[SOLVED] Random Story Module Fix

[dollars5]

Hello,

I just noticed that the random story module seemed to have some problem if there were some discarded stories.

Example: Say you have just 10 stories, and 2-published and 8-discarded - then there is more probability that it would point to the discarded stories.

Here is a small fix that will always guarantee to get a published story for reading:
change

$randstory = rand(1, count($cols));

to

$rand_num = rand(1, count($cols)-1);
$randstory = $cols[$rand_num];

[Geoserv]

What file did you edit?

Geoserv

[dollars5]

Oh, I forgot to mention the file /modules/random_story/random_story_main.php

[kbeeveer46]

Are you sure? If you take a look at the random story code it only grabs published stories.

 $cols = $db->get_col('select link_id from ' . table_links . ' where `link_status` = "published" order by link_id desc limit 200;');
    //echo count($cols);
    if($cols){
        $randstory = rand(1, count($cols));
        $randstoryurl = getmyurl("story", $randstory);
        $main_smarty->assign('random_story_randstoryurl', $randstoryurl);
    } 
  

as you can see from the SQL query that it's only going to pull published stories from the database and then randomize those published stories. Maybe there is a bug with this but I'm not sure.

[dollars5]

A closer look will reveal that we only get the count of the published stories and find a random number - where there is some probability that the number can be an unpublished or discarded story even.

$randstory = rand(1, count($cols));

Consider this small sample set:
link_id : link_status
1 : published
2: discarded
3 : queued
4 : published
5 : queued
6: discarded
7 : discarded
8 : queued
9 : published
10 : discarded

here published=3, queued=3, discarded=4
the count($cols) = 3
say rand(1,3) returns 2 - now it points to a discarded story.

Though the original intention is to use only published stories, we rather seem to pick a random number of the count rather than a random published story.

Thus the small modification of picking one of the 3 published story using the above tweak:

$randstory = $cols[rand(1, count($cols)-1)];

Hope you get the point.

[dollars5]

Also since we consider

count($cols)

- it sometimes gets the last story+1 too so is the correction

count($cols)-1)

[kbeeveer46]

I see what you mean. I'll have to double check with Ash about it.

[dollars5]

any updates on this.

[sunstardude]

Hello,

I just noticed that the random story module seemed to have some problem if there were some discarded stories.

Example: Say you have just 10 stories, and 2-published and 8-discarded - then there is more probability that it would point to the discarded stories.

Here is a small fix that will always guarantee to get a published story for reading:
change

$randstory = rand(1, count($cols));

to

$rand_num = rand(1, count($cols)-1);
$randstory = $cols[$rand_num];

Thanks, dollars5! Now what must be done to make it also include upcoming/queued stories when randomizing?

Edit: Disregard this post... I just noticed it's NOT working. It seemed to be because only about 2 percent of the stories are discarded.

[AshDigg]

Whoops!

To fix it change this line

         $randstoryurl = getmyurl("story", $randstory); 
  

to this

         $randstoryurl = getmyurl("story", $cols[$randstory]); 
  

The problem is, say you have 1,000 stories. It will pick the last 200 stories, number 801 to 1000. It then picks a random number between 1 and 200, then shows the story with that ID. The problem is, the stories we want are ID 801 to 1000. So it's possible it'll pick story ID #56 (for example) which could be discarded or queued or maybe even deleted. The line above will now make it pick #56 from the results (801 + 56 = #857) and should now show the correct story.