Reply panel buttons not working

Thread Starter

jpanhalt

Joined Jan 18, 2008
11,087
None of the buttons at the top of the reply panel are working for me. I have had computer problems, but buttons on other forums are working just fine. Is it a permissions thing that needs to be re-set?

John
 

SgtWookie

Joined Jul 17, 2007
22,230
John,
I just clicked the "reply" button to get the advanced posting option, and the buttons on the bar (bold, italics, underline, etc) seem to be working fine.

Your computer might have a virus, or perhaps damaged DLL's or corrupted registry entries.

Do you have a system restore point available from a date prior to when you started experiencing these problems?

You might try downloading/installing the System Mechanic Professional evaluation from Iolo.
http://www.iolo.com/downloads.aspx
You can use it for ~30 days before it expires.
 

Thread Starter

jpanhalt

Joined Jan 18, 2008
11,087
It's a fresh installation Win XP Pro. Everything is working well, except this particular site. The services I referred to work with other sites, including another electronics forum.

My first guess was along the same lines that you suggest, so I exited, deleted the link, reloaded, and signed in. Problem still exists. I have a feeling it may be that my file/profile with AAE may have a flag switched unintentionally. The problem that created the need to re-load XP was something bizarre that even experts in Cleveland hadn't seen. Long story, short is that I installed a "refurbished" ATI video card, system went blank, could not go through a normal turn off procedure, re-installed the original controller, and system would not boot. At least I saw a Windows screen. Diagnostics said some sectors on the drive were damaged. Did a drive reconstruction to get the data and installed two brand new WD drives. Everything works like a charm now, except the AAE site. How does an ATI Radeon video card damage the hard drive? I don't know (nor does anyone else). So, I am looking for the rare and unusual.

As I write this, I could try making a second account. If that works, then it surely has to be the settings on my current account. What do you think of that approach? It would be the same e-mail address and TCP/IP number. I'm not sure whether the site allows multiple accounts like that.

John
 

SgtWookie

Joined Jul 17, 2007
22,230
John,
Sorry to hear you had problems with your ATI card. In their early days, ATI-owners would joke that they were members of the "Driver of the Week" club, because the company would release new drivers so often (back in '92, they were "bleeding edge", and frequently some of the things they occasionally did left the system less than pristinely stable - but with Windows 3.1 as the OS...)

Video boards are at such a low level of interface that they can easily cause myriad odd problems. Not sure how the video board could cause hard failures on your drives, because the newer drives take care of most of the "housekeeping" themselves, including the drive geometry.

I have sworn off WD drives after a series of unhappy failures. I've moved on to Seagate.

I can't advise you on trying to create another account, as I'm just another member here. If it isn't against the rules, you might try it - I don't recall that being in the rules anywhere, but I wasn't looking for it when I read them quite a while back.

I know you said it was a fresh build, but did you try deleting your cookies and emptying your browser's cache? With the latter, I've found that occasionally Internet Explorer gets fouled up with it's index, or CHKDSK converts temporary directories into files, and things stop working properly. In order to completely recover from that, I've had to:
1) Delete temporary Internet files. (MSIE -> Tools -> Internet Options -> Browsing History -> Delete...)
2) Move the temporary Internet file folder elsewhere, which causes you to be logged off to move the files. (MSIE -> Tools -> Internet Options -> Browsing History -> Settings -> Move Folder)
3) Log back in. Go to where your old temporary internet files were, and delete all files and subdirectories in there.
4) Move the temporary internet files folder back where it belongs (reverse procedure #2)

I created separate dedicated partitions for my Windows pagefile (virtual memory) and my temporary Internet files. This way, I don't have to worry about fragmentation. If things slow down, I dump my temporary internet files and re-boot. Otherwise, things can get cluttered up in a big hurry.

Cookies are pretty easily mangled, and MSIE is pretty adept at mangling them. :rolleyes:
I'd go there first, and you might as well try the move-the-temp folder trick at the same time.
 

Dave

Joined Nov 17, 2003
6,969
Sorry to hear about the issues John, I can confirm that all panel buttons work on all text-editor configurations. As this is confirmed by other members here and on my test account, we need to try and investigate the issue locally. I will ensure there are no changes in your account settings.

The first course of action is, as SgtWookie says, to clear your browser cache (at least of all AAC pages/components etc) and all AAC cookies. It will probably be easiest just to clear your whole cache and all cookies.

