Another glitch? Comments not showing?

[lovecraft68]

Not sure is anyone else is seeing this on their stories.

My latest story has 12 comments. I received #12 a little while ago and I noticed that when I click on the notification it shows this



The issue is if you click on all comments, it shows only seven. On my works page it has all 12 and if I look up the story on my page through the site and not my works page it says 12 next to the story but you'll only see seven when you click onto it. The five missing are the last five and spread out over four days.

The issue for me with this is we gripe not many people comment as it is, but now if they do, then go back to look and see it not there they'll think either the author is removing them or the site isn't putting them through and why should they bother doing it again?

In the end, I'll take the advice I often give on these issues, that it's a free site, not worth freaking out over, and its not like we'll ever know what's going on and once something breaks it could be a day to be fixed or never get fixed at all. Most of all, nothing we can do about it. Just curious if others have noticed it.

 

[BeechLeaf]

TaniaTulle posted yesterday about comments and feedback being weird, and I added something about a different comment weirdness I hadn't seen before. (My problem is now fixed, so it was a lag thing.)

 

[NuclearFairy]

I went and checked my story with my most recent comment. Both comments are there, they are 14 days old.

So I went and checked my most recent comments that are more than five. All eight comments are there, although I had to click the show more comments button to see the oldest three. But, my most recent comment on that one is 26 days old, so I don't know how helpful this is.

 

[TheLobster]

The issue for me with this is we gripe not many people comment as it is, but now if they do, then go back to look and see it not there they'll think either the author is removing them or the site isn't putting them through and why should they bother doing it again?

I don' see how this a new issue. It has always been like that for as long as comments have been held back for moderation. Regular readers are surely aware that their comments won't pop up immediately.

 

[lovecraft68]

I don' see how this a new issue. It has always been like that for as long as comments have been held back for moderation. Regular readers are surely aware that their comments won't pop up immediately.

No, these aren't being delayed if that were the case how would I know they weren't showing? The comments show if I click on that icon on the story in my works page, and if you look up the story on the site it will say in the stats under it 12 comments, but you only see seven on the story itself.

If they were in moderation they wouldn't show anywhere until they clear it.

 

[lovecraft68]

I went and checked my story with my most recent comment. Both comments are there, they are 14 days old.

So I went and checked my most recent comments that are more than five. All eight comments are there, although I had to click the show more comments button to see the oldest three. But, my most recent comment on that one is 26 days old, so I don't know how helpful this is.

I read a story today and it showed six but said total was nine. I clicked show all comments and only saw the six despite what it said and when I looked at the story in the category story list it says nine there.

Seems like the author can see them through their works page but they don't show publicly on the story. The first one I have that's missing is from the 17th and the most recent the one I posted as seen on my page but it doesn't show up on the story.

For all I know this could have been happening, I don't often check these things, but this is a newish story with a small number of comments, so I actually noticed.

 

[TheLobster]

No, these aren't being delayed if that were the case how would I know they weren't showing? The comments show if I click on that icon on the story in my works page, and if you look up the story on the site it will say in the stats under it 12 comments, but you only see seven on the story itself.

If they were in moderation they wouldn't show anywhere until they clear it.

You misunderstood. What I'm saying is that this issue with comments which are not displayed for a few days even after they've been moderated is not one that should affect the readers' perception much as to how the site works and whether it's "worth it" to comment in the first place.

In other words, it is pretty much just an authors' issue (if it's even an issue, considering that you can see all the comments you've received anyway, even during that post-moderation limbo).

 

[lovecraft68]

You misunderstood. What I'm saying is that this issue with comments which are not displayed for a few days even after they've been moderated is not one that should affect the readers' perception much as to how the site works and whether it's "worth it" to comment in the first place.

In other words, it is pretty much just an authors' issue (if it's even an issue, considering that you can see all the comments you've received anyway, even during that post-moderation limbo).

Okay, I get what you meant, you're saying the reader may just think the comment hasn't cleared yet? Its possible, but I wonder if readers understand the way it works at all compared to how we do on our end. I'd also wonder if they'd notice something like the story claiming to have x amount of comments on the story list page then if they glance at the comments see less?

Suppose it depends on the reader.

This site has had glitches since way before I came here, but never as many and as often. Maybe its time for some new duct tape.

