Something Strange

[JH]

I just wrote an episode and saved it. On looking at it, I found one minor typo, so I edited it. When I previewed the edited version, I got an error message. The cause of this was that both option fields in my episode had somehow got blanked. So had all the "admin" fields. I filled them in again and all was well, but it was very strange.

[Sir Toby]

Do you know the episode number? This feature gets used all the time by you and everyone else with no problems. Perhaps there was something unique about the episode you were working with? If you give me the episode number, I'll try to reproduce the bug in the beta test story by entering in the original episode options and doing the same edit.

[JH]

It was 27490. I wondered whether it could be caused by somebody else reading the episode as I was editing it.

[Sir Toby]

It was 27490. I wondered whether it could be caused by somebody else reading the episode as I was editing it.

Well, I took the original text of 27490 and entered it into the beta test story. I also entered in identical story options and "admin" options. I then attempted to edit the episode and everything seemed to work. It doesn't seem like there is anything special about the episode that caused the problem. BTW - I noticed that the color scheme was altered during your edit. Was that intentional, or was that a result of this problem as well?

I seem to remember that someone else complained of a similiar problem a while ago. I don't remember who complained, or where the original complaint is. Its probably buried in the old message board somewhere. Since it doesn't have a search facility, it will be hard to find. If anyone else has ever had this problem, can you please step forward?

And now to begin the painful process of what went wrong... Do you remember exactly when the story options and admin options blanked out? Were they present before you clicked "preview"?

When you first click on "edit", the story software needs to read in the episode from the database. I suppose it is possible to have some sort of bug that causes the episode to be read in wrong. When you click on "preview", the database is not used. The options are stored within input fields in the HTML page, and not within the database. It's possible that either your browser transmitted the options incorrectly, or my server received the options incorrectly. If you can remember when the options were blanked out, that may help to narrow down what is going on.

[JH]

BTW - I noticed that the color scheme was altered during your edit. Was that intentional, or was that a result of this problem as well?.

It wasn't intentional.

I seem to remember that someone else complained of a similiar problem a while ago. I don't remember who complained, or where the original complaint is.

I think that was me, when we were testing the beta story. But then, too, it wasn't reproducible. I don't think the options disappeared that time, just the "admin" field contents (email address, etc).

And now to begin the painful process of what went wrong... Do you remember exactly when the story options and admin options blanked out? Were they present before you clicked "preview"?

I know they were there when I saved the episode the first time. Then when I edited the episode, I realised that the options were gone when the error-checking code warned me that option 1 and option 2 were both missing their text, but I'm not sure if that was when I pressed Preview or Save.

[Sir Toby]

I seem to remember that someone else complained of a similiar problem a while ago. I don't remember who complained, or where the original complaint is.

I think that was me, when we were testing the beta story. But then, too, it wasn't reproducible. I don't think the options disappeared that time, just the "admin" field contents (email address, etc).

And now to begin the painful process of what went wrong... Do you remember exactly when the story options and admin options blanked out? Were they present before you clicked "preview"?

I know they were there when I saved the episode the first time. Then when I edited the episode, I realised that the options were gone when the error-checking code warned me that option 1 and option 2 were both missing their text, but I'm not sure if that was when I pressed Preview or Save.

Well, once again we are stuck with a bug that isn't reproducable. And once again, I'm not quite sure what to do about it. We don't know if it's a quirk that only shows up occasionally, or a bug that arises out of a specific set of circumstances, or a problem specific to you.

I don't mean to ignore this problem, but I really don't know how to try to track this down. Perhaps if I can get my hands on some automated web application testing tools, I can try to put Extend-A-Story through some sort of stress test and see if that causes it. However, I have no such tools at this time, and am not in a position to put Extend-A-Story through such a test right now.

Now, if someone is better equipped to perform such a test, Extend-A-Story is open source. I would be happy to assist someone in setting up such a test on their own hardware if they are better equipped for it. As for myself, I'm just going to have to go with my old standby answer for now. Keep an eye out for further problems and let me know if you find any further details. If anyone else sees this problem, be sure to post your findings as well.

[JH]

It's no big deal, but I'll keep an eye out for it happening again.