Forum posts doing something weird

[zonker]

i've used and still use(not as much as i used to) nord vpn. can't remember the price but i know it was reasonable or i wouldn't have gone for it. and it's reliable and doesn't slow my internet speed. don't know what avg is offering but you might want to consider nord.

I saw the mention of Nord VPN but didn't investigate cost. Looks like maybe AVG is 1.99 a month or that's what I was prompted at the time I activated the 1 week free trial. I didn't want to commit or pay until I saw if it fixed my robot issues or not and also checked to see how much it might slow down things. I did compare a before and after VPN install internet speed test and the difference was significant.
Hughes isn't always super fast but it is always faster than my phone IP. I do understand that sometimes crap happens and we have slower speeds everywhere. Atmospheric conditions especially when running off a satellite dish...and how many people are using will also affect speeds. In my situation both the phone and the hughes end up running off satellite....so it is what it is.

I have a week to make a decision and do more research. So I have a to do list anyway.

that 1.99 is just a come on, i think. that's fairly cheap unless it's ad supported. that price may start to creep up afterwards. you might want to google search them and see what the customers say.

and yeah, i forgot hughes is satellite, so you've got latency issues to start with. but THAT you are used to and we have to deal with what isp is available in certain parts of the country.

oh well, you will make the best of what you have.

[khauser]

NordVPN gets pricey compared to some. It's going to be 3.71/mo with a 2 year contract.

The VPN will probably always slow down Pugsy's connections (and anyone else using a satellite based solution, possibly not including Musk's) because the satellite providers all have some sort of built in web page caching to speed up the connection, and the VPN hides all of that from Hughes and thus they can't provide that feature. However, I would not be surprised if that feature is what is causing so many problems for Pugsy.

Definitely worth exploring though...

[zonker]

NordVPN gets pricey compared to some. It's going to be 3.71/mo with a 2 year contract.

The VPN will probably always slow down Pugsy's connections (and anyone else using a satellite based solution, possibly not including Musk's) because the satellite providers all have some sort of built in web page caching to speed up the connection, and the VPN hides all of that from Hughes and thus they can't provide that feature. However, I would not be surprised if that feature is what is causing so many problems for Pugsy.

Definitely worth exploring though...

i bow to your experience. i've only used a free vpn (hide my ass) and nord. and this was about five years ago. mainly used these for finding old tv shows and movies on sites like pirate bay and such.

don't use it so much any more because there is just such a vast trove of what i like to watch out there on "legitimate" sites that i don't really feel the need to torrent much these days.

what i find odd about pugsy's problems is that they started happening recently. i'm not educated enough in the ways of computer and internet and such to even begin to guess why this is happening. i just don't like it because pugsy provides such a useful service here. it pains me to see her having to through extra layers of bull#$%@ to do her chores as moderator.

[Pugsy]

what i find odd about pugsy's problems is that they started happening recently. i'm not educated enough in the ways of computer and internet and such to even begin to guess why this is happening. i just don't like it because pugsy provides such a useful service here. it pains me to see her having to through extra layers of bull#$%@ to do her chores as moderator.

yep, I find it odd also that I just started having this problem when the forum software started acting up and my problem continued even after the forum software reset which did fix some problems I had been experiencing but not this one particular problem.
I have been using Huges for years so it's not like I made a recent switch....so why now does my IP seem to trigger the forum software robot??? Beats the hell out of me.

And yes...anything that slows me down here makes my job harder because it ends up causing my BP to shoot sky high. When it took me 6 robots and captcha's to open your PM the other night...I was well beyond having smoke come out of my ears I was so pissed.
I have had it take 3 or 4 robot things just to approve a new account post. Stuff that used to take me maybe 5 minutes ends up taking me maybe 30 minutes and a really annoying 30 minutes.

There have been times I have considered sending Carolyn my resignation letter and tell her to let me know when they get the problem fixed. Then I just won't have to come here and deal with all the hassle and headaches and frustrations.
I shouldn't have to buy a VPN or switch to my phone IP or resign myself to a slower IP just to do my work here. Annoys the hell out of me and that's a short trip some days.
If I quit....I quit it all...the moderator stuff, the helping stuff, even the coming here at all stuff. I have done it before...left here and I learned that I could survive without checking in here every day. Last time I did it there was an ugly 2 weeks of forum withdrawal but after that I actually liked life without the forum. I finally returned after about 7 months because palerider (and a few others) begged me to. That's why I came back.

