every single ****ing browser crashes?!

[janey]

There's this one particular site my mom really likes to go to, it's a private forum for her and her friends from like, elementary school.

The problem is, every single browser I've/she's tried so far (Safari, Firefox, Camino, Shiira, and Opera, not much of a variety, but better than nothing) has issues opening most pages at that site. They appear to be loading the page but before it displays anything it beachballs and eventually (after waiting like 20 minutes) I forcequit. I can't even figure out what it is that's making the browsers hang because I can't load enough of the page to figure it out, and I can't use links/lynx/wget/curl because of the bizarre authentication system + javascript-only navigation in place. This is pretty recent too, it used to be perfectly fine until a few days ago.

I really don't want to go out and get Mozilla/Seamonkey/omniweb/icab/... and try it out because I feel that it'll give me the same results and hence will be a total waste of my time (takes like, 5 minutes to login... ).

So, anyone got an idea as to what it could be? I've done a couple restarts, fiddled around with security/plugin/extensions/cache/java/javascript stuff for all the browsers (even turning off images), fsck, fixed permissions, upgraded browsers, and it's bothering me a lot

Haven't gotten the chance to try it on another computer (mostly because Safari just hates that site to begin with), and I don't have the right languages installed on my Windows box to check it out (I have a sinking feeling it might be an incompatible windows media file or something). So is there something that all those browsers have in common that might be screwing things up?

Oh, might I add, I also tried it out with the last version of MSIE for Mac. Doesn't work...in fact, can't even display the page, just blank. Firefox can do it, Camino can, Safari and Shiira have problems half the time.

 

[liketom]

what site is it ?

 

[Mav451]

There's this one particular site my mom really likes to go to, it's a private forum for her and her friends from like, elementary school.

The problem is, every single browser I've/she's tried so far (Safari, Firefox, Camino, Shiira, and Opera, not much of a variety, but better than nothing)

I'm thinking if that many browsers have a problem with a site, it is a SITE problem, not a browser problem.

 

[janey]

Well the thing is the site has its quirks, but for the most part roughly all of it worked with all the browsers. The only peeve is that it uses a MSIE plugin type thing and it pops up a message or two about installing that every time you do something...which isn't a big deal in firefox when you just have the tabs open in the background and then quit all of them at the end (in safari it switches focus to that tab or completely ignores that and opens a small popup window even despite anything I do in safari/saft preferences..)

My mom's pretty much tired of my insistence that I switch everything on that site over to a clean install of phpbb/smf and gallery hosted on my website, so that's out of the question..

 

[janey]

what site is it ?

it's a "cafe" on this korean site called Daum (http://www.daum.net), it's a huge portal, sorta like Yahoo. The site itself is like a free forum/gallery/chat-type thing. And they clearly don't believe in standards of any sort.

Obviously as Korea seems to be one of the biggest fans of Windows and Windows-only technology, a lot of stuff is broken on Mac, but my mom won't use anything else. As illiterate as she is, she's better at using ubuntu/kubuntu and macosx than windows.

And yeah, the daum cafe mainpage itself is a bit quirky in safari: http://cafe.daum.net

my mom's site doesn't work unless you're logged in on that site, so *shrug*

 

[bousozoku]

Have you tried turning off JavaScript and Java to see what happens?

Also, change the user agent to something Windows-ish and see if that helps.

Some of the Korean sites complain but they usually work, even though they can sometimes look garbled since they all seem to want Internet Exploder for Windows.

 

[janey]

Have you tried turning off JavaScript and Java to see what happens?

Also, change the user agent to something Windows-ish and see if that helps.

Some of the Korean sites complain but they usually work, even though they can sometimes look garbled since they all seem to want Internet Exploder for Windows.

1. yes, for all of them. same thing happens. in fact i can't navigate at all if i turn off javascript, none of the links work.

2. changing user agent doesn't do anything, it crashes regardless.

3. yeah i know. hence i want to try it out, but my xp install cd seems to be missing language packs..

 

[VanNess]

The reason you're having trouble with that site is because it's linking to files (graphics and so on) from other hosts that aren't being resolved. I didn't get a BB with Safari, but I did get a slew of error messages ("can't find host") from Safari's Activity window.

My guess is that they have one or more servers that are presently out of commission there, which would explain why the trouble just started happening recently. I don't read/write hangul, but maybe you or your mom could send them an email and ask what's going on.

By the way, Firefox had the exact same trouble there as Safari.

 

[janey]

I didn't get a BB with Safari, but I did get a slew of error messages ("can't find host") from Safari's Activity window.

yeah but a slew of those wouldn't have a major impact on how the site loads in the browser. besides, it happens too soon, like, immediately after you click the link, not after a little bit when things time out and hosts can't be found.

 

[VanNess]

yeah but a slew of those wouldn't have a major impact on how the site loads in the browser. besides, it happens too soon, like, immediately after you click the link, not after a little bit when things time out and hosts can't be found.

