I’ve been getting a lot of support emails like this, so I figured it is time to bring the issue front and center:
Thought I would let you know that for the past week or two, I’m having a problem with your website (wattsupwiththat.com).
I can read the first few stories, fine but as I continue to scroll down, the screen goes blank (all white), and does not come back.
I am using Firefox 3.6.28 on an Imac running Mac OS 10.4.11.
My software may be outdated, but if I’m having the problem others may as well.
WordPress.com (my hosting provider) recently made yet another unannounced upgrade to the blog software that provides for continuous scroll, adding new stories as you scroll down. There seems to be no way to turn off this feature, so the only way around the problem in older browsers (Like Firefox 3.6 which is out of date) is to upgrade. Upgrades are free, just do it.
Firefox is now up to version 11.0 – get it here: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/fx/
Chrome is up to 18.0 – get it here: http://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/
Internet Explorer 9 is out, though IE8 will work just fine. IE 6/7 not so much.
Safari/Opera/others – I have no experience with them, please advise in comments
It would seem that some who post here are still in the age of the “clacks”
Catch up gentlemen. The quill is no more.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology_of_the_Discworld#The_clacks
Running the standard Android browser on Android 4.0.3 on an Mips based tablet. Slight problems with videos but this isn’t restricted to wuwt. So generally ok.
I disagree, IE 8 and 9 are significant improvements over older versions and work well. Microsoft has been improving standards compliance, performance and security. IE9 is very competitive with Chrome and Firefox.
Firefox 3? Windows XP? My god, really?
Some of you people need to stop being so lazy. And all this nonsense about how its lighter and faster, you really think an out of date rendering engine will load modern pages faster?
No wonder the warmists think we are avoiding reality.
I’m running Windows 7 & IE9 on a Toshiba Satellite L750/L755 laptop. No problems.
I have the lastest version of firefox and the latest version of Windows 7, however I still experience problems when trying to view the site from the office, since this feature started operating. As I scroll down, at some moment all the screen is white and I can read nothing. Whatever WordPress uses to achieve that functionality, it is being blocked by mi office’s firewall. I can see the blog normally whenever I am out of the office, with a different internet connection, and the same computer.
I am experiencing this problem with WUWT on my home computer running Windows 7 64 bit. The reason I am still using Firefox ~ 3.8 is that the more recent Firefox (~10) crashes the Nvidia video card driver every few minutes and even sometimes the computer so I have to use the reset button. I think this is a known problem. When I switched back to Firefox 3.8 it stops crashing, but then there is this problem with WUWT. When reading WUWT I therefore switch over to the Google Chrome browser.
Another vote for Opera! Long time user and never had a problem with viewing WUWT on either Mac OS10 or iphone via Opera/Opera mini. Cant beat it IMHO
Anthony says:
April 3, 2012 at 8:09 pm
No it is not. It is proportional the the amount of javascript.
I use NoScript and the load time of most sites is 3 or 4 times faster. I currently have enabled only 5 of 14 sites that are providing scripts for WUWT. (I was wondering why the bottom of the screen was blank, now I know. I would rather live with it than enable any more scripts.)
My main system is still IE6, but I can no longer edit WUWT comments on that system because the Post Comment button is no longer available. It is still available on the other wordpress sites I’ve checked. Just not on WUWT.
As for updates, there is no faster way to make a system unusable than to update the software. I have lost many weeks rebuilding systems because someone made the mistake of updating Windows. In addition, a number of Windows programs no longer have the features I was using – if Microsoft loses some lawsuit, they just remove the feature as a “security” update.
On top of that, an update can fill up the rest of the hard drive and make the entire system unusable.
I have issues with firefox 11 on windows XP, but no issues on chrome.
I have an old G5 Mac with an old safari and seem to have no trouble with any web sites, maybe all the new wizz bang stuff with bells and whistles is a little fussy.
I have been having a problem lately with wattsupwiththat.com. As I scroll down through the posts, when I hit a certain point the screen turns white with an advertisement box which varies. When I hit the back button it takes me back to the bookmark list completely out of wattsupwiththat.com. I am using Safari 4.1.3 with Mac OS 10.4.11. My software updater says no updates available.
The problem isn’t your browser revision level, like everything else that goes wrong it has to be atmospheric CO2.
