Listings cut in half

[astral276]

Where do I find a thread explaining this problem? What happened? What were they trying to do? I appear to have missed it and if anyone is likely to have "special characters" in their listings it would be me - as I use accented French words all the time...

There are various threads on the topic.

It started with an update to enable eBid to handle foreign (i.e. non-English) characters in listing better - making the site more internationally compatible.

A side effect of this update was that some existing characters (e.g.: the copyright sign, pound sign, quotation marks, and others) no longer displayed properly - usually being preceded by an accented capital A.

eBid then ran a database wide routine to (supposedly) fix this problem within listings. Only problem was that they screwed up, and the 'fix' blew many listings apart if they contained those characters.

Since then, admin have not taken responsibility for the damage, seem unable to fix it, don't seem to have had a good backup they could roll back to, and avoid all mention of the problem unless tackled direct by an irate user. No announcement of the screw up has been made, nor any advice as to what users are supposed to do.

If you have your own backup of your listings as they existed before (I think) 25th October, then you can overwrite any damaged listings. Listings created after the 'fix' should be OK.

Note the above date. This issue should have been tackled immediately, as any backup users may have will now likely be out of date (or backups of damaged listings). A situation that worsens as more time passes.

[lejoueurdepipeau]

Thanks astral. What a mess!

[MagnetsAndHangers]

Ive noticed ebid have responded to several threads - but not this one.

I guess it isnt important enough.

[cornishmaid1961]

Humm ... well the listing has vanished altogether now. Don't know if that is the seller or eBid ? Let's hope whoever has taken it down is fixing it somehow along with all the other half listings.

[iwiw60]

After a long illness I'm just now getting back into the swing of things.....WHAT THE HECK HAS HAPPENED??? This morning I had to relist a few auctions, no problem I thought. Seems quite a few of my listings now have over half the description area cut off!! Examples:

Olive Wood Trinket Box Laser Etched Star of David Cross (54895462 : Gallery Auction)
Olive Wood Trinket Box Laser Etched Shalom Messianic (54896793 : Gallery Auction)
Olive Wood Trinket Box Laser Etched Jerusalem View (54904638 : Gallery Auction)

After the initial panic-mode subsided I went in and double-checked My Defaults thinking the basic item descriptions section was somehow screwed up...nope. It's all there.

I have read all the replies to this thread and have not seen ONE reply from Gazza/admin. Gazza...what's UP, please!?

[burgyeb]

This issue sounds very serious. Administration's silence is probably the strongest evidence for how serious it is, and their high decibel stress level concerning the problem. They may be silent on what to do about the issue because they haven't got the answer yet.

Do any of the eBid computer geeks/geniuses have an idea of how the glitch/corruption/etc can be fixed? If so, a more private meeting of alma mater might be appropriate. I do agree with Astrals points on the issue needing to be addressed openly, but due to the seriousness of the issue, it may be more effective to tackle it outside of the forums. Just MHO.

[burgyeb]

Ive noticed ebid have responded to several threads - but not this one.

I guess it isnt important enough.

This one might be hitting the sore spot a little more directly.

[FirstGreenIsGold]

Is this glitch associated with the use of the bulk uploader systems? Or, does anybody know at this point? Is there any way to check auctions for this problem other than checking them one at a time? (I'd assume not, but I'm no computer wizard.) :-)

[cmjewels925]

This issue sounds very serious. Administration's silence is probably the strongest evidence for how serious it is, and their high decibel stress level concerning the problem. They may be silent on what to do about the issue because they haven't got the answer yet.

They do have the answer (of sorts). The only thing they can do is overwrite affected listings with the backup they made on the first of October. This also means that any edits to affected listings that were made between 01/10 and 25/10 will be lost.

There is no way for admin to know which items have been affected so each member with affected listings will have to contact them individually.

Admin's silence is contributing to the problem; they should be alerting ALL selling members to check their listings.

[burgyeb]

I think so; and I am no computer wizard either.

I do the one by one, old fashioned way of listing. The one's checked seem ok.