quote:
Originally posted by zdlo
I've set the events notification to play a sound when someone on my contact list signs in. Sometimes it plays the sound without any change in that contact's offline situation. It stays appearing offline, not appearing online for even a second, but the events notification plays the sound.
Is it a bug, or is it a way to see if someone is blocking you or appearing offline while actually being online? If it is a way to see that, than that means there is a way to see if someone is appearing offline; which most of the experts here says impossible.
I noticed a problem that seems similar, and it could be the same thing.
Today, I had an event notification go off. The sound was custom to a certain contact, so I knew who had just logged in. I waited for the WLM standard toast to pop up since it usually is delayed by a second or so. But the toast never showed. When I looked at my desktop contacts, she was shown as online. But when I brought up the message window, it said she was offline. My contact list also showed her as offline.
I thought that there may have been a bug that showed people who were appearing offline, so I asked another contact to appear offline so I could test it. When he went off, thought, I got the message that he signed out. But this is where it got interesting (at least to me). When he set his status back to online, I got the MP!L notifications, but he appeared offline in the message window and contact list. I asked him what his status was to make sure, and he said it was online.
I decided to try to talk the the first contact. When I did, she replied. I found out that her status was also set to online. Later, my other contact had to log out and log back in. When he did, his status corrected itself. This gave me an idea. I asked my first contact whether she had changed her status from appear offline to online when she had got on. She said that she had. Later, she had to leave, so she set her status to away. When she did this, it registered that she had logged in.
I just did another test to confirm what I was thinking. When a contact of mine changes their status from 'appear offline' to 'online', MP!L registers the change, while WLM does not. When that contact changes their status to something else, WLM finally registers the fact that they are online.
I don't know whether this is a problem caused by MP!L or WLM. If it is a WLM bug, I would have no way of knowing whether it happened before I got Plus, since Plus is the only way I know that there is a problem. It's up to someone with more knowledge of how MP!L works to figure out whether this could have been caused by the program. Also, for all I know, this could be my problem only. It would be helpful if someone else could see if they have a similar problem.
To the OP: Do you use desktop contacts? If you do, does the status on them change when you get this problem? Also, if it happens again, could you try talking the the contact? If they reply, ask them if they had changed their status from 'appear offline'. Actually, if you wanted to, you could get one of your contacts to appear offline and come back, to test it. It could be really helpful to find out if we are having the same problem.
Edit: I believe I answered all of Patchou's questions, except one. I had been logged in for about a day when I noticed the problem.
Edit 2:
MP!L: 4.20.0.262
WLM: 8.1.0178.00
Late edit: I just had the same issue with a contact who logged in on his cell phone. I'm not sure what to make of it, once again it's up to someone who knows more than I do. I also checked with a friend of mine (who does not use MP!L) to see if he had the same issue when I switch from being offline, and he didn't. So it does seem that the problem started with MP!L.
Another edit: I just noticed another problem. The contact who I originally had a problem with was on again today, and I had the same problem with her not showing as online to the real WLM. The new problem is that she never signed off this time. I mean, MP!L never said she signed off. But after a while, I restarted messenger, and it then showed her as offline, in both WLM and MP!L. I didn't have this problem when I was testing earlier. This is even more annoying, since I honestly can't put any trust into Messenger any more.
I hope someone is reading this. I don't want to bump, since it appears to be against the rules.