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Last edited by nat4200 on 19 Apr 2012, 5:23 am, edited 1 time in total.

There's something strange seems to happen with users with a hyphenated name. Are they one of them by any chance?

So my post count is incorrect?

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Last edited by nat4200 on 19 Apr 2012, 5:28 am, edited 2 times in total.

Oh yeah, I know that already, not too bothered about it as long as my actual post count is being counted correctly

I dunno, looks about right to me.

I can't find an example now, but I've seen how sometimes the database seems to conflate two users together, and it seemed tied into hyphen use.

Yeah, no problems.

The user you're talking about participated in a number of threads that were subsequently removed from the public part of the site, so those posts still exist, it's just that you can't access them.

I assume there would also a discrepancy in my own post count, since a good deal of my posting is done in the mod shack.

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Last edited by nat4200 on 19 Apr 2012, 5:27 am, edited 1 time in total.

No problemo.

There are various reasons for the reported post counts to be... less than accurate.

Although a post count is held in the user's profile, that really only reflects the number of times they have hit the "Post" button (successfully), minus the times their posts have been deleted, either by themselves or a moderator.

In some places, especially the search, the post count is calculated on-the-fly.

Moderators will generally see all counts as tallying up with one another.

However, when phpBB calculates a post count, it only includes those posts that the caller can still see. If some of their posts have been moved into forums that they cannot access (even if it is an under-age member having posts present in a thread moved into the adult forum), they don't get counted.

Then again, WP has crashed at various times in the past, and the database is pretty corrupt in places. This causes various post count mismatches for very long-term members - such as even having negative post counts!
http://www.wrongplanet.net/forums-profi ... -9315.html
http://www.wrongplanet.net/forums-profi ... 12348.html

Another effect of the crashes is when you try to access the last page of a long thread, and find not posts being listed (for example). That's because threads also keep counts of how many posts they think they contain. The software assumes that the thread's count has been correctly maintained when reporting the page number of the last page.

And... all these counts are keep reasonably well, and without them, WP would take approximately three lifetimes to load each page.

To clarify, if you reply to a thread that subsequently gets deleted, does your post count go down?
That's happened once before though I wasn't looking to see if it changed.

Threads are just moved to a section that isnt viewable to non mods/admins so threads still exist and your post count should remain

Oh I see - I always thought they were removed from the site altogether. I know locked topics are still viewable though aren't they

Some are kept viewable some are sent to hidden areas.
It all depends on how bad was it and what was the reason for locking it.

Yes.

However, as spongy pointed out, threads generally get moved out of sight, to remain as evidence, rather than being deleted.

Genuine deletion of threads (or even single posts) is rare. The only times that tends to be done is when there is a major spam attack on the site - and anyone who replies in such spam threads might actually have their posts deleted, along with the thread, just because it really isn't worth keeping more than an odd example of the spam.