# New Thread on Board Performance **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [July 30, 2014, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442 "2014-07-30T19:59:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![spinky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@spinky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spinky)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/81 "2014-09-23T17:36:00Z")
> [@TubaDiva](#): > > Gee Sam, why is it we’ve never had any useful advice from the multitude of vB experts on this board chiming in on your problem? We’ve had no end of people telling us how easy it is to do stuff in vB – I wish they’d tell us what’s going on with you. It seems at least a little likely that they’re keeping quiet because they have learned that their input will be met with hostility and inaction. ---
**Author:** ![lost4life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c4cdca/32.png) [@lost4life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lost4life)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/82 "2014-09-23T17:44:29Z")
> [@spinky](#): > > It seems at least a little likely that they’re keeping quiet because they have learned that their input will be met with hostility and inaction. Cool your jets… ---
**Author:** ![dzeiger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@dzeiger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzeiger)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/83 "2014-09-23T19:04:22Z")
Oh, and just in case anyone is correlating usernames and timestamps to possible logs, it happened to me at 1:45 pm Central today (9/23). ---
**Author:** ![JackieLikesVariety](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackielikesvariety/32/296_2.png) [@JackieLikesVariety](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JackieLikesVariety)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/84 "2014-09-23T19:23:19Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > You’re welcome. perhaps you could just be happy with all the money they are paying you for your time and expertise? ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/85 "2014-09-23T19:47:31Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > Thanks, **TubaDiva** , this might give us some useful information. > > We do know a few things. > > Location of the user doesn’t seem to be the issue. We have had reports of problems in Thailand, Australia and Texas. > > It doesn’t appear to correlate to time of day but we don’t have enough data to say that conclusively. > > This happens for users who log on and off frequently and for those who never log off. > > Does it only affect certain accounts? The **SonOfSiamSam** experiment could shed some light here. > > **TubaDiva** , you mentioned earlier that you thought that this was related to vBulletin. I know that I must have missed a lot of information in the previous thread. What exactly was it that made you think that it’s related to vB rather than, say, hardware? The complaints have always been framed as a vBulletin problem. Jerry has not been able to duplicate the problem, so it’s been difficult to diagnose. I’ve not found anything useful on it in Google searches. And it’s not happening to everybody, not happening all the time, and with little to observe when it does happen. Since only a few people have this problem that also makes it more difficult to understand. I don’t know what causes this – if I did we wouldn’t be having this conversation. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/86 "2014-09-23T20:32:08Z")
> [@TubaDiva](#): > > The complaints have always been framed as a vBulletin problem. > > Jerry has not been able to duplicate the problem, so it’s been difficult to diagnose. > > I’ve not found anything useful on it in Google searches. > > And it’s not happening to everybody, not happening all the time, and with little to observe when it does happen. Since only a few people have this problem that also makes it more difficult to understand. > > I don’t know what causes this – if I did we wouldn’t be having this conversation. I know that you don’t know the exact cause. I wasn’t asking you for the cause, obviously. I’m just looking for additional clues and hypotheses and thought that you might have some insight that we hadn’t gone over yet. I thought that you might have a good reason for suspecting that it was a vB config problem that we were overlooking and I now see that this isn’t the case. Fair enough. Intermittent problems are always the toughest to solve because they don’t, by definition, reliably replicate. This is why I am trying to narrow things down so we can do some reasonable testing by eliminating variables. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/87 "2014-09-24T00:44:57Z")
Like everyone else in this I am awaiting further data. What I’ve shared is what little I know. If I had more I’d say something. ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_is\_the\_new\_Analog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e4f/32.png) [@Digital\_is\_the\_new\_Analog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_is_the_new_Analog)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/88 "2014-09-24T01:34:53Z")
> [@jabiru](#): > > I don’t know what **Siam Sam** ’s experience is but the zapping thing happens a lot to me as well. No particular time, although at one stage it did seem to happen more frequently ~9:00am Sydney time. I use the same computer all the time but it also happened on my previous computer. My current one is a MacBook Pro, using Safari. My previous computer was a Toshiba, using Internet Explorer. > > And I never log out. Hi! Long time listener, long time zappeeeeee. I’ve given this data before in the old thread, but since we’re revisiting it - and as a programmer, I appreciate the efforts to understand the oddities - here is my setup. Windows 7 laptop. Chrome. East coast USA. I tend to browse in the evenings during the week, and random times on weekends. I never log out. I browse by going to the forum list and open tabs for the forums that I pay attention to. Then I go to the first tab and select threads from it, opening each in a new tab. Read those, then go on to the next forum. The zapping, when it occurs, tends to be while I’m opening the threads…which means in the first minute of activity. I’ve assumed it has to do with synchronization between servers, as someone else suggested. **TubaDiva** , is it possible for us to find out if there are multiple servers involved here? If there aren’t, it would eliminate one line of thought on the issue. I don’t get hit as often as **Siam Sam** , or whatever his name is these days… 🙂 But does happen often enough to be a nuisance. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/89 "2014-09-24T02:19:14Z")
