Slow page loads again

Bowen

So when I did a PC refresh a month back, it cleared out all my adblock rules. I'm getting massive page "loading" times because the forum is trying to contact "alabasterslim.com" again. I'm assuming this is some sort of tracking/ad backend of the forums? I had to block it because it would sit there and spin the loading times even after the page had been done for 2 minutes.

I had this same problem probably a year ago. Just thought I'd give an FYI or you could give me more information about what it is.

IcyLiquid

I don't have that in my code and that domain is not in any user's avatar. Could you unblock it and do some digging? When you see it happening, open the network console in your browser and look at what exactly is being loaded (full url) and let me know. Also what page you're on when it happens.

There's nothing with that domain name in our codebase, in this custom theme, or any loaded resource that I'm currently aware of.

Bowen

Sure thing, I'll let you know when and where I run across it.

Bowen

@IcyLiquid



I got them to load up. Sometimes they load fast, other times not. Looks like a few users are using them for avatars.

In Moe's when that happened. Also if I go into threads that those users posted in, same issue. Sometimes fast, sometimes forever.

vttym

I am having this problem too when using the latest version of FireFox. When I switched to IE7 (my company is cutting edge), it loaded fine.

I do not use ad blockers with either browser.

Bowen

Chrome for me. Probably more of alabasterslim doesn't have the bandwidth that the forums throw at them during peak times. No idea who operates it. Maybe someone from SE++ that gives out avatars?

IcyLiquid

Those look like signatures to me sir. It even says "/sigs/" in the URL. Not sure what to do here, this falls under @Tube purview. Perhaps a limit on the load time of signatures? I dunno.

Bowen

Says sigs, but those are definitely avatar images that are loading.

Bowen

http://alabasterslim.com/sigs/cache/avatar-76561197969585220.png
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/profile/10496/Stormwatcher

It happened on the Moe's thread list page, so I wasn't in a thread to load the sigs.

vttym

FWIW, I still experience this issue with ANY thread I attempt to load in FireFox. This issue was not present yesterday (or any day prior - I have never had page load issues). I can still load these same threads fine in IE7. This issue persists even in FireFox's "safe mode".

IcyLiquid

Looks like the real url is 'ddgamer.com' and it redirects to 'alabasterslim.com'. Some people do indeed have ddgamer.com avatars (though theyre in the sigs too). Again, Tube will have to address this, its not something I have any control over.

Bowen

Thanks Icy.

Tube

Short of stripping it globally out of people's sigs (which I think would need a database query) there's not a huge amount I can do. I think Alabaster Slim is a legitimate site, I'm inclined to hope their problems clear up in a couple of days. If they don't we can run a mass smashing of relevant sigs, but it's not something I can do by hand.

Bowen

I didn't want to screw PA up if it was some advertising (I like to support sites I go to that way), so it's kosher if I block them at least?

Tube

Absolutely.

Gaslight

Slim's is indeed a legitimate site, that's the site where people can make and host those sig banners that show what games they've been playing on Steam lately and link to their profiles.

I was sure Slim is a member here, but I haven't seen him post in a long time. Also not sure I have his user name exactly right to tag him here. @Alabaster Slim Edit: Shit, that isn't it, doesn't work with no space either...

ObsoletePaper

He's actually @Suds on the Forums.

And I use his Signature as you can see.

Suds

Sorry guys, I didn't know the sigs and avatars were slowing the forums down so much. Tube, if possible I'd like to work with you to get this resolved so that people can still use the signatures.

They're currently set to use a cached version of the image for 6 minutes before refreshing and getting new info from Steam.

Let me know what I can do to help and I'll get right to it.

Nullzone

Don't know if this is the same issue but I've had issues for a few days now getting individual thread pages to load in Firefox 19; I can view the forum indexes fine, but when I click through to any thread it loads the meta title in the tab and sits spinning, typically with the status bar showing "Read forums.penny-arcade.com"

I tried clearing cache/cookies and running in firefox safe mode, doesn't seem to help. Viewing threads in IE9 on the same PC works fine.

skeldare

Nullzone wrote: »

Don't know if this is the same issue but I've had issues for a few days now getting individual thread pages to load in Firefox 19; I can view the forum indexes fine, but when I click through to any thread it loads the meta title in the tab and sits spinning, typically with the status bar showing "Read forums.penny-arcade.com"

I tried clearing cache/cookies and running in firefox safe mode, doesn't seem to help. Viewing threads in IE9 on the same PC works fine.

I'm having similar issues in IE8 but I'm not sure if it's something with my work proxy or not.

Nullzone

I thought it could have been my proxy, but the fact that IE9 works fine and Firefox safemode has the same behavior debunked that theory quick.

Essee

For what it's worth in terms of collecting data, I'm on SeaMonkey (so basically the latest version of Firefox) on Win7 64 and pages on the forums have been loading at normal speeds for me the last couple of days (except a little bit slower when they're expected to be under heavy load, but that's normal, and when that happens it's not hanging on "Read," it sticks on "Waiting for" for a little while). So you should all just be me. I'm using Google's DNS servers if that helps any.

(I actually haven't had the issues with avatars or sigs loading from Suds's site lately either, though that has indeed happened to me once every several months so it doesn't surprise me that it's happening right now. Not to knock the site... it's very nice! Unexpected stuff just happens sometimes.)

mittens

I'm having the same issue with my work computers as well. Firefox 19 on both windows xp and fedora 17 (and two separate networks) doesn't work. IE8 (ugh) does work, google chrome works, and an ancient version of firefox (not sure what version, maybe 3.0?) in one of our labs works.