Table of Contents
You can help by writing or correcting items, or just by commenting. Please read About YahooGroupedia.
This page is a continuation of the Yahoo Groups Neo page, separated to stay within the page size constraints imposed by PBwiki. Start with that page in searching for information about the Neo format.
Outstanding Problems
Note that YahooGroupedia is not official; to get the attention of the Yahoo Groups Team use the [Feedback forum].
For an overview/survey of Yahoo Groups features, a separate page has been created presenting them in a table form, with Classic and Neo versions compared. So far (Oct 30), comparison is not detailed but will eventually get more so. Most applicable features are now listed. [Features Chart]
Info Page
Can't save the Group Description
The edit box for the Group Description still says "Text or HTML", but it is very fussy about what HTML can be put in it. In particular, HTML character references seem to cause a generic "Sorry, an error occurred while loading the content." message. [GMF 44091] The only HTML routinely accepted is text formatting tags, and even they will fail at times. NB As of Oct 30, html capability within the group description has been restored, so pictures and links may be used. (Doesn't mean error msgs will not continue though.)
Can't save the Cover Image
Here's a quick step by step overview of how it should work: [Change Cover Photo].
It has been reported that the symptom of having the upload hang is related to the group's access control for the Photos section. Changing Photos access from "Off" to "Members", "Limited" or "Moderators Only." Under Managment, Control Panel, Access Control Tab. [GMF 43186]
If the image you upload is too small, it will appear to have uploaded in a blurry or pixelated form, but a purple bar will show up at the bottom of the page saying "Sorry, an error occurred while uploading the cover image content." One can easily miss seeing the error message, but if you leave your group page and return to find your graphic gone, that is likely what has happened.
Cover images display at a maximum of 1020x 250 after uploading. Images as small as 500 pixels wide will upload without error, but may appear blurred or pixelated. Images much larger than 1020 wide can take an excessive length of time to load, or may not load. To avoid blurring the home page photo should be approximately 1020 x 300.
Two ways to deal with the new very wide and short format are:
- Make use of existing artwork by "tiling" three or four group related photos horizontally using image editing software.
- Place the image you want on the right edge of a wider background.
Choose the background color to work well with the overlay of the group title, as well as with the photo. A series of proportionally appropriate different background colour images have been uploaded in the wiki, with detailed instructions on how to get them and use them at [GMF 43686].
Owners who are having trouble creating a personalized Cover for their groups in Neo version can contact Nedra Ewart at the Groups - Yahoo Group of Groups, or at Group ManagersForum, and if time permits, using graphics you provide, a new cover can be made for you. Before you do that, please go to her Photobucket Album titled "Neo Backgrounds 4 Yahoo". You can search Photobucket using the keyword tag Neo Covers. Or you can follow this link:
http://s192.photobucket.com/user/4EGP/library/Backgrounds/Neo%20Backgrounds%204%20Yahoo?sort=3&page=1 Check back regularly as I'm adding more to this album over the next few days.
Groups Message Poster in Neo
Can't create plain text messages
Despite the << control, which claims to switch the composition to plain text, the message actually generated is in text/HTML format.
In the first few weeks of Neo's roll-out this caused an inability to post messages in groups that exclude attachments. [Feedback 8/25] On 8/26 it was observed to have been "fixed", but the fix was flawed: the message was marked text/plain but in fact continued to contain HTML markup. [Feedback 9/2] On 9/4 it was observed to have been returned to generating messages marked text/HTML, fixing the illegible messages problem, and now "fixing" the can't post problem by allowing text/HTML messages in groups which formerly rejected them (by being set to exclude attachments).
Doesn't use multipart/alternative format for rich text messages
Common practice when generating "rich text" (text/HTML) message bodies is to generate them as the second entity of a multipart/alternative message body, with the first entity being a text/plain rendering of the same message text. This practice is implemented in Yahoo Mail (and most webmail services and email client software); as well as the classic Groups interface's Rich Text Editor.
