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In the event of not having the iOS app, or needing a function usable only on the 'main' site (like viewing active Moderator Election pages), it is sometimes necessary to open the Desktop format of the site to see data. Also, sometimes, you have to use the Desktop format of the site for some functionality which isn't embedded into the Mobile app (i.e. reading deleted posts/threads/questions as a 10k+ user on sites, when you don't have a computer handy).

Relatively recently, within the past two weeks, comments no longer show in Mobile Safari when looking at the Desktop format of the site. It affects the 'embedded' web browser in the Mobile Stack Exchange app, and also the Safari bundled with the iOS.

This has been tested by me on multiple sites, and replicated on all sites I've tested (SciFi, Ask Ubuntu, Unix and Linux, and also StackOverflow)

My current workaround involves utilizing Google Chrome mobile to achieve this, but this is a pain to constantly switch between Chrome and the Stack Exchange app or mobile Safari. Nuking the Safari cache doesn't help fix this either.

Has this issue been observed by anyone else, and is there a fix in the works, potentially, for this recent issue?

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  • Well, you can always install Chrome on your device and use it.
    – Shadow The GPT Wizard
    Jun 11, 2016 at 6:20
  • @ShadowWizard Which is already what I do (please read my current workaround here). There is a privacy leak in that Google browser though which is one problem, and it doesn't disable the built in browser popup window within the iOS mobile app either so it's not a full solution.
    – Thomas Ward
    Jun 11, 2016 at 12:05
  • Well, according to the answer here, mobile safari is supported, so the bug should be fixed. Hopefully sooner than later...
    – Shadow The GPT Wizard
    Jun 11, 2016 at 12:12
  • Hopefully! This seems to affect the Mobile site as well, 'cause looking at this exact question from iOS Safari in the Mobile view has the same issue
    – Thomas Ward
    Jun 11, 2016 at 13:17
  • @Shadow Not necessarily. Mobile browsers are officially supported for the mobile view of the site only. We don't make guarantees for the desktop view to work on them. We try to fix the very major problems for the desktop view but it isn't always possible.
    – animuson StaffMod
    Jun 11, 2016 at 16:26
  • @animuson but looks like the mobile view is also bugged, see the OP's latest comment.
    – Shadow The GPT Wizard
    Jun 11, 2016 at 16:35
  • @animuson As of today the issue extends to the mobile variant of the sites as well. And, unless you're extending all of the site functions into the mobile app, there are some things that can only be done, even via phone, on the Desktop form of the site via a mobile browser (election checking, seeing 10k+ viewable only posts, etc.) which implies that you would therefore need to extend the features out to the app if you want to keep them usable for all people on all platforms.
    – Thomas Ward
    Jun 11, 2016 at 17:39
  • @animuson and other Mods: mark this as status-norepro or status-declined - I have details about this issue which make it proven it's not an SE issue. (Neither full-site nor mobile-site modes are actually broken on SE's side)
    – Thomas Ward
    Jul 7, 2016 at 16:33

1 Answer 1

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Okay, so this can be status-norepro or similar. It turns out that what my workplace did not tell me was they force-installed an adblocker that blocks all types of 'comment' fields on sites browsed to by the Apple iOS mobile client, when setting up MobileIron and corporate email on my own phone. It uses all sorts of CSS level things for blocking as well, which made it more difficult to debug until I dug deeper into what was going on.

Ultimately, adding *.stackexchange.com, *.askubuntu.com, etc. to the whitelist solved the issue, and comments came back. I feel kinda stupid now for posting that this is an issue, but I only noticed the new adblocking/contentblocking app when doing an inventory of what's on my phone.

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