There are some known issues with the new glow blogs service. There were not deemed sever enough to stop the new server going live and the resulting downtime. Below you can see the known issues at the time the service went live.
You can also read about any new issues discovered.
Email Issues
There are a few issues around email addresses
A standard WordPress install uses emails addresses to add users and send users messages to inform them or in some cases to complete actions.
The new site has carried over the old glow RM easy mail addresses, which no do not work.
Users can add email addresses into the User section of the dashboard. This new email will get a confirmation with a link to follow to confirm.
Going forward this address will be able to receive notification of new comments. Currently email notification of comments is not enabled and these emails are not sent. This is reflected in the disabled state of the comment notification checkbox.
Hopefully this should not impact users in the short term as email did not work in the old glow blogs.
Deleting Blogs
Blog will not be deleted but held in an inaccessible archive and can be restored by the Super Admin
You need to respond to a confirmation email before the ‘delete’ happens.
The confirm emails often end up in spam folders, make sure you check if you think the mail does not get through.
This mail will also contain a misleading message:
if you delete your blog, please consider opening a new blog here
some time in the future! (But remember your current blog and username
are gone forever.)
some time in the future! (But remember your current blog and username
are gone forever.)
The blog will be archived, but your username will still exist.
The Flash File Uploader
The New WordPress 4 Add Media facility fixes this problem.
Vimeo embeds
The Upgrade to WordPress 4 included fixes for this issue.
The Upgrade to WordPress 4 included fixes for this issue.
Importing blogs
The Upgrade to WordPress 4 included fixes for this issue.
WordPress has a facility for importing and export from another blog. When you import the xml file it gives you a chance to map the posts from the import to existing users. The list of existing users is presented as guids, which look like a string of random characters.
My Blogs link
This issue was fixed in release phase 1.1
On the home page of each instance of blogs is a link to create blogs and a link to ‘My Blogs’. The My blogs link allows users to see a list of the blog they have a role on.
However if a user who has never logged onto the blogs service before is added to a blog by an admin they will not see this link.
Workaround, if you add users to a blog send them the link to the blog rather than the link to the Local Authority Home page.
Pupil’s comments always held for moderation
A student user’s comment is going into a moderation queue, even when they have an editor level role on a given blog.
Workaround, all comments by students will have to be moderated.
Access to non-public blogs on other Local Authorities
The blogs authentication is currently tied to the LAS instance. That means if you need access to a glow only or private blog in another Local Authority you will need the tile for that instance on your Unify Launchpad. Your school Unify administrator will be able to make that Tile available for you to your personal launch pad.
Hi John
I’ve been using blog commenting for peer assessment today and I found that once you approve a students comment, the next time they write one it is approved automatically.
Hi Olivia,
You can stop this by checking the ‘An administrator must always approve the comment ‘ checkbox in Settings-> Discussion.
let me know if that does not work.
Hi,
Since my blog migrated it has a page, brilliant beginnings, which uses the magazine template on suffusion that is not visible online, although all the parts are still viewable in site admin. Is there a reason for this and can I sort it? I have tried upgrading the edition of Suffusion, but have had no luck. Please help!
Hi Jo,
We have a known issue with the suffsion theme.
https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/glowblogs/glowbloghelp/2014/10/04/suffusion-theme/
There is a fix which will be released soon. And there is a workaround on the post linked.
Let me know if you can’t get the workaround to work.
Hi
I have created a new blog and added students. When I have test logged in as the student through their Glow login details they do not have a ‘My Blogs’ hyperlink available to them. I am using suffsion.
Any help much appreciated.
Thank you
Hello
Since moving to the new GLOW it appears that you cannot cut / copy and paste from Word into a Post. Have looked at settings but still no joy. Any advice much appreciated.
Hi Alan,
We have discovered this missing ‘My Blogs’ issue when users are added to a blog. I believe that is fixed and will be rolled out when all the interim fixes are applied. This will be after some testing etc.
As a workaround if the pupils go to the blog directly and log in through the link in the sidebar. The ‘My Blogs’ Link will appear after that.
David,
I can paste into a post from Word here. We probably need a bit more information to try and track your problem down. What version of Word, What Browser and version, Operating System.
