The Real Blogger Status

Until late May 2011, we would see various odd and mysterious problem reports, about posting comments, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken . I posted a comment, but now I can't delete it. It's labeled as "Anonymous" - even though I used my Google account! and I tried to publish my comment, but the Publish button doesn't do anything. Both complaints were representative of the many different problem reports seen.

Almost daily, we see a problem report in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , where someone publishes a blog that has readers with a problem My readers can't leave me comments! and when I diagnose the problem The blog uses an inline ("Embedded below post") comment form, with CAPTCHA ("word puzzle") verification. Your readers need to check their cookie and script filters, starting with "third party cookies". the response will frequently be No way! My readers can't handle that!

This week, we are seeing more reports of people who can't post comments on blogs which have the Inline ("Embedded below post") comments form. Unlike a previous problem which involved CAPTCHA ("word verification") screening, the CAPTCHA form seems fine here. People who are not members of a blog, when preparing to comment, are allowed to select how they wish to authenticate, and be identified, subject to the options selected by the blog owner. Anonymously. Using a pseudonym / URL. Using An OpenID. Using a Google id. For some people, this pulldown list is empty. This appears to be yet another problem with a blocked script . One successfully diagnosed problem involved a Kaspersky product. The solution, in that case, was to whitelist "www.google.com/friendconnect". >> Top

Does your blog use Inline (Embedded Below Post) Comments? Do you have any posts with more than 5 comments? I have a few. New Blogger Limits 2009 - Labels, Again Missing Followers - September 2009 - The Good News, And The Bad News Missing Followers - September 2009 The New Post Editor And Spell Checking The New Post Editor Is Here Notice anything odd there? The first 4 or 5 comments, which were made by commenters who have pictures, show the pictures. After that, no pictures. I wonder what other surprises are in store for us this week? >> Top

Apparently one (of several) recent problems , with Inline (Embedded Below Post) Comments, is related to Post Pages. In Settings - Archiving - "Enable Post Pages?", we observe the notice Warning: If you disable Post Pages the embedded comment form will not work. Click here to change your comment settings first. If you can't enable or disable Post Pages, you should check your (Settings - Comments -) Comment Form Placement, and ensure that you have not selected "Embedded below post". There, we see The embedded comment form can not be used if you have Post Pages disabled. Apparently, the Comments setting overrides the Archiving setting. >> Top

There's an odd problem, with embedded comments, and CAPTCHA verification. The problem of post template corruption affects all commenters (owners, members, and readers alike) of a blog with Embedded comments. Besides that, there's an odd problem, which affects some blogs with inline comments, which use CAPTCHA (word puzzle) verification. This may be either the (optional) CAPTCHA which verifies authenticated readers, or the (non optional) CAPTCHA which verifies non authenticated readers. This problem will affect just the readers - the owners and members will not be subject to CAPTCHA verification, and won't have this problem. This is in addition to the well known problem with CAPTCHA verification and third party cookies . Occasionally, you may get a perplexed email from a blog reader I can't comment on your blog - the CAPTCHA form isn't fully displayed!

This month, we are seeing reports from various bloggers who report that they, or their readers, are having problems posting comments to their blogs. The blogs where the problem is reported are most frequently using the inline comment form, aka "Embedded below post" - although other comment form styles, and other symptoms altogether, seem to be observed too. There seem to be a few different scenarios reported. In main page view, instead of seeing the comments and the comment entry form, you'll merely see a link, such as "2 comments". Clicking on "2 comments" puts the blog display into single post mode, and positions the browser below the post, at the comment entry form - or links to the separate comments page or to the popup comments page. Most recently, this link, on some blogs, is reported to be inoperative or invisible. The first thing to try, in this case, is resetting the post template . If resetting the post template does not work, then ...