EDIT: I tried again today (new day) with the same PC / browser setup as the previous day and the final web page did confirm success in the expected way and I also today got the confirmation mail. So I can only conclude that both the entry web site and the email confirmation weren't working (for me anyway) on the server side the day before. The previous day's lack of entry / web / email confirmation didn't in retrospect appear to have anything to do with my browser / network / PC etc.
So I'm glad it is working now.
Thanks Daniel.
After not getting a confirmation email yesterday I did go back, clear cookies (actually used a completely clean firefox profile thus clearing cookies but also disabling my usual security / script / ad / etc. blockers) and try my same personal information from earier when I didn't get confirmation again to see if I'd get a web based and/or email confirmation.
Looking more closely at the "try again after no confirmation" result yesterday was this:
* I still didn't get a confirmation email.
* I clicked submit on my form data with all the correct / same details which previously in the day didn't get me a confirmation email and that took me to a new page:
https://www.wavekeysight.com/landing/?kswHasEntered=1* On that second page I saw MOST but not ALL of the familiar page layout, the wave 2018 logo, black background, quiz on the left, etc.
* But whad I did NOT see on that above landing page was any "Entry successful" or "You already got your entry for today" or similar message. So there was neither an error message of any kind nor a success message of any kind for the entry, but everything else on the page looked similar to what I've seen previous days when I did get confirmation emails and I did get visual indication of "You got your entry" or whatever success message on the landing page.
* On previous work-days I was at work entering on chrome browser with default settings. And on the weekend yesterday as I said I was using Firefox 52.6 ESR on LINUX with a clean profile so no extensions or whatever when I tried to see if it'd work.
So now between the emails never working yesterday even after retrying with the same information and then at the second attempt when I checked more closely noticing that the after-submission "landing" page also didn't actually confirm (or deny) anything though I have seen it do so on previous days with a physically different workplace browser / PC I am wondering if there is some other kind of issue that is making the site not work for me here at home. Browser? Firewall? Just a different page / style design for chrome vs. Firefox where you just never display the same success entries for FF?
But FWIW yesterday on my original attempt to enter which wasn't confirmed I did solve the quiz question and that worked as expected...
I can understand conceivable things that could cause such differences either on my PC/network side or on the web server / page side but that it isn't clear if there is a problem or if so what the nature of it is based on the site/browser interaction is a bit frustrating.
But again thank you overall for the contest, and I do think the confirmation email and remembered you from the day before changes are overall positive improvements though maybe some polish of the overall system could still facilitate things somehow in cases where things aren't apparently working for whatever reason.
Thanks everyone for the feedback!
A couple comments:
1. We did weekend updates the first year and that was pretty rough for us as a small team, so we generally try to run the event just on weekdays. This includes the daily challenge question. It obviously does not include responding to forum questions :)
2. E-mail confirmations/entry confirmation: There were a couple ways to accidentally get multiple confirmation e-mails, but this doesn't show up as multiple entries in the system. The system we're using is pretty smart, so really the only way you could end up with multiple entries is if you are intentionally gaming the system with multiple sets of information. If you're unsure whether your entry went through, you can clear cookies and try again with the same e-mail. Also, if you see the "get daily entry" button, it means you can get an entry for that day. Going to the page from a device without the cookie and filling out the form again will yield the same result.
Also, the entry confirmation is a new thing for us this year, so there is certainly some streamlining we can do for future events.