RSS Widgets which are fed from glow blogs now refuse to load. All feeds report “RSS Error: WP HTTP Error: Connection timed out after 10001 milliseconds” I have tested the URLs with a feed verifier and they are correct and working. Is this simply that the new servers are so slow? Is there a solution that can be applied at Glow’s end? I know that there are workarounds involving burnfeeds but I am not happy to use either my own personal account or to set up dummy accounts for the school to achieve this.
Hi Graham,
I wonder could you send a bit more detail?
Where these feeds working OK before the migration?
Could you give URLs for where the feeds are coming from and where you are attempting to show them?
cheers
john
Hi John,
The feeds were working before the migration, however, when problems occured our IT people deleted the widgets without my knowledge. I can’t be 100% certain that the feed URLs are in the same format as before. I have tested the feeds at W3C (http://validator.w3.org/feed/) so I don’t think they are the issue.
I have put one widget back on our homepage so you can see the error. (http://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/er/StNinians/) It is the bottom widget on right. The feed is coming from the following blog (http://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/er/snhscareers/feed/).
If you need any more info let me know.
Thanks
Graham
Hi Graham,
Thanks, we got a call about that site on Friday. I’ll be in touch via email and kick of some exploration of the issue. I’ve replicated it. It looks like RSS feeds from outside glow work. Glow feeds work outside, but glow feeds don’t work in glow!
Hi John
I have had a request regarding e-portfolios from a primary school, they don’t know how to find them after the migration. I contacted the help desk and spoke to Stephen Grant who kindly sent me the url for the help on Blogs.
To be honest e-portfolios and word press is something I am not familiar with. Also the first contact with Stephen was on an other matter regarding Blog for a School which had been transferred to the new setup. The school can see it and the edit comes up, but are unable save the changes. I got Stephen Grant to check if the SCA account for the establishment has those rights and they did. It was used to create the Blog in the first place.
I know it is two issues, they may be connected, more than likely I am not equipped to actually solve these problems.
regards
David Anderson East-Ayrshire Council Glow Coordinator
Hi David,
The pupils should be able to find their e-portfolios by clicking on the tile for blog then on the My Blogs link on the LA blog home page. Let me know of any problems.
As for the edit problem, I would guess if you are edit a post on a blog and changes are not being saved you are using Internet Explorer. If you use a new version of IE you need to have compatibility mode turned on for glowscotland.org.uk
Alternatively use Chrome, Firefox or Safari which do not have the problem (If your LA gives you a choice of browser)
Hi!
I’m noticing that scheduled posts are not going up. Instead, they appear in the admin system with “missed schedule”.
Hi Paul,
Yes that will have to go on our known issues list. The developers will be investigating this.
Hi, after logging back into my blog (Kirk o’ Shotts Room 3) I notice there are literally hundreds of comments awaiting moderation. All I have seen so far are spam but they haven’t been sent to the spam folder. I know there was an issue with this last year too but thought it had been fixed. Can you advise what I can do to be able to quickly access valid comments and get rid of all the spam, please? Thank you.
Hi Caroline,
At some point, before we took over the blogs project, the plugin that protected against spam stopped working. RM deployed a new plugin WP-SpamFree, this needs to be activated on each blog.
As to quickly accessing valid comments I do not think there is a way to do so. I had a few thousand on one blog and the only think that helped was to open the Screen Options (at the top right of the dashboard) and set the number of comments shown to 200. This let me delete 200 at a time. (setting it higher gave me failures).
Hi
I created a school blog ‘Mauchline Primary School’ and have just received my new login for Glow for both my own account and the ASM account. However I am no longer able to edit the blog – only to view it like everyone else.
How do I get back into my own blog?
Thanks
Susan Cross
Hi Susan,
Has your username changed?
If so your account will be no longer associated with the blog.
You need to log a call through your LA to the RM help desk to get your new username added to the blog.
Hi there,
I am having difficulty posting to my West Lothian school blog, CroftmallochPrimary. I am logged in to Glow, I select my school’s blog from the list, I select Post to Blog from the side bar, type a blog, publish it but it doesn’t appear on the school blog at all! I seem to have a little black hole blog all to myself that no-one else can see. All other staff can blog fine to school page. Help.
Hi Elizabeth,
I think we need a little more detail, could you log a call with the glow help desk through West Lothian please.
I’m having difficulty with a hyperlink which doesnt seem to be live.
I reqyested a new link form the site and it was sent to my glow account but same problem . Any ideas how to remedy this ?
Hi Fran,
I am uncertain about he nature of your problem so will drop you an email.