Prevent accidental multiple postings

March 4, 2002 1:31 PM

I suppose this has already been discussed, but isn't it a simple thing to do to prevent accidental multiple postings? Perhaps the current comment could be compared to the previous comment?
posted by aaronshaf to Feature Requests at 1:31 PM (8 comments total)

Do you think that it's that big of a problem?
posted by ColdChef at 1:49 PM on March 4, 2002

It has been discussed in the past, I think. Matt is the one who has to clean it up and the one who would have to update the code to check for it, so I figure he calculates the tradeoff every time it happens.
posted by daveadams at 2:08 PM on March 4, 2002

I see how it could be a problem for some.
: )
posted by Catch at 2:10 PM on March 4, 2002

The problem is because the system is so overloaded that it often times out, especially when someone's already gone through preview and is trying to make the final post. They see the error message, assume the error means their response didn't get posted (a bad assumption; sometimes it hasn't been posted, sometimes it has, it just depends on exactly where the timeout occurred), hit the back button and then the post button again.

Matt has said he's recoding in order to reduce/eliminate these timeouts, but he has to do it page-by-page or something ... whatever it is, it requires hundreds of individual, time-consuming changes, so he's only doing it a little at a time. Until he's done, the best solution is: Never assume your post was NOT made just because MeFi timed out on you. Go back a page, copy your response to your clipboard for safekeeping, then go back another page, clear your entry from the box, and reload the thread and see if your post is there. If not, paste your response back into the box and try again.

Annoying, I know, but it beats posting the same thing three times in a row and looking silly.
posted by aaron at 2:24 PM on March 4, 2002

Metafilter needs some Beauwolf-cluster action.
posted by aaronshaf at 3:17 PM on March 4, 2002

Couldn't this be solved for 99% of people with a little JavaScript:

<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">
<!--
var beenSubmitted = 0;

function checkStatus() {
	if(beenSubmitted) {
		alert("Your request is being processed. Please wait.");
		return;
	}
	beenSubmitted = 1;

	document.myform.submit();
}

//-->
</script>

with onSubmit="checkStatus();return false;" in the form tag.
posted by astro38 at 3:28 PM on March 4, 2002

There are a few things I can do to eliminate these. I can do a checksum on each comment for one just like it in the last hour or so, and prevent repeats. I've been meaning to do it for some time and haven't gotten around to it yet. It's extra processing on the server side though.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 3:59 PM on March 4, 2002

Couldn't this be solved for 99% of people with a little JavaScript:

That wouldn't solve the problem of people getting a timeout error and hitting reload until they get an actual page back, which is, I assume, much of the problem.
posted by daveadams at 7:05 PM on March 4, 2002