Per our previous thread, WordPress.com tech support advises:
We were able to track down the issue with Ad Control and fix it for you. It appears to have been IE-specific, so you may need to clear your browser’s cache to notice a difference.
So do that, or start using Chrome or Firefox or Opera or Safari, or…
I didn’t do anything and it seems all good. So not even cache emptying is needed.
Thanks!
WordPress – the font of all wisdom.
At least WUWT no longer comes to you in a serious eye strain version!
ABE is your friend: anything but explorer.
I’m intrigued by the ad that followed the
“So do that, or start using Chrome or Firefox or Opera or Safari, or…”
It was a supplier of laser diodes. I’m trying to work out what it is about Watts ….
That’s it!!!! WATT, that is also why fluke were advertising yesterday.
Thanks – very glad to have my eysight restored!
Ghostery is an add-on to Firefox which is all by itself enough reason to switch. By disabling (some or all) embedded tracking scripts, etc., it about doubles (or more) loading speed. Then there’s Greasemonkey, whose CA tool enhances the input box with formatting, linking, blockquote, strikeout, and Preview. And Lazarus, that records and saves everything you type, allowing quick recovery when an entry goes blooey.
ABE, indeed! But Firefox is loaded with benefits like the above.
Full disclosure: I get a 50% commission on everyone who switches, on the $0 purchase price. Please quote the Special Code, IwuzanIEsukah.
|9-p
Good.
May I spread a warning- I recently received an email purporting to be from Fedex. It contained a Trojan Horse which was difficult to remove.(several hours of AVG scans and reinstalling affected programs) So unless you expect an email from the genuine Fedex spam it don’t open it.
give thanx u r back to normal, anthony…
Scottish Sceptic is intrigued by the ad that followed the
“So do that, or start using Chrome or Firefox or Opera or Safari, or…”
My ad was for “High Precision, Ultra Stable Temperature Controllers & Laser Diode Drivers” and ended with
I wonder if their mention of Firefox and IE helped in the ad selection too.
A site like WUWT that demands rigorous proof in most things climatological, before demonizing a piece of software should require more information than, “It appears to have been IE-specific,” My IE8 never experienced a problem.
Just for rambling’s sake… as a Web developer I’ve always found it easiest to develop for IE, then pretty much everything else is a minor tweak away from done. This latest project I’ve been on I have pretty much abandoned IE, which for me is a big deal. Yes, the site will work on it, but, you’re on your own for styling. Period. Maybe IE10. Maybe they’ll figure it out for 11. Or 12. Or whenever.
And, for the firefox proponents, you’re not in the clear either. The current version of FF has enough bugs and anomalous behaviors that I’m not even testing on it. Too bad, so sad, get Chrome.
As much as I despise google and their policies and politics, they’ve made the best current browser. Sigh.
“appears to have been IE-specific”
Hate to say “I told you so”…. but IE has been an HTML nightmare since Bill Gates was in diapers. To repeat an old Microsoft joke: ” How many Microsoft engineers would it take to change a lightbulb.? Answer: None. Microsoft would just make darkness the new standard.”.
Looking Good.
Thanks Anthony for all the hard work fixing this irritating issue.
No cache emptying needed here either. All’s good, as if none of it ever happenned. Thank you all !
Anthony, that thing with you and IE, it must have been very bad and no, no need need to explain.
Can someone PLEASE put a bullet to the back of IE’s head and put us all out of our misery. IE has single-handedly set web engineering back 5 to 10 years. And anyone who builds a site (not this one of course) that “requires” IE should be made to run the gauntlet of the internet town square being socially stoned to death for being to stupid to live a productive life. Off soapbox now.
John Marshall, I got the same email. However since it was a zip file with an windows executable included my iMac was not at risk. FedEx have a recorded message on their customer service warning people about this email message.
Brian – I have searched the Firefox site without success for a way to stop twitter from being attached to the pages I open. It constantly slows things down, and I don’t want it. Adblock removes some of them, but is there an easy way to delete twitter altogether?
Anthony and mods – I have lost the ‘older posts’ link at the bottom of the page and need to go to the monthly link to find them. I get a bar at the bottom of the page over the top of the text about WordPress and its style.
I am running the latest Firefox on a PC with (blush) Vista. The problems mentioned above are not critical, but something has changed for the worse in the last few weeks.
Paul Coppin says:
March 13, 2012 at 4:41 am
but IE has been an HTML nightmare since Bill Gates was in diapers.
——-
The first web browser was invented in 1990 … Microsoft responded with its Internet Explorer in 1995.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_browser
Wonder how much of this is google playing with microsoft’s head.. A little mischief here and there keeps customers coming to chrome.
johanna;
Ghostery add-on appears to do the job. Just don’t exclude Twitter (white-list it) in the widgets list.
You will note after installing that every time you open a new page, a little drop-down info tab briefly appears, showing the scripts blocked and permitted. Twitter is blocked now on mine.