Simply apply for a research grant to explore the problem and buy a new computer to do the stats.
Solved.
I had the problem you described for a few days under an older Safari on Snow Leopard. Upgraded to Safari 5.1.5 and OS 10.6.8 and all problems went away.
The same problem was observed on rare occasions sometime during recent weeks with Internet Explorer 9, MS Windows 7 Professional Edition 64-bit, Intel Z68, Intel Core i7 2600K, 12GB RAM, AMD-ATI Eyefinity 6 Edition 2GB VRAM. Recovery efforts included reloading various WUWT Webpages, exit the IE9 browser and reloading with WUWT, and rebooting WIN7Pro64 and IE9. These troubleshooting efforts completely failed to clear the problem. Then, while switching between IE9 windows and other Webpages with returns to WUWT, the loading of the WUWT Webpages inexplicably resumed their normal functioning while linking between WUWT Webpages. The impression these intermittant events left was the possibility of a software bug dependent upon some arcane set of preconditions.
A number of other problems were observed in 2011 with Internet Explorer 8, MS Windows XP SP3, Dell Optiplex 755n, Pentium 4 HT, 4GB RAM, Intel GMA. The problems ceased after some hours or days without changing anything in the system configuration, and sometimes without rebooting or relaunching IE8. This seemed to suggest the changed factors were more likely to have occurred on the server side of the system.
Other systems ranging from Internet Explorer 9, MS Windows Vista Ultimate 32-bit and 64-bit on an Intel Core 2 Duo (Montevina) 4GB RAM, 4GB VRAM, 4GB cache, NVIDIA GPU to IE7 and MS Windows XP on an ASUS Eee PC, Intel Atom, 1GB RAM experienced a number of events during 2011 where WUWT pages were not loading properly, and those episodes were resolved without making changes to their configuration, rebooting, or leaving the immediate session. The IE6, MS Windows XP SP3 on a Dell Optiplex 270 Pentium 4 4GB RAM Intel GMA hasn’t been in recent use with WUWT, so there is no current report on its performance.
Just experimented with WUWT on the Motorola X2 Android on Verizon, and I ran into problems not seen before. WUWT at first seems to load properly, I begin to scroll down the screen to see the lower stories, and about the time something else, perhaps the Google ads, interrupts the scrolling, blanks the screen white, and then presents perhaps one or two article texts with a return graphic symbol in place of the original graphic illustration or photograph. Recovery requires going back to an earlier Webpage and reloading WUWT, only to have it ultimately whiteout again.
There is definitely something more going on here than obsolescent browsers despite what WordPress has to say about it.
Hope this helps with the troubleshooting….
I’m using Firefox 3.6.22 on a Win7 machine and the site works perfect for me, which is a good thing because I find Firefox’s recent decision to rapidly increase it’s release number so it’s on par with Crome to be really, really inane and I’m not going to update it.
Which is my problem, I don’t expect this site or any site to bend themselves because I don’t want to upgrade Firefox. Though I have to ask since I’m curious now, is the endless scrolling first page a conscious design element of this site or did it come default with this design? I know on my free wordpress blog that I can specify how many posts I want on each page and doing that would probably get rid of that script.
Working fine here in
Firefox 11.00
IE8
Opera 11.62
Chromium 19.0.1049.0
on WinXP SP3
Never had a problem with this site
Win XP sp3 with Firefox v 10 and 11
“ann r says:
April 3, 2012 at 7:23 pm
Rats! I hate upgrading because it messes up my bookmarks every time.”
If you have more than one computer, all the browsers can synchronize their bookmarks via the internet. If you use more than one browser on one computer, the free program “Transmute” will copy your bookmarks from one browser to the other.
The new browsers load much faster than the early ones, which makes a definite difference when using Google street view etc.
Erm, messing around with upgrading take a lot of time — often upgrades break not only the machine, but also the user interface, and that stresses people and wastes their time. Also, not everyone has the readies to buy new hardware.
