Friday, August 14, 2009

Blogger trouble

Am I the only one on blogspot having this problem? I try to set up future posts and get this error message: bX-fduxe2

What the hell does that mean? When you click on their support link it just leads to confusing dead ends. And since I'm a computer retard anyway, I thought maybe one of you might know what's going on? Whether this is serious? How can I fix it? How can I report it someone who actually might do something?

Thanks. I've always depended on the kindness of cyber strangers.


14 comments :

15-Seconds said...

You are not alone.

Well, on this matter anyway.

Blogger has been having problems and if you contact them they say...we know, we know....

Orel said...

We've gotten the same problem. And sometimes a post that looks like it's been scheduled properly doesn't actually go up. The best thing to do is make like Sisyphus and wait and try again.

Brad Farless said...

Same problem. Can't get posts to schedule. I get some weird error, but different from the one you have.

I get: bX-myvnv3

Dimension Skipper said...

I subscribe (via iGoogle) to the feed for the blogspot "known issues" page just so I can easily see if there are any major Blogger issues cropping up at any particular time (especially if I ever start noticing anything weird myself).

That allows me to track Blogger's "Known Issues." as they are reported.

[See the link for "Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)" at the bottom of that linked page for the feed URL if anybody's interested in doing the same, though you doesn't have to use iGoogle, any feed reader should do.]

I'm not crazy about the format of that page, how most issue posts have no meaningful title whatsoever. It seems like a blogging site's issue reporting page ought to have more of a bloggy look/feel to it by consistently using plain English post titles, but it's something to make users a little aware of potential issues at least...

Anyway, back on June 18, they reported (then updated July 6):
____________

Scheduled posting is currently unreliable for some users. We're looking into this and will post and [sic] update when we have more to share.

Thanks for your patience.

Update July 6, 2009: A fix will be pushed to production by tomorrow (Tuesday) evening, (US Pacific GMT -0800).

____________

Not sure what "unreliable" means, but I would guess it means sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I also note that the post itself still has a label of "outstanding" affixed to it, so I don't know that their alleged July 6 "fix" satisfactorily addressed the issue. They don't seem to be very definitive about it. I see nothing newer at this time regarding the problem.

You can always try reporting it to them yourself with any details you may be able to provide, but I have my doubts as to whether that would accomplish anything useful. I'm also not sure how you would go about doing that since most posts on that Known Issues page have a "REPORT IT" button, but the one about post scheduling problems does not. So maybe they consider it fixed and closed after all, but then they really ought to remove the "outstanding" label then. And obviously the problem must NOT be fixed or has somehow recurred.

Yeah, I know... all of that doesn't really help one bit. Oh well.

Dimension Skipper said...

Actually NONE of the posts on that Known Issues page show any title at all.

I was thinking of the way they display in my iGoogle feed list where right now of the nine most current issues posted, five show a seemingly randomly ascending seven-digit number which means nothing to me, three show nothing at all, and one has an actual meaningful title displayed.

Otherwise, everything I said still applies as far as I know.
_________

Have you tried hitting blogger on the side when it happens?...

Bob Claster said...

Found this workaround for you on the web:

"I've managed to figure out a work-around on this. If you save your post as a draft, you can then go to the Edit Posts page, tick the checkbox and hit Publish Selected and your post should publish."

Dimension Skipper said...

I was sure your friend Earl P. had mentioned the same issue at some point recently, but a cursory search of his blog failed to reveal it.* However, a more thorough Google search uncovered it at the bottom of his June 28 post...

The "scheduling" function on my blog doesn't seem to work anymore, so I can't write stuff one day, and schedule to publish it another day. I now have to publish manually. To give you something fresh to read in the morning, I will have to publish the night before. I don't know why any of this should be of interest to you. I just thought I'd pass it alone.

Then on July 23, he again referenced the issue by noting...

As is my habit when I leave town, I have left some little stories, which I Yiddishize as shticklach, for your daily consumption. Since the blog’s "scheduling" function is still on the fritz, I have enlisted Anna to publish the stories manually...
_____________

* Naturally there's a potential issue involving blog navbar searches returning incomplete results as reported in this July 26th known issue. So I utilized their workaround solution to do a real search of Mr. P's blog.

OK, yes... I'll shut up now. But maybe you and Mr. P can put your heads together and come up with a solution. Or at least commiserate over a few brewskis with Norm and Cliff.

Dimension Skipper said...

Looks like Bob C. found and posted something helpful while I was making my prior inane rambling comment. Good. Hope it works for you.

I would try to relay the info to Earl P in a comment, but he often mentions how technodeficient he is, so I don't know that it would necessarily help him. I'll just leave that task up to Bob C. or you, Ken.

Brad Farless said...

Thanks for the tip Bob. Worked like a charm!

The Curmudgeon said...

I occasionally post in advance... on Blogger... and I haven't had this problem.

Presumably, just by saying this, I'm now doomed.....

Pamela Jaye said...

I never publish on blogger. In advance or otherwise. But Sepinwall does... maybe he knows. (or you could spread whatever bad juju you have to him - I understand why he "schedules" his (time sensitive stuff) - why do you? just curious.)

By Ken Levine said...

I schedule stuff so I can go out and have a life.

Michael Taylor said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Michael Taylor said...

Sorry -- too many typos in that first comment... For nearly two years, I frequently scheduled future post publication dates/times, but this function stopped working several weeks ago. I tried writing and editing the posts on Blogger, then publishing the edited post at the proper time, but that resulted in the publication date being the same as the original editing date. Thoroughly frustrated by the failure of Blogger functions I once took for granted, I gave up. Now I write and edit off-line, then go on-line to publish. This is not at all convenient, but so it goes.

Too bad. Blogger was once a versatile, user-friendly site. Now, not so much.

But hey, it's still free...