Or for simple raw speed, without some bells and whistles that you might otherwise like, try Opera. Tiny memory footprint. I sometimes use it when attacking my massive webmail inbox backlog, e.g.. And it has a very nice feature called Opera Unite which allows “hosting” of your own photos etc.
johanna;
I have a previous post and later post links by title at the top just under the WUWT title bar. I also keep 4 WUWT tabs open at all times: Home, current post being read, Sea Ice Resource, and Tips & Notes. Any story off email notification or the home page gets drag-dropped onto the current post tab.
Works for me! 😉
johanna says:March 13, 2012 at 5:48 am
Anthony and mods – I have lost the ‘older posts’ link at the bottom of the page and need to go to the monthly link to find them. I get a bar at the bottom of the page over the top of the text about WordPress and its style.
I have the same problem, on XP w/SP3, Firefox 10.0.2. Tried Brian H’s suggestion of Ghostery, no change. Tried turning on and off each tracking item one at a time and refreshing the site. No change. This problem has been ongoing since the first week of Feb. 2012, and not on other WordPress sites.
For those who want ad blockers like Ghostery, bear in mind that in lieu of big oil funding and manna from Greenpeace or WWF, WUWT gets revenue generation from Google adwords and pay per click. It isn’t a lot but helps go towards my kids college fund, which with the way college cost are escalating in California, I may have to relocate someplace else to send them to college.
So thanks in advance for keeping the ads.
Truthseeker and John Marshal — Having been bit once many Moons ago from both an email and a webpage redirect, I learned to turn on the ‘Status’ bar on my browsers. Then just hovering over the link you can see the actual URL it will establish. With FF, go to ‘View’ – ‘Toolbars’ – ‘Add-on bar’ and select it. With IE8, go to ‘View’ – Toolbars’ – ‘Status bar’ and Lock the bars to supposedly prevent webpages changing your layout.
Thanks to whoever recommended “Ghostery” – that’s a great Add-on for FF. I just put it up with no revisions or white-lists and it hasn’t blocked anything I need! 😎
Anthony,
I don’t care so much about the ads. It is the unyielding overbearing anti-privacy posture assumed by Google or anyone big enough to abuse my personal information. Most ads do not bog my system down and I block pop-ups. Also, I normally enable scripts and pages at friendly sites like WUWT. But the recent privacy policy statement by Google has me fencing them off from my life, which surprisingly is easy.
^^^
This. Oh so very much this.
People still use IE?
“So thanks in advance for keeping the ads.”
I haven’t been using ad blockers because it’s only fair that I lend my bulging eyeballs in exchange for the stuff which the ads are paying for.
Anthony, I don’t care about blocking the ads, I just want your great site to be accessible to me. Something changed about six weeks ago. I added no software, and have no problems on other WordPress sites.
johanna says:March 13, 2012 at 5:48 am
Anthony and mods – I have lost the ‘older posts’ link at the bottom of the page and need to go to the monthly link to find them. I get a bar at the bottom of the page over the top of the text about WordPress and its style.
——
Steve Keohane says:
March 13, 2012 at 7:19 am
I have the same problem, on XP w/SP3, Firefox 10.0.2. Tried Brian H’s suggestion of Ghostery, no change. Tried turning on and off each tracking item one at a time and refreshing the site. No change. This problem has been ongoing since the first week of Feb. 2012, and not on other WordPress sites.
——————————————————————————–
Me three. I now have to go to Ric Werme’s summary guide.
I use a Mac and Safari.
What happened to the “Older Posts” button?
Now it says this at the bottom of the page:
Watts Up With That? Theme: Twenty Ten Blog at WordPress.com
Steve Keohane says:
March 13, 2012 at 7:19 am
johanna says:March 13, 2012 at 5:48 am
Anthony and mods – I have lost the ‘older posts’ link at the bottom of the page and need to go to the monthly link to find them. I get a bar at the bottom of the page over the top of the text about WordPress and its style.
I have the same problem, on XP w/SP3, Firefox 10.0.2. Tried Brian H’s suggestion of Ghostery, no change. Tried turning on and off each tracking item one at a time and refreshing the site. No change. This problem has been ongoing since the first week of Feb. 2012, and not on other WordPress sites.
———————————————————————————-
Thanks, Steve, the timing is the same for me. Ghostery doesn’t work for me either. Always nice to hear that you are not the only one 🙂
I’m guessing that WordPress has made some changes and not all of the bugs have been ironed out. Given what WP has enabled in terms of public communication, plus it is free, I can live with it.
Users that are concerned by Google tracking implemented in Chrome should look into SRWare Iron. It’s based upon the Chromium software but with an emphasis on privacy.
Same observation: “I have lost the ‘older posts’ link at the bottom of the [main] page”
… Opera 11.61 user under Win Xp SP3 …
No problem with Firefox…. hint hint….
Glad that it’s fixed, as compatibility mode didn’t seem to work all the time.
