Mumsnet Talk re-platforming - Known issues update

[JustineMumsnet]

Hi all,
As you probably know we re-plaftormed the site overnight on Tuesday (in order to move to a faster, more stable and secure site which would be easier to develop new features on). There are a number of issues and bugs as a result of the move that we are working through and we thought it would be a good idea to list them on a page which we can keep updated as we sort through the problems. You can find that page here.

Mumsnet is a very large, complicated and old site - we've been working on re-platforming for the best part of 3 years - so it's not a huge surprise there are some bugs but please be assured we are working our way through them will get to them all as soon as we possibly can. In the meantime I do apologise for any inconvenience and frustration - I know it's been a painful day and a half for some.

Thank you to all those who've fed back and are helping us solve the remaining issues - it's really much appreciated .

It's been a while - still random order which makes the local talk unusable. Perhaps that's the plan?

Ok, this is strange.

I normally use Microsoft Edge on Windows 10. That gives me 5 blank lines at the head of each subject and lots of white space either side of the posts and adverts. If I use Chrome, I get "Promoted by Mumsnet" posts on the first 5 lines and additional adverts to the left and right of the screen (currently for Breast Cancer Now). If I use an InPrivate window on Edge I get the same, and this stuff continues to appear when I login. However, returning to the normal InPrivate window I still don't get this even if I log out and login again. Very odd.

It looks like the missing items are dealt with by Javascript but, for some reason, that isn't working in all circumstances.

My weekly post to say that notifications still aren't working.

This supposed ‘upgrade’ has nothing to commend it! Why are images still so small? When I enlarge them to size they used to be before this ‘improvement’ they are so blurry I might as well not bother!

Why are these issues not being fixed?

I do a garden “pictures “ thread . The photos are definitely not an improvement.

PMs are still not working properly . I sent a long reply to a PM (via the mobile version on an iPhone) that has just disappeared into the ether

Is MN deliberately trying to encourage to move off the site and on to FB/email? At least Messenger is reliable.

But you need at least one PM to get through to share at last one RL name/email

What about the REFRESH button, when is it coming back Mumsnet?

I doubt it will come back. It was completely pointless. It did exactly the same as clicking the Refresh button on your browser.

Hi all, apologies it's been a while since we updated on this thread. We appreciate it's frustrating that things aren't working as expected and we're working as fast as we can to resolve all the problems.

Here are some responses to the issues raised since our last update:

@TheThreadisMildlyAmusing We're not reinstating the refresh button as it was because it was just a browser refresh that can be achieved using the browser function. We are working on a replacement for it that will show you when new posts have been added to the thread while you've been reading it and will allow you to load them in with a button click.

@prettybird There are intermittent issues regarding PMs that we're finding hard to pin down but we're trying to figure out what's happening. If you are willing to do some 121 testing with us then that would be really helpful? If you are interested then please let me know and we can arrange it.

@Seeingadistance @AnneKipankitoo @Bosky We released some changes to the image viewer that we think have improved it but we will review it again as we're still getting a lot of feedback about image sizes.

@debwong When you say notifications aren't working what exactly isn't working for you? We know that some notifications aren't taking users to the right place on the thread and we're waiting on a fix to be released for that. If it's something else then let us know.

@prh47bridge Thank you for the great explanation about the impact of the text size and layout changes! In regards to the 5 blank lines you are seeing - they are sponsored threads that are pulled in via a 3rd party. If you're using an ad blocker then they will not appear but we are getting reports that users without ad blockers are still seeing blank slots and we're currently looking into why.

@kitchens4ever We can't change the width of the column because of our ad setup unfortunately, but we have reduced the number of ad slots on threads to reduce some scrolling. We want the website to be accessible so we will discuss this further and see what other changes we can make without reducing the font size or making it less accessible for other users.

@Zonder The changes to local are waiting to be tested and we will release them as soon as we can. Apologies for the delay on this!

@BotCrossHuns We've reviewed the smaller fonts on the threads I'm on page and will release changes soon. The changes will also fix the overlapping text. I've also raised the issue with the navigation links being small so will update on that soon.

@ExtremelyDedicated @DentonsFringeArnottsWaistcoat We're currently looking at the issue with pages refreshing unexpectedly and hope to have a fix soon.

@DentonsFringeArnottsWaistcoat when a thread is deleted a message should be left behind in threads I'm on so we will add this to the list to be fixed.

I hope I covered everything - please follow up if not!

@KatyMumsnet i’ve had deleted threads missing ( ie no reason showing)
the site is repeatedly crashing.
also big threads ( or more than a page) (ie this one) if i try to go up or down the page the screen will go white and i’m uable to view any replies ( trying to copy your user name took me several minutes as every time i tried to just move up the page the thread disappeared) which means i can’t go and skip and read diff posters replies or skip to find a certain reply as the page will either keep crashing and reloading or i just get a blank screen.

if theres more than a page to a thread its a no go.
i keep raising this but getting nowhere.
this site has been unusable since this launch.

i’m on an iphone.

KatyMumsnet thanks for the update.

Image Size Viewer

Will the changes only affect images posted after you made the imporvements as the image posted by Polgara2 above is still quite small in the centre of a huge white pop-up:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/site_stuff/4534986-mumsnet-talk-re-platforming-known-issues-update?page=7&reply=117768879

Incidentally, there seems be something off with the links in email notifications.

I got an email notification that I had been mentioned in your post above but when I followed the link it was "Page Not Found".

@KatyMumsnet No ad blocker for me. I've found the URL used to download the ads for the first five lines. On my normal browser the return payload does not contain any ads, but if I open an InPrivate window and user the same URL, the return payload includes ads. Very strange.

