paleolith
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Posts posted by paleolith
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Why do you need a local copy of 3-year-old logs posted to your cache?
If you own a challenge cache (compilation type, where the prerequisite list is fixed) and maintain a list of those making progress, such as in Spinal Tap, then you need to be able to automate counting which GS doesn't provide.
Situations where PQs do not suffice include: more than five logs on one day, a find log post-dated so that it appears more than five logs deep when initially posted, and a ancient note being changed to a find. All three situations have occurred on one or the other of my challenge caches. (Note that the "last five logs" in a PQ are the most recently dated logs, not the most recently posted logs.
Doing it manually is not feasible, so the choices are to use some method which digs deeper into the logs, or to forget including the progress report.
Other than that, I agree with Prime Suspect -- I don't know of another reason to keep a local copy. In fact I do not have local copies of the logs for the caches I own (except for the one linked above, and that's only because it's on the bookmark list for the prerequisites). And the progress report is not an essential part of the cache, but I think it's an interesting part of the cache listing. There probably are other valid reasons, but those reasons are likely to be as obscure as mine.
Still, it would be useful if a PQ could "send everything that's changed since the last one". However, there are so many complications to this that I'm not even going to start listing them -- and to support an offline database, which GS has stated they won't do. I'd be happy if GS would simply support compilation challenges by running the small number of SQL statements needed (which I'd be happy to provide) and sending me the results. But I'm not holding my breath.
Edward
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And of course now it's wrong for challenges where there's no mystery or puzzle, just a prerequisite task.
But this thread wasn't supposed to reappear until T-day.
Edward
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if you don't use the br tag, the whole page is one big run-on sentence even if you hit enter after every line.
You should be using the <p> tag, not the <br> tag.
Edward
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one of my TB's ... made just one leg of it's journey ... went missing
I placed one in SoCal. The cacher who picked it up (someone I know) took it to Hawaii. Someone else picked it up a few days later and took it to Vancouver. And it disappeared from the cache there. Yet it's still the highest milage TB I have due to that trip to Hawaii and back.
Edward
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I think this has been reported before, but I can't find it.
When you click on an image in the description's gallery, the caption is missing (in the lightbox display). If you have previously clicked on a log image, that image's caption is shown with the description image.
Edward
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Finding inconsistencies [sic] on the gc.com web site is easy. The questions you need to ask are 1) does it matter and 2) does anyone other than you care. In this case I suspect the answer to both questions is "no", and you aren't going to get any support here. Consistency doesn't matter for its own sake, only when it makes a difference in the ease of using the site.
Edward
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GCJ825 Rivas Ridge is 5-1/2 years old and has 15 finds. (One of the logged finds is almost certainly erroneous.) And it's not out in the middle of Wyoming -- it's barely a mile, as the crow flies, from densely populated neighborhoods on the edge of Los Angeles.
GCAE57 Buddah's [sic] Belly is almost 7 years old and has 35 finds. It's just off popular hiking trails near Thousand Oaks CA -- still a couple million people within a one-hour drive.
Both require some skills navigating off maintained trails, and a good bit more strenuous hike than the cache in the OP (which seems to be rated assuming you'll have to stop driving some ways back). But both have been continuously available since placement.
GCQ1WJ 1999 is 4 years old and has 12 finds. The nearby GCJNQN Gordon's Power Workout has 19 finds in 5 years. Both, again, are very near densely populated areas.
GCHBWA 4x4 Adventure has 19 finds in almost 6 years. Suffers from a misleading name (4x4s no longer allowed in the area).
GCZAEP Breadcrumbs has 10 finds in 3 years. For a mystery cache, it's pretty easy. Again, dense population within a couple of miles.
You can find lonely caches anywhere.
Edward
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I think that setting the default number of logs to 20 (or allowing each user to choose) would actually decrease the load on the gc.com servers, at least for my browsing. I probably hit "all logs" well over half the time, so gc.com ends up serving up the main page twice.
Edward
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Don't know if this is your problem, but make sure you are not trying to show more than 50 caches per page in the bookmark list. One of the reported problems is that when you ask for 100 or more, at most 91 show up on each page and the rest of that page is not visible.
Edward
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I post a lot of photos -- see for example my DNF log on PCH (which admittedly is perhaps my record). And I'm afraid I also don't see the need for big changes.
I can generally show what I want to show ON THE WEB within the gc.com limitations. (I do wish they would state the limits much more clearly. I THINK I know what I'm dealing with, but despite having adapted many photos to those limits, it's still not crystal clear to me.)
The combined keys are
1) You can make the pixel dimensions as large as you want as long as the file is under 125KB.
2) You can make the file as large as you want as long as the dimensions are under 600x600.
3) gc.com is all about viewing on the web, but allows you to link elsewhere.
