Welcome to the weekly Help Desk news. In these weekly updates we will attempt to bring you the most up to date information, as well as provide some helpful hints for super duper deviantART fun.



Help Desk Holiday Closure Dates

In addition to the normal closure times for the Help Desk, the Help Desk will be closed Monday, January 1st for New Years Day and reopen Tuesday, January 2nd.

You may still submit tickets during this time and they will be answered in the order that they are received when we return.

If you have critical matter needing immediate attention (and not policy related), please email help@deviantart.com.

You can also visit #help on the dAMN messaging network to receive live help 24/7.




Hexe's Corner


What if we thought of a way to guarantee more streamlined help. Would you embrace it even if it meant giving up something you liked?

This week I would like to take the time to discuss a proposal to a change I would like to make in the way users receive help. Now bear in mind this is just a thought, but I am mentioning it here first to get your feedback.

For the longest time deviantART has had a General Help Forum, but was never fully staffed, it has been a place run by you the user, While the forum has had it's ups and downs, we do not believe this is a responsibility that should be dealt with by users. Long story shorter, we're thinking of closing the General Help Forum.

In order to be as clear as possible what I’ll list below are some of the major reasons which are prompting this consideration;

1. Some individuals providing answers to various threads are doing so in an aggressive or mean spirited manner, and while you can expect to find rudeness on any forum we do not believe that visitors to the Help forum should be subjected to this behavior.

2. Some users offering assistance are actually providing misinformation, incorrect answers, or are actually only confusing the issues where they attempt to help.

3. Some responses actually attempt to second guess staff decisions or hypothesize about the reasons behind a problem, sometimes with wildly inaccurate results.

4. Many help threads receive multiple identical answers as some users rush to answer the question while ignoring previous, near identical replies. Smaller subsets of threads actually collect contradictory answers which confuse the situation.

5. Some users confuse the Help forum as an official resource rather than an informal area to receive informal help from other users. This issue can be further confused by the presence of other users who phrase their answers in a manner which leads them to be confused for actual staff members giving official responses.

6. The forum often collects inquiries which should either be kept private or which should not be answered by other users. Ban inquiries, inquiries on staff actions and inquiries concerning payment concerns are good examples of this.

We propose that by removing the Help forum and directing people to the official Help desk those people who require assistance will receive an accurate and official response in a reasonable amount of time. Also by removing the need for Help desk and @MN personnel to moderate the forum this time can instead be devoted by the Help Desk to the creation of user resources that the community have asked for such as, visual guides and tutorials.

So I am asking you all now how you would feel if this change were to take place? If you would like to take the time to participate in answering please direct your attention to this poll, which can be located by clicking here.

Please do not post how you feel on this choice here, please only do so in the poll linked above, so we make keep replies all in one place.




Ewm's Corner

In light of recent issues I would like to take the time to discuss Internal Server errors. If you run across one of these errors while browsing the best thing to do is to not panic. We ask during these issues that you do not access features such as your Message Centre or Profile settings
pages as this can lead to them being erased, either temporarily or permanently. You should also not try and post any important data, such as comments or journals, as these run an equal risk of becoming blank.

In closing we also ask that you do not try and contact the Help Desk concerning these matters, as when the error happens we're usually aware and it can only lead to blank inquiries if you try and send one in.

For more information, please see the following FAQ entry; FAQ #566: I received a MYSQL or Internal Server error while browsing areas of the site. What do I do?




Bug Corner


Internal Server Issues: There have been some server errors this week in turn causing this message to be shown site wide for users, while the message was the same user end the problems were unrelated back end wise. We hope to have these fully resolved, but please be advised they can happen again while we wait for new hardware to arrive.


Thumbnail Rendering Issues: We're still experiencing some thumbnail rendering issues, these should be resolved soon.


Fixed -

Donate a Subscription #1: When a user already had an existing subscription the option to donate a subscription to the user vanishes. (Status - FIXED)

Donate a Subscription #2: This option showed up to logged out members, which caused some confusion in turn leading them to believe they could purchase a subscription without being logged in to an account. (Status - FIXED)

Misleading Message in Verify Process: There was a misleading message in the verify process when failing, leading a user to believe their email was invalid when it was not. (Status - FIXED)

Disallow Comments on Banned Members Deviations: There was an error causing banned members deviations to be commented on again. (Status - FIXED)




Weekly Tip

Did you ever wonder why sometimes the site can load all white or have all the formatting going down in one straight straight line? Usually such is the case when your browser fails to load the CSS file, sometimes a hard refresh helps (Ctrl f5), in worst cases your browser will need to be reinstalled (Firefox only).

If none of these tips clear up the issue you may want to call your Internet Service Provider, as there can be a routing issue to one of our servers.




Top 5 FAQ's

The top 5 most frequently asked questions for this week are...

FAQ #114: I forgot my password and need it emailed to me. Where can I do this?
FAQ #30: How can we stay informed about new changes, updates, and technical problems with deviantART?
FAQ #68: Can I remove someone who is watching me?
FAQ #716: I was told to make sure I have Javascript enabled. How do I do this?
FAQ #167: How do I upload a website button to be displayed on my userpage?




Recently Revised or New FAQ's

Revised -

FAQ #167: How do I upload a website button to be displayed on my userpage?
FAQ #97: Can I remove my website button completely?
FAQ #68: Can I remove someone who is watching me?
FAQ #114: I forgot my password and need it emailed to me. Where can I do this?
FAQ #566: I received a MYSQL or Internal Server error while browsing areas of the site. What do I do?


Newly Added -

FAQ #716: I was told to make sure I have Javascript enabled. How do I do this?
FAQ #717: How do I use the 'Frontpage Customization' feature?
FAQ #718: If I delete my message centre items will this remove the messages where they're posted?
FAQ #719: I read in the 'Status Forum' that an issue was fixed but I think it's happening again. Why is this?
FAQ #720: I added a new journal but my user page is still displaying the old one. How can I fix this?