anyone else get errors like this?

Bad Request - Request Too Long

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HTTP Error 400. The size of the request headers is too long.

i don't get it normally but if i go to recruiting search -> advanced search, fill out a bunch of crap, then try to search again - or go to other pages - it will happen, presumably because that big blob of search is being included as a referrer. i can't even open my regular team popup from there. it won't happen in a secondary browser because i haven't accumulated enough cookies for WIS over there, i think. wondering if other folks have the same issue or if its just me?

to reproduce:
1) be a person who has used the current browser for a while without clearing your cache/cookies
2) recruit search -> advanced -> fill out everything (or use this link)
https://www.whatifsports.com/hd/Recruiting/TeamRecruitingPool.aspx?filterView=1&positionFilter=4&decisionStatus=2&view=1&minDistance=1000&maxDistance=2000&includeHS=False&includeJUCO=True&includeTransfers=True&includeInternational=True&state=International&projDivision=2&prefPlayingTime=0&prefDistance=2&prefOffense=2&prefDefense=0&prefPlayStyle=0&ratingFilter1=1&ratingFilter1Min=33&ratingFilter1Max=100&ratingFilter2=3&ratingFilter2Min=22&ratingFilter2Max=100&ratingFilter3=5&ratingFilter3Min=22&ratingFilter3Max=100&ratingFilter4=7&ratingFilter4Min=22&ratingFilter4Max=100&primarySortField=18&primarySortDirection=1&page=1&search=True

3) hit search again from the results page

What browser are you using?

chrome

Works for me gill, returns "No Recruits Found"

Running MS Edge though

[Edit] Seems to work for me on Chrome as well (Version 91.0.4472.114)

i guess i just left my browser open too long. i have about 140 of these ASPSESSIONIDAAATCTSC that are marked to clear when i restart my browser. going to give that a shot.

This happened to me ~ a month ago. I switched from Chrome to Safari and it was fine, so I assumed it was just Chrome acting buggy.

i'm reading its because i use tab saving in chrome, and the same would happen in firefox with tab saving there. now that IE is chromium i wonder if it would happen there too, if IE supports tab saving? i've used that for as long as its existed, more than 5 years, so not sure why its just a problem now. i don't have 5 years of session cookies, only like 5 months, so some how those have to get cleaned up, or else something changed 5 months ago.

restarting chrome didn't fix it, logging out of WIS didn't fix it... i'm sure i could manually delete those WIS cookies, or all cookies in the whole browser, and resolve it. well, pretty sure. going to mess with it a bit more later when i can restart my computer to see if there is some normal step where chrome still cleans these up, that i am just missing because i leave my stuff open for all eternity. interesting that someone else had the same problem.

well, i can find no earthly way to get the session cookies to self-cleanup. i tried everything i could think of outside of manually clearing cookies (manual intervention should not be required!). logging out, rebooting my computer, closing all the chrome tabs in case i'd accessed WIS in any of those previously, various combinations...

i checked my other computer and it has the same problem, just in lower volume (about 100 session cookies, about 150 required for site to stop functioning). seems like any tab-saving folks would eventually run into this same issue. i don't know how much folks use tab saving in the wild - not sure how folks get on without it - but i am guessing most do!

the problem is that every cookie for the site gets sent up on every request, as with cookies on any other site. your request can only be so long, so if your request is gunked up with 150 session cookies, there's no room to do anything else, and requests start failing.

the solution for anyone else who might encounter it: either clear your entire browser's cookies, which is probably a pain in the rear, or just clear for this 1 site (recommended). for chrome users you get get there with chrome://settings/cookies/detail?site=www.whatifsports.com and hitting remove all.

I had this same issue about a week ago. When I went to my Chrome setting, I just cleared my cache and cookies for "all-time". Now it's working fine, so may be something to just clear out from time to time.

The bigger you make your search conditions -> The bigger the request is to the web server -> the more memory it takes to store said request -> the more cache is required to store said request and the result set. If you have a low cache setting you wont be storing as much so if the server needs to do more work than the cache has memory available (very fickle for search engines like recruiting where there are so many ways to store data because the user base is diverse) the data cache can get corrupted which the browser then receives a malformed (corrupt) stream of data which the browser cannot handle.

its got nothing to do with the cache size on either end and everything to do with HTTP request length, which is limited by the server in this case (but could be limited by many different parties in the abstract case). the reason i was running into this was primarily the large set of sessions cookies (which all get sent up on each request). originally i had to try a long request (like recruiting with lots of options), from a page that itself was a long request (which is passed as the referrer). but over time just the cookies would be enough. by the end of my playing around with it, i couldn't even click my team banner from the home page or office page or whatever. which makes sense as the HTTP request is essentially = mostly static length headers + current request with parameters + referrer + cookies.

anyway, the general clear cache + cookies button would work, as suggested, but it has nothing to do with the cache and everything to do with the cookies, for the aforementioned reasons. clearing browser-wide will nuke any existing sessions and preferences stored via cookies on any site - that is why i suggest just browsing to the chrome cookies for whatifsports.com and just clearing them, which is here:

chrome://settings/cookies/detail?site=www.whatifsports.com (then hit remove all)