Well, if a site is dependent upon other hosts for content, it's going to affect page loading until the browser finally gives up. Even then, the page is incomplete. I didn't try any links on the page after Safari's Activity window reported the problem (and there were many separate errors, as in easily more than 50) because the page was obviously broken.

 

[janey]

Well, if a site is dependent upon other hosts for content, it's going to affect page loading until the browser finally gives up. Even then, the page is incomplete. I didn't try any links on the page after Safari's Activity window reported the problem (and there were many separate errors, as in easily more than 50) because the page was obviously broken.

it would not start beachballing this immediately, no matter how broken. This doesn't even begin to load the parts that can be loaded (my DSL is NOT that fast) before it beachballs.

Also, Safari activity window isn't showing anything that failed to load for those sites...interested in a screenshot?

 

[rdowns]

2 obvious solutions. Have you tried IE for Mac or enabled the debug menu in Safari and used IE as the agent?

 

[janey]

2 obvious solutions. Have you tried IE for Mac or enabled the debug menu in Safari and used IE as the agent?

Yes and yes. IE doesn't even display the page properly, and changing the user agent in Safari or Firefox fail to work.

 

[demallien]

Yes and yes. IE doesn't even display the page properly, and changing the user agent in Safari or Firefox fail to work.

Have you tried the site using Firefox for Windows? and Linux? At least that way we would know if the problem is OS or browser related...

 

[janey]

Have you tried the site using Firefox for Windows? and Linux? At least that way we would know if the problem is OS or browser related...

i can't read the site in ff/ie/whatever for windows or linux. can't find the language files on the academic copy of xp i used on my PC, and i'm missing fonts and such on linux at the moment. trust me, i really wish i could, but they're all useless at the moment

one thing though, two of my mom's friends can access the site and the particular pages in question just fine, and they're running msie on xp, so...

 

[demallien]

For what it's worth, Mozilla on PC never finishes loading the cafe page, although the browser still works, and the page is active

 

[mkjj]

Safari

Just tried the site, a bit slow to load in Safari (maybe time of day, US is waking up!) but works fine, no issues really, pics, videos, flash, all OK.

 

[UKnjb]

Shiira

Everything loads fine from here (UK, near London, 12:11), although a bit sluggish. Links work. Me running Panther 10.3.9

 

[VanNess]

it would not start beachballing this immediately, no matter how broken. This doesn't even begin to load the parts that can be loaded (my DSL is NOT that fast) before it beachballs.

Also, Safari activity window isn't showing anything that failed to load for those sites...interested in a screenshot?

Not sure which site is being referenced in your screenshot, but I thought http://cafe.daum.net/ was the one at issue, which is what I tried. It produces so many errors that I can't fit them in a single screenshot. Nevertheless, no BB here.

The other link you provided appears to load ok.

 

[UKnjb]

Not sure which site is being referenced in your screenshot, but I thought http://cafe.daum.net/ was the one at issue, which is what I tried. It produces so many errors that I can't fit them in a single screenshot. Nevertheless, no BB here.

The other link you provided appears to load ok.

Shiira still.

Have tried both links including http://cafe.daum.net/ again (20:28 GMT) and everything is still working fine. Not so sluggish this time, though.

 

[VanNess]

Shiira still.

Have tried both links including http://cafe.daum.net/ again (20:28 GMT) and everything is still working fine. Not so sluggish this time, though.

Does the loaded page look like the attached screenshot? Shiira and Safari both use webkit, so a difference in page rendering would be unexpected.

 

[UKnjb]

Here's what I get (21:38 GMT)

View attachment 47333

Tell me if I can do any more ---- cannot read Korean though.

 

[janey]

hey guys, thanks for all the screenshots?

Umm, I'm getting exactly what you are, without the errors, displayed correctly. Still having the problem opening the sites I originally had a problem with...Is there something like a plugin or something that all of the browsers would be sharing that might be causing the problem?
I need stuff that's constant...like maybe a site problem or some problem on my end..



Oookay, edit, it works fine in linux and on my intel mac, just gives me a plugin-missing-for-unspecified-mime-type error..hmm

 

[bousozoku]

hey guys, thanks for all the screenshots?

Umm, I'm getting exactly what you are, without the errors, displayed correctly. Still having the problem opening the sites I originally had a problem with...Is there something like a plugin or something that all of the browsers would be sharing that might be causing the problem?
I need stuff that's constant...like maybe a site problem or some problem on my end..



Oookay, edit, it works fine in linux and on my intel mac, just gives me a plugin-missing-for-unspecified-mime-type error..hmm

I only had a problem with the main site because of a missing font file for which they apparently didn't specify a substitute.

I'm using Firefox and I've got QuickTime, Flip4Mac, Flash 8.0.24, and Real multimedia plug-ins.

You should probably copy all of your Internet Plug-ins folder items to somewhere else and re-install them.

 

[technicolor]

I have problems with all browsers on my mac too. Not specific sites, but they crash more than I believe is normal and more than when I was a windows user. I am thinking perhaps its my computer, I am going to do a fresh OS install now that school is out.