change name

Hi--just wondering if the change user name feature has been removed. For a while there was a message on the relevant page saying it had been taken down to fix a bug, and now it is back up but with only a change password option. Thanks!

I think they got sick of people asking when it would be available - so took it away completely. Apparently you can contact one of the staff and ask them to change it for you.

Geeky back story...
From what we can gather - your username was used as a unique identifier in several (all?) parts of the website to link you to your records (books, talk posts etc). This is generally a bad idea in database design, particularly if you're going to allow that identifier to be changed willy nilly down the road. Whenever a user changed their name - the system would have to know all the places on the site that were linked by that identifier, and update them too, as the site grows - this becomes more complex.

As an example - I once changed my name (capitalised a couple of letters) and suddenly I wasn't recognised as the owner of a particular group anymore, and had no access to the settings for it. That seems to be fixed now, however.

They've moved to assigning everyone a member number that doesn't change (good, normal design) but it seems there are many dark parts of LT which still refer to your username and thus name-changing was disabled (unless you contact a team member).

Makes sense--thanks for the explanation!

>2 AndrewB: We can't change it for anyone, until the bug is fixed. We're working on the bug, so the feature to change your username will be back up soon.

Thanks -- please be sure to get the word out via newsletter or blog when the bug is fixed.

Will do - I'll definitely make sure it's posted here.

I was just routed to this answer Sonya--that's fine. I'll take this as my "final answer" for now, unless I hear otherwise. Thank you.

Sharman

I was just routed here too - any idea on when it might be fixed?

Can we email a team member to get it changed?

Not according to Sonya's message 4. There have been some terrible messes when someone changed their name and - their books didn't belong to them, or their talk messages didn't, or...I'm afraid you're just going to have to be patient.

Sonya? Any reports on progress/ideas when this might be done? Or is is just two weeks?

Standard "two weeks". We're doing some under-the-hood kinds of work, and we know this needs to get fixed.

Anyone who wants to be emailed when we have the changeusername feature back up can email me, and I'll email you when it's up.

sonya@librarything.com

We're able to change your username for you -- email info@librarything.com with your old name, and the new name.