Instead the Neo interface generates a message containing only a text/HTML entity. This creates compatibility issues with the structure of the Yahoo Groups message handling, which often presumes the existence of a text/plain part to every message. The message processing typically uses the text/plain part for display of message summaries and digests, and for the quoted material in replies and pending message rejections. The failure to generate a text/plain message element can also impair or prevent compatibility with members' mail user agents.
Reply intended for sender goes to whole group instead
In a group with the Reply-To option set to "Sender" clicking the reply to this message icon (left pointing arrow) will open a composition window which may show the sender's address as destination, but the message will actually be sent to the group. If the "Show More" has been used the composition window will show the group's posting address. The user must explicitly select the sender's address from the To: drop-list in order for the message to be sent to the sender only. [GMF 43204] Observed 8/31.
This error is potentially dangerous in Freegle/Freecycle types of groups, where the usual reply to a posting may include a phone number, street address or other personal information that should not be posted in the group.
Group "Reply to" Options ignored
Apparently, no matter the group default setting, "Reply" to a post works in this way: Hitting the <reply> button in "Messages" mode generates automatically a reply to sender, even if sender is oneself. <Reply> in "Topics" mode creates a reply to Group. In both cases it is alterable by clicking on the small box upper right above the msg compose pane. "Show more" comes up on mouseover. Click that and we get the "To:" field and other stuff above, then in the "To:" field, the drop-down menu comes with the little down-arrow offering all three "To" options, ie to Group, Sender and Owner. As of around 10th September this was reported to have been fixed.
Moderator Functions
Moderator/owners report being unable to do many basic moderating functions as easily as before if at all, such as approving posts or new members. Some of these problems are temporary, some are functions now not included in Neo, though some of them are being worked on by Yahoo. Specific matters widely reported include:
Oddities Regarding Members' Posting Status
There are sporadic reports of oddities regarding individual members' posting status. One example was of a moderated group having new members show as "allowed," ie unmoderated, while in another, members showed as "allowed" in the members list but the individual member page showed "use group settings."
Changing group settings
Changing any group setting, eg description, can bring an error message. This is usually a problem only for those newly converted to Neo. This malfunction eventually clears up.
Exporting the Members List
Exporting the members list can now only be done for the first 1,000 members; after that, one at a time. There is a techie but 3rd party work-around ("Command-line utility") found in GMF42989. Additionally, the 1000 limit can be doubled by doing the newest 1000 first then resorting to oldest first and getting the first 1000 of them. Other sort criteria will get still more, but with lots of duplication. Yahoo's 100 limit still in place as of Oct 23.
MyGroups Pending Actions Links
(This text left as is for the record. Functionality is more or less restored as of Oct 9.) MyGroups page no longer features links to "pending" thingies, msgs and members, thus moderators of multiple groups cannot see at a glance all tasks awaiting and have to check each group individually. A [work-around] is available which enables a Classic view of the MyGroups page, for just such a survey. Leaving the MyGroups page, eg for doing a task, propels one back into Neo, but returning (via back-button) brings Classic back again. Good also just for nostalgia!
Ability to "Reject" Pending Messages Gone
Ability to "Reject" pending messages, i.e. automatically send a msg to the author about why their post didn't work, is also gone, no word from Yahoo about that. (Yahoo uses the word "Reject" now for what used to be the "Delete" function, ie only delete but no msg.) Suggested work-around is to reply to notification email -- when that works! -- change address to poster and explain therein why post was declined.
Issues with More Than One Pending Message
While processing more than one pending message, screen may "freeze," preventing further action, requiring variously Refresh, Back Button, closing Browser, etc. Opening each pending msg in a new tab then closing tab may be a work-around. Also there now appear to be only two options for multiple pending messages, approve or "reject" ALL.
