Question

Is there any reason at all to expect, to hope that that the OS site will ever overcome the obstacles of "running script" slowdowns, "loading MathJax" freezes, and any other major impediments to site functionality?

Answer 1

Yes.

Answer 2

As much as I like OS, I cannot fathom why these problems have not been solved by now. So, why pile more features to the site and split hairs over SmartScores until the site functions efficiently. I am no programmer but I have used a googol of sites across the Webs, and I have never encountered one like OS with functionality inconsistency that is consistently a problem. A site that is aethetically pleasing is great but one without reliable functionality is frustrating for users.

Answer 3

@apoorvk --> What is the wellspring of your hope?

Answer 4

"Hope, my Friend, is the pillar of unfathomable support in the hour of dejection" :D


Jokes apart, there are a lot of bugs, since the whole system has been refurbished. Plus, the official launch is due in a few hours.

The Mods have been pretty busy ("I miss sleep badly" - Colm Shalvey), with the launch, and so, the bugs and the slowness is yet to be sorted out, yet they do make a lot of bug-fixes with every release. I am sure once the dust dies down, and the system stabilizes, OS shall see better light (and faster too =] )


So till then, "Bear We Shall!!!"

Answer 5

Sorry, I have to leave and return. I've just received the 3,000th "high memory usage" warning from being on OS. BRB

Answer 6

@apoorvk --> "Hope is the thing with feathers.." (Emily Dic..son)

I have been told that these site functionality problems have been resident here on OS for years. I would just like to know from a programmer or the site architect just what IS the nature of the problem.

Answer 7

Hello Directrix,

I appreciate your concerns. I'll try to enlighten you as much as possible. First, I would greatly appreciate it if you would at least give us the benefit of the doubt in these situations. As you have admitted, you are no programmer. The fact is these are difficult problems to solve.

We're not adding new features at the expense of working on serious performance issues. We're dividing our time across all of the efforts that we have ongoing as best we can. If we've gone "all hands on deck" into SmartScore, it's because we haven't been able to reliably reproduce any performance issues.

I have experienced no "running script" message, high memory errors, or issues with the MathJAX loading (although we have very little control over that, MathJAX is an external service). So, if you would like to see these problems solved, perhaps it would be more constructive to discuss the details of your particular issues.

Answer 8

@Directrix - perhaps you'd like to provide me with more details?

Answer 9

@apoorvk whose quote is that? "Hope"

Answer 10

I made that up myself lol. i seemed 'wise', no? ;D

Answer 11

Amazing and awesomes. Very very thank you.

Answer 12

@farmdawgnation: I have faced the " high memory errors" myself. Albeit, the count is (high) single digit number yet it is valid. I think @Directrix is facing more of these due to low physical memory of his system.

Answer 13

Howdy howdy, @directrix, what browser are you using?

We've seen a good bit of slow script errors in IE, and have and continue to work hard to support the IEs, but they are a bit behind "modern" browsers. As for high memory errors, I haven't seen any of this, but I believe it, heh. There are some things I'll look into for that.

Worth noting, I think Shadowfiend did a great job recently of making the server run smooth like butter. So you may notice your browser being slow, but thankfully actually interacting with the site (posting, medaling, etc) is coming along. That is to say, you notice the broken things, but you rarely notice when things are running perfectly. :)

Always happy to hear the feedback though. We all consider performance to be our number one feature.

Answer 14

I'll join the party. First off, I very much doubt you've used a googol of sites across the web; indeed, that would likely be physically impossible, since a googol is 20 orders of magnitude more than the number of subatomic particles in the visible universe ;)

Jokes aside, I understand your frustration, but the fact of the matter is at OpenStudy we're not just pushing the boundaries of education, we're pushing the boundaries of technology, as well. I challenge you to find another site out there as dynamic as this one. At any given moment, you can see the question any user is in; you can chat in any number of groups at the same time; every component of the site updates in real time; hundreds of questions are asked each day and appear immediately on all online users' screens. We consider this a core part of the OpenStudy experience, and yes, we're paying a certain price. Ultimately, pushing boundaries like this always means growing pains, and we're managing them as best we can as we move along.

