The CAPTCHA Continues As A Challenge

This month, we are again seeing evidence of recent security changes by Microsoft. We see signs of continued frustration, in the process of publishing comments - and publishing posts, as part of the Import process.

In the process of diagnosing an apparent comment publishing problem, I ventured into the comment publishing experience, yet again.

I temporarily tweaked commenting permissions for this blog, to allow anonymous comments and to require the CAPTCHA.

With CAPTCHA required, I published a test comment to my earlier post in this blog.

I did my best - which was not good enough.



CAPTCHA solving continues, as a challenge.

I entered a test comment, and made appropriate selections.

I got a challenge.

"Select all the food."

I did my best.

Apparently, my best was not enough.

"Select all images with a store front."

I tried again. Not all images here were completely obvious, either.

My second try was successful.



Hmm.

Select all the food.

Zoom in on the fourth image, above - and tell me which pictures, that I did not select, are food? To whom? Will zooming always improve chances of success?

CAPTCHA solving, as spam interdiction, will always lead to frustration.

There will be cultural issues - and resolution problems - with CAPTCHAs. This version of the CAPTCHA beats the one from several years ago - but still will cause frustration.

And need I again point out - will require proper filter tuning, on each computer used. Note that ongoing changes by Microsoft are currently affecting publishing comments - and publishing posts during the Import process.

And our experience may very, depending upon many different details, varying by blog, by computer, and by person. My sympathies to all who must deal with spam - and with spam interdiction.

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The CAPTCHA continues to be an unavoidable element in comment publishing and other episodes of #Blogger life. And like life, some episodes are more pleasant than others.

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Inaccessible Comments, On Some Popular Posts

Viewing comments, on some popular blogs, one may get the idea that not as many comments are being published, as are immediately visible.

With a large comment complement, comments are paginated - with some comments hidden behind a link, captioned "Load more". The "Load more" link is JavaScript based - and there is a problem.

The "Load more" link does not always work, on all blogs.

Comments on some blogs may be unreadable - with the "Load more" link not operational.

Some posts never display all comments.

Look at the bottom of the page, below the post.

And there is the "Load more" link.

And the link, as seen when one mouse over it, is shown to be JavaScript based.

And clicking on the link yields the caption "Loading ...".

And "Loading ..." never goes away - and we get no view of the missing comments.



I've seen this problem with blogs using both dynamic and non dynamic templates.

Both dynamic templates, and non dynamic templates, appear to use comments paginated behind "Load more" - and may exhibit this problem. I've seen this problem, reported in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, for both template types.

I have reproduced this problem, using two blogs.

Here are two recently reported cases, reproduced in my testing today. I do not know how long both cases may be active.

http://slifkinchallenge.blogspot.com/2016/05/thank-you-yehoshua-duker-and-yosef.html
https://productforums.google.com/d/topic/blogger/RotUfv8AwuU/discussion

http://istanbulkonstantinopel.blogspot.com/2014/03/study-in-turkey-2.html
https://productforums.google.com/d/topic/blogger/7Yau3KKR9mo/discussion

Noting that both blogs are (natively) published in countries that are subject to local country codes (Israel and Turkey, respectively), I will deny that to be a simple affinity - since I viewed both blogs from my browser, as "blogspot.com", as I reproduced the problem. That said, that is an interesting coincidence, no?

There are several possible causes of this problem. Adding the above observation, some of these causes may be more or less relevant.

• Comments feed setting.
• Comment feed content / corruption.
• Cookie / script filters.
• HTTPS Redirect.
• Occam's Razor.
• Post template corruption.

Comments feed setting.

Features like the comment reply option, and blogs published to dynamic templates, require a full comment feed. It's possible that comment pagination, behind JavaScript links, is similarly sensitive to the comments feed setting.

This detail will affect everybody - both blog owner(s) and reader(s) alike. And it will probably affect all posts, uniformly.

The solution for this problem would involve checking - and correcting - the comments and feed settings, for the blogs involved.

