andy2049

Today I went to try and update my Geomate Jr and see if the Eastern or Default list has reappeared as it dissapeared a couple of months ago. Instead of the update page I receive a message, Looking around I found, I really hope this means that the geomate will once again be a supported product. I love my PN-40 but often I am in an area where I didn't have a chance to generage a PQ.

Same here. Cachers in my area have minds like steal straps and remember names. I have been stunned by other cachers telling me how much they enjoyed a particular cache I hid or remember when I found a couple of their caches. Last thing I want is for them to remember when I posted a cache and the cords were off.

I have the same issue. There are a number of caches that I have sent emails about and never received responces. As a matter of fact I can think of 7 or 8 caches I marked as needing maintnance and nothing was ever done. Have you looked at the user's profile to see when they last found a cache? They might be simply inactive.

Found a site that works. http://geomatejr.appspot.com/ I was able to update without an issue. :-O

Looks like the update site is broken again. :-< I am really disapointed in the death of the GMJ. I always carried it because the kids loved to use it. I also liked having a backup to my GPSr or when my PQs failed me. I hope someone comes up with a solution.

This week I had the same issue with 2 PQs using PN-40, CR2, Win vista and 7. The issue is with the GC website. From the "Pocket Queries Ready for Download" section I clicked on the PQ name to download the PQ manually. I received a message saying, "Sorry, the requested Pockey Query is no longer available" and the PQ is removed from the list of ready PQs. It appears the PQ was no longer available on the server. :-< One PQ was three days old and the other was two day old.

We have picked up and dropped books before. As long as they are in their own zip lock they travel well. I cache with a 7 year old and I can tell you the favorite is kids meal toys from any fast food place. Kids prefer anything with a character they recognize. Another good source for cache toys is the dollar store and wally world. Some toys stay in caches for a long time so durability is a factor. I only place items if I think they would survive being left at the beach for a week. If not there is no way they would survive a cache.

^Disturbing. Primarily I cache in shorts and t-shirt 9 months out of the year as I travel through GA, FL, and AL. I tried pants but didn’t work with long hikes in 90+ degree weather. I do carry a pair of beefy leather work gloves to deal with any painful barriers I encounter and a supply of alcohol wipes and band aids for when the gloves are not enough. Heavy bushwhacking caches are saved for the cooler weather months.

Is it worth it? That depends on what your goal is. I placed one on my work vehicle 4 months ago as a way to see how many miles I am caching while I drive for work. I would log that the TB visited any finds within about 200 feet of where I parked. As an added bonus I thought it would be cool to see if I randomly meet other cachers. The TB is worth it for me because of the amount of driving I do and the goals I had in mind. The TB log shows that over the last 4 months I have cached almost 6,500 miles. That is not including the 1,200 I have not logged yet and caches that were more than 200 feet away from my vehicle. The TB has also been spotted by two cachers while out and about. I am looking at enlarging the TB numbers to make spotting it easier.

Are you checking CSS or HTML? If you check both, most sites will have errors. The problem with the validators is that they're kind of irrelevant because most sites display fine, even if they have errors. Correct. That is exactly the point that was trying to be made. Someone mentioned that GC was using bad code because of the w3c validation.

Whipping an exhausted camel?

Really?w3.org test Realy. http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/validat...g=1〈=en

On the subject of the W3C test. W3c validation is like having a mechanic disassemble your car and test each and every part. Just because your O2 sensor is reading 8 volts instead of 7.5 volts that doesn't translate into your car not working. I have seen many pages that pass the validation still not work. Also, what pages that have dynamic content pass the validation? Hell if you run the validation on w3.org you get 30 errors and 420 warnings and they develop the W3C standards.

From experience I know this is something you usually don't do. Try composing an email to convey the information above that would not instantly generate thousands of email replies. As soon as GS send an email telling users that they are doing an update that might effect a tiny percent of pages they will receive thousands of emails from people asking for information on the update wanting to know what they are doing and why they are making changes. Once again it comes down to manpower. With every notice they send out they will receive a ton of emails asking, "Will my caches be affected?" Then if a response is not send in six hours the opinion changes to "GS doesn't care about us" and "they should have warned us sooner". The notification argument is a moot point. Even if they sent an email saying they were making an update the cache pages would still be broken and we would still be in the same place. The only difference is that GS would still be replying to emails asking about the update instead of fixing things like the white space issue.

Arse&Hemi, I also noticed that most of your caches, if not all, are marked as premium member only. Is that something you changed with this issue or has that always been the case?

I looked at a number of your cache pages and the ones that use regular HTML are appearing fine. The ones that I found messed up, including your profile page, have more information in the divitis then the actual information on your pages. I know all that div information was not coded by hand. What did you use to create it?