Pretty much avoiding this site now. Am reading, but hardly posting.

Threads still “jump”. Not going to explain, you should know what I mean.

Trying to post, especially after 11pm, can be hit and miss.

BIGGEST bugbear is keeping track of long-running threads. In the past, would always be taken to to the last point in the thread that I’d read. No more - constantly have to find my own way to it.

This is the ONE point that is making me hate MN.

Furries - "BIGGEST bugbear is keeping track of long-running threads. In the past, would always be taken to to the last point in the thread that I’d read. No more - constantly have to find my own way to it."

I have got in the habit of always bookmarking the last post in a thread that I have read, then it always takes me to that point.

Yes, the keeping place on long running threads is driving me mad but I wasn't quite sure what had changed, couldn't explain it. I'm on 4 series of long running threads that all update daily and have done for years, something has changed and I have to bookmark every single time I read them to keep my place, I never used to have to do this. One of these threads has been running since 2009 and is dying on its feet as so many of the regulars are struggling to post.

URLs in Lists

Just noticed something and I don't know if it has been mentioned before.

If URLs are included in auto-generated List format then they are not automatically "clickable" as hyperlinks.

1. https://www.mumsnet.com/articles/talk-updates
2. https://www.mumsnet.com/h/campaigns
3. https://www.mumsnet.com/h/competitions

However, they will work if surrounded by double square brackets.

1. www.mumsnet.com/articles/talk-updates
2. www.mumsnet.com/h/campaigns
3. www.mumsnet.com/h/competitions

There used to be instructions under the Reply Entry Box about how to use the double square brackets to make URLs clickable but they are not there any more.

Oh! I'm not sure if that's me making a mistake with the square brackets or if it is the List Format messing up.

The code looks like this (is there a container for code snippets?)

www.mumsnet.com/articles/talk-updatesXV0=%3C/li%3E%3Cli%3E[[www.mumsnet.com/h/campaigns

www.mumsnet.com/articles/talk-updatesXV0=%3C/li%3E%3Cli%3E[[www.mumsnet.com/h/campaigns

www.mumsnet.com/h/competitions

-----

Weird. I'll try with the double square brackets again:

1. www.mumsnet.com/articles/talk-updates
2. www.mumsnet.com/h/campaigns
3. www.mumsnet.com/h/competitions

That last bit looks fine in Preview.

I have attached a screen shot of the text in the Message Editing Box in case it all goes skew whiff when it is published.

Looks like I just made an error entering the square brackets the first time.

And now I am feeling dumb! I forgot that there is now a Link Generator so you don't need to use square brackets any more!

Still the issue with Lists though.

Hi, just a quick update on a couple of the issues on this thread:

@BoreOfWhabylon the issue with @ mentions not appearing bold is now fixed.

@Zonder the local results are now ordered by newest first and you can use the drop down to change it to closest first if you want to.

A few people raised issues with PM notifications showing when there are no messages to read - we think we've fixed this so please check and let us know if you're still seeing notifications with no corresponding messages. @DragonwithoutaDungeon fyi!

@Memyselfandfood We're currently trying to figure out why pages are crashing and we're making some progress in the background but as it's an intermittent issue it's hard for us to pin down the exact cause.

@ExtremelyDedicated @Furries can I check that the behaviour you're expecting is that you click through from a watched thread notification or from threads I'm on/watching and you land on the last post you saw? If so, we are working on a fix for this!

@Bosky we will take a look at that issue with the lists - thanks for flagging!

As always, apologies if I missed anything and please do follow up if so. We are working through all the issues so please bear with us!

Nothing has changed yet regarding the mini font for all the navigation, thread lists in trending, threads I'm on etc

Also in threads I'm on, anything in lists still ends up all overlapping with lines on top of each other

Hello

We're still working on the changes to threads I'm on. The font size and overlapping lines will be fixed as part of that update! It's taking longer than expected because we're also changing it to show how many updates the user has since they last saw the thread.

We don't have plans to change the navigation font just yet but it is on our list to discuss - we're working through some bigger issues right now but we're taking the feedback on and will update when we have more information on that!

@KatyMumsnet - yes, when clicking on threads in my notifications (that’s the only way I keep up with threads). It’s really hit and miss. If I’ve posted on it fairly recently, it’s usually ok - the thread will open at the last post that I read. But give it a few days and I’m taken straight back to page 1 (as happened when opening this thread!)

I can see the messages that I had notifications for. Good to be able to get to them and luckily there wasn't anything important in them. Thank you @KatyMumsnet

The whole site since update has just been riddled with issues and tbh MNHQs responses to things users have brought up have not been great overall and sometimes fairly worrying though. I'm definitely using the site a lot less, I'm sure I'm not the only one.

2 things I've also noticed are:

The search function being pretty rubbish compared to the old one.

And there's still no "go to page" function in the ellipses between page numbers on desktop. On a large thread this means you do have to go through page by page if you are not navigating to the first or last page. Very annoying tbh.

The return key on my phone won't work properly since the update. If I put punctuation of any sort, I can use my return button after the punctuation as normal. However, if I want to list words and not put a space or punctuation afterwards but want to move to a new line, so writing out a recipe for example, I press return and the cursor stays exactly where it is and will not move to the next line.

If I try to continue typing after using the return key, the words just carry on on the same line but I have blank lines below the text instead.

So I'll write a list, using the return key after each word to show you:
Horse dog cat giraffe mouse elephant

I pressed return after each of those words, the cursor didn't move to a new line, but a blank line is created instead below the text. Does that make sense? I'm using a Samsung S10 and Chrome.