[khauser]

The vpn workaround was an educated guess on my part. Although I write software for a living, I don't write web front ends. But I can look at it. Also I know quite a bit about architecture for web systems. And I've read some on how satellite providers work to relieve the latency introduced by talking up and then back down to/ from a satellite.

We all had a bunch of issues awhile back that meant slow systems and double posts. I think pugsy was unlucky in that some rules based system flagged he provider a a source of trouble, especially as she is very active here.

Unfortunately there's a huge disconnect between the forum sponsor and the web provider, and I suspect the issue is really between the web provider and a third party captcha provider. We have no way of reaching the right people.

So I suggested the vpn test. At least it would help narrow down the issue, and gives pugsy alternatives.

Generally not a fan of Elon Musk, but SpaceX and Starlink are very promising despite him. Starlink is very different from existing satellite systems because they are not in geosynchronous orbits. This is why latency is so acceptable. In addition, the satellites use laser light to form their own backhaul ... a network between satellites.

Not bad...

[Pugsy]

Geezzz.....Ookla speed test with AVG vpn turned on....download speed 0.8 MBPS....with it turned off 2.6 MBPS.

This sucks.

phone IP...verizon...OMG even worse 0.35 download speed. That's without the VPN being turned on. No wonder I hate it.

I did change to 5 GB connection on hughes and with it did increase things a little to 2.94 without VPN and 1.3 with VPN.

I was hoping that changing to 5 G would get rid of the robot...it didn't.

Sigh.....

Where in the hell are those places that give faster....I saw something that said 25 MBps was "good"....hell, I am no where near that.
Is it because I am out in the boonies????

Edit...apparently I have been bad. I exceeded my monthly download allowance and have had my hands slapped and that's why the slower speed right now. During off hours I can do faster speeds with hughes (during off hours) but for 4 more days I get between 1 to 3 MBps.

I guess I need to spend less time fooling around here.

[Dog Slobber]

phpbb (the forum software) uses ReCAPTCHA, maintained by Google and Google's AI.

There are a fair amount of reports of problems between Firefox and ReCAPTCHA. Because ReCAPTCHA is maintained by Google, there is nothing CPAPtalk's IT can do to whitelist your IP or IP range. All they can do is enable/disable the use of ReCAPTCHA, and possibly configure where it is being used.

I suspect the problem started during the forum delay problems because of one or more of the following:

• Your FireFox implementation or configuration is experiencing the incompatibility between it and ReCAPTCHA
• During the forum delay time frame, because of your heavy use of the forums, Google's ReCAPTCHA AI blacklisted your IP or IP Range because of its high volume of ReCAPTCHA attempts and inability to resolve the ReCAPTCHA because of the FireFox incompatibility. This explains why using a VPN or your cell phone ISP doesn't experience the issue, they provide a different IP.

Potential Solutions:

• IT disable ReCAPTCHA. Doing this will fix your problem, but the forum will be overwhelmed by Bots.
• IT keep ReCAPTCHA for Forum registrations, but disable it for other forum activities. I'm not sure if phpbb allows this.
• Try another browser. I suspect you may not have to permanently change to the other browser, but enough times to successfully pass the ReCAPTCHA challenge and clear your IP from the blacklist.
• Force your Hughes modem/router to get a different IP address. This won't work if a lot of the Hughes IP range has been blacklisted. Forcing your equipment to get a new IP can also be tedious or complicated to achieve, and is dependant on your equipment and Hughes DHCP lease time.

What, I would suggest is:

• Using Chrome, Edge or another non-FF browser, go to the CPAPTalk Registration page, this page has a ReCAPTCHA, and you can attempt the ReCAPTCHA to at least verify if FF is a contributing cause.
  
  https://www.cpaptalk.com/ucp.php?mode=register

[Pugsy]

What, I would suggest is:

Using Chrome, Edge or another non-FF browser, go to the CPAPTalk Registration page, this page has a ReCAPTCHA, and you can attempt the ReCAPTCHA to at least verify if FF is a contributing cause.

