There is a bug in the record navigation app
I have complained about this bug previously but it persists in the record navigation app. Go to a page of records, e.g., Canada, Quebec Catholic Parish Registers, 1621-1979; St. Régis; Baptêmes, mariages, sépultures 1848-1876, and try this: Replace the page number "1" with "200" and hit <enter>. It takes you to page 200 of the records, as you would expect. Now, say you want to edit the page number to "100" instead of "200": Backspace over the "2", replace it with "1" and hit <enter>. It takes you to page "1", not page "100" as expected. For some reason, the zeroes have been lost. If you do the same thing using numbers that aren't zero, e.g., start at 223, try to go to 123 by backspacing over the 2 and replacing it with 1, hit <enter>, it takes you to page 123, as expected. If the way the navigation tool works depends on the number you type in, it's a bug.
The previous version of that record navigation app used to work properly for changing page numbers before the bug I just described was introduced, but it was also better designed, because the right and left arrow keys for moving through the records were close to each other, adjacent to the page number. Now you have to move the mouse from one side of the screen to the other to do this once simple operation. Also, when you are entering a title for the record you want to store in the source box, normal line editing functions no longer work. (I'm talking about the line editing functions that have been around for decades!) You have to scroll through the whole entry to select and copy it, for example. And, if you hit the down arrow key to get to the next line of text, it often changes the record you are looking at instead of taking you to the next line of text you have entered for the title. I have had the software crash while doing this, or take me to a screen that tells me I'm not authorized to look at that record.
Whenever I try to use the Feedback tab, I get the message "An error has prevented the requested action. Please visit the FamilySearch Community for help or to report an issue." This has prevented me from reporting the following bug in the record navigation app, which I have reported twice previously elsewhere, having received no response.
Best Answers
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Rewriting an application using an up-to-date technology stack doesn't oblige you to lose good and well-used functionality, just either:
to provide similar capabilities using the new technology, or
to discuss the matter with your user community/beta testers and sort out (and communicate in advance of go-live) how users will be able to work round the gap.
Obviously, though, people do need to accept that the screens and flows may differ from those in the previous version.
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I'm also on Win10 and Firefox, and the Feedback tab works fine. I've been using it a lot lately, begging them to restore the previous functionality of the Catalog's image viewer, but I'm pretty sure I'm just shouting into the void.
I seldom use the backspace or delete keys on the image number field; usually, I select the digit(s) that I want to change and type the new digit(s), and that appears to work as expected. I can confirm, however, that the behavior with backspace and zeros is Truly Odd and kind of unpredictable, for me. (I think Gordon was demonstrating some patterns in his video? Someone distracted me partway through and I lost track.)
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Yes, there is a pattern and thinking about it more, I see what the programming is doing.
There is no image 0. When you try to type a 0 into the navigation box, nothing happens.
If you have a number that ends in zeros, such as 200, and erase the 2, you are left with 00 which immediately changes to a blank box because there is no image 00. No matter how fast of a typer you are, you cannot type fast enough to use the backspace to erase the 2 then type in a 1 to change it to 100. As soon as you hit the backspace key to delete the 2 the box contains 00 which the routine helpfully erases for you so that by the time you type a 1 and hit return, you go to page 1, not 100.
The same happens if you start with 20 and try to go to 10 by erasing the 2 and typing a 1.
Likewise if you start with 201and erase the 2, the program changes the 01 to 1 so when you type a 1, you end up on page 11, not 101.
It works differently when the initial number is highlighted and replaced which must be because there is never a time that that initial number is actually gone.
I would put this in the category of computer routines that are too helpful. I find these quite annoying. (Whenever I update my system I turn off as many automatic process as I can.) If I want to type a 0 and learn for myself there is no 0 image, let me. If I want to enter 1 as 001, let me. Don't helpfully erase the two leading zeros that I want to type.
I don't think I would have ever come across this issue because I personally find it quicker to double click with the mouse and completely type the new number I want. But then I type weird, also. I find it easier and quicker If I am typing along and make a mistake to just use the delete key to erase back to the letter I mistyped and then continue on rather than to use the back arrow to move to the wrong letter, correct it, then use forward arrow to return to the end of the word, then continue typing.
I would chalk this one up the programmers not realizing anyone would ever edit numbers the way @MDoran1 does or not noticing the effect of creating leading zeros halfway through that type of editing. They can't test every possible way of doing everything. But I do hope that now this has been reported that it is a quick fix and it just starts working well for your, @MDoran1 , in a week or two.
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Yeah, there is absolutely no reason for the computer to pay any attention whatsoever to the contents of the image number box until the user hits "enter".
Leading zeros aren't the only thing it's being overhelpful about: if there are only 451 images, then it will not let me change 401 into 55 by first changing the 4 into a 5 — if I select the 4 and type 5, it leaves the 4 unchanged and moves my cursor after the 1 (!). This means that if I'm trying to work quickly and accidentally select only part of the number, I end up typing essentially numerical gibberish into the box, because the computer has "helpfully" moved the cursor on me.
All of these misbehaviors of the image number box are especially nonhelpful in this new-and-disimproved arrangement, because typing in the box is now really the only efficient navigation method — the forward and back arrows are way over at opposite sides of the image, and my mouse hand practically cramps up just thinking about finding them and clicking them.
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@MDoran1 there have been reports here that certain browser add ons block that feedback tab.
To quote @Áine Ní Donnghaile from a post of hers: "Also, the Feedback button works poorly if you have any adblockers active on FamilySearch. AdBlock Plus, uBlock Origin, and Malwarebytes BrowserGuard are all known to affect the FS Feedback button adversely. There are surely others."