"Reply to" Settings Have Been Disturbed
"Reply to" settings have been disturbed, in that whatever the actual group setting (reply to Group, Sender or Owner) "Reply" by default goes to Group; there is a drop-down menu to alter this but it is more work and mistakes will happen needlessly. See "Regarding Reply-to Options" above in "Working with it" for details. As of around 10th September, this is reported to have been fixed.
Pending Member's Email Not Shown
Re approving members, prospective member's email now not shown, just yahoo id and name. Such email info is often the only way a moderator can identify a prospective member. As of Sep 1, it was reported that clicking on the member ID in the approval notice shows the prospective member's moderated email.
Bulk Message Deleting Gone
Deleting msgs from the archive can no longer be done in bulk from the message list, but message by message, by entering the message, hovering over the text and scrolling down to the trash can icon, usually(?) lower left. Way tedious!
Group Activity Logs
Many issues have been reported with Activity Logs, those records spanning the entire group history of who did what in the categories of Message Posts (now "Mail"), Web Tools (now "Web"), Membership(s), Moderator Activity and Email Commands. Details of these issues can be found in the [Missing Features] section of the main Neo page.
Reinstating Banned Members
To reinstate a banned member, theoretically, you go to the Banned Members list, check the box beside that member and choose an Action from the drop-down menu. Simple! Except that the options supplied there seem to have been created by short-cut software that just copied the list that normal members get: Change Delivery Settings, Set Posting Privileges, Send Message, Ban Member and Remove from Group. This observed Oct 2, though it most likely was happening earlier and just not reported.
Web Tools
File Folders with apostrophes in the name can't be opened.
Certain characters, including apostrophe, cause an access failure. [GMF 44658] Access to the files can still be made via the classic interface, and if the folder is renamed to remove the punctuation characters then access via Neo is restored. [GMF 44691]
Files Editing Crippled
Ability to edit Files, ie those sent out in repetitive functions, eg monthly info packets, welcome, goodbye and other situations now beset with error msgs and malfunctions, similar to database issues (see below)
Photo Section functionality not yet restored
Since the Neo roll-out, the Photo section has had many problems that Yahoo is slowly fixing. Besides the specific items mentioned below, the Photo section is plagued, like most things Neo, with glitches, errors, snafus, bugs and operational malfunctions.
On Sep 6, image names started re-appearing, overlaying the bottoms of the thumbnails, and as of Sep 13, albums are once more sortable alphabetically and the Comment feature had been restored. Within albums, sorting criteria have appeared but are not yet (as of Sep 21) complete. One can sort manually (good luck with that) or by latest first or last, there is still no alphabetical sort.
In addition, ability to download photos, lost for a while in Neo, has been only partially restored. There is a download icon (down-pointing arrow above an open box) which appeared around Sep 17 and does work but observations Sep 20 showed that with any date prior to early 2009 it did not, and attempts to download such a pic would revert whatever sorting criterion from that session to the previous sort criterion (say "latest" to meaningless). Still a few bugs ...
And not all former size options are available, with no indication whether the missing ones will return. (Currently missing are medium and original, available are thumbnail and large.)
Other Neo Issues
Problems directly connected with the Neo rollout are various and pervasive, and not limited to the specific issues below. Generally speaking, many issues have arisen in trying to do things that were easy before, and are not obvious now. Thus, even if something is possible in Neo, the "how" may not be clear at all. Stay tuned!
General Disdain of Old Systems
It seems that, in general, there have been many suggestions from Yahoo Customer Care and Admin involving little tech tweaks that, of course, any sensible user should be doing routinely, like using the latest version of browser or Flash, clearing browser caches and even new computers (which are so cheap that anyone can afford them) with Operating Systems that can support all the high-end code written into Neo. There is sometimes more than a small hint in these suggestions that the user is at fault when problems arise that these fixes may help with.
Search functions
Such functions as are still available are hard to find, not obvious, such as member searches.
And even the basic message search for key words is not intuitively obvious. Placeholder text in the "Search Groups" box near the top does now indicate where message search can be found; this done in early Sep. Previously only intrepid "try everything" explorers were finding this feature.
