Can we please have some mechanism to prevent double posts?

April 20, 2002 11:28 AM

Can we please have some mechanism to prevent double posts? it's pretty simple to implement, and should'nt increase any load on the server... For example, this post has many double posts...
posted by arnab to Feature Requests at 11:28 AM (12 comments total)

(Assuming you mean repeated comments within the same thread, not repeated threads about the same subject)

I'm pretty sure there's already some mechanism in place: there used to be a lot more of these than there are now. And I know when I've accidentally hit the back button after posting a comment -- which used to trigger a double comment -- I've gotten a server error instead of the embarassment of repeating myself in public repeating myself in public repeating myself in public.
posted by ook at 11:53 AM on April 20, 2002

actually, arnab, it's pretty difficult to prevent all double posts. many postings -- for example, of current events -- refer to one of many possible news sources. one could not simply cross-check the URLs in those cases, and in the time i've been here, current events double-posts seem the most common. (whether that is because same-URL double posts are caught in the post-a-thread screen -- for i believe a same-URL comparison to other threads is made when you preview your post -- i am not sure.)
posted by moz at 2:24 PM on April 20, 2002

What moz said. And there is a mechanism that prevents the doubleposting of an identical link.
posted by Marquis at 3:45 PM on April 20, 2002

or people could just take the time to make sure they're not double-posting, but i s'pose that would be too easy.
posted by jmd82 at 4:58 PM on April 20, 2002

Looking at the thread that arnab links to, I'd say that he's pretty clearly talking about repeated comments within threads rather than double posts on the front page i.e. those caused by twitchy 'Post' fingers, server timeouts or rampaging wildebeest. It has been mentioned before but presumably a solution has yet to be implemented. Maybe a "Features Currently Being Worked On" page would be handy for checking on the progress of this sort of thing?
posted by MUD at 5:08 PM on April 20, 2002

my system is great
posted by clavdivs at 6:23 PM on April 20, 2002

I think it's fair to say that Matt knows about the problem and has made his own assessment of its priority in his life--somewhere below hanging out with Kay, making a living, and having some fun, I hope. Hopefully it's not too serious a problem, and the new server will alleviate the timeouts that probably cause most of the double posts anyway.
posted by rodii at 6:32 PM on April 20, 2002

I've had the server time out a few times while posting and thankfully it didn't post another one when I reloaded. Consequently, I don't think those double posts are due to the server timeouts.
posted by jaden at 11:46 PM on April 20, 2002

I'm finding that my recent double-posts have been to do with server time outs. It says the server has timed out, then I hit the back button and my message is posted, but I don't realise and hit post, and so it ends up in there twice.

Personally I wouldn't mind if there was a ban on posting more than once every 5 minutes or something - which would presumably end the double posts and give people more time to consider their responses.
posted by skylar at 5:17 AM on April 21, 2002

Scoop does this by putting a hidden field in the comment form with a key made of the user's session id, their IP, and the time. When you load a comment form, it shoves the key into your session. When you post a comment, it looks for the key in your session and deletes it if it's found (and goes ahead with the post). If it's not found, then you've already posted the comment, and it gives you back the form with a warning to that effect. It also does some management stuff -- keys expire after a certain amount of time so if you don't end up posting, you don't have a million old keys lying around in your session.

This has pretty much ended double-posts on K5, without getting in anyone's way.
posted by rusty at 11:24 AM on April 21, 2002

For me the time-outs have gone away for now.

I have gotten the hang of realzing that if I get the time-out when posting, almost always the post has gone through. So I reload the appropriate page before going back and hitting 'post' again, or sometimes I hit 'preview' and it shows up. It's just a matter of adjusting to the reality.
posted by dhartung at 11:27 PM on April 21, 2002

skylar - Why do you hit the back button? I just reload the page when I get the server error and I have yet to have a post go up twice.
posted by jaden at 3:35 PM on April 23, 2002