When having trouble with the site...

PLEASE provide as much information as possible. An email to me saying "can't access your site" doesn't give me a whole lot to work with. Plus, it just prolongs the amount of time it takes (for both of us) to resolve the problem.

Here's some handy-dandy guidelines:

• If you are getting an error, provide more information about the error itself. If you can cut and paste the error into an email message, that helps a lot. Also, does the error display on the website or is it a browser or operating system error?
• If you are having trouble logging in, tell me more about your account. What is the email address associated with your account? What is your username? What happens when you try to log in? Do you get an error? If so, see above.
• What browser and version are you using? Chrome, Firefox, Internet Exploder, Safari or other browser? You can usually find the version number in the main menu under Help and/or About.
• What operating system are you using? Windows XP, Windows 7, Mac Leopard or perhaps some flavor of Linux?
• Provide screenshots. These are particularly helpful because then I can see what you see. If you don't have a screen capture utility, you can hit your Print Screen button and the captured image will be placed in your clipboard. Then open an image editor and paste. Save that into a JPG or PNG image and then send it to me.
• Provide your IP address. You can get it at http://whatismyipaddress.com/
• Any other information you can provide about the issue can be critical in resolving it.
• What did you have for breakfast? Eggs, toast and coffee or just a bran muffin?

We've recently installed some software that blocks spammers. They were one of the biggest problems we were having with performance. But this means that a small percentage of you may be erroneously deemed as spammers based on many factors -- probably the biggest factor I'm seeing so far is with those using ancient computers with ancient browsers. Old browsers are very often security risks and are used by spammers and hackers to gain access to websites. I hate to alienate anyone that is truly legitimate, but the spammer-blocking utility has done wonders for the performance of this site. So it's just something we have to deal with.

I may also do away with the Site Issues category and implement a support ticket system via my main website at http://harnessweb.com. This way, I can specify the information I need during the ticket submission process. Stay tuned.

Thanks!