 

[RejectReality]

No, these aren't being delayed if that were the case how would I know they weren't showing? The comments show if I click on that icon on the story in my works page, and if you look up the story on the site it will say in the stats under it 12 comments, but you only see seven on the story itself.

If they were in moderation they wouldn't show anywhere until they clear it.

Every comment I've gotten for a while has had a delay between appearing in the dashboard and appearing on the story. I'm talking about hours rather than days, though.

 

[lovecraft68]

Every comment I've gotten for a while has had a delay between appearing in the dashboard and appearing on the story. I'm talking about hours rather than days, though.

Yeah, we know every part of the site updates differently with our pages being the most accurate, but as you noted, this is four days for the oldest one not showing.

Now that I've seen it I'll watch for it. I only caught this because of how new it is.

Funny thing is when I first looked at the new comment, the two I noticed were missing were negative and I'd wondered if the site removed them for some reason, then I saw two others not there either.

 

[SimonDoom]

I think there have been glitches because they are making changes. That's my impression. I noticed recently that there was a change in the way the most recent comments were presented when I saw a notice about a new comment and clicked on that story. The change seems to be for the better, but it may create unexpected collateral issues.

 

[TheLobster]

This site has had glitches since way before I came here, but never as many and as often. Maybe its time for some new duct tape.

This site is a series of tubes caches. They evidently had scaling problems with the database at some point and figured the "best" way to solve would be introduce extra caching for every distinct view (i.e. page) and batch jobs to populate those caches. This may have worked for a while but as the site grew, the batch jobs seems to not be coping with the load well (possibly because they don't want to allocate more computing resources to them for cost reasons).

The real tragedy, of course, is that contemporary databases could easily handle the kind of read-heavy load Literotica experiences; and even if they were to stick to ancient MySQL or whatever godforsaken database they're using, overlaying a global in-memory cache like Redis would at least solve discrepancies between public page #1 showing something different than public page #2. What they have now, though, is neither of those architectures, but rather a giant ball of years-old layers of band-aids and duct tape, held together by bubble gum and pure spite.

 

[lovecraft68]

This site is a series of tubes caches. They evidently had scaling problems with the database at some point and figured the "best" way to solve would be introduce extra caching for every distinct view (i.e. page) and batch jobs to populate those caches. This may have worked for a while but as the site grew, the batch jobs seems to not be coping with the load well (possibly because they don't want to allocate more computing resources to them for cost reasons).

The real tragedy, of course, is that contemporary databases could easily handle the kind of read-heavy load Literotica experiences; and even if they were to stick to ancient MySQL or whatever godforsaken database they're using, overlaying a global in-memory cache like Redis would at least solve discrepancies between public page #1 showing something different than public page #2. What they have now, though, is neither of those architectures, but rather a giant ball of years-old layers of band-aids and duct tape, held together by bubble gum and pure spite.

Held together with pure spite is how people refer to me, but they throw in malice or bitterness as well.

Funny thing about you speaking of how out dated this is.

My company uses a system called AS400. How old is it? There hasn't been support for it in forever. My wife used this system when she was in purchasing at Brooks corporate right out of college (97) and the woman who trained her griped about it being old.

We're supposedly going to D365 later this year and we started the trainings and I'm like 'wow, this is what modern tech looks like!" except I said it with mute off on my mic and people attending the training from corporate weren't amused.

 

[RejectReality]

I think there have been glitches because they are making changes. That's my impression. I noticed recently that there was a change in the way the most recent comments were presented when I saw a notice about a new comment and clicked on that story. The change seems to be for the better, but it may create unexpected collateral issues.

Yeah, I absolutely prefer the "jump directly to the comment you clicked from your dashboard" behavior that I just noticed happening. A++ update for me.

I can't work out a logical path between glitches in that and the issue LC is experiencing, but I suppose as long as it's a change to the story page code, it's always possible.

 

[Ianus4]

This is another wonderful improvement.
It seems that the number of comments on stories now includes unapproved comments, which of course will not appear until they are approved.
Perhaps related to this, when I click on a particular story in the "My Comments" list, previously all comments related to that story were displayed, but now only my own comment is shown. To see all comments related to the story, I have to click again.

