Take a second look at the private entries list

[lwc]

After this change, only portablefreeware.com/index.php?q=[#lwc] still needs fixing (e.g. [@lwc] works).

Also just to stress, the entire point is the only way to get those searches is manually, so it's not supposed to be encoded.

[Andrew Lee]

Can we establish some baseline here?

If you go to the home page and enter "[#lwc]" into the search box, you should get the page "lwc's private submissions (4)" with 4 private entries. The URL will be "https://www.portablefreeware.com/index. ... 3lwc%5D&m=", right?

Alternatively if you visit one of the many URL encoder/decoder sites around, enter "[#lwc]" and click "Encode", you will also see that the parameter will be encoded to "%5B%23lwc%5D" as per the URL specs.

Also just to stress, the entire point is the only way to get those searches is manually, so it's not supposed to be encoded.

So I don't quite understand what you are trying to say here.

[lwc]

Maybe a short video capture will explain it more clearly.
Alas, this forum doesn't allow videos, so it's a temporary link, please try to see it today or tomorrow:
https://streamable.com/ry8zd7

[Andrew Lee]

Maybe a short video capture will explain it more clearly.
Alas, this forum doesn't allow videos, so it's a temporary link, please try to see it today or tomorrow:
https://streamable.com/ry8zd7

A video is indeed worth a thousand words!

I have fixed the error. Please try again.

[lwc]

Sorry, no change, using it still looks like in the last screen of the video.

[Andrew Lee]

Sorry, no change, using it still looks like in the last screen of the video.

"Looks like", yes, but the URL has been changed to use "%5B" and "%5D" in the GET paramaters.

[lwc]

You can see in my video I don't use the search. I click a username, then just quickly change the search results to @ or #. The former works while the latter doesn't.

[Andrew Lee]

Can't seem to replicate the bug?

https://imgur.com/a/KOuxUz6

[lwc]

Because my video showed I changed directly from the URL location. I click a username, then I add @ or # right in the URL bar. @ works, # doesn't.

Also, try going to a person that has no private submissions (like [#SYSTEM]) and see what happens. It might be the same if they have no favorites.

[Andrew Lee]

@lwc: "#" needs to be encoded as "%23". If you do that, you should get the correct result.

[lwc]

I know but why?

Also, did you check [#SYSTEM] / [%23SYSTEM]?

[Andrew Lee]

Please take a look at the link I sent earlier.

The TDLR is that only the alphanumeric characters, hyphen, underscore, tilde and period characters can be entered directly into the URL bar. All other characters (including [, ], # etc) must be encoded. I know you can get '@" to work in this instance, but that could be browser dependent and goes against the strict URL encoding rules.

So the "[#SYSTEM]" param will be encoded as "%5b%23SYSTEM%5d" if you are planning to enter it into the URL bar.

That's the screen I got for "/index.php?q=%5B%23SYSTEM%5D":