But, to flip the argument on its head, we're not just pushing the boundaries of technology, we're pushing the boundaries of education, as well. SmartScore is a critical part of that, measuring things that no other system measures, but that everyone cares about, and we wanted to put it in people's hands as quickly as possible so we could start improving it. It may be splitting hairs to you, but to us it's a core part of our vision for the future of education.

I should say in passing that I'm not sure how these problems would have been resident on OpenStudy for years. The site in its current form has existed for only a little over one year, and previous iterations were very differently built and reacted very differently in general.

Anyway, net net, experience matters to us. While we know sometimes it can be slow, that slowness comes from the differences in the experience on OpenStudy compared to any other site out there, and we're dealing with it as we get the chance. We're going to continue improving all aspects of the experience—from adding value by introducing things like SmartScore to improving performance whenever we see the opportunity or the need.

I have a suspicion I know where these high memory use issues are coming from (I confess I hadn't seen anything about them until now), and we'll try and get some goodness in to deal with those in the next few days.

Answer 15

1) I do notice when the site is running smoothly, and I attempt to document the conditions under which that occurs because that's when I want to be on the site.

2) A significant but short-lived improvement in site functionality came several weeks ago when somebody in OS Tech "kept I.E. Explorer after school" and talked to him about his behavior on OS.

3) On my Windows 7 machine, I have 4K RAM. I have purchased external cooling fans for it. When I enter the OS site, my internal computer fan immediately flips into high speed.

4) My browser is I.E. 9.0.8112.16421. Given that (as overheard in the Chat Thread) Bill Gates is a major supporter of this site, I would think that the site might be optimized for use with the Internet Explorer.

5) My two Windows XP machines with I.E. 8.x will not access the OS site for more than a nanosecond without immediately freezing as a result of "script errors." Those machines have 1K RAM. I don't expect them to handle the graphics here.

6) Not one of my three computers behaves in this way on any other site on the Webs.

7) This is not all about me. Think about other potential OS users who cannot access the site because of problems mentioned above. And, as I prepare this message, I do so on a word processor independent of OS because I do not want to lose text when the OS site freezes, loses its connection, or flows like syrup on a freezing day.

8) Suggestion: Post a recommended minimum computer capabilities statement for users somewhere on the site.

9) My comments are intended as constructive input for the programmers. I am not interested in a debate. As I know little about the technological genesis of the OS framework, it is clear to me that those architects and programmers know equally little about the user side of the OS experience.

Answer 16

A few things:
- I apologize if we came across combative. I was trying to explain the complexity of the development calculus in terms of what we work on at any given moment, rather than debate.
- We definitely definitely appreciate your input. We know every time we see a post about something like this, there are probably at least 10-20 frequent users who are seeing similar problems. Independently, we're looking at some performance stuff right now as SmartScore-related stuff has calmed down a bit.
- Bill Gates is not a direct supporter of the site per se, though we have received funding from the Next Generation Learning Challenges, which is in part funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. That said, we do not use that as a criterion on deciding what software to work with.
- IE9 should indeed not be showing these problems at all. We'll be taking a closer look at it, as our previous tests with it have not shown the significant issues you're referring to.
- IE8 is an outdated browser whose support costs us a lot of pain, but we likewise try to avoid serious script slowness and such on it. @farmdawgnation has some thoughts on how to improve performance there by improving an underlying library we're using, and he was intending on looking at it one of these next couple of days.
- I suspect the improvement you saw when we did our IE release was at least partly the placebo effect, as we haven't added any significantly unperformant code since then. We did improve IE performance measurably, but it has not gone back down in our experience at all.

While I'm also not looking to debate, I strongly disagree with your assertion that we don't know the user experience on the site. All of us are on the site regularly, most of us answer questions both in OpenStudy Feedback and subject groups fairly regularly, and people like @cshalvey are on the site a significant portion of the time. We eat our own proverbial dog food, which is why we use OpenStudy itself for feedback.

The thing that is definitely true is that none of us use IE on a regular basis, and so there are definitely things that fall through the cracks there. I apologize for that, and will see if we can find a team member who can use IE a bit more frequently; because most of us are Mac users, this is not as straightforward as it might seem. It is evident that we have more issues on IE than we thought, and that's something we'll be working to fix (both the issues themselves and the fact that we were in a situation where we weren't aware of them).

Answer 17

@farmdawgnation Works great for me in chrome even with adblock/scripts block/plugin filter