OSDev.org

session data.

I am trying to edit Printing To Screen on OSDev Wiki. However, I keep getting an error.
https://imgur.com/a/11DDr



Since the wiki has raw HTML enabled, the preview is hidden as a precaution against JavaScript attacks. What do I do? Is it because it uses the tag?

Odd. OK, I just checked using my own account, and made a small test edit on my personal page (I had something to add to it anyway, so that wasn't an arbitrary choice). I was able to make the edit and save it, but since it was very brief all it shows is that editing in general isn't pooched - for me, at any rate.

Do you know how long were you working on the edit? Most wikis have a session timeout period of between fifteen and thirty minutes; if it your edit is going longer than that, you may need to say it incrementally, or edit it offline (as I explain below).

To the wiki moderators: do any of you know, or know how to determine, what the wiki's session timeout period is set to?

If it is an exceptionally long edit, I would recommend - as a temporary work-around, at least - copying the section to be edited to a text editor locally, and saving a copy on your own system before submitting it. This would, if nothing else, ensure that the work isn't likely to be lost. I know it is a kludgey solution, but my experience with wikis and fora of all sorts is that this is a wise practice in general for longer edits.

I would ask that you try to make a minor test edit which could be saved immediately, and see if you are able to save that. If that doesn't work, post here and let the wiki mods know; otherwise, if you have the time, try making a series of edits where you hold off from submitting it for a period of time (start with ten minutes, then go forward in five minute increments until it times out), to determine empirically how long the timeout period is for you. I will perform the same experiment myself and we can see if the results differ.

If anyone else could do the same, and report their results, it would be useful as a way of checking the health of the wiki. While I find it unlikely that the timeout period is varying for different users, if it is we probably need to know.

I tried all the minor edits and things. It still doesn't work, not even changing a link on another Wiki page (I'm planning to make changes to that as well). What should I do? I searched and found this.

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:E ... g_back_in.

stevewoods1986 wrote:I tried all the minor edits and things. It still doesn't work, not even changing a link on another Wiki page (I'm planning to make changes to that as well). What should I do?

OK, that's pretty serious, especially if it is the sort of server configuration issue that link describes. I will leave it up to the admins to look into that.

I do have a few other things to try in the meanwhile, though I doubt they will help since it does sound like it is on the server end. Still, it would be better than just waiting, and might rule out some causes. I don't know which of these you've already tried, so bear with me as some of them are going to seem fairly obvious, but my experience as both a user and a tech tells me that the obvious things need to be positively ruled out, as people often overlook them for being so obvious.

First, if you haven't done so already (I am guessing you have), try logging out of your account and then log back in. That should unequivocally clear any session data on both the server and the browsers.

Second, log out again, clear your browser's cache, history and cookies (though you probably don't need to clear out the saved passwords), close and re-open the browser, then log in and try again. If there is a state issue with the browser, that may clear it. Again, I don't know if you tried this already or not.

Try logging out and then logging in using a different browser, and if it works on that browser, then check the configurations on the first browser.

Next, shut down (not reboot, shut down, for at least 15 seconds) and restart the system to see if there is some odd state going on with the OS or the network hardware. It's a long shot, and something of a cliché as a lot of help desk techs have customers do this in order to buy time to think about a problem (and also because it really does clear a lot of inconsistent state issues, even if it doesn't find the cause of them), but if you haven't done it already, it is probably worth a shot.

Finally, try logging out on that machine, and if you can, log in on a different system, preferably one on a different network entirely such as one at a public library or an Internet cafe. If you still can't save any edits, that would narrow the problem down to something server-side, either with your stored account data or with the wiki in general.

Actually, you should probably do them in reverse order, as that would make it a strictly narrowing and partitioning search of the problem space. However, that may not be practical in this instance.

There are several possible causes for a problem in the database, the wiki configuration, or the wiki's runtime state; that's just the nature of complex systems like these. The more you can narrow down the problem for the mods, the easier it will be for them to troubleshoot it.

Schol-R-LEA wrote:

stevewoods1986 wrote:I tried all the minor edits and things. It still doesn't work, not even changing a link on another Wiki page (I'm planning to make changes to that as well). What should I do?

OK, that's pretty serious, especially if it is the sort of server configuration issue that link describes. I will leave it up to the admins to look into that.

I do have a few other things to try in the meanwhile, though I doubt they will help since it does sound like it is on the server end. Still, it would be better than just waiting, and might rule out some causes. I don't know which of these you've already tried, so bear with me as some of them are going to seem fairly obvious, but my experience as both a user and a tech tells me that the obvious things need to be positively ruled out, as people often overlook them for being so obvious.

First, if you haven't done so already (I am guessing you have), try logging out of your account and then log back in. That should unequivocally clear any session data on both the server and the browsers.

Second, log out again, clear your browser's cache, history and cookies (though you probably don't need to clear out the saved passwords), close and re-open the browser, then log in and try again. If there is a state issue with the browser, that may clear it. Again, I don't know if you tried this already or not.

Try logging out and then logging in using a different browser, and if it works on that browser, then check the configurations on the first browser.

Next, shut down (not reboot, shut down, for at least 15 seconds) and restart the system to see if there is some odd state going on with the OS or the network hardware. It's a long shot, and something of a cliché as a lot of help desk techs have customers do this in order to buy time to think about a problem (and also because it really does clear a lot of inconsistent state issues, even if it doesn't find the cause of them), but if you haven't done it already, it is probably worth a shot.

Finally, try logging out on that machine, and if you can, log in on a different system, preferably one on a different network entirely such as one at a public library or an Internet cafe. If you still can't save any edits, that would narrow the problem down to something server-side, either with your stored account data or with the wiki in general.

Actually, you should probably do them in reverse order, as that would make it a strictly narrowing and partitioning search of the problem space. However, that may not be practical in this instance.

There are several possible causes for a problem in the database, the wiki configuration, or the wiki's runtime state; that's just the nature of complex systems like these. The more you can narrow down the problem for the mods, the easier it will be for them to troubleshoot it.

Can you edit pages?

Yes. When I did the tests I mentioned, I was able to keep an edit window for 25 minutes before submitting and still have it accepted (I didn't really try any longer than that as other matters came up before I could). The editing, at least on my end, is working.

This doesn't necessarily mean it isn't a server issue, however. If your user account information is corrupted in the database, or there is some problem with how the server interacts with your browser (for the record, I am currently using FF for Linux), then it could still be there rather than on your end.

Also, which pages were you trying to work on? I think it would make sense for me to try editing those particular pages to make sure it isn't a problem specific to them.

I am no longer certain if that error message is the one it should be sending you; AFAICT, that message should only come up if it is timing out, so if it is giving that message for some other problem, the admins need to know about it. I can't really see any way for you to troubleshoot that on your end, however.

In any case, if you haven't already done so, I would try to rule out problems with your browser or network in the ways I described, as the only way to fix a problem on the server side would be for the admins to troubleshoot it. I can understand if you aren't happy waiting for that, and in any case the more information you give them about the problem, the better.

If you want, you can send me - or better still, one of the mods - a copy of your edits in PM and I can try to post them for you. It's not a real solution, but it would at least get the edits in, or let us determine whether the edits themselves are a problem (I can't see how that would be the case, but stranger things have happened).

I get this message all the time (When i'm actually editing the wiki heh.) All your changes are preserved in the text box, all you need to do is scroll down and click save/edit/submit/whatever its called and you will be good to go.

If it still fails the second time for you then I would say you found an actual issue. Please let us know if this works for you!

- Amy

I think it's working now.