Website is deformed on login page

[Cyril BonnettParticipant @cyrilbonnett24790]

I have ad block plus installed in IE11 windows 10, you can disable it for selected websites.

**LINK**

By disabling it for Model engineering it cures the problem

Cyril

[Frances IoMParticipant @francesiom58905]

On this machine I only have noscript + request policy – as these combined with turning images on + off gives me fine control of what I see – the bar is only a problem when certain images are not displayed and the formatting goes adrift (the old fashioned approach was to embed the size of each image so even if not displayed the browser would leave a gap – but there is at least one 1px image there whose only function is to act as a tracker for those who turned off javascript – catch is that when advertisers are your true audience then they call the tune as to how the sheeple are herded

Edited By Frances IoM on 06/12/2015 19:06:57

[Steven VineParticipant @stevenvine79904]

Gentlemen

If you pass the Model Engineer URL to any of the 'checkers' on the internet you will see that the code that makes up the ME webpage is 'defective' in quite few places. As a programmer, I would first and foremost make sure that my code syntax was correct before I released it into the wilds of the internet. Making sure the code is 100% correct is indeed the place to start. Once the webpage code is correct then it should be safe to pass it on to a parser (such as IE, Firefox etc). The parsers will interpret the code and construct the webpage you see on the screen. The parsers are very forgiving of malformed webpage code and will display a webpage correctly in spite of the conflicting instructions a webpage could present. It is unfair to expect the parsers to deal with that kind of problem. As I say, if the webpage coding is correct then there should be no problems. It looks like it is not in this case.

Do a Google for 'website checkers', throw the Model Engineer URL at your chosen checker, and see what that tells you.

Only the writers of these web pages can sort out the problem.

Steve

[BigAlParticipant @bigal15229]

Steven, thank you for confirming what I have suspected for some considerable time. It is just that I did not have the know how to prove my suspicions. I have written several sites as well as our club website, http://www.pembs-me.co.uk and have never been able to ensure that I coded it properly. (I always hand code).

Cheers
Alan

[Steven VineParticipant @stevenvine79904]

Posted by BigAl on 06/12/2015 19:41:33:

Steven, thank you for confirming what I have suspected for some considerable time. It is just that I did not have the know how to prove my suspicions. I have written several sites as well as our club website, http://www.pembs-me.co.uk and have never been able to ensure that I coded it properly. (I always hand code).

Cheers
Alan

Hi Alan

I run mine by the W3c site. **LINK**

That lets you know of any basic coding errors. If you straighten out any errors that that site find then you are on the right road.

You home page checks out fine. Kudos

Steve

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:00:00

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:03:59

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:10:03

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:11:13

[BigAlParticipant @bigal15229]

Thanks for the link. Very useful. The homepage might well be okay but it seems I have work to do on quite a few of the others, luckily nothing serious. Things like omitting closing tags on <br>s. Just a lot of them though. Oh dear, something else to keep me out of the workshop.

Sigh

Alan

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by Frances IoM on 06/12/2015 19:06:19:
On this machine I only have noscript + request policy – as these combined with turning images on + off gives me fine control of what I see – the bar is only a problem when certain images are not displayed and the formatting goes adrift (the old fashioned approach was to embed the size of each image so even if not displayed the browser would leave a gap – but there is at least one 1px image there whose only function is to act as a tracker for those who turned off javascript – catch is that when advertisers are your true audience then they call the tune as to how the sheeple are herded

Edited By Frances IoM on 06/12/2015 19:06:57

Perhaps we could do what some websites are starting to do and embed images saying 'please turn off your ad blocker if you can see this, to help pay for the website'.

Neil

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 19:22:08:

Only the writers of these web pages can sort out the problem.

Not a trivial exercise when the site is generated using a huge commercial CMS shared across a dozen linked websites all using the same underlying code…

Neil

[Frances IoMParticipant @francesiom58905]

Neil
(a) look at https://news.ycombinator.com/ for a very fast text only (+ suspect a very low txm cost) – suspect fairly easy to add album images into this format
(b) too many ads are very intrusive (eg this site with popups that were stopped after complaints), blinking, on mouse roll overs etc – I’ve seen an adcompany research doc but forgot to bookmark it that showed that click thru actually improved with text based adverts rather than in your face adverts
(c) too much tracking and for other too many sites inclusion of malware within adverts which makes global non-use of adblockers akin to russian roulette
(d) personally I’d prefer micropayments if or when this oft talked about scheme ever gets built (or build into the subs) as once adverts are the key then site users are merely the product to be delivered

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

Posted by Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 19:57:47:

Posted by BigAl on 06/12/2015 19:41:33:

Steven, thank you for confirming what I have suspected for some considerable time. It is just that I did not have the know how to prove my suspicions. I have written several sites as well as our club website, http://www.pembs-me.co.uk and have never been able to ensure that I coded it properly. (I always hand code).