> [@Giraffe](#): > > **Siam Sam** , since you’re the user who appears to be the most reliably affected by this problem, do you mind giving some more details about your SDMB browsing habits? You say you access the board from different computers, are these computers you use regularly? Are you logging on and off every time you use said computer or leaving yourself logged in? What browser(s) are you using? Any special security settings, e.g. cookies disabled, privacy settings? Are you clearing your history? > > Apologies if you’re already spelled this out in past threads, I haven’t been following. And there’s a very good chance this is all completely irrelevant, but maybe it will help us identify a signature we can use to trigger the problem more reliably? That’s always the first step to debugging anything. My main computer is here at home. I usually log in about this time of day, 9 or 10am, which right now is 9 or 10pm CST in the US. But I’ve tried it on other people’s computers away from home. And the wife’s laptop. This PC is eight or nine years old, but the wife’s PC is fairly new. It’s happened on all those computers and can happen at any time of the day. I always log out. I’m also in then habit of regularly clearing cookies. The zaps aren’t regular. They can happen twice a day, or every day I log on, or not for a week or 10 days. > [@TubaDiva](#): > > Okay, SiamSam, you are given permission to start a new screen name for testing purposes. > > Please call it something like “SiamSam2” or “SonOfSiamSam” so it’s obvious you are not socking but testing. > > Of course we’ll close that second name down when testing is over. > > And let’s see what happens with this. I hope understanding and a fix for your problem is just around the corner. Thanks! I can’t seem to do this while I’m still logged in here. When I call up the Board in a new tab or window, my computer knows I’m logged here and just gives me a second window on my account. Once I finish my session here this morning (it’s almost 9:30am over here. I’ll set up a new account as SiamSam2 and use it only in this thread for purposes of testing. Not zapped this time, but the next time I am, I will close and log onto the other account immediately to see what happens. (Now watch some joker sign up with a SiamSam3 or 4.) ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/90 "2014-09-24T02:35:06Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > Thanks! I can’t seem to do this while I’m still logged in here. When I call up the Board in a new tab or window, my computer knows I’m logged here and just gives me a second window on my account. Once I finish my session here this morning (it’s almost 9:30am over here. I’ll set up a new account as SiamSam2 and use it only in this thread for purposes of testing. Not zapped this time, but the next time I am, I will close and log onto the other account immediately to see what happens. (Now watch some joker sign up with a SiamSam3 or 4.) I think it would be a lot more useful if you just used the new account from now on, at least until you’ve either hit the problem a few times or it’s been long enough that you suspect it isn’t happening. Jumping between accounts won’t tell us much. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/91 "2014-09-24T02:40:04Z")
> [@Giraffe](#): > > I think it would be a lot more useful if you just used the new account from now on, at least until you’ve either hit the problem a few times or it’s been long enough that you suspect it isn’t happening. Jumping between accounts won’t tell us much. I thought I was supposed to log out if I got zapped and then log in under the new account once I got zapped on this one. It could be days before I’m zapped again. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/92 "2014-09-24T02:47:17Z")
Okay, I’m in. It’s me. I found that if I use a different browser, IE in this case, the computer doesn’t know I’m logged in on my real account. I used the triple 2 to make sure it stands out from my real account. I thought the plan was to log in here if I got zapped. But I should just use this account exlusively for a while? **TubaDiva** , please give me guidance. Meanwhile, I’ll only use this account in this thread for now. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/93 "2014-09-24T02:48:20Z")
Would I get a warning for bad-mouthing my sock outside the Pit? EDIT: And purely for academic interest, would any warnings my sock just happened to run up for flagrant violations be held against my real account? Heh. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/94 "2014-09-24T02:57:43Z")
It would be best for testing purposes to just use the 222 account for a few days. They can just merge the accounts when we are done. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/95 "2014-09-24T03:00:27Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > Would I get a warning for bad-mouthing my sock outside the Pit? > > EDIT: And purely for academic interest, would any warnings my sock just happened to run up for flagrant violations be held against my real account? Heh. 😃 Hey! Up yours, buddy! ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/96 "2014-09-24T03:02:25Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > It would be best for testing purposes to just use the 222 account for a few days. They can just merge the accounts when we are done. I’m going through my Subscribed threads under my real now. I’ll log in just under this account the next time and see what **TubaDiva** wants me to do. If it’s just using this account exclusively, how long should it be? ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/97 "2014-09-24T03:07:04Z")
> [@SiamSam222](#): > > I’m going through my Subscribed threads under my real now. I’ll log in just under this account the next time and see what **TubaDiva** wants me to do. If it’s just using this account exclusively, how long should it be? Maybe a week or three zaps, which ever comes first. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/98 "2014-09-24T03:14:21Z")
The basic idea is to do your normal routine with a different account to see if it follows the account or the activity. Anything else won’t tell us much. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/99 "2014-09-24T03:14:33Z")
Okay. I just want to get **TD’s** sanction on that. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2014, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442/100 "2014-09-24T03:19:09Z")
> [@SiamSam222](#): > > Okay. I just want to get **TD’s** sanction on that. That’s reasonable. Please let us know if and when you start. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-thread-on-board-performance/694442.md?page=6)