The Message Search function was case-sensitive. It should not be, and was fixed sometime around Sep 15.
And a new problem noticed/reported Oct 25, "Advanced Search," findable after doing one round of a normal keyword search, does not function in all its parameters: specifying a date or range of dates returns an error msg. Other parameters seem to be okay.
Aliases are not consistently applied
There has been a report that an alias may be shown on the group's pages that is other than the alias assigned to the group.[Feedback 8/31]
"Manage My Groups" Page Issues
Many reports are there of people unable to find their groups. Mostly the groups eventually show up, solutions consisting of help from Customer Care to repeated Refreshes to just waiting. As of Sep 1, this issue seems to be mostly settling down. Also reported Sep 1, the arbitrary Order of one's groups, supposedly manually sortable, only sortable up to the first 25. Beyond that, random order prevails again. As of Oct 9, a new complement page, "All My Groups," has been rolled out, which more or less restores the old functionality of the Classic MyGroups page, though there are residual sorting issues.
Database
Widespread and varied problems have been reported with access to databases in groups that use them, both moderators and ordinary members. This includes one report of a database being editable by an ordinary member when it shouldn't have been. As of Sep 7, Yahoo has indicated they are looking into it.
Mobile devices
Multiple problems are reported by users of many different smaller devices, including ipads, blackberries, androids, iphones, other cell-phones and more.
Attribution in Replies
When replying to a post via the Neo web interface, it seems at first that the previous material to which one is replying is not there at all. It IS, but one has to click on the three dots at the bottom to display it, and/or edit it, or indeed to post below it. And in any case, it appears that the previous material is not given attribution marks, ie >> to indicate it was written by the previous poster, thus for finicky posters, those marks have to be entered manually.
URL Difficulties
Many instances reported as of Sep 25 (and possibly earlier) of members clicking on links only to get 404'd. These are valid, correct addresses but don't work, apparently because of a communication problem between the Neo servers and the Classic servers. Basically, a Neo'd group URL should look like this: xxx/neo/yyy and a Classic like xxx/yyy. If either link is entered in the browser's address bar, it should go there or redirect to the other, according to the Neo/Classic status of the individual. When a Classic address is supplied, the system seems to work as intended but various glitches have been reported with Neo addresses. A relatively simple and reliable work-around seems to be to take the "neo/" out of a malfunctioning URL and the redirect process works, even putting the "neo/" back in to arrive at the address that was always correct. It is as if Yahoo itself is saying No to Neo.
Other Language Characters
Such characters have already been a bane in file names and databases. Even the lowly apostrophe has caused files to be unreadable since they cannot be opened in Neo, apparently a case of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. Now, as of mid-Oct, comes word of a new manifestation of character incompatibility problèmes: accented characters in both message bodies and subject lines. This may be resulting from Neo's Random Roll-out™ approach, whereby a user @ yahoo.fr is not yet personally Neo'd, but the group hosted by yahoo.com is. See [Comment #12] at page bottom.
Just Plain Bugginess™
Reports are coming from people newly Neoized (Sep 23) of (some of) their groups being arbitrarily shifted from Public to Restricted. As problems go, this might be just a shrug or a laugh, except that Yahoo's policy about switching prohibits a Closed or Restricted group from going back to Public. (It's actually a fairly sensible policy, since it respects the confidentiality of group members who might not want to go to Public.)
Or there's mail going out from -owner addresses to pending members or whatever. They purport to be from the group owner but the data within the angle-brackets (what email software goes by) make it from group-owner@model.domainEmail [sic], not even a dot com. Naturally, replying to this goes into the Great Bit Bucket but this usually will not be noticed until Mailer-Daemon notifies the hapless replier, who then may or may not be able to figure out what to do next, if the M-D notification has not just gone into a spam folder. This has been happening since about Sep 15, claimed to have been fixed as of Oct 5.
