This has happened a sufficient number of times on different machines, using different browsers, to be more than just bad luck.

I spend a long time writing a post to start a new thread.

I click the green 'Create Thread' button.

But instead of the reassuring green bar saying something about success, I get a nasty red bar like this...

That's not the bad news though. This is - I use the back button on my browser to try again...

...but everything I typed has been lost.

So I have to start again from scratch.

Please fix this.

N.B. I'm not 100% certain, but I think it is more likely to happen if there's an image in the post.

P.S. I didn't get the error writing this post - the screenshot's from the creation of another thread within the past hour or so on this same machine. So you should be able to find the log.

Reported to developer

Just had another one trying to create a thread in the Marketplace Support Forum, a few minutes ago, and from this computer

(N.B. I made the previous post purely to get a timestamp - the "failure to create a thread" happened a few minutes before that and from the same computer, so that may help you identify the log entry.

I did not have an image in the post, so the thought that it might be to do with images is incorrect.

However, when I eventually managed to create the thread (having retyped everything) the title was truncated (I think I'd used double quotes " around part of the title,and when the thread was created the first " and everything after it had vanished). So the problem might have something to do with titles that are too long, and/or specific characters in the title.

This is normally caused by a session timeout. About how long did it take you to type up that last post that failed?

I probably take a bit longer than most people - I'd say a few minutes, possibly five, for that last thread that failed.

Is there a specific timeout, or is it variable ?

I just tried a quick test by taking a known time (just over 10 minutes) to create a new thread. I hit 'Create Thread' for that a few minutes ago and it failed. So I think you're probably correct.

Can you add a warning about the timeout to that page ? It's not the timeout itself that's the problem, but the fact that I've taken a long time to get the post correct, and when it fails to create the thread I lose everything that I so carefully typed ! Perhaps I should adopt a more slapdash approach ? ;o)

Here's the text of the thread that just failed to create (probably spurious information now):