Long story, but I was playing around with using different firewalls and when I installed ZA (ZoneAlarm) and then logged onto SFN there was 1 noticeable problem. You know how you can click on New Posts, Search or Quick Links and get a drop down menu... well the drop down part didn't work.

 

As soon as I disabled ZA it did work.

 

As soon as I removed ZA and went back to Norton firewall it worked.

 

This wasn't a browser setting, ZA itself was blocking part of SFN despite the fact I gave www.scienceforums.net 100% access rights.

 

Oh, and it wouldn't let Yahoo! Mail load either. Again the site had access rights and again disabling/removing ZA fixed the issue.

 

I was never a fan of ZA and the fact that it just wouldn't work really didn't help my already negative view of the program.

 

NB: Those sites did have access rights, they could download cookies, activeX, Java applets & anything the site might want was all enabled through the ZA options.

 

I'm not saying ZA is a bad firewall, it is quite good, but I've just never really liked it as a program and this isn't the first time I've had issues when trying to use it.

I use a free version of it, but haven't had those problems. I don't know what is causing your problem. Probably space aliens.

ditto.

 

are you using zone alarm or zone alarm pro?

ZA Pro... I had just installed the trial version.

drop down arrows are seen as a security threat?

I doubt it... all I know is that when ZA is active they don't load, when ZA is disabled they do load. The site has access rights anyway, so even if they were a security threat I had specified for it to be allowed anyway. Dunno!

ZA is a funny beast. I use the free version for the lovely firewall - I find the other stuff pretty pointless.

By "other stuff" are you referring to the AV, anti-spyware, mail scanner etc. ?

 

And am I correct to assume that no one else has the same problems that I have described?

I experienced this problem once, and I am using Zone Alarm (the free one).

 

It went away after that, so I really have no idea what's wrong with yours. Any custom security options?

Any custom security options?

Well it started out as all default and it didn't work. Then, as I always do, I fully customised everything myself... and it still didn't work

 

Like I said in the first post, I'm not using ZA anymore, back to the old firewall/AV setup, still, thought I'd mention it here.

maybe zonealarm pro disables java or something? I believe thats how the drop-downs are done.

 

Did you deactivate avast!/norton before you installed ZAPro? multiple anti-viruses can cause all sorts of problems if the active protection is activated for more than one of them (I'm assuming that ZAPro is the firewall/av/anti-slyware suite).

 

Come to think of it, i occasionally have that trouble with the drop-downs: if i click too soon (ie, before the page is completely loaded) then it redirects me to the search page rather than giving me a drop-down; maybe ZAPro increased the d/l time or something, so you were clicking before the page was fully downloaded (before the javascript was read/applied?)

Come to think of it' date=' i occasionally have that trouble with the drop-downs: if i click too soon (ie, before the page is completely loaded) then it redirects me to the search page rather than giving me a drop-down; maybe ZAPro increased the d/l time or something, so you were clicking before the page was fully downloaded (before the javascript was read/applied?)[/quote']

 

same thing happens to me.

Dak is probably correct; the links would take you to the search page if the Javascript was not there (the JS prevents it from letting you go there). Most likely, Zone Alarm prevents javascript from loading (or it requires some form of annoying authentication for it, or something) so that happens. Probably the privacy controls.

 

Doesn't happen to me though.

ZA Pro does not include the AV, so I still had Avast running... norton firewall had been disabled and removed entirely, there was no - can't think of the word - when two programs running don't work together and so the net effect is two not fully working programs.

 

Even without ZA I can't click on the New Posts (or whatever JS button) immediately, there's a small wait.

 

It is quite possilbe that ZA was mucking around with JS and there's a small possibility that when I configure it I may have left JS blocked... but when I gave http://www.scienceforums.net access rights it should have allowed the site to use JS.

 

Whatever option it was it would have been enabled by default and as no one else seems to have this problem... dunno, I think blaming JS seems a good bet!

^ yeah, javascript can be used for a whole range of annoying/malitiouse purposes, so i wouldnt be surprised if ZAPro has some kind of anti-malitouse-javascript thingy that is mistaking the SFN drop-down javascript for malitouse.

 

just a guess tho; i only use the free, bog-standard-firewall ZA.

 

edit: aha! linkagah seems like it could have been the ad-blocking bit of ZAPro.

If someone has nothing better to do they could get ZA Pro (free 15 day trial) and see if they have the same problem... but you prob all have better things to do, so no probs, it's only really outta interest, no need.