With fonts like those, who needs enemies…
(OK, OK, sorry… somehow I was thinking a font in need is a font indeed…)
A web developer has to test on all versions of all browsers. Thats sad, but thats the only way to be sure that a site works everywhere!
WordPress fixed it just for you, Anthony?
They ought to give you specific credit for saving their reputation with many sites, by diagnosing then alerting them to it?
(Reality is that MSIE is very very widely used.
I know people who avoid Google because they judge Google’s scanning of some old books to be improper using of someone else’s IP.)
As for blocking ads, I agree with you Anthony – you need revenue to keep going. TINFL.
The episode with WordPress’ defect reinforces my urging to Keep It Simple for Success. The more gimmicks you put in software, the more risk of tripping over something, the higher your coding and testing costs, the higher your product support costs, and the worse your reputation n the marketplace. The two-year-old-with-hammer term applies – a common variant is adopting a new feature before everyone else is ready, which happened with Cascading Style Sheets (weren’t yet supported by a popular browser).
And the more stuff you add to web pages the higher the risk. I agree with removing the “recent comments” gimmicky display, WUWT was already complex.
And as Smokey said at March 11, 2012 at 9:30 am, in my words, outfits that continually tinker with their software are questionable. Facebook’s function is flakey because of that approach. Except for urgent defect fixes a regular development cycle with thorough testing is necessary. Testing is not easy, but much of it can be automated. Info from some informed commenters herein suggest to me that WordPress did not even verify correct syntax.
And customizing software written by someone else is a fool’s game – when they update it you need to spend much money testing and tweaking your customization. (One cause of problems is the interaction of two inadequately coded pieces of software, they may appear to work together until an uncommon combination of data occurs or one of them is tweaked. Unwise choices too – why does MSIE default to gray text instead of black? It’s been suggested that Microsoft’s page rendering is not robust code – sometimes you have to bite the bullet and rewrite. (Code that “grew like Topsy” from a small/mis-managed start is trouble – hard to revise, hard to debug.) Note too that the font colour problem only occurred with some ads – if they come direct from third parties that’s another risk factor.)
Thankyou Blade says: March 11, 2012 at 5:46 am for cautioning about flitting around, and advising to gather data and confront WordPress. You, a few others, and Anthony pointed in the right directions, as confirmed by WordPress to Anthony – they had a coding defect that something questionable in MSIE tripped over.
Thankyou Jeremy Poynton says: March 11, 2012 at 5:43 am for pointing out the folly of faint typefaces.
Web page coders are two-year-olds with hammers, coding to impress their friends, not real people.
There are economic lessons in all of this, such as software development costs, the low asset value of code that “grew like Topsy”, the cost of troubleshooting to be able to use someone’s product, and lost sales. (One attitude that irks me is a seller’s expectation that I risk changing software on my computer so I can read their website.)
Brian H (or anybody else):
I installed Greasemonkey on your suggestion and voila! Nothing. I can go to type a comment and I see no tools, nothing, nada. Fortunately there appears to be no way to get it to do whatever in the heck it does. It sure would be nice not to have to learn yet another computer language in order to use English, bolding, italics, indents, graphics insertion and the other basically mundane things one can do with virtually any word processor. WordPress, so far, has failed to impress.
Greasemonkey, on the other hand is VERY impressive. It is indeed there. So two questions:
1) how does one get Greasemonkey to do anything, anything at all, particularly something useful?
2) how to remove it, assuming there is no useful aspect in having it except usage of disk space to host it, which, of course, is not useful.
CodeTech says: March 13, 2012 at 4:33 am
[…] Too bad, so sad, get Chrome.
As much as I despise google and their policies and politics, they’ve made the best current browser. Sigh.
Don’t be sad and don’t sigh. You’ll be relieved to know that Chrome is nothing but a rebranding by Google of the Chromium browser. (And we’re all using it at home, having quit on IE and FF).
I’m sure you feel happier now.
Regarding the good post in these threads on the font problem with WordPress and MSIE, whose author used W3c to check consistency:
Some of the things flagged as missing may actually be just incorrect order, for example if opening with don’t close in order , W3c claims the ending > symbol for is missing when it is in fact not, W3c is confused by the unsymmetrical order of the statements.
So W3c is a great initiative, but takes time to understand what it is actually saying.
It does highlight where the companion starting tag was, in most cases, and gives general guidance plus in some cases links to educational information. And has at least a bit of humour: “The construct <foo is valid in HTML (it is an example of the rather obscure “Shorttags” feature) but its use is not recommended. In most cases, this is a typo that you will want to fix. If you really want to use shorttags, be aware that they are not well implemented by browsers.” (Appears to actually be a case where a closing tag for a later opening tag was missing – see nesting remark above.)
I presume better consistency checking software can be purchased, and hope that some flagging is built into good page generation programs.
Does anyone know of a good economical page generation program that produces clean (not gimmicky) page code, either directly as a WYSIWG program or converting from .txt, .rtf, or .doc files?