Comment feed content / corruption.

Similar to the problem with the Blogger blog post published location, it's possible that some unknown detail in the data could interfere with script functionality.

If the problem involves content in one post - or a comment on one post, it's possible that comments for one post could be affected; but other posts could paginate comments successfully.

This detail would probably affect everybody, uniformly.

The solution for this problem will require determining what feed content detail causes the problem. This will probably involve affinity diagnosis.

Cookie / script filters.

Any problem which involves a JavaScript based link, both cookies and scripts are always going to be involved. Any filter that interferes with either cookies (identity) or scripts (link functionality) will always be a possibility.

Filters may affect either blog owners and / or blog readers, uniquely. A problem that involves some owners / readers will likely involve filters.

Thanks to the effect of country local domains, cookie / script filters may affect individuals geographically.

The solution for this problem is to check / open up script filters - and then check / open up cookie filters.

HTTPS Redirect.

Both blogs, identified above, appear to not be using the "HTTPS Redirect" option. It's not impossible that this is another feature, broken by the SSL Rollout.

Occam's Razor.

Considering the most simple alternative, is it possible that paginated comments are simply inoperative? Maybe, because of (or incidentally involving) the SSL Rollout??

Post template corruption.

Comments are part of the post template. It's likely that proper comment functionality also requires a clean post template. This detail will probably affect everybody - though it's possible that there could be code that is sensitive to some owners / readers, but not others.

The solution for this problem is to reset the post template, on the blogs involved.

The bottom line.

This problem, if not incidentally solved by a Blogger code change, will probably not be diagnosed, immediately.

More examples of this symptom are badly needed. Right now, we have seen only a handful of people with blogs that are popular - and generate comments in sufficient volume - and have reported this problem.

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Some #Blogger blog owners, who publish blogs with posts that receive large volumes of comments, report inability to display all comments published. Comments, when displayed in large volumes, are paginated behind JavaScript based links - and some links, when clicked, don't seem to work.

https://productforums.google.com/d/topic/blogger/7Yau3KKR9mo/discussion
https://productforums.google.com/d/topic/blogger/RotUfv8AwuU/discussion

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Microsoft Windows Security Updates, May 2016

If you use a computer that runs Microsoft Windows, you may have been affected by Microsoft supplied updates, distributed 3 weeks ago.

May 10 was the day termed "Patch Tuesday" - the day when Microsoft releases important security related patches, to its various Internet updated products. During the 3 weeks after May 10, we've seen a significant number of security related discussions, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue.

It appears that Microsoft updates, for May 2016, affect use of Blogger.

The Microsoft Security updates, applied May 2016, appear to have affected various Blogger features, that are known to be vulnerable to layered security.

• CAPTCHA visibility when daily post limit is exceeded.
• Publishing comments, or replying to published comments.
• Quick Edit icons.
• Followers / Reading List maintenance.
• Stats self initiated pageviews.

All of these features are known to be affected by cookie filters, and / or by script filters.

If you are using a computer that runs either Microsoft Windows 7 or Windows 10, and you are experiencing a problem with publishing comments, or with using Quick Edit, or with blocking your own views in Stats, or similar problems, you may want to check your cookie and script filters.

I note that some of the reports mention the browser used as Chrome or Firefox. You'll want to check filter settings in Windows Security Essentials.

Being realistic, it's also possible that Microsoft broke something within Windows - but we'll have to wait patiently, for them to admit that.

If you need different or more advice, please start a new topic in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue.

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Microsoft released monthly security updates May 10, 2016 - and since that date, there have been a number of security filter related issues, reported in Blogger Help Forum. It appears that the the Microsoft Updates involve cookie or script filters, which affect use of Blogger.

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Problems Being Observed, In Blogs Now Using Google+ Comments

A few blog owners, eagerly opting to use the latest Blogger enhancement, Google+ Comments, are seeing some changes which they did not anticipate.

