[TECHNICAL] Deleted attachments (pictures/drawings/photographs)

[Ventus Fall]

So, suggestion time from me

When someone uploads a file as an attachment to the forums, it stays on for a certain amount of time. I personally don't know -nor have ever been able to figure out- how long these attachments stay on for, but they do get seemingly automatically deleted after a while, with the message:

[attachment deleted by admin]


When I saw that message for the first time (which I believe was half a year or a year after a post I made containing attachments), I thought I was doing something wrong. I asked a moderator and friend at the time what I did wrong, and the answer was I hadn't done anything wrong, that it's just something that happens automatically.
There was no other place I had uploaded those certain pictures in the past, and no stash on deviantArt for me to store there. So these pictures are gone forever, as I also can't find them anywhere in my camera folder and such.

That's besides the point, though. It just an experience I had with this I wish to share.

My suggestion?
One of two things:
1) Either mention clearly somewhere what the time limit is how long a file stays on for, maybe also changing the automated message to say it was automatically removed because of a time limit.
2) Have the pictures uploaded the whole time and not automatically removed.

[MrRazot]

I'm a bit confused by this to be honest. I didn't actually realise this was a thing... >->


e.g. there's lots of pics still there on the What Do You Look Like thread.

[Ventus Fall]

e.g. there's lots of pics still there on the What Do You Look Like thread.

Any pictures shown via a link (the url and/or img tags) are no problem if the picture is still online.
However, if the picture was uploaded on the forums (when you click the + button next to "Attachments and other options") then after a while these pictures seem to be deleted automatically. It seems as if an admin removed them, but from what I heard it's an automatic process. (Hope this makes it clearer?)

I don't mind it's automatic, but mention of it somewhere would be nice and how much time a picture stays on the forums if uploaded by such means

[Vortex Cynbel]

I think this has to do with how much space the forum has. Maybe it doesn't have to do with the amount of time a picture is posted but rather the file size of it. Since the forum works on limited resources I am guessing larger pictures are deleted manually by some admin (or some kind of algorithm) in order that every member can attach pictures at any times.


But as you know I am not an admin nor I run this site so I wouldn't actually know x3 It would be good if we could have an official answer..

[Vosur Aekira]

I've seen it a couple of times as well, but I do believe it is automatic instead of manually done. I usually see details of if there are edits to a post but usually there are none or the timing of it doesn't quite add up to when the attachment was lost.

[Ventus Fall]

I don't think it's manual either, and like I said in the first post I asked a moderator about it and they said it was automatic (although I cannot remember who it was). I don't see any admins going through every single post just to find pictures and to remove them
And if I recall correctly there is a limit to how large the file can be to be uploaded.

But yeah, if maybe it can be mentioned when uploading a picture and/or somewhere else that such things are removed (automatically) over time, that would be very helpful in my opinion

[Tweak]

It's a manually run process. If I get alerts that the attachment directory is filling up I'll run a script which clears out all attachments from a specifc period of time. It's not done often, I sometimes increase the space instead but over time a lot of attachments build up and it's easier to clear them.

[Vosur Aekira]

Interesting, must be an option that doesn't require editing each post then? Anyways, would there be a way to have an auto-notification sent out to those who are about to lose the images that were attached?

[Vortex Cynbel]

Also is there a way to recover deleted data? I don't think it exists but I wanted to ask just in case..

[Ventus Fall]

It's a manually run process. If I get alerts that the attachment directory is filling up I'll run a script which clears out all attachments from a specifc period of time. It's not done often, I sometimes increase the space instead but over time a lot of attachments build up and it's easier to clear them.

Ah, ok! You learn something new every day xD

Can we in that case perhaps still add clearly somewhere that attachments might get deleted over time, to keep this in mind when uploading to the forums that it is not meant for the purpose of uploading imagery and to 'store' it on here?