Welcome to KT Rusty again!

May be your computer skills are getting a little rusty?

dcarch :-) :-) :-)

A touch of WD-40 works wonders.

Rusty - I cleared my computer "History" and things have never been right with my original user name. So I just sign my posts.

seagrass

Welcome back, Rusty! Sorry to hear about your computer. I've signed in from at least six devices over the years, so I'm not looking forward to this happening At the next one. It's probably some kind of routine meant to prevent duplicate screen names gone wrong. Glad to know that a little variation will work!

To clarify, it's not really 'a little variation', it's a completely new ID. I can't access any of the photos or my other 'stuff' I have saved on GW. Grrrrrrrrr. . . . . .

Rusty

I don't understand - why are some people continuing to clear their entire cookies and history if it causes this problem?

Isn't it possible to exclude certain URLs when doing so?

Because if you don't do maintenance such as this task on your computer it gets clogged and slows down. Think of it as every time you go into a drawer, you blow through it and don't keep things tidy. Pretty soon it's going to be a difficult drawer to operate within because of all the disorganization. Not clearing history/cookies, etc...is similar.

I guess it depends on the system and hardware. I don't clear browser history or cache on my Mac desktop computer, and it seems fine. I've had it for over a decade.

I do go through occasionally and clear specific cookies from sites, but not the entire cache.

Ouch! Rusty, I didn't realize. That's bad!

Yes, you can manually clear out everything, and there are some utilities that allow an "all/except", but if you don't have that, it can take a long time...

Oh, I didn't think of losing photos, threads etc on GW. That does suck!!!

I clear my cache regularly on my desktop which I use for work just to keep it speedy. I haven't lost GW on that, but now I'm afraid to do it on my laptop, which is where I access GW all the time.

May do nothing but if you are able to clear back to before a problem was noticed you might be able to reclaim your old sign on. Something a tech told me that was done with one of my computers to clear a problem. Now when there is a problem I have the ability to select 7 days, 4 weeks or other time periods. If 7 days does not work so far the 4 weeks has.

I just don't get it - if you have your username and password, why would removing cookies make it so you couldn't sign back in?

I have been bumped out a number of times, probably because of updates, but have always been able to log back in. It takes several tries sometimes, tho. Even 1 character or space off and of course it's no go.

I keep a list of my usernames & passwords.

No matter how Rusty you get we are happy to have you!

I don't know carol. You would think if you had those bits, one could re-enter, right? That works everywhere else in my online world, but NOT here.

Too weird.
I've long wondered if all these glitches being different for everybody depends on the platform being used - or maybe even on servers.

I had some issues a while ago but ultimately got back in as me. ( no matter how many times I logged in, it would ask me to log in or join).

It happens with so many people. We are not all computer wizards, but obviously are ok enough to get here regularly. It's NOT us.

I tend to agree with your thought carol. It's rather hit or miss with these glitches. I'm on mac, as are you I think. But I'm a laptop and perhaps you are desktop. Maybe that is a difference? I don't know. Anyhow, it's super annoying and each time it happens I mumble about how if I didn't like to 'be' with these folks as much as I do, I'd just say forget it. Not worth the frustration. Because really, no where else in my online life does this nonsense happen. Maybe it's my internet provider? IT dept is a bunch of unpaid interns and they take their revenge by doing this? Gremlins?

It could be any of these, though the simplest explanation is that there's a cookie or similar containing your identity that gets erased. I would have thought that it wasn't cleared cleanly, but that wouldn't explain the new computer doing the same. Worse than the glitch is that it seems CS doesn't care....

After I cleared my Mac I entered my password on the CA Gardening Forum first and now that is my "door" to everything else. Houzz won't let me put in a password for any other forum. I have to go to CA Gardening Forum first and then link to any other forum I have listed in order to be recognized and leave comments. Irritating!

The idea of clearing your browser is if there was a glitch caused in most cases by incompatibility of programs if you clear back to before the glitch happened you removed the problem. For whatever reason the last two times I had difficulty signing on to my mail that is what I was asked to do and I no longer have the problem.

I'm on a desktop iMac OS 10.11.6 El Capitan, using Chrome browser

sea sea

... unless it's your drawer of drawers ...

I too have been whacked with the houzz bat......

I was kicked out after I tried to fix my access to messages. Then I could get back on but there was no cooking forum (according to Houzz). I finally am able to get back on if and only if I follow a bookmark on my iPhone.

I am not particularly savvy about computers but I think the marriage between houzz and gardenweb is glitchy.