Even after checking all of the settings, some blogs, with Google+ Comments enabled, may not show the comment form - or may show the form, but comments may not be visible. Besides the visibility of the form, there are other changes which some blog owners don't appreciate.

In many cases, Google+ Comments, like other new features, require an updated post template. This will be seen in blogs with customised post templates, most frequently - although newer, less customised blogs also may need a post template reset.

After getting Google+ Comments working in general, some blog owners find other unexpected changes.

There will be changes seen by the blog owner.

• Almost the entire "Comments" section, in the dashboard Settings - "Posts and comments" wizard, will disappear - though "Comment Location" will remain - and will default to "Embedded". None of these settings are relevant in Google+ Comments. On some blogs, there may be no "Comments" dashboard menu entry at all.
• There are no controls for moderation, or for notification, of comments.
• There is no ability to moderate comments, from the dashboard. Moderation is done under each post, one post at a time.
• As a blog owner, you have no special ability to moderate comments, made against your blog.
• There may be some comments, which you may not be able to moderate - but will publish against your blog.
• If you Block somebody from Following you, that person may still be able to post a Comment on your blog. When you look at the comments, you will only see

  This post is hidden because you have blocked the author.

• The "Export blog" wizard, which used to export both comments and posts, will only export posts.

There will be changes seen, by the blog readers.

• People without Google+ accounts won't be able to make - or view - comments (since comments are Circle dependent).
• Visibility of the comment form, as with all embedded comments, is sensitive to cookie / script filters, on the client computers.
• Comments posted outside Google Comments may not be immediately visible, though the comments remain in existence. Resetting various sections of the template may resolve this, when observed.
• If you change the blog address - with either a simple BlogSpot address change, a non BlogSpot address republishing (aka "custom domain"), or export / import - existing Google+ Comments may not remain visible, with the blog. This may be a similar problem, with URLs subject to Country Code Aliasing.
• With a blog using Google+ Comments, the Comments newsfeed will not be published. Any "Recent Comments" gadgets will be useless.
• The comment count, as displayed in the blog main page display, may show "0 comments" - even with comments actually present, and visible when clicking on "0 comments".
• You may or may not get email notification of comments, when comments are not shared specifically with you - even if you own the blog. Other people, who do not own the blog, may get notifications when you do not.
• It appears that Google+ Comments only work with blogs that are published publicly.

There will be problems seen (not seen) by both blog owners and readers.

• With a blog using Google+ Comments, comments made while the blog was using Blogger Comments won't be visible. They will be present, in the Blogger Comments database - they won't be visible, unfortunately.
• With a blog using Blogger Comments, comments made while the blog was using Google+ Comments won't be visible. Google+ Comments will still be out there, in the streams of the owners and readers - they just won't be visible on the blog.
• If you change a blog between Blogger and Google+ Comments, comments made under the previous host won't be visible, to either the owners, or the readers. Neither the Blogger dashboard, or the blog display, supports multiple comment hosts.

Fortunately, in most cases any prematurely made decisions are reversible. Go to the dashboard Google+ menu entry, and unselect "Use Google+ Comments on this blog". The blog will simply return to native Blogger based Comments. Any comments made under Google+ will not be visible to you, from the blog - but everything else should return to normal.

I've now added a Problem Rollup discussion, in Blogger Help Forum: Feature Suggestions and Feedback, where your opinion is appreciated. Please be objective.

See my test blogs Google+ Comments, Dynamic Template Test and Google+ Comments, Simple Template Test if you wish.

Click here, for instructions to revert back to Blogger based comments. Note that you will lose ability to view all Google+ based comments - though the comments will still exist.

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Blogger And Google+ Continue To Move Ever Closer Together

Today, Blogger announced the most innovative step in integrating Blogger and Google+, since sharing of Blogger posts to Google+.

The December 2011 sharing option lets us publish our blog posts to Google+. Today, Blogger added the ability to do the same - and more - with our blog comments. Like basic Google+ post sharing, Google+ Comments will be shared, and be visible, on a Circle by Circle basis.

