Download Limiter Issues

Hey guys, as some of you may have experienced there are some issues with the download tracker.

Some people are reporting having enough mb to download but the system won't allow them to download models. Unfortunately, we have not been unable to reproduce this issue on our end so we can not begin to fix it, that sucks, we know, and we're sorry for the people who are having these issues.

There are literately a dozen different issues that could be happening to cause this so trying to pin point it for each user isn't really possible. So what's this all mean. Ok let me cut to the chase.

Because of the way the site works now you technically don't have to log in for the system to track you, because of this the tracker was done using custom code that works outside the WordPress themework. Jonathan believes this is what is causing issues, we did this because we didn't want to make people log in to have to download from the website.

However, with all the issues popping up the only thing that makes sense is to require people to login to download models, this way WordPress tracks the downloads more efficiently and hopefully with less bugs than we have now. I've wanted to stay away from this method because I though it restricted users experience.

Looking at other sites that people use like CGTextures.com ShareCG.com Goodtextures.com all these sites require you to login to download anything, even Blenderartist.org requires you to login to post, granted that makes more sense than the other sites. I feel like I'm just typing jibberish, sorry. So as of right now nothing on the site will change, you guys are still going to have issues with downloads, we're sorry about that, but moving forward in Version 4 of Blendswap, you will be required to login to download any models.

We know some people may see this as crap, but it's the only way we think makes sense for what we need the site to do. Besides with the new features in Version 4 I think a lot of users are going to want to log in anyways just to see what's going on with their models ;)

So, shit's not working quite right, right now. Sorry about that, and we will not be trying to fix it because Version 4 of the site will hopefully drop around the first of the year and we don't see a point in trying to fix something that will soon be replaced. To the people that think having to login to download is crap, sorry, but we see this as necessary.

So here's what's going to happen, we're going to open downloads again for the rest of the month as a ammend for all those downloads that have failed during these last weeks, but don't get used to it because when version 4 rolls around you will again be limited to your original download limit. (Unlimited downloads are running already at the time of publication of this post, pay no attention to any indication of a limit).

Again we are trully sorry for the issues you guys have been having, and the lack of replies from me about your concerns. But we didn't know what to do. Until Version 4 of the site drops downloads will be unlimited, please take it easy on downloading so we don't bust our limit on bandwidth.

When Version 4 drops limited downloads will be reimplemented and hopefully work correctly, but everyone will be required to login to download from the site.

The Blendswap Crew.