Discrepancy between number of rows in _members versus forum count...

[Biology Forums]

Why might there be a discrepancy between what my forum counts as the # of members versus how many rows there actually are

[Arantor]

Members that are pending email approval, COPPA, admin approval, account deletion or banned should be excluded from that count.

[Biology Forums]

The way I see it is, when someone signs up (regardless of whether they are approved or not, etc), the smf_members table increases by +1 row, correct? Therefore, why is the smf_members table smaller than what is counted?

[Arantor]

Oh, I thought you were saying the other way around.

The count is not updated every time, it is stored and incremented on a new registration, and decremented on an account deletion.

Two general answers occur:
1. You were deleting rows manually
2. Something was broken on the site at some point preventing the count being updated correctly

2) rarely happens.

[Biology Forums]

#1 applies.

Anything I can do to repair this stupid mistake? I mean, it's not a matter of life and death, but I do like order, especially as the community gets larger.

[Arantor]

This is why you don't do it, mkay?

To adjust it manually, edit the smf_settings table for entry totalMembers.

[Biology Forums]

Will do, thanks!