Regarding the programming bug vs. quirk, I can confirm that this occurs using MacOS 15.1.1 with Safari 18.1.1. Strange things happen when you use the back arrow to change a page number and there are zeros in the number:
Just so you are aware, when reports like this are posted in the community, when a moderator sees them they do get forwarded to the proper team but we users do not always get a reply here reporting that that has occurred. It can days to years for a problem to be corrected depending on the complexity of the repair, the severity of the problem, and the number of higher priority items. For this particular issue, since is it only a minor annoyance, unless it is a five minute fix it probably is going to have a pretty low priority and not get fixed for a long time.
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I've also noticed another occasional quirk with the Feedback button. A first attempt to give Feedback on a specific page will provide an error message. But, waiting a minute or so, on the same page, using the same browser, and the Feedback button will work as expected.
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I have some programming experience, and I know a bug when I see one: That's a bug. Not a quirk. It may even explain some of the instability that I have experienced with this app. The reason I reported it is that I go through hundreds of records on a weekly basis and that bug slows me down and is very frustrating to have to deal with. What's incomprehensible to me is that the old version of that navigation app worked perfectly well, was better designed and just generally worked better. No problems with the line editing on it either, unlike this new version (I think I covered that in a separate note). So why did you get rid of it?
BTW, I'm using Microsoft 10 and Firefox browser with no active ad blockers.
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Why did they update the navigation app? The answer the developers usually give is that the old pages of the website were based on web technology that is now antiquated, slow, and ready to self destruct and updating to a new underlying platform and rewriting the various pages is necessary for security concerns and to not only keep the pages functioning at all but to improve various aspects.
It's good you posted your operating system and browser. Now they can see that it is a problem in more than one operating system and more than one browser. I checked and this is also a problem on my Mac with Firefox 133.0.
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My workaround to use the feedback button is to copy the URL and log into FamilySearch with Chrome. While it's not ideal, it works and it doesn't log me out of my preferred browser (Firefox).
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Thanks for all the feedback. Maybe because several people have run into this problem the solution will be found quickly. I'm sure I have encountered every one of the instances you have cited in my searches through records. The reason being able to use the backspace and delete keys normally is important to me is that I usually search for several hundred records each week and I often use a binary search approach to zero in on the target record, adjusting the record number with each iteration. It would take too long to type in the whole number each time.
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As I mentioned earlier, if this is happening, it could explain some of the other bizarre behaviour of this "new and improved" record navigation app. For instance, has anyone else ever been sent to a message that tells you you are not authorized to access the record?
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Hidden Feature Alert:
@Julia Szent-Györgyi wrote, "All of these misbehaviors of the image number box are especially nonhelpful in this new-and-disimproved arrangement, because typing in the box is now really the only efficient navigation method — the forward and back arrows are way over at opposite sides of the image, and my mouse hand practically cramps up just thinking about finding them and clicking them."
Julia, to save your hand from cramping, be aware that the forward and back arrow keys move you forward or back one image at a time. There is no need to move the mouse pointer from one side of the screen to the other. (No, I didn't know this either until five minutes ago when I tested it out.)
Holding down the shift key and using the forward, back, up and down arrow keys slides the image around on the page. This can be used instead of clicking and dragging the image.
I poked around to see if there was a key combination that moves the film forward or back in multiples of 5 or 10 but couldn't find one.
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About Gordon Collett's solution to the new positions of the forward and backward arrow keys: That's a very useful suggestion and I will use it whenever possible. The question remains though, why have they made this "improvement"? It was far better the way it was in the older version of the app, with the arrow keys right beside the record number. We could have the feature you found, plus minimal required cursor movement by placing the arrow keys close together, as before. (I really hope the programmers are watching this thread . . . are you there?)
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@MDoran1 We've been assured multiple times that suggestions posted here are passed on from the moderators to the programmers. But historically we have hardly ever heard back as to whether an idea or bug will be acted on or not. Improvements either show up one day or do not. In the groups dedicated to feeedback on new features which are under active development we do tend to get responses such as in some of these Community groups:
Some of it is just a moderate comment along the lines of "Thank you for reporting this. We've passed it on." But sometimes we do hear back from the project managers themselves such as the comment from Robert Parker near the end of this thread:
https://community.familysearch.org/discussion/170303/ok-now-this-is-downright-insulting
(No, I'm not any type of FamilySearch Center personnel or support but there can some some interesting posts in that group at times.)
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The Swedish National Archives has this type of navigation which works well and is pretty handy:
You can't type in a page number, but on the side you can jump to a particular year and the top bar lets you jump to the start of the film, go back five images, go back one image, open a dropdown menu to pick a particular image, go forward one image, go forward five images, or jump to the end of the film. Something like this in the FamilySearch viewer would be nice. I do, however, like typing in the page number more than scrolling down what can be a very long menu to pick the number.
The Norwegian archives image view also works well:
You can type in an image number, slide the marker on the bar, go forward or back one image, or type in a page number.
So there are a lot of good viewers out there but I am not aware of any that have the forward and back arrows as far apart as FamilySearch does. I agree that that is a bit of an unfortunate, impractical design flaw. I can only assume the designers assumed one would be going forward continually or backward continually rather than jumping forward then immediately backward repeatedly.
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Ancestry and FindMyPast also put the forward and back buttons at opposite sides of the image - as far apart as is possible. And, the arrows on FMP are tiny.
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