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Why are my file uploads being blocked?
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PBwiki hosts all sorts of content for all sorts of different uses (private business collaboration sites, public conference planning, K-12 lesson plans, vacation to-do lists, etc etc) and sometimes our filters unexpectedly catch things they shouldn't --- the phrase "prime meridian", for example, has "prime" which often shows up in home-loan-refinance spam, and "meridian" is, except for the last "n", the name of a weight loss drug. Tricky.
We try to be as open and restriction-free as possible but due to some aggressive abuse by a handful of bad actors, we've had to install some limits on what files can be uploaded to public wikis, and free ones in particular. An example was HTML files, which some folks were uploading. That'd be fine ordinarily, but these pages were full of popup ads for porn and all sorts of other things which led to a really bad effect on PBwiki's search engine rankings. Worse, some people were guessing passwords on other peoples wikis and posting this kind of 'very off topic' content unbeknownst to the wiki's original owners. Not cool.
I'm in the process of tweaking these rules a bit to be more clear and less interruptive of legitimate users' work, but the restrictions in one form or another will need to remain for the foreseeable future.
If anyone out there has clever ideas about how to tackle this better, send them our way!
The company and 2 other people say
this answers the question
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Inappropriate?PBwiki hosts all sorts of content for all sorts of different uses (private business collaboration sites, public conference planning, K-12 lesson plans, vacation to-do lists, etc etc) and sometimes our filters unexpectedly catch things they shouldn't --- the phrase "prime meridian", for example, has "prime" which often shows up in home-loan-refinance spam, and "meridian" is, except for the last "n", the name of a weight loss drug. Tricky.
We try to be as open and restriction-free as possible but due to some aggressive abuse by a handful of bad actors, we've had to install some limits on what files can be uploaded to public wikis, and free ones in particular. An example was HTML files, which some folks were uploading. That'd be fine ordinarily, but these pages were full of popup ads for porn and all sorts of other things which led to a really bad effect on PBwiki's search engine rankings. Worse, some people were guessing passwords on other peoples wikis and posting this kind of 'very off topic' content unbeknownst to the wiki's original owners. Not cool.
I'm in the process of tweaking these rules a bit to be more clear and less interruptive of legitimate users' work, but the restrictions in one form or another will need to remain for the foreseeable future.
If anyone out there has clever ideas about how to tackle this better, send them our way!
The company and 2 other people say
this answers the question
1 Comment Add a comment
This answers the question
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This is no answer, if you can't fix this, I will stop using this site. -
Inappropriate?Thanks Rachel!
At least I understand better now. My original file is an Excel page, when I uploaded it the first time the format was scatered, the page once loaded was unreadable so someone adviced me to convert it to html format to keep the intended original format.
It becomes clear now that until this issue is sorted out I need to learn to upload Excel files maintaining the format.
I am not savvy so my advice to others trying to upload html files would be to try to use another venue meanwhile.
Maru del Campo
I’m unsure
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Inappropriate?I have trouble posting OpenDoc format files, in particular, .odt (the text file). These are, IIRC, zipped xml for the most part.
Why the ban?
I’m angry
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Inappropriate?J,
Our filters look at both the extension and the rest of the file name. As an example, a .jpg file on its own isn't going to trigger a block but for example hot-chicks-hatching-from-chicken-eggs.jpg would probably be flagged. I know it's frustrating, it's paranoid but we've been badly burned by malicious behavior in the past. We're working on a better mechanism for this whole filtering but it's not going to be ready for this upcoming release.
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Inappropriate?Nathan,
OK, so why do files with names like "Capitulum 09.odt" get caught? And why for me and not others (a friend is able to post exactly the same files with no problem)?
Here's what the start of the file looks like:
PK ?78^?2 ' ' mimetypeapplication/vnd.oasis.opendocument.textPK ?78 Configurations2/statusbar/PK ?78 ' Configurations2/accelerator/current.xml PK PK ?78 Configurations2/floater/PK ?78 Configurations2/popupmenu/PK ?78 Configurations2/progressbar/PK ?78 Configurations2/menubar/PK ?78 Configurations2/toolbar/PK ?78 Configurations2/images/Bitmaps/PK ?78 layout-cachecd`d(hf``‡d``·Ä ` #?HÉj`å?v„6å?PbÑ<ÒqTMˆGTM 4...? 4‹ -
Inappropriate?J,
Unfortunately, the answer for the time being is 'it depends on a lot of factors' -- whether the wiki is free or premium, public or private, the country you're connecting from, age of the wiki, time since you signed up and/or cleared your browser cookies, and whether the particular ip address you're assigned appears on one of a number of real-time-blackhole lists for computers which are now or have recently sent spam emails, plus the actual file name and the rate of uploads from your IP and your 'neighbors' . It also depends on the file type the contents of the file and so on. It's a complex mix of rules designed distinguish a myriad of different attack vectors people (and robots) have used to try to abuse our system to the detriment of our real users. That said, yes, it is clearly overreaching by blocking you on a regular basis. We do recognize the need to revamp these rules and find ways to be more informative and less obnoxious, and we'll be taking that on as soon as we get past the upcoming milestone release (aka PBwiki 2.0)
I’m frustrated by a few dozen jerks in Poland, Russia, Italy, Ukraine, Vietnam, Korea, and Switzerland
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Inappropriate?"That said, yes, it is clearly overreaching by blocking you on a regular basis"
Right. :-) Clearly the heuristics get mad about .odt files, because I can post everything else without any problems - ok, everything else I've tried. And I've tried from different locations, including academic campuses and my FiOS at home.
I understand the problem, but it just seems like there's something about this particular filetype that sets off the filter in a big way.
1 person says
this answers the question
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Inappropriate?I am stuck and frustrated on day one. Instead of shutting down the entire file upload procedure wouldn't it make more sense to block the individual file? By the way I have been asked to run a test Wiki for a department before we invest in a full plan. Although I understand and heartly agree with the need for filtering, so far I am unimpressed with this kind of early roadblock. And if it is true the suspension lasts days,I will look for alternatives.
I’m believing an IT dept dreamt this one up
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Inappropriate?Rename the file as a .jpg, upload it, then rename it back after it's uploaded.
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this answers the question
