Question

Some apparently similar versions of InternetExplorer can not save edits or add comments on my twiki site. Why not?

On my machine IE5.5 can't save edits or leave a comment. After submission it justs sits there forever waiting to recieve something. Someone else verifies that he also can't save or comment only he's using IE6sp2. A third person has no problems with IE6sp2.

http://koala.ilog.fr/twikiirc/bin/irclogger_log/twiki?date=2004-10-05,Tue&sel=7#l3

Environment

-- MattWilkie - 05 Oct 2004

Answer

Other oddities which may or may not be related:

• comments are added immediately after the trailing percent (%) sign, not on the next line.
• I can't save TWikiPreferences. There is no error on screen or in the twiki or apache logs. The browser says "contacting yukongis.ca" then "receiving" and then "Done" and I am left looking at a new edit screen, minus my changes.

removed note about EDITTABLE bug which is actually spec: EditTablePluginAnomolies .

Is SaveForever possibly related? I did have a mix of ownership on the files, since fixed, the problem remains. However the directories are not owned by the apache user. I don't know how to change that since chown nobody:nobody is denied.

-- MattWilkie - 06 Oct 2004

Matt, Konqueror stack traces even just viewing this page [the example above]. It seems to be something to do with authentication, but can't be more specific than that.

-- CrawfordCurrie - 06 Oct 2004

I'm not doing anything uncommon with authentication, unless someone can spot a problem with this (attached httpd.conf virtual host).

This is a real showstopper for me, are there any other ideas? Like what steps/tests might help narrow down the problem area?

-- MattWilkie - 09,10 Oct 2004

• I don't see anything glaringly obvious, but then I'm no apache expert. Nothing wierd in .htaccess? No strange modules loaded in Apache?

Everything is in the server config. .htaccess is not used except to Redirect permanent /index.htm http://yukongis.ca/bin/view/Main/FrontPage from the site root. I don't know what constitutes a "strange" module. Loaded ones are: vhost_alias_module env_module log_config_module mime_magic_module mime_module negotiation_module status_module info_module include_module autoindex_module dir_module cgid_module asis_module imap_module actions_module speling_module userdir_module alias_module access_module auth_module auth_anon_module auth_dbm_module cern_meta_module expires_module headers_module usertrack_module unique_id_module setenvif_module ssl_module rewrite_module jk2_module php5_module

• Kong does this: it displays the page, then a couple of secs later hauls up the log prompt. Before I can hit OK or Cancel, it quietly dies. It does it reproducibly.
• As long as directory permissions allow write and execute to the apache user, they should be OK.

• Make sure your RCS version is up to date.

• I take it switching back to Apache 1.3 isn't an option?

• While I'm thinking about it, I had an issue with KeepAlive a while ago, that caused (causes) the browser to appear to hang until the KeepAlive timed out.

KeepAlive settings in the main httpd.conf (which I can read but not change):

KeepAlive On
MaxKeepAliveRequests 100
KeepAliveTimeout 15

Q: when you did your tests, were you logged in as you or as guest?. I'm wondering if the empty guest password is causing problems.

thank you for your ideas

-- CrawfordCurrie - 10 Oct 2004, -- Main.MattWilkie - 11 Oct 2004

There are some messages in the apache error log. I don't know if they coincide with the problem browser edits or not:

[Sat Oct  9 00:18:38 2004] viewauth: print() on closed filehandle FILE at ../lib/TWiki/Store.pm line 868.
[Sat Oct  9 05:36:28 2004] save: print() on closed filehandle FILE at ../lib/TWiki/Store.pm line 868.
[Mon Oct 11 00:04:58 2004] viewauth: print() on closed filehandle FILE at ../lib/TWiki/Store.pm line 868.

the sh line looks highly irregular to me.

-- MattWilkie - 11 Oct 2004

The print on closed filehandle is it trying to print to the log. Is the log writeable?

No, I can't get as far as login with Konq.

-- CrawfordCurrie - 11 Oct 2004

The log is writable now. A few days ago it wasn't, and at that time the error messages were like this:

Couldn't write "| 08 Oct 2004 - 23:51 | Main.TWikiGuest | view | Sandbox.WhatsW
rongIE |  | 199.247.157.76 |" to /usr/local/sites/yukongis.ca/www/htdocs/data/l
og200410.txt: Permission denied

-- MattWilkie - 11 Oct 2004

[Sun Dec  5 00:50:21 2004] save: Use of uninitialized value in string eq at ../lib/TWiki/Store.pm line 839.
[Sun Dec  5 00:50:21 2004] save: Use of uninitialized value in string at ../lib/TWiki/Store.pm line 659.
[Sun Dec  5 00:50:21 2004] save: Use of uninitialized value in substitution (s///) at ../lib/TWiki/Store/RcsWrap.pm line 597.

-- MattWilkie - 05 Dec 2004

I have a major lead. The culprit is something to do with PatternSkin. If I set the skin to classic then there are no problems and no errors in the apache log. Aaah, but as the page get's longer the older skins can crap out sometimes too.

-- MattWilkie - 08 Dec 2004

A problem occurs when %USERLAYOUTURL% and %USERSTYLEURL% are not set.

PROBLEM: unresolved variables in the URL (specifically USERLAYOUTURL, USERSTYLEURL and FAVICON)

If there are unresolved variables in the URL, performance suffers big time, and, on my site, Internet Explorer users couldn't post at all. This exacerbates the pre-existing problem. Setting these preferences cures the lag for some topics some of the time.

I wonder if this has anything to do with the abysmal performance of twiki.org lately? All those old user preference forms which haven't been brought up to date.

-- MattWilkie - 08 Dec 2004

see UnresolvedVarsInURL

FAVICON only exists in DEVELOP; i've now checked my changes to TWiki.WebPreferences and i'll add more documentation to AddIconToTitle to remedy that one. (checked into DEVELOP r3377)

checked in TWiki.TWikiPreferences for USERLAYOUTURL AND USERSTYLEURL to DEVELOP r3378

-- WillNorris - 09 Dec 2004

my web host changed their server and this problem seems to have disappeared entirely now. The linux kernel was also upgraded to 2.6.10-1.770_FC3smp and perl to 5.8.5

I edited some of the older comments

-- MattWilkie - 20 Apr 2005