Comment display error (Dec. 2001)

December 5, 2001 6:28 AM

Okay what'd I do wrong this time? =(
posted by ZachsMind to Bugs at 6:28 AM (25 comments total)

It appears that you need to enclose your href in quotes, e.g. <a href="http://blahblah.org">
Otherwise it seems mefi tries to insert some, but doesn't do it quite right. I think.
posted by transient at 6:48 AM on December 5, 2001

I checked and doublechecked it in preview and didn't see the error. Ack. I need more coffee...
posted by ZachsMind at 6:50 AM on December 5, 2001

I see the error but the rest of the post shows up fine. (MacOS X, IE 5.1) Is it truncated in some browser? Stupid browser.
posted by rodii at 7:15 AM on December 5, 2001

Okay what'd I do wrong this time? =(

You used an emoticon just now. That's pretty wrong.

posted by Karl at 7:23 AM on December 5, 2001

Hey! Emoticons are dah bomb!

I just panicked I guess. The lack of the extra quote mark worked in my browser when I hit preview so I didn't think to look for the extra quote mark, but when I posted it I couldn't see half of what I posted. I tried to fix it and only made it worse. Story of my life.

Oh. I'm on a Windows 98 machine using MSIE5.5. Which probably explains it. MS sucks. Nice to know at least Mac users will be able to read it.
posted by ZachsMind at 7:30 AM on December 5, 2001

posted by Karl at 8:22 AM on December 5, 2001

ZachsMind - without your persecution complex we'd be deprived of your company. If you ever get over it and go all mellow as a result, tell me as I wouldn't mind giving you some real chase to pep you up.
Oh, and I don't know what Karl's just posted but it's turned my whole page upside down and Java-shaking every other second. Or was it Zach again?
posted by MiguelCardoso at 8:33 AM on December 5, 2001

Zach, a similar thing also happened to me the other day. I'm on a Win 98 machine using Netscape Communicator 4.7.

My theory was that MeFi thought I was self-linking to a comment of mine from an earlier thread. Maybe it's different than that, though.
posted by msacheson at 9:00 AM on December 5, 2001

put quotes in your links for now and i won't be a problem.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:11 AM on December 5, 2001

...And you do not want mathowie to be a problem!
posted by fuq at 9:18 AM on December 5, 2001

heh, I meant it won't be a problem, not i.

stupid chubby fingers.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 10:03 AM on December 5, 2001

One day they'll build cities around smilies.
posted by holloway at 10:47 AM on December 5, 2001

There's something strangely hypnotic about karl's smiley... Man I'm getting so sleepy... There is no 9622... There is no 9622.... There is no 9622...
posted by drezdn at 10:59 AM on December 5, 2001

Maybe I am reading something into this that's just not there? But, Zach, I think Gen was busting your chops re your uncharacteristically short posts.
posted by Vek at 11:06 AM on December 5, 2001

oh
posted by ZachsMind at 11:52 AM on December 5, 2001

actually, MeFi was acting a bit weird that particular moment and Zach's post was formatted strangely while I was cruising by so I did a test and my post came through fine. It's all back to normal of course. I wasn't busting anyone's chops. :)
posted by gen at 1:01 PM on December 5, 2001

There is no 9622... There is no 9622.... There is no 9622...

Proof.
posted by jpoulos at 1:21 PM on December 5, 2001

this is a test
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:21 PM on December 5, 2001

this is another test, except this time I added one quote mark instead of two
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:22 PM on December 5, 2001

yet another test, with the missing quote on the tail end
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:23 PM on December 5, 2001

there you have it.

here's how to break it.

Create a link in a comment, but write improper markup as follows:

<a href=http://foo.com">test post</a>

and it becomes:

<a href=http://foo.com" ">test post</a>

So, if you don't want to break the site, write out those links correctly. With or without the tag checker, it would produce an error in most browsers (IE 6 seems to display it ok with the single quote at the end, but I know most browsers will not.)
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:25 PM on December 5, 2001

posted by Karl at 2:18 PM on December 5, 2001

damn! i didn't test in netscape. now it should work.
posted by jpoulos at 2:18 PM on December 5, 2001

actually, it wasn't a netscape issue. explorer had cached the stylesheets, which i had failed to steal--so i didn't notice they were missing until i switched to ns. not that anyone is still listening to me babble....
posted by jpoulos at 2:22 PM on December 5, 2001

Oh, then I guess I was the only one busting chops ;-) It's an emoticon kinda day!
posted by Vek at 2:58 PM on December 5, 2001