Strange PP ban behavior

[a5cent]

Hey y'all

A couple weeks ago Paul Franks (no idea who the guy is) accused me of having forgotten to PP ban zinatbaby (a spammer). I was pretty sure I had not forgotten, but of course I don't film myself moderating so I couldn't prove it. I have since started double checking my PP bans and I'm confident I know what happened that day.

It happened again while trying to PP ban "David Blake". I PP banned the bloke three times, to no avail. I refreshed the page (the thread with "David Blake's" posts) each time, but the account pop-up never showed him as being permanently banned.

I then tried the usual trick of logging out and clearing IE's cache. After trying a fourth time the PP ban worked as expected. Anybody else ever experience this?

 

[Laura Knotek]

I've had that happen on mobile. I really cannot say about desktop, since I don't use IE on desktop.

I am going to mention the continuing IE issues at the team leader meeting on Thursday, since it looks like nothing has been done since the last meeting when I brought up those issues.

 

[a5cent]

I've had that happen on mobile. I really cannot say about desktop, since I don't use IE on desktop.

Okay. Good to hear I'm not the only one. Do you know if this has been reported? I want this officially logged somewhere. Somewhere where Paul Franks and whoever else is in his team can see it.

 

[Laura Knotek]

Okay. Good to hear I'm not the only one. Do you know if this has been reported? I want this officially logged somewhere. Somewhere where Paul Franks and whoever else is in his team can see it.

I've emailed this thread to James.

I forgot to mention, Paul Franks is Network mod 'Branta'. He is a really knowledgeable guy, so he might even have some input into this issue.

 

[James Falconer]

Paul Franks (branta) is one of our Network Moderators... him, along with bevcraw and HelloNNNewman make up the Net Mod team. They oversee the entire network for trouble and keep an eye on spammers, and help out with teams when needed. REALLY useful team to have, and they're awesome.

In regards to Dave Blake, he was actually the mod team lead here for a long time. If you can PM me the details of that situation it would be appreciated.

Long story short on Passport... the tools are only guaranteed to work properly on desktop. While we try and are working towards more and more mobile support... if you're ever having an issue with a particular function, try it on the desktop version of the site and go from there!

 

[Laura Knotek]

Paul Franks (branta) is one of our Network Moderators... him, along with bevcraw and HelloNNNewman make up the Net Mod team. They oversee the entire network for trouble and keep an eye on spammers, and help out with teams when needed. REALLY useful team to have, and they're awesome.

In regards to Dave Blake, he was actually the mod team lead here for a long time. If you can PM me the details of that situation it would be appreciated.

Long story short on Passport... the tools are only guaranteed to work properly on desktop. While we try and are working towards more and more mobile support... if you're ever having an issue with a particular function, try it on the desktop version of the site and go from there!

That wasn't Dave Blake (the real guy). It was someone impersonating him, like how MatrixLeader impersonated people on CB back in the day. Fake "Dave Blake" had an IP in Hungary.

 

[a5cent]

Hey James, thanks for your reply.

Anyway, I got the account names mixed up. Dave Blake was the mod team lead. David Blake is an imposter, posing as Dave Blake. I linked to the imposters account in the first post.

I admit that the accusation of forgetting the PP ban did agitate me a bit, mainly because I was sure I had and wondered if I was starting to hallucinate. I'm not agitated anymore, but I do want that problem logged somewhere.

I am using IE11 on the desktop. I can't change browsers, so I do rely on desktop IE11 working. There is definitely still something wrong with how the website works with IE's cache. I still regularly clear IE11's cache to enable the mod tools. It works for a while thereafter, but only for a while...

Now that I know the quirks and what to look out for, it's manageable, but still... if it can't be easily/cheaply fixed, I do want it at least logged somewhere.

 

[James Falconer]

I've sent this thread along to tech to take a look.

Good to hear you have things at a 'manageable' state at the very least.... it can only get better, right?

 

[Branta]

OK, just a wild guess here. Assuming this is Internet Exploder on a PC could you please check settings on cookies popups etc for mobilenations.com and check whether you're using any script blockers or firewalls which might intercept active content in a submission.

Looking at the profiles there's only one successful ban logged (no failures or reversals) on each of the two accounts so that tells us nothing more but there might be something logged in the backend if James gets Marcus to ferret through the Pp server log.

 

[Branta]

Okay. Good to hear I'm not the only one. Do you know if this has been reported? I want this officially logged somewhere. Somewhere where Paul Franks and whoever else is in his team can see it.

The Netmods can see discussion here and we see reported posts for all forums but we don't always look in the mod discussion areas every day. "Report" the post (including the in-forum reports) or send us an email <networkmods@mobilenations.com> if there's anything we need to see promptly.

 

[a5cent]

OK, just a wild guess here. Assuming this is Internet Exploder on a PC could you please check settings on cookies popups etc for mobilenations.com and check whether you're using any script blockers or firewalls which might intercept active content in a submission.

Yes, I'm using IE11 version 11.0.9600.16521, on the Windows 8.1 desktop. It's a default installation, in terms of both the applied settings and installed Add-Ons (none, except those that come pre-installed by IE11)

Testing under Windows 8.x might be important, as only then are the 'Enhanced Protected Mode' and 'Third-party cookie blocking' features enabled. Both are disabled when IE11 runs on Windows 7.


Security Settings:


Privacy Settings:

Per Site Privacy Actions (cookie management) = Nothing is explicitly blocked or allowed, meaning default settings apply



Very little is there in terms of settings at all. Nothing I'd consider suspicious anyway. If a firewall was interfering I'd probably never get a PP ban successfully completed, but I do. Every problem I've had was so far was solved by logging out, clearing the cache, and trying again. IMHO that implicates cookie and cache management rather than firewall issues, no?

The Netmods can see discussion here and we see reported posts for all forums but we don't always look in the mod discussion areas every day. "Report" the post (including the in-forum reports) or send us an email <networkmods@mobilenations.com> if there's anything we need to see promptly.

Okay. I wasn't sure if such things are expected to go up the "chain of command", or if one can reach out directly. Thx.

 

[a5cent]

Oh yeah...

On the PP page, the "Ban User" drop down list doesn't change to "permanently banned". That is another indication that the ban isn't actually going through.

 

[Branta]

Oh yeah...

On the PP page, the "Ban User" drop down list doesn't change to "permanently banned". That is another indication that the ban isn't actually going through.

This doesn't stack up, can you remember enough for a blow by blow description? The dropdown doesn't change as you describe, I see it shift to become "Un-ban" and some reduced banning durations. If you're not seeing permaban offered in the initial banning action it might suggest a scrolling issue, it could be below bottom of screen on a mobile device (I see this on SG3).

 

[a5cent]

This doesn't stack up, can you remember enough for a blow by blow description? The dropdown doesn't change as you describe, I see it shift to become "Un-ban" and some reduced banning durations. If you're not seeing permaban offered in the initial banning action it might suggest a scrolling issue, it could be below bottom of screen on a mobile device (I see this on SG3).

No. I do see the "Permanent Ban" entry in the list. After selecting it I click the "Submit" button to the right of it. After the post completes the drop down list is still set to "Not Banned" however. That suggests the post didn't get through, wasn't processed, wasn't committed to the DB, something like that...

I'm doing all this from the desktop (I never moderate from a mobile device).