Cheers
Alan

Hi Alan

I run mine by the W3c site. **LINK**

That lets you know of any basic coding errors. If you straighten out any errors that that site find then you are on the right road.

You home page checks out fine. Kudos

Steve

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:00:00

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:03:59

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:10:03

Edited By Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 20:11:13

I just ran ebay.co.uk through and far more errors than the page this thread is on has. Snap for google, OpenSuseOrg and HP.

Then to just prove the point Microsoft.com. Error after error after error.

Like it says at the top of the page "This tool is an ongoing experiment in better HTML checking, and its behavior remains subject to change"

In other words it might just do the job one day but given the complexity of the job it's trying to do that is rather doubtful.

I will admit that there are some rather odd things about the software that drives this forum but I'm pretty sure that the problem that started this thread could be fixed by doing what I suggested. It's one of the few down sides related to running Linux plus what ever desktop is being used – that area and keeping it up to date is often the cause of all sorts of problems. Linux itself sometimes has some oddities but they are rare and usually caused by things the distro people choose to use have done to it. Free adbockers are best avoided if it comes with say a paid for virus checker it's probably ok. Lots of sites wont function correctly when they are active anyway.

The forum even function correctly with a rather dated version of Konqueror.

John

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Edited By John W1 on 06/12/2015 23:30:12

Edited By John W1 on 06/12/2015 23:37:45

Edited By John W1 on 06/12/2015 23:40:04

[Steven VineParticipant @stevenvine79904]

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 06/12/2015 21:12:51:

Posted by Steven Vine on 06/12/2015 19:22:08:

Only the writers of these web pages can sort out the problem.

Not a trivial exercise when the site is generated using a huge commercial CMS shared across a dozen linked websites all using the same underlying code…

Neil

I hear you Neil. I deal with a fair few different Corporates; to get anything corrected in the software is nigh impossible in most cases.

Steve.

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

Out of curiosity Neil what forum software do you use ? Or is it some ones diy job?

John

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[clivelParticipant @clivel]

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 06/12/2015 18:09:14:

Naturally as this website is paid for by advertising, there isn't much incentive for the site to be re-written to accommodate adblockers…

Neil

I never use adblockers, and urge others to do likewise.

Web sites are not free to setup, maintain, or host. These costs needs to be paid somehow. Some site owners choose to carry the burden themselves, others tout for donations and yet others like on this site, carry advertising to try and recoup the cost. So using an adblocker to undermine this model seems to me to be not much better than a form of free-loading.

Admittedly some ads can be extremely annoying and intrusive, but as none of us are obliged to visit a site if it offends us we are free to move elsewhere. Alternatively a polite complaint to the site owners may result in changes as happened in the case of the popups that appeared on this site some months back.

That being said I must confess that I have partially disabled Flash. FireFox gives the option to "Ask to activate". That way when a web page containing Flash opens up, instead of automatically playing the animation, all I see is a grey box containing the option to "Activate Adobe Flash" which other than when viewing a Youtube video is rarely necessary. This does of course hide the small portion of adverts that use Flash, however it is these self same Flash adverts that are responsible for causing browser crashes or regularly freezing up the browser for sometimes as long as 30 seconds before crashing.

Clive

 

 

Edited By clivel on 07/12/2015 00:13:28

[BigAlParticipant @bigal15229]

As an open source devotee I have tried out many flavours of Linux including OpenSuse, Debian, Centos (which I still run on my email server) as well as the one I have settled on for every day use, Linux Mint. Additionally I have trialled both of the major desktop environments, KDE and Gnome, for each of them. Each has its own help forum so as a user it is always worth while looking at them. In addition there are forums for Mozilla as well as for both Firefox and Thunderbird. I am a regular user of a commercial clock and watch forum hosted by the NAWCC that actively encourages users to insert pictures in their posts so that future users can always see them. That takes hosting space but the hosting company thinks it is worthwhile. All of this is to show that I am not exactly a 'newbie' where using forums is concerned.