4) If you edit your photo to within the limits, gc.com does not touch it but serves it up as-is.
Can I always display the best quality photo within these limits? No, of course not. Can I always display it well enough for good-experience viewing on gc.com? I have not yet found an exception.
Here are a couple of my logs with large images. One image is 2048x338 and a 37KB file, the other is 2048x485 and is a 60KB file:
my found log for Sandstone Peak
my found log for Tri Peak Cache
I think the quality of these is highly satisfactory for web viewing. And yet they are actually too large in pixels -- almost no one (including me) has a monitor wide enough to display them without horizontal scrolling. I should have made them smaller.
These of course are low-complexity images, which is why the high compression works OK. Certainly I have had photos which ideally I would have presented at 800x800, but the complexity was high and I was not able to compress them to 125KB without losing too much. With those, I cropped and reduced to under 600x600. I'm pretty sure the "red shank in bloom" photo on this log is such a case.
If I really want to present more, I use JAlbum to create the album and host it on my own web site. (My host charges $6/month, but there are now a number of free web hosting sites which do not modify your web pages in any way, in particular to not add advertising, and which give adequate performance. I have used one of these for a neighborhood web site.) This way I'm completely certain that my images have not been modified, and present them as I wish. which AFAIK I cannot be certain of with Flickr or Imageshack. My albums (these shooting stars for example) also often allow downloading the full resolution photo (though even that is usually cropped and adjusted).
Phishing? Possible now, since gc.com allows us to post links. Perhaps posting links in logs should be limited to premium members, so that gc.com has an ID in the form of credit card info for anyone posting bad links. But come on, how many people actually read any given gc.com log? Phishers want pages with millions of impressions, not hundreds.
I also think that such additional photo capabilities would complicate the UI to the point of discouraging some less technical users from uploading photos, to the detriment of all. For example, suppose someone uploads a 2048x3076 photo. Now you have to ask them what to do with it: what size to display it, do you want the original made available, etc. OK, you don't HAVE TO ask them -- you could just make a downsized image for regular display and automatically link to the larger -- but then how do you cater to someone who WANTS to specify the normal display size? Etc.
In short, if you think this should be done, show us the details of your proposed UI for doing so. I think it's going to be very hard to design the UI to allow two-level photos without adding complexity for users who don't want that sophistication.
Edward
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Or, just leave it a multi-cache with only one stage. A multi-cache is not required to have multiple stages, just allowed. OTOH, multi-caches typically get fewer seekers.
If you archive it and recreate it, you can put a link to the original cache in the description to make it easier for people to read the original logs, since there are a couple of long ones.
Edward
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Usually there are only a couple. It's a long-standing problem which is apparently difficult to pin down. Since it's mostly just annoying, I don't think anyone has pushed GS to bump its priority up.
Edward
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Since you haven't received any replies, perhaps you should approach from the other direction -- explain your configuration and ask how you might most easily adjust it so you don't have to unzip the files (and in the process get the advantage of smaller emails). In the most common configuration (Windows and GSAK), you normally don't need to unzip as a separate step, just drag and drop the .zip file onto GSAK. Very likely there are shortcuts in most configurations and someone with a similar setup can suggest how.
Edward
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But personally I favor removing the formal cache sizes entirely. I want people to read the description. I want CONTROL.
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Cool. Then they can just turn it on for every thread and we can all be saved the trouble of posting. We can just read the bot discussions!What would really be nice is some sort of expert system put in place in the forums to analyze message topics and automatically suggest "maybe you can find your answer here"
It'll never work! Waymarking IS ABOUT VISITING PLACES, not about finding stupid Tupperware with wet 3x5 spiral notebooks. Who would go for that idea? Let's keep Waymarking focused on visiting places and not branch off into incompatible ideas like putting ammo cans near bridges.One day Dave decides to create a new category. For this category a person would hide a container at a location and provide the coordinates. The challenge would be to find the container and sign the log.Edward
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Does "40 stairs" mean 40 steps or 40 flights? If 40 steps, I would rate it T1.5, since it's not wheelchair-accessible. If 40 flights, that's about 500', so 2.0 or 2.5. maybe 3.0 if the trail is rough or there's no trail.
Terrain is relative. If you're hiding in a city and most caches are on level ground, then 50' of elevation gain may rate a full point of terrain. If the likely finders are hikers in a mountainous area, then 50' rates for nothing at all. This isn't a problem, but you do need to be alert to the surroundings. This kind of flexibility is good because it allows the limited rating scale to be used for varying purposes.
