Another favorites bug. January 16, 2007 6:20 AM   Subscribe

Another favorites bug.
posted by GuyZero to Bugs at 6:20 AM (24 comments total) 2 users marked this as a favorite

I posted a comment in this thread, the comment got fav'ed, then it got deleted. My Total fav'ed comment count remains where it was before the comment was deleted but if I was to add up the actual comments listed on my fav'ed page, it doesn't match the total displayed.

Also, I thought it wasn't deletion material, but that's not really a big deal. If you delete comments that have been favorite-ed, the favorite counts get out of sync.
posted by GuyZero at 6:22 AM on January 16, 2007


I don't know if this is another favorites bug, so much as one that has been discussed before.
posted by Partial Law at 6:44 AM on January 16, 2007


Whoops. My bad. The bug was new to me. I should review the bugs category before I post new ones perhaps.
posted by GuyZero at 6:57 AM on January 16, 2007


how hard can it be, really, to create favorites code that works? i mean, let alone the fact that the queries return bogus and dynamically changing results, just page backward once until there is less than a pageful of either posts or comments and the whole thing goes berserk. "now displaying 312 of 124 favorites" indeed.
posted by quonsar at 8:53 AM on January 16, 2007


how hard can it be, really, to create favorites code that works?

How long ago did you add your perfect code to blort that does this? It was years ago, right? And it only took a few hours because it was so easy?

I've got a thousand balls up in the air, and stuff like favorites and tags are both features far from perfect but better than nothing. They work most of the time for most people for most uses, but at the edges they have lots of little bugs I'll eventually fix.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:09 AM on January 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


quonsar, I can only assume you've never built software for a living. Bugs happen. You find them, you log them, sometimes you fix them. It's considerate to log bugs in other people's software. But really, haranguing matt for not fixing them? meh. My only complaint is that there's no easy way for me to make sure I'm not submitting a duplicate issue.
posted by GuyZero at 9:16 AM on January 16, 2007


Here's a less snarky response: I need to add code on the deletion of comments and posts that clears the tags and favorites db of any linked items. I forgot to do that from day one. Now that there are thousands of erroneous records, I'll need to do a looping query for all deleted items, then delete stuff in the tags and favorites tables. It'll have to be done in batches, since it'll be pretty hard on the db to run the query on everything.

It's probably a couple days worth of work, and I'll start working on the first part (wipe tags/favorites upon deletion) today.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:37 AM on January 16, 2007


This favorites bug is my favorite bug.
posted by Eideteker at 10:39 AM on January 16, 2007


I finished the code to clean out tags and favorites from any threads we delete going forward. Next up, whacking favorites from comments that get deleted. Then a final cleanup.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 11:11 AM on January 16, 2007


For what it's worth, I think it would be nice if you went the other way, and made it so that all favorited comments were both counted and available via the favorites pages, whether they had been deleted or not.
posted by bingo at 1:04 PM on January 16, 2007


well, bingo, people instead want to see correct counts, so the deleted stuff is going to be gone (didn't you complain about this bug as well?).
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:08 PM on January 16, 2007


I think bingo is asking to still see his favo(u)rited comments even after they've been deleted, which, while cool, presupposes that a) those comments still actually exist and b) that you'd be willing to allow this back door in to the trash pile.
posted by timeistight at 1:41 PM on January 16, 2007


I too believe that every single one of my comments is some sort of single, perfect snowflake formed from the very essence of joy rendered corporeal, however I'm not such a narcissist that I expect everyone else to share this belief.

Comments are either deleted or not. Bingo, if you love your comments so much, make sure to write them down on 3x5 index cards before you post them. The suggestion to archive them for posterity is silly.