This sounds very much like a cache/cookies issue and, although it shouldn't happen, computers do have their moments. See http://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/faq.php?faq=vb_user_maintain#faq_vb_clear_cookies for more details

If the problem persists then get back to me, this may go a little deeper, but I would like to eliminate the most obvious cause.

Dave
 

Dave

Joined Nov 17, 2003
6,969
John, I notice you use the standard editor - have you tried to see if the buttons still do not work if you change editor mode.

(To change editor mode click the A/A button in the top right-hand corner of the post reply dialog).

Dave
 

Thread Starter

jpanhalt

Joined Jan 18, 2008
11,087
I noticed last night That I had a small caution sign in the lower left corner of each page. I am getting errors loading the pages. That might be due to some security/cookie setting or to the fact I am using I.E. 6, not the I.E. 7. None of the buttons on the reply panel work.

I will do some experiments a little later with the security settings. Are you or SgtWookie using I.E. 6 or 7 or some other browser?

I am still stuck with the fact that prior to the drive failure, everything worked (I was using I.E.6 then too). With brand new drives it is not.
 

Thread Starter

jpanhalt

Joined Jan 18, 2008
11,087
The right answer is always so obvious in retrospect. Cleared cookies, history, and files (based on SgtWookies comments).

It is now working with no errors.

Thank you both. I didn't realize what else CHKDSK could do. After the failure, running CHKDSK and a variety of other things, I made a bit by bit copy and used a DOS program (DataRescue PC originally by ACR Data Recovery) to recover. What still puzzles me is that I reloaded all of the programs on the new hard drives by using the original CD disks. The only things I reloaded from the recovered data were dbx (Outlook Express records), fav files, and address book (wab). I did not knowingly load cookies or history.

Oh well, it will remain another unsolved mystery of the universe created by Microsoft.

John
 

Dave

Joined Nov 17, 2003
6,969
Glad to hear everything is fine now, John. Cookies are usually the primary culprit with issues such as the one described here. I give them a regular clear out using ccleaner (free download and very much worth getting for keeping rubbish off your PC).

Dave
 

bloguetronica

Joined Apr 27, 2007
1,541
Glad to hear everything is fine now, John. Cookies are usually the primary culprit with issues such as the one described here. I give them a regular clear out using ccleaner (free download and very much worth getting for keeping rubbish off your PC).

Dave
Indeed. I have my share of experience. Sometimes the admin only needs to change some minimal settings that shouldn't affect accounts, and the account won't work properly until you reset the cookies and login again. Happened with me during the restore of my website's forums, and lots of times, I must say.
 

SgtWookie

Joined Jul 17, 2007
22,230
Hey John,
Glad you got it back working. :)

On one of my systems, I'd occasionally get a BSOD. When that happens, frequently directory data gets scrambled, and CHKDSK doesn't always pick the best solution.

What happened in my case, was that I had been on the Web, and MSIE was writing to files in several of the Temporary Internet Files subdirectories, which meant that not only the files that were being written, but the entries for the directories themselves, were in the process of being updated when the BSOD's occurred.

CHKDSK ran automatically on reboot, found the missing/crosslinked files/directories, and resolved the problem by changing the directory to a file, and making copies of the crosslinked files. This left the MSIE index pointing to what SHOULD have been directories, that were now files. What clued me in that I was having a problem is that any time I tried to save a graphics image, it would always try to save as "untitled.BMP" - and I couldn't select any other file format. This was occurring because MSIE couldn't actually write the image to it's cache; I can only assume it was simply held in RAM. I was also getting errors on loading web pages from various sites.

It took a fair amount of tinkering around to come up with the solution of delete/move/delete/move the temporary internet files.
 

Dave

Joined Nov 17, 2003
6,969
Indeed. I have my share of experience. Sometimes the admin only needs to change some minimal settings that shouldn't affect accounts, and the account won't work properly until you reset the cookies and login again. Happened with me during the restore of my website's forums, and lots of times, I must say.
Yes, strange things sometimes do happen. From an admin perspective the issue is often isolation, and the first thing that needs ascertaining is whether the problem is confined to an individual member, whether it is a member group issue, or if it is a forum-wide issue. From there you can go troubleshooting.

It took a fair amount of tinkering around to come up with the solution of delete/move/delete/move the temporary internet files.
Along with cookies, it is the first piece of advice we always offer, and it solves a large proportion of the problems.

Dave
 
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