I have never had any problem with any of them with one exception. This one. Sorry Model Engineer, others can do it why can't you? I do not recall any that are so inundated with advertising as this one yet all somehow survive. It is up to the owners of a website if they want to put people off of visiting by running all the bells and whistles and smother the site in adverts. A forum is a different beast. It is there for people to discuss the subject in hand. Bells, whistles and adverts are simply a nuisance and, I firmly believe, seriously detract from the prime objective of the forum which is for users to help each other and to have a platform to discuss the subject in hand.

Cheers
Alan

[clivelParticipant @clivel]

Hi Alan,

I also run Linux Mint as my everyday OS, having done so for the past year or two.

My current environment is Linux Mint 17.1 Cinnamon 64 bit. When viewing this site with both Firefox 42.0 and Chrome 47.0 everything looks fine and I don't experience the problem you are seeing. I also don't recall seeing the problem in the past using earlier versions of Mint, so I suspect that the problem has something to do with your environment, but what the could be, I have no idea.

Thanks to Microsoft web site development is a lot more complex than it should be. The various IE browsers are notorious for ignoring standards and to make matters worse, for the huge incompatibilities that have been introduced between various versions of IE itself. This has required programmers to introduce obscure workarounds that on occasion have adverse effects on other browsers.

I notice that this site is served via ASP (Active Server Pages), a Microsoft product, so it is likely that the pages are tailored to provide an IE "best experience" which may be detrimental to other browsers. However as pointed out above, I am not experiencing the problems you are, so I doubt that MS is to blame this time.

Clive

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

I'm afraid users have to accept that the forum software is unlikely to change in the near future. Out of curiosity I have looked at the cost of some really nice forum systems, but because a change would have to apply across all the MTM forums and we have a huge user base it is difficult to make an economic case, particularly as, in general the forum does work and it is popular.

As for the amount and nature of advertising, companies in the model engineering sector find it much more effective at generating sales than other related websites, so we have much more demand for advertising. If the amount and nature of advertising became a material deterrent to users our popularity and rankings would drop, and advertisers would go elsewhere – it's a self-regulating system.

As for malware – if any of our advertisers are embedding genuine malware (rather than just trackers which are essential to knowing where referrals come from) then please email me details.

Neil

[BigAlParticipant @bigal15229]

I cannot say definitely that it is the site causing the problem but equally I cannot say definitely it is my set up. What I can say is that I consistently have had the same problem viewing this particular forum across quite a few different versions of my OS and across three different machines. I can also say that this is the only forum where this has manifested itself. Actually it is the only website where I have seen this. I also note that others have posted that they are experiencing difficulties. In my mind logic says that it points to something outside my set up. That said, I simply do not have he knowledge to be able to point a helpful finger to the site designers or to be able to isolate the problem within my set up. What I can say is that I am not going to alter my set up or my way of working to suit just one site. The site is not worth it. (Sorry ME).

It is nice to hear of others running Linux as their everyday OS so something good is appearing out of all of this.

Cheers
Alan

[BigAlParticipant @bigal15229]

Hi Neil, you posted while I was writing. I hear what you say. I also see that you and MTM are happy that "… in general the forum does work". As it is a commercial site I would have thought that the owners would have wanted it to work for everyone rather than just 'most'. I also believe that nowadays there is a legal responsibility for site owners to ensure that the site contents are available to all as opposed to just some.

Cheers
Alan

[Russell EberhardtParticipant @russelleberhardt48058]

Another Linux Mint Cinnamon 17.1 user here.

Big Al: The current version of Firefox in the Mint repository is 42.0. I suggest that you try updating your installation although it seems unlikely that that is the problem. Did you try clearing the cache as suggested earlier? I don't have your problem here. I am also running AdblockPlus with no ill effects.

An Other: I suspect your problem with the thread title is a result of the site being written for Windows fonts and the substitute fonts for Linux are slightly different. I see the same effect both with Linux Mint and PCLinuxOS, but only when the ads are removed by the Adblocker!

Russell.

