Author: kevin

Description:
Add a 'delayed edit' checkbox (or param to URL) that allows people making very
long edits to submit them in an offline mode.

When submitting a large edit, I'm consistently getting errors (due to server
load) of:

Sorry- we have a problem...
The wikimedia web server didn't return any response to your request.
To get information on what's going on you can visit #wikipedia.
An "offsite" status page is hosted on OpenFacts.
Generated Mon, 02 May 2005 20:32:33 GMT by srv5.wikimedia.org
(squid/2.5.STABLE9.wp20050411.S9plus.no2GB[icpfix,nortt,htcpclr])

this is causing me great frustration. I understand it is due to large server
loads, and would like to tell the wiki servers, "Hey, just do this whenever you
can, I'll move on with my life and come back.". This timeout problem is also
affecting others, mentioned with significant "Yah, that's happening to me a lot,
too" on #wikipedia chat.

I'd like to suggest that there be a checkbox on a page (activated by a
javascript character count of the input box size) saying, "submit normally" or
"submit delayed". the latter would add a param to the form submittal saying,
"delayedSave=1". this would allow the webserver to return very quickly saying,
"got it" and the processing can happen in the background. Any errors would
result in a lost edit, but that's better than not being able to submit at all
when the servers get busy.

Alternatively, a simple checkbox or alternate submit button saying 'submit
delayed' would be nice. Or, just keep it hidden, and change the timeout message
(above) to read, "if you want to post this edit in delayed mode, add the
following to the url before submitting...".

Version: unspecified
Severity: enhancement