Title
Detect if recaptcha is blocked, if so, notify user more prominently
Short, concise description of the idea
Sometimes the "prove you're a human" tests on certain pages don't appear, because the user has JavaScript from recaptcha.net blocked. LiveJournal should handle this in a more obvious way.
Full description of the idea
Some pages on LiveJournal (notably, in Support terms, the Lost Information and Join LiveJournal pages) require users to complete a CAPTCHA in order to proceed. These CAPTCHAs are served by recaptcha.net. If the user permits JavaScript from LiveJournal, but blocks it from recaptcha.net, they will see a page that has no CAPTCHA, but also minimal indication that they are not seeing a CAPTCHA that should be there. There is a heading that says "Prove you're a human", but no significant indication below it that anything is missing.
Some CAPTCHA-using web pages have code that detects whether JavaScript from their CAPTCHA provider is blocked, and either displays a non-JavaScript CAPTCHA, or a message asking the user to permit JavaScript from their CAPTCHA provider. I suggest that LiveJournal implement something similar. Either a full-on JavaScript blocking detection hoodackey, or something as simple as an additional bit of text that says something like "If you do not see a CAPTCHA below this message, please set your browser or security software to permit JavaScript from recaptcha.net." Or something in between.
Edited to add on Wednesday, 24 February 2010 at 19:22 UTC:
- This is what the Join LiveJournal page looks like with LiveJournal JavaScripts permitted, and ReCaptcha JavaScripts forbidden.
- The logged-out Support request form already degrades gracefully to a non-JavaScript CAPTCHA if LiveJournal JavaScripts are permitted but ReCaptcha JavaScripts forbidden, so the code already exists to do this.
- I've also found since submitting this entry that the Lost Information form now seems to degrade gracefully as well - it didn't before.
- I haven't looked at any other (potentially) CAPTCHA-bearing pages on LiveJournal; the comment submission form come to mind, but there may be others
[edits end]
An ordered list of benefits
- More users can successfully complete the "Lost Information" or "Join LiveJournal" forms without opening Support requests.
An ordered list of problems/issues involved
- May require co-ordination with recaptcha to implement fully.