Add "feed moved" info to feed accounts.

[kyrielle]

Title:
Add "feed moved" info to feed accounts.

Area:
feeds

Summary:
Add information to the profile of feed accounts on what to do if the feed has moved.

Description:
It seems like one of the ongoing themes both here and on LJ is "please don't create another account if the feed for site X has moved, please just let support know and they can fix it" - so it seems like it would be useful if that information was somewhere on each feed account. The profile seems likely. It could say something like:

"If this account is not updating because the feed URL has changed at the original site, please let support know and give them the new URL. They can update the account to work again."

In that, feed URL would link to the known URL, "original site" would link to the site, and support of course would link to support.

(It would be even cooler if you could just smack a link and plug in the new URL but, honestly, the extra development work and additional page to maintain probably isn't worth it in this case.)

Poll #1676 Add "feed moved" info to feed accounts.

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 35

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
32 (91.4%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
1 (2.9%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
0 (0.0%)

(I have no opinion)
1 (2.9%)

(Other: please comment)
1 (2.9%)

Comments

[yvi]

http://bugs.dwscoalition.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1405 - Would this also be good?

[kyrielle]

Yes! I hadn't seen that. Denise said this would be quicker, so it might be nice to do this until that comes in - but if someone implemented that before this one, this would become irrelevant, which would be fine. :)

[azurelunatic]

I was just about to mention that (well, the LJ suggestion); I'd be very happy with a "this is what to do" note with (for the moment) a link to the create-a-support-request form prefilled for syn (maybe even with the summary prefilled based on the profile? ooo!), to be changed to a link to the proper new form once created. Less change in UI, getting people used to following the helpful link.

[cesy]

This sounds very sensible.

[foxfirefey]

I think this is already a bug!

http://bugs.dwscoalition.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1405

[denise]

Nope, that's "create a separate form for submitting feed changes", this is "stick a note on the profile". (And is likely to be implemented a hell of a lot faster than 1405, since it's pretty much a one-line change.)

[kyrielle]

Though my note about the "probably too much work" extra is, basically, 1405. Hee. Shiny that it's out there!

[triadruid]

Is there any way to just retroactively combine duplicate feeds? Otherwise yes, I suppose this helps, but they will always Build a Better Idiot.

[denise]

Nonfunctional at the moment, but yes, it exists.

[triadruid]

Should I make a suggestion, or is it already in the workflow plan?

[denise]

Already in the bugtracker, yeah. (It'll take a major overhaul, since it depends on something that we broke with the friends split.)

[kyrielle]

Yes, but right now it doesn't even take an idiot, sadly. Let's say a feed I read hasn't updated but when I go look at the site it has tons of new stuff. So I go to my profile, find the feed, follow the link, and see the status - with an error! - but no information on what to do about it. Going back to the site I find the feed has moved.

If I haven't encountered this before and don't read through news posts in detail, what would you expect me to do? Bingo, create a new feed...and off we are. To be honest, I don't think that's an Idiot. Or even lazy, to not to dig dig dig for the info on how to fix a feed in faqs and news and...honestly, it's usually the case that an account is an account is an account. It looks like it has set-in-stone attributes. It's not that obvious that there MIGHT be any way to fix that.

Some people will still create a new account, but I think this would reduce the occurrence.