I don't know. But I doubt that they will revert the site design because a tiny percentage of cache pages have dirty HTML code causing the page to display incorrectly. Nothing dirty. I have good "clean" HTML on my pages and no issues since the change. I know of a few people who have looked at YOUR code and have said it's got some problems, I looked myself and saw the same problems. You want to complain about GC's "flawed" coding that won't let your flawed coding work the way you want it to?? Sorry, I can't support that. If you had spent the same amount of time and effort cleaning up the code on your pages that you have spent on this thread, you would probably have at least a good start on having your pages render properly. I agree with mtn-man, t4e, and MickEMT. As stated in posts 45, 66 and 73. I think you will find that the issue with your pages is in the code you provided. BTW I don't know if you used MS Word to create any of these pages but Word is possibly the worst HTML editor on the planet. It is so bad that applications like dreamweaver have tools like "Clean Up Word HTML" to correct the crappy HTML Word uses.

I don't know. But I doubt that they will revert the site design because a tiny percentage of cache pages have dirty HTML code causing the page to display incorrectly.

I am wondering how far along this route they actually went. They'd have to have some kind of sandbox to make sure the updates don't catastrophically fail. It it possible that neither of the testers looked at ANY sample cache listings or other pages? Unlikely. I'd chalk this whole thing up to better-to-beg-forgiveness-than-ask-permission I too come from an IT service background and I know that a rollout like this on a production system where EVERYONE pays would result in the fecal matter impacting the horizontal air impeller. I am sure that, like most companies of this type, they have a couple of small scale sand box systems with sand box information. They most likely do not replicate the whole database. If you did this the sandbox system would begin to function just like the main system including sending notifications. Also if something was wrong with the sandbox db then you have find out if it is an issue with the db copy, the sandbox, or the release. I might be wrong but it appears this issue is not widespread. It looks like only a handful of people that had certain pages affected. After looking at a couple of the OPs problem pages it appears to be an issue with his code. I don't think that GS has any obligation to check to make sure that their changes don't break pages with poor html code. So the questions is how many cache pages do they need to look at before they roll out even a small visual change?

I agree with the OP. It appears that some people are not taking the time required to insure that the cords are correct. We had a case in my area where a cache went undiscovered for almost two months. We sent multiple emails to the owner asking him to confirm the location. We told him exactly where his cords were placing us but he insisted that his cords were correct. The cache was discovered 146 feet off the GZ. It doesn't really matter what equipment you are using if you know how to use it. For example, I have helped some friends plant caches using the cords displayed on a geomate jr that I own. It is not the most accurate piece of equipment but you can get good cords using the averaging method of 50 reads. When I would verify the cords with my PN-40 they were right on. Plus I think the inaccuracy of the devices adds a little to the hunt. If all devices were right on it would be like a Waldo book where someone circled him on every page. If a cache is less than 25 feet off that's ok with me. When the distance is more than 50 then I remember the name and avoid caches by that person in the future.

My professional background is customer support. For many years I was a supervisor at a help desk for a company that provided online content management. I have experienced this same issue from the company side. Here is an example from work. The product the company provided had an HTML editor that customers use to create and edit pages. If you use the editor everything is fine. From day 1 we used the CSS style sheet to change the visual effect for the html header, h1, h2, and the like. The header styles were not included in the editor and we would advise customers not to code those elements into their pages they were creating. Of course when we would change one of the styles because of a design change we would receive multiple phone calls asking us why we changed their code. They would also make the same argument made by the OP, "Why don't you test before you make changes?" As the provider of an online service you need to advance your product. If things stay the same and no visual or functional changes are made and people leave. They are trying to maintain a viable product. When changes are made, for example to a CSS style sheet, there is no way to check every single cache page to make sure there are no conflicts. You complain that they did not do enough testing. Do you expect them to setup a sandbox environment, replicate the whole database and pay someone to look at every single cache every time they make any visual change? That is going a little far. I understand the frustration of fixing the pages. I have been there myself. But I looked at the code for your cache GC1WV30 and I have to say the code could have been made a little more durable. I know div tags are the cool thing to do now but I would never use them unless I was creating pages on a system I had control of. Remember the oldest tools of HTML are still the most reliable.

All I really want to know is this.... Did he atleast sign the log?

I have been looking at a new GPS unit and I decided on the PN-40. I noticed that new Delorme PN series units are coming out in early 2010. When the new models are released will the current models become cheaper?

I purchased my mate a month ago and have been very happy with the results. It comes in handy when I want to get away while my significant other is shopping. Today I used my mate to get a ftf on a puzzle cache using the coords screen. I got on site and two other cachers were already there and had been for hours. It was quite a feeling beating two other cachers with full fledged GPSrs and me with my "$70 toy". Questions for Warren, "When is Apispere coming out with a Geomate Sr so I can finally give the Jr to the kids?"