As several of you noticed, comments weren't working on this blog for the past couple of days. Apparently, the problem was that Movable Type looked to see if a CAPTCHA was entered correctly before accepting a comment... and the entries currently have no provision for displaying a CAPTCHA, let alone entering a response to it. I didn't notice this when (rather quickly) testing the site because it seems that the CAPTCHA is used only for people who aren't registered users of Shmuel's Soapbox; as I was logged in to work on the site, it let my own test comments go through. (Of course, there's also no way of becoming a registered user as matters currently stand, so that doesn't help anybody but me and Erin... and that's if my sister-from-another-mister even remembers her password anymore.)
The ideal solution would be to update the site code so that CAPTCHAs are displayed and used properly, but that would require digging through documentation and once again figuring out how the code is supposed to work, and that's way more effort than I have time or energy for right now. As it stands, the code used here is a heavily duct-taped version of whatever Erin put together when she installed MT for me back in 2003. That was version 2.63, at most. I upgraded to 5.031 just before Holidailies started. I'm a bit amazed it still works at all... but anyway, for now I've solved the problem by turning off the CAPTCHA system entirely. If this leads to a deluge of spam, I may have to reconsider this, but for now, comment away.
Note: after you post a comment, it may look like it hasn't been posted. It's probably a cache issue; try reloading the page.
(As for the New Jersey Saga, I'm expecting that to require a total of five installments. You've been warned...)
Posted by Shmuel at December 9, 2010 10:40 AM