Plugin fails with certain browsers

This sounds like issues with caching. If you are using a page cache, that con interfere with the form data getting submitted correctly.

Browser caching issues can also come up when the signup form is used multiple times on the same computer: the browser caches the result page and so instead of completing the submission, it shows the cached page.

Having a separate “thanks” page can help with this.

Also, when testing, make sure that the “duplicate submission” settings on the signup form settings are not getting triggered. That can make it look like new submissions are not getting added tot he database because they are actually only updating an existing submission.

I am Julien, the webmaster of the website Martin was mentioning in his post: https://double-ri.eu/

Thank you very much for your fast reply and your help. We do have a separate “thanks” page and the “Duplicate Record Preference” setting is set as “Show a validation error message”. I really have the impression that the problem is wider than just a caching issue.

Here is for example a message from one of our users:
“There appear to be continued problems with the sign petition mask – I have tried three web browsers by now, also firefox doesn’t solve the problem.
After hitting the ?sign“ button, it says ?thank you for signing“ but displays other people’s names rather than mine (eg Thank you, Mie Mie Kyaw for signing the petition for an increased EU Budget for Research and Innovation!)

The confirmation emails also never arrived.
I know several colleagues who also have tried to sign and have failed to sign.”

Several users reported this thank you page directed to someone else and their signature not being taken in consideration.

Also, some users who didn’t tick the “Privacy Policy” box and didn’t see an error message and arrived to the thank you page, without their signature being taken in consideration.

Do you have any idea where the problem could come from?

Thank you,
Julien from EuroScience IT

Yes, this is definitely some kind of caching. That is the only way data can “leak” from another submission. It’s probably html page caching, but could also be some kind of server caching. The fact that it is intermittent also implicates caching.

OK thanks. Could you give me some ideas on how to solve that?
Server/WordPress/plugin configuration?
I am using WPEngine as a host.

Thank you,
Julien

• This reply was modified 6 years, 6 months ago by EuroScience.

Hi again,

I reached out to WPEngine support and here is what they are telling me:

“So I had looked into the previous instances of similar problems being located with this plugin. When I looked at the “Solved” message, it said the fields “Display” option set to zero when it should have been set >0. I tried to look through the wpadmin dashboard and found the plugin and went through the settings but was unable to locate the option to change the “display” option value. I found this here https://double-ri.eu…cipants-database_settings_page”

Can this be of any help?

Thank you,
Julien

The display setting they are referring to is in the field group configuration, which is on the Manage Database Fields page under the field groups tab.

Alright, so that’s nothing important I suppose.

So could you please give me some ideas on how to solve this caching issue? What do I need to configure and where?

Thanks you!
Julien

It’s usually what’s called “page” caching that can cause such issues. Typically, this is set up in a plugin, although it might be set up by your web host. Basically, you should have page caching disabled on pages with the signup or signup thanks shortcodes.

Hello,

I created a new page for signup (https://double-ri.eu/sign/ – before it was on the home page) and then I asked my host support (via WPEngine support chat) to disable page caching for this one and the thank you page (https://double-ri.eu/thanks).

And this worked! It seems like our problem is solved.

Thanks again for your help and I hope this thread can help future users.

Thanks for all the detail, that really can be helpful. Caching causes a lot of issues with dynamic plugins, and many commercial hosting providers do a lot of caching to minimize the impact on their servers, it reduces their cost.