 

 

Edited By Russell Eberhardt on 07/12/2015 09:29:45

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

I've tried other Linux distro's at times and have always gone back to OpenSuse. Time and time again they have offered the most stable distro available long before others that are easy to install. Fairly brain and pain free. Their user forum offers excellent support. I've probably been using it for at least 18 years now. I did use a VM and dual booting with windows for a while, maybe for the first 2 years. I am a bit KDE biased but had a lot less trouble with 4 than many others and suspect the same will be true of 5. I'm also one of those people who have little interest in the shell and try and do everything from the desktop. I've used too many shells to be bothered to pick up another one. Bash is one of the types I dislike anyway.

I don't run cutting edge except for a few applications that I obtain from the OpenSuse build service for a one click install or assemble them myself. OpenSuse covers cutting edge too if people want it. They call it TumbleWeed.

AddBlockers? I recently read an article concerning the tracking facilities built into modern web browsers. It's been extended in recent years probably as it was possible to do similar things early on. The days of pop ups and people remotely taking over some aspects of the desktop via java seem to be over unless people visit dubious fringe site such as the porno area. Java script is more secure now anyway. So why bother. The tracking aspect is annoying but there. Most browsers now offer incognito browsing. The net effect of that is that adds will still appear but they wont relate to things that tracking shows you to be interested in. The server still has your ip address anyway. Mess with the adds on some sites and it wont work correctly as they depend on the income from them. This site for instance may well gain extra income if people use it as a route to going to Arc or any of the others that advertise on here providing they use the add to go to the site. Maybe yet more income if they buy after following the link. They will also get income for displaying the add. This is life folks so may as well put up with it. It's also not to difficult to mess it all up for them either. At a trivial level in that direction there is no need to continuously use one browser. One can be used for one thing and another for other purposes.

John

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[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

Noticing the comment about fonts I'm pretty sure I have MS fonts installed by default. Mint users could follow this.

**LINK**

The only font problem I have is the big high res screen one.They tend to come out a little small but are manageable. I did think about going even bigger and 4K for Xmas until I looked at the dpi and probable scaling.

John

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[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

It seems that 12 of the 'errors' on the home page are due to people like me uploading pictures with spaces in their filenames, which display but register as an error anyway.

One error is caused by some third party code we can't change, but Katy is trying to implement a work around.

The main error seems to be caused by the famous facebook 'tracking pixel' which doesn't validate for w3c and generates four other errors. Katy is trying to solve these problems.

Neil

[Katy PurvisParticipant @katypurvis79544]

Just out of interest, can any of you still see deformed screen? I can't reproduce it, but I've just changed two small things which may have solved the problem, so I would appreciate it if one of you could check for me?

Thanks

Katy

[BigAlParticipant @bigal15229]

I learnt long ago that ANY file name, be it a picture, word processor documet, CAD file or whatever should not have any spaces in its name. Use an underscore (_) or hyphen (-). If course, if no one has ever pointed this out you have no chance of knowing. I believe that this originates back in the original UNIX days when a space was not included in the file name specifacations. Microsoft has not helped matters by its instance of have a folder called 'My Documents' but of course Microsoft helps Microsoft rather than its users.

Cheers
Alan

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

There a a lot of free GPL and other forum software about Neil as shown here

**LINK**

Some offer conversion scripts for porting from others. I'm sure some forums use some of the GPL ones.

The only complaints I have about this forum are. Can't cut and paste and have to use the browser buttons. Unique in my experience. If I decide to include a photo while posting it has to be in my album before I start the post. Add it to an album and it doesn't show unless I restart the post. The forum isn't Opera friendly. Being fair the version I am using is rather old. They are doing a complete rewrite which I will be able to use at some point. Opera isn't everybody's cup of tea but I collect a lot of bookmarks and find it the best for that. It might just need a java update.

One factor that I find particularly irritating is sending messages as the forum doesn't act as middle man masking either ends email address from the other unless they choose to do so by actually sending it in a message. The problem with supplying it directly is that there are lots of insecure PC's out there that have managed to install data mining software some how or the other. The net effect for some one is that they start getting spam as their email address has been obtained from the other persons machine. I don't get much spam other than blips when I have communicated with some one. None off here yet but it happens with monotonous regularity.

As I know some people are interested in photography here is one perfect forum as far as I am aware. Useful and helpful too.

**LINK**

They use tinypic.com for image storage. Might be of interest.

John

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