Incorrect comment count

July 4, 2007 5:46 PM

There's a minor bug in the activity page. It says "Displaying comments 1 to 50 of 490" while my profile page says I have 507 comments. Perhaps it's printing the number of total threads in which I've commented instead of the total of comments I've made?
posted by null terminated to Bugs at 5:46 PM (27 comments total)

I think the activity page subtracted points for all the LOLCATS on your flickr page.
posted by The Deej at 5:58 PM on July 4, 2007

Fair enough.
posted by null terminated at 5:59 PM on July 4, 2007

I believe one counts deleted comment while the other doesn't. Probably worth fixing.
posted by cortex (staff) at 6:03 PM on July 4, 2007

Yeah, I think the remainder were deleted. Check quonsar, he should be off by a thousand (har har)
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:05 PM on July 4, 2007

PANTS AND FISH.
posted by Samuel Farrow at 6:10 PM on July 4, 2007

Mine:
MeFi 667 vs. 718 (What? Those were my favorite 51 comments!!!!)
MeTa 577 vs. 577 (Makes sense.)
AskMe 717 vs. 710 (What? Those were my favorite 7 answers!!!!)
posted by The Deej at 6:13 PM on July 4, 2007

Yeah, quonsar's user page shows 8280 comments, while the Activity page shows "Displaying comments 1 to 50 of 7,772." Pretty impressive, in a weird, Meta-way.
posted by cgc373 at 6:17 PM on July 4, 2007

Yeah, I don't think it's quite just that, then; q has a fair share of deleted comments, but not 500.

Maybe the larger count includes some combination of personal deleted comments and undeleted comments in threads which were, themselves, deleted.
posted by cortex (staff) at 6:21 PM on July 4, 2007

I believe one counts deleted comment while the other doesn't.
That would mean I have 63 comments deleted from MeFi, 2 from MetaTalk and 3 from Ask MeFi. The MeFi count seems a bit high. Could it be that the count includes comments in a post that was deleted?
posted by tellurian at 6:22 PM on July 4, 2007

Note to self: must preview.
posted by tellurian at 6:23 PM on July 4, 2007

Yep, we recently added comments on deleted posts into the activity page, and the counts on the page weren't reflecting that. Everything should match now.
posted by pb (staff) at 6:27 PM on July 4, 2007

Wow! that was a quick fix. Now though, I'm wondering what my two MetaTalk deletions were.
posted by tellurian at 6:39 PM on July 4, 2007

I've had four comments deleted out of 1,101?

*finds hello kitty pencil box full of laxatives and Xacto knives in bureau, puts on Cardigans album full blast, begins cry & cut ritual*

I SUCK I'LL NEVER BE PRETTY
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 6:40 PM on July 4, 2007

just to clarify, cortex nailed it. The count on the profile page was including comments on deleted posts, while the count on the activity page was not including comments on deleted posts.

Now, both counts are including comments on deleted posts and the activity page displays comments on deleted posts. The count discrepancies didn't have anything to do with the number of deleted comments.
posted by pb (staff) at 6:53 PM on July 4, 2007

I must be doing something wrong. Mine both agree on the number!
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 7:02 PM on July 4, 2007

Yes, that explanation isn't quite right as mine also agree in number on all sites, and I am positive that I've had at least a few comments deleted over the years.
posted by Rhomboid at 7:32 PM on July 4, 2007

If your numbers are perfectly equal at this point, it's probably a massive coincidence wherein the number of comments we've deleted serendipitously equals the number of comments we've inserted, of whole cloth, into your posting history so that we can use them to win arguments against you in the future.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:38 PM on July 4, 2007 [2 favorites]

pb fixed it already, both numbers should match now.
posted by puke & cry at 7:39 PM on July 4, 2007

unless I'm missing something?
posted by puke & cry at 7:39 PM on July 4, 2007

Oh, I missed that part at the end of pb's comment where the change had already been made.
posted by Rhomboid at 7:49 PM on July 4, 2007

matt can't count.
posted by quonsar at 7:52 PM on July 4, 2007

Damn, now I'm sad that I never realized the discrepancy and will never know how many deleted comments I have.

And I'm even sadder that now we'll never see a MeTa retort along the lines of "Oh yeah? Well, you've had over 113 comments deleted out of 1762 (0.064136), whereas I my deletion rate is only 0.002371... " .
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 8:48 PM on July 4, 2007

six mefi, four askme, and an FPP, Alvy. That's two over the limit; we're gonna have to put you in iso for a while.

You done this to yerself.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:03 PM on July 4, 2007

we're gonna have to put you in iso for a while.

The dreaded room 9660 with only the yellow book to read...

[too obscure?]
posted by Rhomboid at 10:36 PM on July 4, 2007

too obvious.
posted by quonsar at 6:19 AM on July 5, 2007

and thus right up my alley.
posted by quonsar at 6:20 AM on July 5, 2007

Dear Everyone,

Hi, hope you're all doing well, I'm okay. Isolation isn't so bad, actually this box is bigger than my apartment, and I imagine there there are far scarier places to be held... up quonsar's alley, for example.

Shuddering, I remain...
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:22 AM on July 5, 2007