veiled4allah: changes to comment procedure

Since the denial of service attack on my site two weeks ago, I've implemented a variety of changes to my comments system in order to protect against a similar attack in the future. Most of these changes are behind the scenes and don't affect ordinary visitors and commentors in any way.

However, two changes that I've made this weekend will affect you if you wish to leave a comment.

1) Commenting is now a two-stage process. After you've typed your comment, you have to click on a button called "Spell-Check". This will take you to a new page where you can review your comment and make any desired changes. As a bonus, your comment is also run through a spell-checker (the spell-check functionality has been around for many months, but was previously optional). Only after this stage can you post your comment.

2) On the spell-check page, you must also enter a security code. This should be pretty easy for most folks. You will see an image with a number in it. Enter the number exactly as you see it in the form field below it.

This should be pretty straight-forward, it just requires a little extra work from you. The reason I've implemented these changes is that although they are straight-forward for a human being entering a comment directly, they should be effective in slowing down or stopping automated comment submission scripts like the one that was used in the DOS attack against me.

If you are using a text-only browser or do not have images displayed in your browser (unlikely in this day and age) or if you have special accessability needs (possible) you may not be able to view the security code image. If so, you won't be able to post comments. However, you are free as always to email me.

Please let me know if you experience any problems with the new comment procedure. Thanks for your patience, and I apologize for any inconvenience.

Note 1: More tech details available at my MT tips blog, for those who are interested.

Note 2: While I was at it, I made some substantial modifications to my comment posting template which was horribly cluttered. Hopefully the new version is more user-friendly, inshallah, and this makes up for the extra hassle in commenting.