Recycle Bug

This thread to make players and developers aware of the Recycle/Selection bug.


There is a Bug in the recycle process, which may be the selection part of it. This is rare for it to happen, but I have now confirmed previous occurrences of mine were not mouse-device related.

Scenario:
*right click an inventory item
*select Recycle from the drop-down menu
*a confirmation box pops up for a completely different item than the one you clicked

As you can see this could be a dangerous bug, however I would guess it is only happening 1/1000 recycles so if anyone has information to reproduce this bug perhaps we can speed up the fix time.

Below are two screenshots that explain the problem visually, note this is an EXAMPLE and subtle green selection squares may appear in different locations when the bug is actually occurring.



Archived image unavailable: bug-recycle-EXAMPLE-01.html

Archived image unavailable: bug-recycle-EXAMPLE-02.html

In this example we want to recycle Code Bit 2, but the selection for some reason jumps up to a different row/column and does the action.

Some times when recycling squares we are careful about the initial click, but do not read the confirmation box. Make sure you do for now until this is fixed or we get a lock function.

I had an idea, it might help to troubleshoot this issue.

Due to the nature of UDP not having error checking, and the rareness of this bug,
It's possible that the "select this square" message was not received by Server, and the last selected square is still equal to the "currently selected square" variable on server (assuming it works like this).

A way for the developers to test this internally, would be to add a command /sendSQpositionoff to a test version of client
For the test they could select "Kessay AR1 square" first, type the above command which would stop square select messages from being sent by the client, then select the CodeBit2 square (message would not be sent), open the right click menu (edit: its possible the right click from this would be another select message send) then issue the recycle instruction .. recycle function on server would take it's target from "currently selected square" variable which has not been updated.

What would be a fix should this actually be the cause? Not certain, but some form of manual checking on that data. I don't think sending square select data twice would be a good fix, for example if there was a connectivity issue in-between client and server for a second both messages would be lost.

There's an alternate method of recycling an item wherin you drag it onto the info symbol. Do you think it would be affected by this too? or would it be a safer way of recycling until this gets fixed?

TheTaxidermist, in your scenario if this error occurred..

Assuming holding left mouse button down is suppost to send a "currently selected square" info to server, and the second message "recycle" sent when the mouse is released over the $I. It's possible that method of recycle would fall victim to the same problem should the first data not arrive at server. (assuming it works like this, which it may not)

edit:
Until we know what is causing it.. double check what you are recycling by reading the confirmation box, and if you have an item outside of email that is important.. be extra careful when recycling. This might be inconvenient but it's better than loosing something you can't get back. This bug has happened around 5 times to me since I have been playing and it's only the last time I was sure there is a problem with a part of the process.

edit: and in-case a valued item's name does appear in the confirmation box, Alt+F4 your client to quit, an error with laser mouse at the last moment could have your cursor skip to the Yes button.

more reasons why we need a Lock function on inventory items.

Natasha's analysis of the problem seems strong to me, which suggests that this issue is lag-related. 

Just so you know it's also better if you sent a /bug about this in game with the same information that way the devs will get the data instantly as they don't always read the forums.

Cadsuane wrote:

Natasha's analysis of the problem seems strong to me, which suggests that this issue is lag-related. 

Yup. I think it could be something client-side, rather than a bug. I don't think anyone else has had this bug before and you'know just check the Info box before you recycle stuff, its as simple as that.

Sell it to a vendor, you get twice the info

It is possible that the issue is network related, but it could be anything.
It might be unfixable, for example an error in memory, Microsoft doesn't often do things perfect.