The ability to post a comment, against a Blogger blog post shared in Google+, and have the comment publish to the blog will make for interesting comment based conversations.

There will be challenges to this feature, however. One of the most annoying problems with Blogger comments, right now, involves the embedded comment form, and security limitations caused by cookie filtering on many readers computers.

This blog uses a full page comment form, because too many of my readers need to post comments, in spite of the cookie filtering on their computer. Blogger Google+ Commenting requires use of the embedded comment form.

Google+ Comments lets you bring the following conversations together in one place, right under your blog post:

• Comments made on your Blogger blog post
• Comments on the blog post that you’ve shared to Google+
• Shared content on Google+ that links to your blog post

Readers will need a Google+ page or profile to comment on your blog.

Anybody who publishes a blog, and has readers who do not understand the reason for allowing third party cookies, will not want to use an embedded comment form - and won't benefit from Google+ Commenting, either. Until either

• Blogger resolves their "third party cookies" problem, with the embedded comment form.
• All Blogger blog readers resolve their issues with filtering "third party cookies".

Google+ Comments will have a limited audience.

Many blog owners may find a problem, in the moderation process.

Once you enable Google+ Comments, you can moderate comments within the blog post itself.

Owners of large blogs may not enjoy having to check each post, one by one, to moderate comments - so, you let your readers moderate for you.

I check my dashboard Comments menu, several times daily - and see all comments posted to the blog, in one convenient place. Having to look at each post, to moderate comments, won't be as convenient.

A third challenge will come from blog owners who want everybody to be able to comment, on their blogs. Requiring a Google+ account to comment won't be widely accepted by blog owners who have readers who comment either Anonymously, or using an OpenID.

One of the benefits of Google+ Commenting will be a reduction in comment based spam. The increasingly annoying "nice blog" spam - and the accompanying security risks from having it published on our blogs - should be eliminated, from blogs using Google+ Comments.

Google+ Comments is a feature that is needed, on some Blogger blogs - but it needs to remain optional, for some time.

If you're in one of my Circles, and wish to test this new feature, see if you can comment, on my recipes blog, Chuck's Kitchen.

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Deleted Comments Cannot Be Recovered

Blogger blog owners, who are accustomed to recovering deleted files on a personal computer, will find Blogger Comments to lack useful protection.

If you accidentally delete a file on your personal computer, no worry - just look in the Trash Can, find the file in question, and recover the file. Just do this before you empty the Trash Can.

Comments, published on our blogs, cannot be recovered once deleted.

I deleted a comment - but now realise that I acted in haste. How do I recover the comment that I deleted?

To this person, there is no useful answer.

Whether you moderate comments before or after they are published - and whether you moderate using the dashboard Comments wizard, or your email Inbox - once you click on "Delete" (and possibly hit "Yes"), the comments in question are gone. There is no Trash Can for deleted comments.

Some blog owners will retrieve the deleted content (possibly, from email), and manually re publish the content, when possible. Unfortunately, that will produce a comment with (possibly) the deleted text - but no link to the originator of the comment deleted. If the text content of the comment is the relevant detail to you, as the blog owner, you may do this - but the republished comment won't be the same.

Delete comments with care. Once you delete a comment, you won't get it back.

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If You Use CAPTCHA Screening On Your Blog, Try Publishing A Comment, As A Guest

Not all Blogger blog owners, using CAPTCHA screening to reduce abusive comments on their blogs, know first hand what the typical CAPTCHA puzzle can be like.

We're seeing a few concerned blog owners, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, asking why they're seeing fewer comments on their blogs.

I'm hearing from people that they can't post comments on my blog. I tested, and comments are working just fine. What is the problem, here?

Not all blog owners bother to test the CAPTCHA, on their blogs - or even know why they don't see one, when commenting.

Not all blog owners, enabling Word verification in their blog commenting settings, bother to read the tool tip behind the "?".

Show word verification
This will require people leaving comments on your blog to complete a word verification step, which will help reduce comment spam. Learn more.
Blog authors will not see word verification for comments.

