adblocker. Atleast you don't want to see it that way because Adblocker is not something that is "rare". Adblocker is something that is extremely popular and widespread.

You can either tackle it from xF's side or ask millions of people to turn it off.

I know for a fact that I'd lose lots of site members if I had to ask them to turn off adblocker(not that we run ads, but that still doesn't mean people will turn it off and on just to visit my site)

The vast majority of adblockers have an option to whitelist certain sites. Just ask them to add your site to the whitelist?

> Why are you so content on blaming the software?

Because fixing it in the software is the logical and most practical solution to the issue.

> the software can't do anything about it.

I would like some proof of this claim. Are you telling me that no matter how the software structures its request that it's impossible to keep adblocker from interfering? I find that extraordinarily unlikely.

> Turn of adblocker, problem solved.

For me in one instance, perhaps. However, when your community consists of hundreds or maybe thousands of members, it's not exactly feasible to tell them they must turn off adblock or they might not even be able to post in some threads. That's patently absurd. No one wants to hear it, and the majority of people will be content to leave your site and not post new content.

It's done a lot of sites no harm, however see above.

If the adblocker intercepts the post request to the server (which it probably will do if the post url contains the word 'advertising' in it), then the post request will fail.

xenForo uses the thread name in the url if you have friendly URL's enabled - so the post request will probably get blocked.

In saying that, I guess they could probably have something to only use content ID's for link URL's, seeing as they probably won't be seen anyway.

 

[Ghan_04]

> Just ask them to add your site to the whitelist?

So essentially it's this: "Whitelist our site in your adblocker or you might not be able to post."
That's incredibly bizarre. I've NEVER had a site ask me to do that just in order to contribute. It has NEVER OCCURRED.

 

[The Dark Wizard]

The vast majority of adblockers have an option to whitelist certain sites. Just ask them to add your site to the whitelist?

> Why are you so content on blaming the software?

Because fixing it in the software is the logical and most practical solution to the issue.

> the software can't do anything about it.

I would like some proof of this claim. Are you telling me that no matter how the software structures its request that it's impossible to keep adblocker from interfering? I find that extraordinarily unlikely.

> Turn of adblocker, problem solved.

For me in one instance, perhaps. However, when your community consists of hundreds or maybe thousands of members, it's not exactly feasible to tell them they must turn off adblock or they might not even be able to post in some threads. That's patently absurd. No one wants to hear it, and the majority of people will be content to leave your site and not post new content.

Because as Ghan states, asking hundreds or even thousands of people to do something, is absurd. No one is going to use your site and post new content if they have to take extra steps to make it work, when they just go to a competing site where they don't have to do that.

 

[Liam W]

Well, there is also another easy way to fix it - turn of full friendly URL's (it will stop the thread name appearing in the URL).

Also, see my point at the bottom of my last post.

Liam

 

[Ghan_04]

> No one is going to use your site and post new content if they have to take extra steps to make it work, when they just go to a competing site where they don't have to do that.

The user experience is key to any successful web venture. If you have to have users do something special in order to experience your site, you are going to have a bad time. Users are lazy, and they want their content without having to jump through hoops for it. Something that is detrimental to the user experience is the #1 thing that will drive people to choose a different software solution to fit their needs.

> turn of full friendly URL's (it will stop the thread name appearing in the URL).

It would still be nice if this could be fixed in the software. Actually, all you need to do is uncheck the "include content title in URL" setting. You can keep full friendly URLs turned on.

 

[The Dark Wizard]

> turn of full friendly URL's (it will stop the thread name appearing in the URL).

It would still be nice if this could be fixed in the software. Actually, all you need to do is uncheck the "include content title in URL" setting. You can keep full friendly URLs turned on.

This also has the problem of any established site that has already been index, taking a dip on google as the URLs change across the site.