New computers are great but it’s a PIA to get them up to speed! I like the change, I think it was a creative way to avoid numbers.

I don't have many issues with this site other than being redirected to Houzz occasionally, and having a comment disappear while I'm writing it. I'm using a PC and Firefox, never log out, and a bookmark brings me to the Gardenweb forums.

I clear my cache when I remember to, but I never delete my cookies. It would take a lot of cookies to make a difference in your browser speed, but it can happen. Cookies are tiny and store bits of information like your user name and password, and allow websites to recognize you when you visit them. Even if you delete the cookie for this site, it should install a new one when you return. I don't know why it isn't doing that, but must be a Houzz issue. I feel like they do only the bare minimum when it comes to the maintenance of this site.

" ... I think the marriage between houzz and gardenweb is glitchy ... "

I think that's a good analogy.

I believe when they incorporated gardenweb into houzz they tried to keep gardenweb as it was, as much as they could. But maintaining two domains together yet separate became too much. I know I wouldn't have wanted to try.

I think gardenweb/houzz is now undergoing a quiet divorce. Well, not really a divorce, just a name change. Gardenweb users are being slowly pushed from gardenweb to houzz. And in all the ways that matter, it is still gardenweb, even if it uses a houzz address. All the same members, posts, comments etc.

Just styled a bit differently. (font, images are presented as thumbs, ... etc.)

Accidentally lose your gardenweb login status, whether by deliberately logging out, clearing cookies, using a different browser, replacing an aging computer, whatever, and you can no longer log in on the gardenweb domain.

But you can still log in, you just have to use the houzz domain, such as: https://www.houzz.com/discussions

Once logged into houzz, you should still have all the forums you were following listed on the left, your same profile (minus the cover photo), everything. Presented a bit differently but... at least you're in. And many folks may not even know they're on houzz instead of gardenweb. (check the URL in the address bar)

If I were to lose my login cookie and I could no longer log into gardenweb, I'd log into houzz and edit all my bookmarks replacing gardenweb with houzz. (right-click the bookmark and you should see "properties", "edit", or something like that)

In the meantime, if you're logged on the gardenweb domain (gardenweb.com) and you prefer that format... don't log out. But eventually the login cookie will/may expire and you'll be forced to use houzz.com. That or your computer will age, slow down, you'll replace it, and you be forced to use houzz on your new computer/device. (trying to sign in from gardenweb will give you a redirect error because apparently houzz removed/changed a file)

I'm just guessing but I suspect houzz is trying to slowly migrate users from the gardenweb domain onto the houzz domain without causing too much pushback.

Myself... I prefer the way gardenweb is styled/presented and since I'm still logged into gardenweb, I'll use it while I can. (I even backed up my cookie database file - cookies.sqlite in your active profile if using firefox) That's just me though. Eventually houzz will make changes that will break gardenweb, or the cookie will expire and I'll use houzz. But for now, I'll stick with gardenweb. :)

I've been through the difficulties too and yet again, can't log in on my ipad or phone--only my desk computer. It's *really* important to include the " /discussions" in the Houzz address, or you won't get there. And I do wonder why, no matter which words I use (including houzz,) I cannot google to get here.

I totally got it. Sometimes I show up as "originalpinkmountain" and other times lpinkmountain. I had to rename myself to log back in, however my new name doesn't always take . . .

Thanks for explaining it the way you did Richard. Unfortunately, garden web has been dead to me for quite some time for some reason. I too preferred that format. I have to be on houzz which I don't care for as much as garden web is redirected each time to houzz. It's a small thing, but it does come with these issues. I guess many of us will have various screen names as try our best to get back in after we are 'out' for whichever reason.

I've changed my display name a time or two but have never been locked out of my account and had to resort to creating a new account... yet anyway. :)

Thinking ahead, maybe the thing a person could do is go into their browser settings and copy their username and password and write them down for that eventual someday?

I can't say where they're found in other browsers but in firefox, it's in: about:logins and in my case looks like this...

If a person logs in with the same username and password, whether on gardenweb or houzz, they should never end up with a second account. (I'm not sure about the "Continue with Google" though, I never do that)

The problem Richard, is that (for me at least) my username and password don't work after I do maintenance on my computer. Sometimes I get thrown off the boat without doing anything for my computer. I have all my passwords written down and in a digital file for double back up, so one would think I would not have this issue every-single-time. It's only this website. I finally gave in and created a secondary profile for when this happens. I'm several days post-last thrown overboard, so the frustration is lessened, at this moment, but I know it will happen again. It always does.