The simple advice

Blog authors will not see word verification for comments.

does not sink in, to everybody.

This leaves many blog owners unaware of how frustrating it may be, for their guests to comment, on their blogs.

If you're a blog owner, musing whether to add word verification to your blog, in an effort to cut down on the spamming and trolling going on in many blog comment threads, maybe you should try posting on your blog, as a guest. With "Show word verification" set to "Yes", logout from Blogger - or clear cache, cookies, and sessions (yes, all 3!) - then restart the browser, and try leaving a comment on your blog.

What you discover may not please you. Then ask yourself how many of your readers will have the patience, to solve a CAPTCHA, every time they wish to publish a comment?

As a blog owner, you have 3 settings which are used, in proper combination, to provide a safe environment for your readers to leave comments.

1. Authentication.
2. CAPTCHA Screening.
3. Moderation.

Consider using one or both of the other two options, if possible.

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Blog Readers Report Comments, Supposedly Published Using A Mobile Computer, Appear To Disappear

Recently, we've been seeing a few problem reports in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, mentioning problems publishing comments on Blogger blogs, when using mobile computers.

My readers tell me that they can't comment on my blog, using an iPad. Comments disappear, when they try to publish them.

As with a previously explored problem with comments on a non mobile computer, this problem may involve unfamiliarity with the publishing sequence.

The dialogue involved in publishing a comment, when using a desktop computer with a full size display and a non mobile Blogger template, is not simple. Depending upon the various commenting options selected by the owner, the publishing sequence may be even more complex. Blog owners may need to consider the additional details involved in comment publishing, when using a mobile computer.

Using Blogger on a mobile computer involves various compromises - and the comment publishing process on a mobile computer even more compromises.

• The small display size, on a mobile computer, makes finding the various controls involved a challenge. Both the small size of everything involved, and the necessity of repeatedly scrolling around the screen, looking for the controls used in comment publishing, is frustrating.
• The "mobile template" is an attempt to make up for the small display size. The mobile template puts the various controls on a series of displays, with various buttons and links used to move from display to display.

People unaccustomed to the sequence of steps involved in the comment publishing process may not see all of the controls required, when using a mobile computer. Neither the wide non mobile template, nor the deep mobile template, displays the comment publishing sequence easily. People who are not very experienced with the comment publishing process, in general, might become confused with the displays.

As an example, let's look at the basic comment entry dialogue. So simple - when you are used to it, and can see all of the components.

• On a desktop / full function display, you'll see an entry box, and a "Publish" button beneath the box. You use the keyboard and / or mouse to enter text into the box, then click on the "Publish" button.
• When the required display space is larger than the physical screen space, you'll have a horizontal and / or vertical scroll bar, indicating that scrolling is required, to locate other display content. You'll use the mouse to manipulate the scroll bars, and make other portions of the display visible.
• A mobile display will have an entry box, and an on screen keyboard. The onscreen keyboard will occupy a fixed amount of display space, with the entry box occupying the available remainder.
• The mobile display won't have scroll bars - if other portions of the display are not immediately visible, you'll use your finger to scroll around the screen. If you are not familiar with screen layout, you'll have to scroll around, aimlessly.
• The "Publish" button will be somewhere near the entry box - but depending upon screen size and orientation, may not be immediately visible. You may have to scroll around the screen to find the "Publish" button.
• People not used to using a mobile computer may be unable to find the "Publish" button. Finding other display content that may appear to replace the "Publish" button, they may be confused when their comments are not published, and report that their comments disappeared.

Both the authentication sequence (when authentication is required), and the CAPTCHA entry sequence (when a CAPTCHA is involved), when involved in mobile computing commenting, will make the comment publishing process even more complicated. The authentication sequence may be more complex, if the browser in use has a problem with Blogger authentication - and "third party" cookies.

Since most blogs are designed primarily for non mobile computer use, commenting using mobile computers may not be obvious, for a while. Many readers may simply not publish comments, to the same activity level, when using their mobile computers.

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