But I don't want to use another browser and I have all my links in FireFox which helps me help people faster and I don't want to have to go to all the work to move them....and I shouldn't have to. I like FireFox. I am old and set in my ways and don't like change.

I turned off the VPN. Opened a new window so I could access your post and click on the link you provided...immediately got the robot before I could even access your post....clicked on the link....no robot. I have no idea what that means. Sometimes I get the robot repeatedly with anything I do and sometimes I can go an hour and not see it.

At any rate...I got things to do today outside the forum. Get my hair done for one thing. I will play around with all this crap later after I get home. If the VPN didn't slow my already not so great speed I would just continue with it as the added layer of security sort of appeals to me. I have to wait until Hughes resets my download allowance to really test out the speed thing but I have a feeling it wasn't nearly what it is supposed to do even before I exceeded the limit.

You know the irony in all this....there is a tower in our back pasture that transmits all this crap. It affects our cell phone service a lot...I get barely 1 bar at the house and I go 1/2 mile down the road and get 5 bars.
Hubby says I need to go blow up the tower....that option is looking better and better. Might piss off some people though.

[zonker]

But I don't want to use another browser and I have all my links in FireFox which helps me help people faster and I don't want to have to go to all the work to move them....and I shouldn't have to. I like FireFox. I am old and set in my ways and don't like change.

i'm thinking what dog said here might bear repeating-

[*]Try another browser. I suspect you may not have to permanently change to the other browser, but enough times to successfully pass the ReCAPTCHA challenge and clear your IP from the blacklist.

as already stated, i'm not really educated in the ways of the internet. but what he says here makes sense to me. it takes something out of the equation. it's simple for you to do. and you may NOT have to permanently switch to a different browser.

once you are in a calmer state of mind, you may want to try it?

[Goofproof]

Thanks for the link to your speed test, I will be using it,Nice one. However my Frontier is about the same speed as yours. Ping 61 Download 2.60 Upload 0.72 Frontier/Verizon second tier DSL, Best download speed I can get is 350 Kb's a second. way slower than the tests say, too slow, much slower than tests show. Capta problems at times, but mostly stays connected. I keep logged in, coolies on, do not clear browser history. Using Google Chrome Jim

[Pugsy]

once you are in a calmer state of mind, you may want to try it?

You are assuming I will calm down. Fat chance of that. Remember I am a very stubborn old woman.

I am using Edge and Bing right now. Using Hughes... VPN off...robot still shows up...and I can't see a damn thing because everything is frigging tiny and can't make viewing page larger...I hate it.
Edge was already installed on this laptop since it is a Windows computer. I think I had IE at one time but couldn't find it now. I probably removed it.

I am going to go get my hair done, have lunch and maybe a toddy to boot.
You all have fun.

Apparently using a different browser is not in my future especially since it didn't fix my problem and I hate it because I can't control it.

[Dog Slobber]

A couple things more things to try then:

• Ensure you are not blocking cross-site or google cookies. ReCAPTCHA will drop a google cookie on you, even though you're on CPAPtalk.
• Ensure you have a google account, and it's been logged in from the browser you use, in your case FF. Google's anti-bot technology gives a lower-bot score probability to a session that has a google account association.

[Pugsy]

Okay, I installed Chrome. Much, much better visually than Edge and not really all that different from FireFox and they had an easy feature to transfer all my bookmarked stuff as well as passwords over. So I have quick access to my over 2 K links...

I had a little problem figuring out how to make the tiny pages larger but now that I have that figured out....I can use it for a while and I am okay with it.

So for now...using Chrome...VPN off for now....and so far (knock on wood) no robot and using Hughes.

[Dog Slobber]

Okay, I installed Chrome.

You're not as stubborn as you think you are. Y'ol softie.

[khauser]

Okay, I installed Chrome.

You're not as stubborn as you think you are. Y'ol softie.

I'm amazed it happened ... I believe I suggested that months ago, LOL