HowTo? Prevent contents loss when error on attachment made?

[l_d_allan]

Summary: When I attempt to upload an attachment that turns out to be oversize, a non-recoverable error happens. The contents of post are lost. As intended? Work-around?

Setup and more or less relevant info:

• Win7-64+Sp1 and IE9 (all updates)
• Sysop of under construction www.canprint.org/forum
• semi newbie of 2.0 and rusty at bbCode tagging
• Big fan of SMF. Also evaluated phpBB 3.0.x, and SMF is much better, imo. Keep up the good work!

Further comments:

• Obviously, this is PEBKAC on my part.
• If this isn't "As Intended", perhaps it should be improved as a "Feature Request"?
• Doing a Preview first doesn't help. Perhaps the action of checking with "Preview" could make some kind of "snapshot" to allow recovery?
• Granted, I could increase the allowable size of attachments, but this would be a bandaide to hide a symptom, imo.

[Illori]

try using another browser other then firefox, or copy/paste your text before you submit.

[l_d_allan]

Thanks for the reply. I'm currently using IE9, and not Firefox. My work-around is as you suggest with copy/paste, but that is kind of a "hold your nose workaround" because I often forget to do that.

Is this recoverable with IE8? I have another computer on my SOHO network that I left with IE8, so I can check.

I infer this non-recoverable error is "an intended" and not a bug? It isn't PEBKAC on my part? I further infer that there isn't a setting for SMF to make a "recoverable draft" every 5 to 10 minutes or so (a'la Word)?

If so, I would advocate having a fix be on the list of "Feature Requests".

Also, I will sometimes put a "prologue" at the top of an involved post and do intermediate saves:

< Preliminary draft under construction as of 2011-Aug-18 and may change >

This is really a "hold your nose workaround", but has saved me a lot of time when an error caused the contents to be lost.

Again, I am a huge fan of SMF. This is one of those irritating "shoot myself in the foot" that seems like it could be improved to make SMF even better.

Or not?

[l_d_allan]

If so, I would advocate having a fix be on the list of "Feature Requests".

Submitted.
See http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=447100.0

[l_d_allan]

May already be working. I tried again as a test by attempting to upload an oversized attachment. It failed again, but this time I noticed a "Back" button that returned me to the earlier webpage with text widget. This time, using the "Back" button resulting In The Contents Being Intact. Much Better!