Also, if anyone wants to come by my place some night and go through my collection of comment cards with me, drop a line.
posted by GuyZero at 2:05 PM on January 16, 2007


What might be cool, maybe, is getting an email saying that your comment has been deleted, which contains the offending text. It might help people to grasp where they are going wrong. Or perhaps a deleted comment 'score' in the profile. Although public humiliation should be reserved for the truly deserving. Not that I need concern myself with such matters. I mean, my comments are iridescent soap bubbles, floating placidly on the unceasing wind created in my colon. Quite Lovely.
posted by econous at 2:37 PM on January 16, 2007


clean out tags and favorites from any threads we delete

why would you do that? the displayable-on-front-page status of a thread should not reflect on the favorited status of a comment. what logic dictates unfavoriting comments because they are contained in a "deleted" (non-displaying) thread?
posted by quonsar at 6:00 PM on January 16, 2007


clean out tags and favorites from any threads we delete

While quonsar has always been a dick when harassing you about bugs, please don't clear favorites in nuked threads (Except on metatalk, since deleted threads are perma-gone). I don't think favorites were around when Ask MetaFilter threads were disappeared when deleted.
posted by blasdelf at 6:31 PM on January 16, 2007


As timeistight surmised, what I meant was that it would be nice to be able to see favorited comments, even after they were deleted. And that's what I tried to say on another occasion as well. And the way I'm imagining it, the count would still be correct, because both the comments and the count would still be available...as favorites. But if you went to the thread where the comments were originally posted, they'll be gone.

All I'm saying is this. If someone has marked a comment as a favorite, then maybe that comment is worth keeping around, if only for the benefit of that one person. Wiping something out of existence even after you've given people the option to indicate specifically that they want to keep it around, seems like overkill to me.
posted by bingo at 6:38 PM on January 16, 2007


quonsar, I meant that I would remove favorites on a post that was deleted, not the comments within. I will only remove favorites from comments that have been directly deleted.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:58 PM on January 16, 2007


If someone has marked a comment as a favorite, then maybe that comment is worth keeping around, if only for the benefit of that one person.

In my experience of seeing favorites on really corrosive and off-topic stuff on Ask MeFi that gets deleted, I wouldn't call it "worth keeping around". Instead it seems more like people favorite the stuff that is over-the-top snarky and often mean on Ask MeFi, knowing it will be deleted.

Wiping something out of existence even after you've given people the option to indicate specifically that they want to keep it around, seems like overkill to me.

And yet, people continue to complain that the counts are incorrect (like this very thread).

Repeat after me: your worth is not tied to your favorites count and it does not reflect in any way, shape, or form on you as a person.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:01 PM on January 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


*sobs*

Matt has pulled away my last crutch. My self esteem is crumbling, and the booze, pills and killings aren't working anymore either.

Damnit! It just figures. Now I'll have to figure out how to try to be a "good person" in order to have self worth.

Blech.

Thanks Matt. Thanks a lot.
posted by quin at 7:54 PM on January 16, 2007


Repeat after me: your worth is not tied to your favorites count and it does not reflect in any way, shape, or form on you as a person.

That's not the point. The point is that people favourite comments because they want to come back to them. When you delete the favourite along with the comment, you cripple that feature.
posted by timeistight at 9:52 PM on January 16, 2007


Repeat after me: your worth is not tied to your favorites count and it does not reflect in any way, shape, or form on you as a person.

It reflects on you as a member of the community. Isn't that something you want people to care about? Isn't that why it's possible to tell from someone's profile page how many favorites they've received from other users?

People - many people, at least - are proud of their number of favorited comments. That doesn't mean that they are losers who have no lives. It means that they're actually motivated to make positive contributions to the site, because they like getting feedback from other users. Isn't that good?
posted by bingo at 8:24 AM on January 17, 2007




People - many people, at least - are proud of their number of favorited comments. That doesn't mean that they are losers who have no lives. It means that they're actually motivated to make positive contributions to the site, because they like getting feedback from other users. Isn't that good?

I'm not saying people are misguided by focusing on it, but instead I made a mistake by showing a favorites count. It's just a number and focusing on it isn't the best way to be a good member here. There's no total system-wide favorites count on Flickr or delicious, but those systems work heavily on the favorites feature.

By reducing it to a number system-wide, I mistakenly created a metric that people could obsess over.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 11:02 AM on January 18, 2007


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