Is there only a certain amount of time to get a post up?

[Tobus Neth]

Is there a refresh that happens while your writing a post? cuz I lost a rather long post?

[Whimsy Chris]

I always Copy my posts before hitting Submit, because you never know when it's going to be lost.

[Tobus Neth]

Thanks Chris, I did that as well but some how copied only half.

[Cosmo]

While I don't know of any particular timeout time for our site, in any web-based text submission tool you are going to run into this.

I often use the Copy technique. Also, I almost always use the "preview" button button when composing. This seems to help (although, it will also sometimes deep-six my post just like the submit button).

If I'm composing a post for some forum other than the customer service forum (i.e. a post where timeliness is not an issue and I can keep it in the background while I work on more important CS matters) that is particularly long, I will compose in a text editor like Word and then copy-paste the post into the submission box.

[DitheringFool]

I've learned to never hit submit until I Ctrl-A Ctrl-C first :)

If anything unexpected happens, simply start over with Ctrl-V.

[Tobus Neth]

Thanks guys.

[ithuriel]

If you leave an active post open for an hour or so you will lose it everytime. You get booted back to the front page of Paizo.

Copy saves the day.

[MrVergee]

I've had the same problem a couple of times. It's really frustrating to loose something you've been writing for a long time.

Memo to self: must remember to copy, must remember to copy, must remember to copy ...

[ericthecleric]

Better still, write long posts elsewhere first (like Word), then copy them across.

[Kata. the .....]

ericthecleric wrote:

Better still, write long posts elsewhere first (like Word), then copy them across.

I have a WordPad/NotePad New Text Document.txt on my desktop for anytime I am doing anything more than a quick response (here, Wikipedia, etc.) If I have to look something else on another web page or if the post goes over about 5-6 quickly typed lines. I copy and paste to that and finish editing it there.

As Cosmo said, I also tend to use Preview when available as it is on Paizo.com's great Messageboard.

[RainOfSteel]

Yes, this is a massive necro.

The original poster states that the page refreshed while the post was being written. The original poster's second message suggests the refresh occurred after clicking on submit.

For me:

I was typing away at a post for about twenty minutes. I was done. I sat back to re-read the last two sentences I'd written for accuracy. My hands were not on the keyboard or mouse. I read over (more than once) the two last sentences for about thirty seconds, and then the web page for writing out the post refreshed, wiping out my post. I had not clicked on or typed anything, the page refresh was spontaneous.

Up-topic, it is suggested that in any web-based text submission tool, this may be a problem. I have been posting on forums for about 15 years, and while I have had problems with losing a post *after* clicking on submit (which makes me save a copy before clicking on submit), I have never had a web page spontaneously refresh on me while I was working on the post and I wasn't touching the keyboard or mouse (where some fat-fingered move could accidentally refresh the web page).

Anyway, I just wanted to say:

</gnar, gnar, gnash, gnash, growl, growl, </frustration>>