There's a cache in Tallahassee that's T3.0. Well, it's off trail, in the woods, more than 100 yards from parking, has an elevation gain of at least 20'. If you rate it by clayjar, it can come out to that. And since the only way you can get harder in Florida is with a long slog through a swamp, or by paddling, or similar excursions, it's reasonable to use a 3.0 for this sort of cache. Otherwise everything in Florida is 2.5 and under (except for the ones that are 5.0 due to requiring a boat, spelunking gear, etc), and you've wasted half the scale. In SoCal, at least in hiking areas, this cache would be a T1.5 -- and only because of the rule that T1 is supposed to mean wheelchair accessible.
(The highest point in Florida is about 350' above sea level. A few years ago, I drove with my wife, sister, and mother over to Louisiana. It was after Hurricane Ivan, and the Escambia Bay bridges were still out, so we had to detour north. I noticed we would be going near Florida's high point and suggested we go see it. My mom said OK, but I'll stay in the car and let you "young" people -- ages from 48 to 56 -- hike to the high point. But when we got there, she had to walk past the high point to get to the rest rooms.)
Edward
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We are a nation of decimalists, and I think that needs to stop right now!
As one who is rapidly approaching his two-gigasecond event, I resemble that remark.
Edward
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Yep, same problem I reported almost three weeks ago, and no response from GS. Nate? Is this on the bugt list? I guess it's not as high priority as the inability to edit bookmarks -- the workaround for this one is simply to stick with 50 caches/page, which is easier than the delete/recreate workaround for the other -- but it's still a major bug.
Edward
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Four Windows has been archived for a couple months.
Ah, I missed that, must not be spending enough time on the forums, thanks. I still have more forums posts than finds ... Seems it was not only archived but also locked, as there have been no "finds" since archiving.
Hmm, a new cognate for me, Rätsel = riddle ... interesting.
Edward
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Maybe someone couldn't spell DPM?
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Must be the third week of the alternate month, since this came up again. (And yeah, I started one of them some time back.)
I'm with the Urkel, I suspect that most bogus loggers don't realize they are supposed to physically visit the site of a virtual cache. I don't like hanging out with jerks (such as those who intentionally abuse the system), but misinformed is simply misinformed.
The language problem isn't just German vs English. Calling them Virtual caches is a problem just in English. Virtual, in technology, generally refers to "you see it but it isn't really there". This could very easily mean a cache that you only have to visit online.
The continued existence of Four Windows doesn't help.
Absentee owners, and owners who just don't care, are also problems. I don't object to the ban on new virtuals, but I wish gc.com would allow them to be adopted. Allowing them to continue while prohibiting adoptions results, I think, in a lot of non-maintenance.
Edward
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I'm sure the reviewers absolutely loved having to judge whether placements constituted (denigrated) Power Trails. "Wow factor" anyone?
I'm not interested in those power trails, but I'm happy that some people are. Their existence doesn't hurt me, except in the rare case that they block another cache from an interesting location. Cache on.
OTOH, having a hider around who calls other cachers sad, miserable, lonely and loathsome just because they disagree with his cache placements ... that does affect me. That's far sillier than civilly criticizing the hides.
Edward
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Groundspeak releases hot fixes when they think a bug is seriously impacting the ability of users to find or log caches. Apparently editing bookmarks is not considered that critical.
To restate Nate's explanation again, they have to consider not only the impact of the bug but the cost and risks of a fast fix. I'm not familiar with their exact methodology, but in software development in general, sometimes the problem can be simple, the fix be simple, and yet rushing in a fix outside normal procedures can be very expensive. It is certainly possible to set up development procedures which allow almost any fix to be rushed into production, but there's a very sharply increasing cost/benefit ratio as you try to incorporate more kinds of fixes into "out of line" fixes. When you have to create separate development branches in order to decrease the time-to-fix, the cost goes way up. It's also possible to increase reliability so that we almost never see bugs in production, but there also the cost rises very sharply as you try to approach perfection.
In addition, QA on out-of-line changes is very expensive. If only an isolated component needs to be changed, it's not unthinkable to take some shortcuts -- that's the hot fix. But if a full build is required, then a full release-level QA is also required. Software generally follows the principle that when you start pulling on strings, you discover that everything is connected to everything else.
Would I like to have this bug fixed today? Yes, of course.
Do I hear anyone saying they want the membership fee increased to $100/year (gold, not platinum) to pay for the kind of resources required for space-shuttle reliability levels? I haven't seen such a request, certainly not from me.
Edward
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I have one that I placed seven months ago and it hasn't been found yet.
And it's an easy find -- but it is listed as a letterbox hybrid. Maybe I'll get around to making a stamp and actually list it as a letterbox too, and see whether the first finder is a cacher or a letterboxer.Edward
And it's an easy find -- but it is listed as a letterbox hybrid. Maybe I'll get around to making a stamp and actually list it as a letterbox too, and see whether the first finder is a cacher or a letterboxer.
Good cheap containers
in How do I...?
Posted
There's an old saying: "Good, cheap, fast -- pick any two".
Edward