Firefox is a classic case of upgrade annoyance, every upgrade they remove menu items, switch buttons around and randomly stop useful features from working. But do they fix the bugs that matter? Nops. Even on the new Firefox, if your net connection stalls, the *entire* app freezes, but to console you, the latest upgrade got shiny new buttons and no longer offers to restore sessions when it crashed(once again). (meh)
Linux is just as bad (if not worse) here, Ubuntu for example is completely unusable ever since they changed the desktop without a warning into clumsy mess, so has Fedora(and other issues, it’s not only the interface, but sometimes drivers etc don’t work right, and people end up with a long list of woes like, no sound, CPU fan constantly working, for which you need to spend hours tracking the issue, if you can find it at all, and then get a fix for it)
The last time I was sabotaged this way it took the entire afternoon to ‘downgrade’ the computer into something workable — I don’t have time or muse to faff around with this rubbish for hours either, so I no longer upgrade anything, life is short and one is dead for a very long time.
So don’t be so quick to berate upgrade refuseniks, it’s a good method to avoid guaranteed madness.
Also, a lot of people do not have control over their computer and it’s software either(think work, libraries, even hospitals) and so, the onus here is on you to ensure your site can be viewed.
I use Firefox on a MacBook, and have never had any problems with this site since I got this laptop (my previous one was quite old and I did get problems here). As Anthony says, it’s pointless trying to resist the need to update – you just make myriad problems for yourself
I’m never able to update my Fiorefox on the Mac as prompted however – I have to close down Firefox, open Safari, and install the new Firefox from there, then delete the older Firefox version. It’s only takes a minute, and I don’t lose my bookmarks, though I do need to reinstall a few passwords.
Couple of notes… if you run XP sp3, IE8 is as high as you can go. IE won’t install – 9 requires Vista or 7. XP systems are hardly obsolete. In small networks, they are far more reliable than Vista/7 and cross compatible with a lot more software. And anybody who thinks Microsoft Office 2010 is any kind of improvement is dreaming… 🙂
Our million machine office network switched (is switching) to windows 7 platform, from XP Pro, and we’ve lost half our functionality. 2010 “compatibility” frequently isn’t, colour tables have all been revised so updating things like excel templates is a major chore, and almost none of our macros run, because the handling of DOS in a windows GUI has totally changed. But we’re very SECURE!. Not that there’s anything left to steal because most of our stuff no longer works….. Sign me “Frustrated in Toronto…”. Oh, yeah, and under the current austerity, we have virtually no CSRs and the ones we do have try very hard not to be found….
Mac OS X 10.4 came out in 2005 and Windows XP in 2001. XP still gets updates but Apple does not update versions of Mac OS X older than the current version – 1 (n-1) so OS X 10.6 is the oldest version of Mac OS X that gets updates. I support Mac users professionally and they are some of the most obstinate people I have ever met making all kinds of lame excuses for not upgrading. If you depend on your computer you need to do better keeping up. 5 year old software is full of security issues and you are doing your self a disservice holding on to it. If you like maintaining antique software and hardware fine but get something else for your day to day usage. A brand new Mac Mini with mouse and keyboard is less than $740 a refurbished one is even less Windows systems are even less. It’s Time To Upgrade!
Any speaking of WUWT and WordPress , I get this message this morning on every post to WUWT:
Server Maintenance
Your server is going through a few minutes of routine maintenance. Please don’t touch your browser for a few minutes.
What do I do?
If you were posting a comment or making a post on your blog then do not press BACK on your browser. Wait 5 minutes and press the refresh icon on your browser. Your comment or post will be sent as normal.
If you are browsing a blog here just wait a few moments and hit refresh. The page you were expecting will appear.
If I open a second browser, the post is there, waiting to be moderated. Personally, I think the issues are coming from WordPress’ interest in increasing the monetization of the site – I’m seein in-post ads where I never used to, and frequently, and they have reported code problems internal to these ads (from Google). There have been a lot of complaints about in-post ads – in appropriate content married to post topics and audiences etc. Still, WordPress has a cost to operate, and they need to pay for it somehow, You can apparently pay you way out of the ads, but really, the need to find a way to insert them in the free version, outside of the posts themselves.
Personally, I have issues with WordPress from time to time. I write a reply like this, and hit Post comment, and WordPress demands that I log into my WordPress account. Occasionally it barfs on “duplicate email address”. OSX 10.6 (since I need Rosetta for some stuff, and Lion dumps supporting it) with the latest Firefox.