 

[BeechLeaf]

Ah, I thought that behaviour was different, but perhaps I was just imagining it. I couldn't remember doing the sequence of click and see just mine, then click again to see them all, until recently.

 

[lovecraft68]

This is another wonderful improvement.
It seems that the number of comments on stories now includes unapproved comments, which of course will not appear until they are approved.
Perhaps related to this, when I click on a particular story in the "My Comments" list, previously all comments related to that story were displayed, but now only my own comment is shown. To see all comments related to the story, I have to click again.

Thing is if that's true then comments are taking four or more days to approve and appear to the public?

 

[Ianus4]

Thing is if that's true then comments are taking four or more days to approve and appear to the public?

So far, it has been at least 48 hours, and unfortunately, I cannot rule out that it may take even longer at times...
It seems that either the stories are approved quickly or the comments are, but the two cannot be done together.

 

[Rambling_Chantrix]

I'm noticing this too, seems like a caching issue mostly? Probably some wip server architecture shifts.

 

[RejectReality]

All of my incoming comments are on older stories. Anyone experiencing delays more than a few hours, is it on new releases? That could be useful information if there is actually a bug.

 

[SimonDoom]

Yeah, I absolutely prefer the "jump directly to the comment you clicked from your dashboard" behavior that I just noticed happening. A++ update for me.

I can't work out a logical path between glitches in that and the issue LC is experiencing, but I suppose as long as it's a change to the story page code, it's always possible.

There's an interesting demonstration of human nature here. People notice the negative, not the positive. It's the way it is.

I've been here just over 9 years, and over that time the site has made numerous improvements that have made my experience as an author and as a reader more enjoyable. I expect that's true for others. But you'd never know it to read the Author's Hangout comments, where negative observations about site changes and experiences probably outweigh the positive ones 9 to 1.

If something negative happens, people notice immediately and this forum is peppered with new threads featuring complaints and handwringing. If something good happens, if there's any comment on it at all, the attitude seems to be, "What took you so long?"

 

[RejectReality]

There's an interesting demonstration of human nature here. People notice the negative, not the positive. It's the way it is.

I've been here just over 9 years, and over that time the site has made numerous improvements that have made my experience as an author and as a reader more enjoyable. I expect that's true for others. But you'd never know it to read the Author's Hangout comments, where negative observations about site changes and experiences probably outweigh the positive ones 9 to 1.

If something negative happens, people notice immediately and this forum is peppered with new threads featuring complaints and handwringing. If something good happens, if there's any comment on it at all, the attitude seems to be, "What took you so long?"

Like the massive increase in supported links to other platforms like Facebook/X that recently happened. Or the "support this author" links now appearing in other places beyond just your profile, such as by your author link on story pages — at the bottom so they appear near the voting/comment forms no less. So many people cry about not being able to promote their paid work in story links, but Lit is actually providing those links themselves now if you enter the information in your profile, and there's good reason to block such links in the story text.

 

[BeechLeaf]

I've been very careful (I hope) not to say that any changes or behaviour are bad - but some are weirder than they used to be. I just went into two recent stories by authors I'm following. When I go to the final page I expect to see comments that have already been approved and published.

Rambling_Chantrix's latest has no comments, but a link All Comments (11), which comes up with a list of 9 comments under the heading 9 COMMENTS. Okay, 9 versus 11 is lag; we know about lag.

mrs_mackenzie's latest has 5 comments under a heading 1 COMMENT. Now that's one list in one place, lag may have hidden others, but it's saying 1 = 5, and speaking as a mathematician and programmer I do find that an eency bit weird.

 

[Kasumi_Lee]

I encountered one recently when I deleted a comment from my latest story (the comment was incoherent gibberish, so not helpful). When I went back to the Latest Activity tab, the message which used to read "Anonymous user has commented on your story" now reads "Someone has commented on your deleted work".

My work has most definitely NOT been deleted, so I'm guessing the backend programmers inserted the wrong text into the code, but it's still kind of alarming to see this message even though I know it actually means the comment has been deleted.

 

[lovecraft68]

So far, it has been at least 48 hours, and unfortunately, I cannot rule out that it may take even longer at times...
It seems that either the stories are approved quickly or the comments are, but the two cannot be done together.

On the other side of things I left a comment this morning that was visible right away.