Hoping to undo future mistakes!

April 16, 2010 11:46 AM

Why can't I undo? Ack! I just wrote a huge long reply to an Ask Mefi and accidentally deleted the whole thing. Control+z does nothing and right-click>undo is not available. Is there any way to make undo possible?
posted by keep it under cover to Feature Requests at 11:46 AM (42 comments total)

Oh I think this will be undone quite quickly.
posted by cashman at 11:53 AM on April 16, 2010

This is a problem with your browser and not with metafilter.
posted by RustyBrooks at 11:54 AM on April 16, 2010

For future reference, Lazarus is a Firefox add-on that you can use to avoid this problem.
posted by phoenixy at 11:54 AM on April 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Firefox already saves stuff in text fields also. You can close the browser and reopen it and if you have ti set right, everything is there.
posted by cashman at 11:56 AM on April 16, 2010

Firefox also has undo that works just fine in the comment box, so, I can't image KIUC was using FF to begin with.
posted by SpiffyRob at 11:57 AM on April 16, 2010

I suspect undo would be a function of your browser and not something Metafilter could add, although I bet PB could figure out a way to make your CD tray serve you a martini if he really wanted to.

I compose long posts in a new email (make sure you don't address it to anyone, there is no 'unsend' button either), Word, or text document and then cut and paste it into the comment box when I'm ready to post. This has the added advantage of using whatever formatting and spell checking capabilities your email client or word processor has built-in.
posted by bondcliff at 12:01 PM on April 16, 2010

For future reference, Lazarus is a Firefox add-on that you can use to avoid this problem.

Anyone else have experience with this or something similar? I am a frequent victim of time-outs due to crappy internet. For the most part I type in text and copy-paste, but if someone has already solved this problem...
posted by whatzit at 12:04 PM on April 16, 2010

What's a browser? I use the google.
posted by Mister_A at 12:05 PM on April 16, 2010 [8 favorites]

This is not really a MeFi-related problem. There are Firefox add-ons that do a decent job and typing into a text document using autosave is also okay. Simple hack is to type into a gmail draft. If whatever you did is un CTRL-Z-able, I'm not sure what else we could offer in any case.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:06 PM on April 16, 2010

Aww, nuts. Thanks for the tips.
posted by keep it under cover at 12:09 PM on April 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

What's a browser? I use the google.

Can you please change the Facebook page to how it was before? I can't get to my profile.
posted by shakespeherian at 12:12 PM on April 16, 2010 [12 favorites]

"I accidentally my whole comment"
posted by mr_crash_davis mark II: Jazz Odyssey at 12:40 PM on April 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

If I had a dollar for every time I did this (type up a long reply and then somehow lose it by closing/switching the browser window) I would be able to afford maybe half a dozen or so sockpuppets.

However, I find this also to be a prime argument for the existence of God. God knows my tl;dr replies are often not MeFi worthy, and he thusly intervenes. Praise him.
posted by deacon_blues at 12:40 PM on April 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

Compose all your comments in a word processing program _{if you are nuts like me.}
posted by 2bucksplus at 12:55 PM on April 16, 2010

Please don't respond to credulous requests for help with instructions for erasing a hard drive.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:04 PM on April 16, 2010

Sorry, that was a terrible joke. Hope you didn't do it.
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 1:12 PM on April 16, 2010

It wasn't a great joke, but it wouldn't work anyway. There'd be confirmations screens, and I'm pretty sure Windows doesn't allow you to format the current boot drive.
posted by kmz at 1:17 PM on April 16, 2010

I wasn't going to test it to find out. ;-)
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 1:19 PM on April 16, 2010

I want to hear a lot more about this martini in a CD tray feature.

Wait, I don't even have a CD tray any more. Can we get a USB or SD version? Everyone has a USB port now, right?
posted by loquacious at 1:34 PM on April 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'm sure this is fixed with MetaFilter Wave, which is now in alpha.
posted by dhartung at 1:41 PM on April 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

My browser the whole thing!
posted by GuyZero at 1:42 PM on April 16, 2010

Wait, I don't even have a CD tray any more. Can we get a USB or SD version? Everyone has a USB port now, right?

No. Everyone knows USB is for humping dogs.
posted by qvantamon at 1:43 PM on April 16, 2010

that's microUSB n00bs




*tries outrunning the taser again*
posted by infini at 1:51 PM on April 16, 2010

I'm sure this is fixed with MetaFilter Wave, which is now in alpha.

Do we get armbands?
posted by The Whelk at 2:21 PM on April 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

Do we get armbands?

MotherFUCKER That shit was in deep, deep storage until now. Thanks for re-awakening a health class moment for me
posted by stet at 2:35 PM on April 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Can someone explain the joke that got stet all grar'd up? Mr. Whelk, please?
posted by Mister_A at 2:42 PM on April 16, 2010

The Wave
posted by The Whelk at 2:43 PM on April 16, 2010

Detail
posted by The Whelk at 2:43 PM on April 16, 2010

and here I thought it was connected to that Buzz thing that always gets me grar'd everytime I trip over some email contact of funny's with a wide open "look at me look at all my contacts" setting. bah.

otoh that third wave experiment is pretty cool in a morbid sort of way
posted by infini at 2:54 PM on April 16, 2010

Whoa! That sounds like a terrible thing to do to your class... and a pretty good after-school special.
posted by Mister_A at 2:55 PM on April 16, 2010

You know about The Wave!!!???

From health class? Wow. I saw it at my Jewish summer camp. Followed by what I now remember as a scare-the-kids-and-talk-about-Nazis-and-assimilation conversation.
posted by quinoa at 3:43 PM on April 16, 2010

Is there any way to make undo possible?

Use your favourite text pad to compose your comment.
posted by UbuRoivas at 4:24 PM on April 16, 2010

I read that article in Wikipedia, and all I could think of was "so... that was Eric Cartman's class, then?"
posted by qvantamon at 4:55 PM on April 16, 2010

this is nothing. i post less than half of what i type. voluntarily.
posted by fallacy of the beard at 11:37 PM on April 16, 2010

Hey, man, you gotta just... let it go, y'know?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 2:48 AM on April 17, 2010

Unsurprisingly, Opera has had multi-step Undo (as well as spellchecking) built-in for ages, I didn't even know this was a problem.
posted by Dr Dracator at 3:46 AM on April 17, 2010

I find it astounding that people are editing their comments with anything other than emacs. What are you all, barbarians?
posted by koeselitz at 2:16 PM on April 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'm sure this is fixed with MetaFilter Wave, which is now in alpha.

With the amount of "fuck you" I've seen in threads this year, maybe we should rename it MetaFilter Hug.
posted by secret about box at 3:13 AM on April 18, 2010

MetaFilter Big Squeezy Hug

ftfy :)
posted by infini at 7:31 AM on April 18, 2010

With the amount of "fuck you" I've seen in threads this year,

I've actually got a macro for "The 'fuck you' stuff has to stop" emails now.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:49 AM on April 18, 2010

Surely this is more direct?
posted by The Whelk at 8:20 AM on April 18, 2010

now that is what makes this place so very cool

MetaFilter: Best of the web
posted by infini at 11:51 AM on April 18, 2010