Support

You are right about the default sort. That's something we'll fix.

However, I can't reproduce your issue for the date. Here's what I do. First I change the "Sort table by" dropdown to Date. The page reloads. Then I change the ordering dropdown to Descending. The page reloads again. Now I can go back and forth any number of pages and the sorting sticks to date descending.

Please note that every time you change a sorting parameter the page reloads. If you change the "sort table by" dropdown and, while the page is loading, also change the ordering dropdown then your second change will be ignored as it's not posted to the server. I agree that this is a bit confusing but that's how Joomla works :( I'd much rather changing the value in one dropdown blocking the interface but I can't implement this since it'd be inconsistent with how Joomla itself works.

You should NOT be adding IP addresses to the blacklist manually. Let Admin Tools handle automatic blocking. I have been saying that so many times over the years.

No hacker –wannabe or seasoned– would EVER use their own static IP address to attack your site. That's like a criminal leaving his business card on the crime scene for police to find. Instead they will use a bunch of hacked computers ("botnet") or otherwise someone else's Internet connection and they'll only use that IP address for a limited period of time. So you are NOT blocking the hackers by putting them on the blacklist.

Who are you blocking then? Virtually all ISPs use dynamic IP addresses. When you connect to them they assign you a random IP from their pool of IP addresses. Many ISPs also use a short lease time, i.e. they change your IP address every so often (mine does every hour) to make sure that you won't have an effectively static IP address. So the IP address you blacklisted will be inadvertently assigned to an innocent third party. If that innocent third party tries to access your site they will be blocked and will never attempt to visit your site again. You've lost a client.

Therefore it makes more sense to temporarily ban an IP address while it's attacking your site. That's exactly what Admin Tools does when you set up the automatic IP block in the Web Application Firewall page. Enable it and let the machine handle the task of blocking and unblocking IP addresses. It's easier.

Furthermore, every IP address you have in your blacklist requires a bit of memory and a bit of time to process on each and every page load. If you have more than ~300 entries you are adding over one second of page load time and a few Mb of memory usage on each and every page load. This makes your site slower which has an adverse impact on search engine ranking.

IP blacklisting should be reserved for the really stupid script kiddies (wannabe hackers who actually don't understand how all that works) who are are using their home connection's static IP address to pound on your site. They are annoying and blacklisting them is the only way to stop having to deal with them. Admin Tools can also do that automatically through the last few options of the automatic IP banning feature.

You're welcome!