On Oct 11, there was a flurry of sign-in twitchiness, many reports of users being asked to sign in repeatedly, sometimes each time they did something. This apparently lasted only one day.
Other examples of bugginess would be how Neo behaves different ways with different browsers and different times. Good programming should anticipate most of this and work with the different major browsers, including older versions and mobile device browsers. Yahoo tells people to change their browsers, clear their caches and so on, and that is part of the picture but the sheer widespread randomness and amazing variety of glitches not attributable to user error or ignorance says a good deal of responsibility lies with Y! So say many users with long experience in software and its development.
These last, elusive issues are not specific enough problems to get any action via Yahoo's suggestion/feedback forum, so the two general approaches recommended are wait or get advice from elsewhere, especially from one of the [Groups about Groups]
A few more examples: Members are encountering error messages when doing ordinary things like posting from the website. And there has been one report of signing-in protocols having an odd effect, whereby going to the Yahoo site before signing in produced a blank page but signing in first made everything functional. And a report also Sep 15 of "lines through text" in messages, as if strikethrough had become a default font/format.
Issues Possibly Connected with Neo
Links posted in messages are turned into plain text and are not "live"/clickable in message archives but ARE okay in email versions. This has been observed and reported for "classic" groups as well [Feedback]. A temporary work-around could be to use an add-on like Linkification for Firefox, which renders text links clickable.
Concurrently, posts in many groups have been delayed and gone missing. This has happened many times in the past and may or may not be connected with the Neo rollout. As of Aug 30 this problem may be easing.
"Fixed" Problems
Ability to Edit Pending Messages Gone
Fixed as of Sep 13 [GMF 44397], but there are limitations, see [Differences].
Additionally, there are reports that sometimes the edits do not "take", and the message is approved unaltered.And a report Oct 30 of inability to edit the CC filed to scrub out unwanted other addressees [GMF 47412]
The Attachments option is no longer available
This is fixed. At first the Attachment option in Neo offered only the selection of "On" or "Off". Observed 2013-09-14 [GMF 44520]. It now is followed by an option to choose "Include Attachments in Email" or "Include Attachments as links in Email". Observed 2013-11-13 [GMF 48024]. In the classic interface the option to control email attachment processing offering the settings "Store on site", "Include in emails", and "Exclude from site and emails". See the section on Differences above.
URLs in plain text message bodies are no longer linkified in the Messages archive
This has been fixed in the Neo format, but not in "classic" format.
Can't use the Groups Message Poster in groups which exclude attachments
Messages from members using Neo began appearing in groups that exclude attachments on the evening of 8/26 [Listhelp 49345]. The first fix (simply marking the message as text/plain) was withdrawn due to problems with the message body containing HTML markup. The second fix is to revert to generating text/HTML message bodies, but allow them to be posted in groups which exclude attachments. The bug had been confirmed and reported [Feedback].
HTML character references in plain text message bodies
In groups that exclude attachments it looks like the message poster in Neo is improperly sanitizing text generated into text/plain email message bodies. The irony is that there's a corresponding bug in the message display that covers it up by interpreting the HTML character references even in plain text message bodies -- even in the View Source mode (classic interface). So it is only those receiving the message by email that are seeing the HTML character references. Observed 8/26. This was "fixed" by reverting to marking the messages as text/HTML.
Line breaks missing in plain text message bodies
In groups that exclude attachments the message poster removes the line breaks entered by the user, and sometimes those carried in from the quoted material, blocking the message body as one large paragraph. This is no doubt related to treating the composition as HTML based and then stripping out the HTML elements. For example see [YGOG 45798]. This was "fixed" by reverting to marking the messages as text/HTML.
Photo Section Issues partially fixed
See Photo Section report above under [Web Tools] for details
"MyGroups" functionality more or less restored
As of Oct 9, ability to see activity and pending tasks in multiple groups has been restored.
Comments (0)
You don't have permission to comment on this page.