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DreadPirateRoberts

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Posts posted by DreadPirateRoberts

  1. I would really like to have the ability to show my cache finds (or my recent cache finds) on my personal website. The simplest way to do this would be to use a PQ to give me all of my finds and ingest the results into a database, and then pull from that database on my website. I could even use the google maps api to show my finds on a nice map.

     

    However, from discussions towards the end of this thread, that concept seems to be in direct violation of the Groundspeak TOU.

     

    But let's say I were to keep an independent database. Let's say every time I found a cache, I took a waypoint reading with my GPS at the cache site, and then used those waypoints to populate the google map markers. I could even make the markers on the map link back to geocaching.com and search by lat/lon (not even by the GCXXXX waypoint name), so that I would be using no information derived from geocaching.com on the map. That couldn't be in violation of the TOU, could it?

     

    So, the point is, the end results of the two above scenarios would be virtually indistinguishable, yet one would clearly violate the TOU, and the other would not (as far as I can tell). If you were to look at my website, how would you know if I was violating the TOU or not?

     

    I don't bring this up to start a fight or be diffucult, just as food for thought as updates to the TOU are being considered. I would love to be given some limited rights to display information about my finds on my personal website.

     

    EDIT after thinking a bit more about this, I realize the big problem: it's making cache location information available to the general public, and it comes right at the time when TPTB have made that information available only to signed-in members. You could view the source on my webpage and get cache coords without logging into GC.com. Hrm, there doesn't seem to be an easy solution to this one.

  2. I thought about that, but what will happen when I get that first international cache? I didn't see USA in the countries list, and the states/countries selection seems to be mutually exclusive.

     

    Granted, it will probably be a while before I find a cache in another country, but my brother will be moving to Africa before too long, so it could happen :)

     

    I guess I could do two different PQs, one with all of the states, and another with all of the countries, if/when that happens. Thanks for the quick replies!

  3. I'm trying to create a PQ to give me all cache finds. I figured I would set my center point at my zip code and a search radius of 9999 miles or something very large. However, I have found that 500 miles seems to be the maximum distance allowed. When I put in any number larger than 500, it resets it back to 500.

     

    Is there another way to get all my finds, regardless of location, in a PQ? I know that archived listings won't show up in the PQ, and that's fine.

  4. The owner of this listing is blocking the display of bookmark lists. Click here to view them.

    Thanks for considering this Jeremy, but I have one question. Why would it have to say "click here to view them"? To me, that just tempts someone to click on it, and if the owner's concern is spoilers, there would still be a high chance of someone clicking the link and seeing the spoiler.

     

    The owner has control in every other aspect of what appears on their cache page. They can provide a hint or not. They can delete a log with spoilers. It seems like the control to not show bookmark lists (on the cache page) would also be logical.

     

    I realize I'm getting nit-picky here. Like I said above, thanks for considering this and validating the "spoiler" objection. In the short time that I've been reading this board, I've been blown away by your openness and responsiveness to issues that are raised here. Keep it up!

     

    EDIT: BalkanSabranje beat me to it.

  5. There are several caches near me that are temporarily unavailable, or have something like 10 DNFs as the last logs. I really don't want them cluttering up my search results and PQs, but I'd like to know if they ever come back to life.

     

    My solution is to add them to both my ignore list and my watch list. However, I'm wondering if this will work--will the fact that they are on my ignore list stop the watch list e-mail from going out whenever there is activity on the cache? Anyone know the answer to this? (Jeremy?)

  6. You can estimate distance between degrees of longitude at a given latitude with the following formula:

     

    d = (pi / 180) * R * cos(lat)

     

    The latitude is expressed in decimal degrees. R is the radius of the earth, which is 3,963.1676 miles. (thanks, google: http://www.google.com/search?q=radius+of+the+earth+in+mi ).

     

    Doing the multiplication, you get a slightly simpler:

     

    d = 69.17 * cos(lat)

     

    The distance between two degrees of latitude is mostly constant, with some variation since the earth is not a sphere. It varies between 68.7 and 69.4 miles.

     

    Maybe that can at least be a starting point for you.

  7. what can you do with cachemate and gsak, that you can't do with easygps?

    I use a combination of Google Maps, gpsbabel, and GSAK to give me a completely free way to do "caches on a route". This page:

     

    http://www.alancurry.com/gpsbabel/route3.php

     

    has instructions for using Google Maps and gpsbabel to create an ARC file from driving directions, and then you can use GSAK to filter your cache listings based on distance from that ARC. The worst part is generating a bunch of PQs to cover your route, but until gc.com adds features for this type of thing, you're stuck in that boat no matter what your solution for caches on a route. The upside is that other than your premium membership, this can be a totally free way to do caches on a route!

     

    Also, I agree with the other poster to say that the filtering capabilities of GSAK are very powerful. I've used those capabilities to define filters for kid-friendly caches, caches containing Jeep TBs, etc.

  8. Since the average cache takes 10 minutes to find, I think we should get one smiley for every 10 minutes of searching.  So if  a cache is an easy drive up, you get one smiley. If it takes you three hours you get 18 smileys.

    So, basically, you'd be rewarding incompetence! I like it! :D

     

    Of course, there would be some side benefits of this:

     

    - You would be encouraged to slow down and enjoy the surroundings

     

    - Waiting out muggles wouldn't be so bad.. you'd almost be able to hear your smiley count going up

     

    - Do a cache at 2 AM on the first Sunday in April and you get 6 free points (Daylight Saving Time for non-US folks)

  9. I have an idea.  How about giving a cache owner the option of whether or not to allow their cache to be placed in a public bookmark list?

    I haven't seen any replies to this, and it seems like an excellent answer to the problems that have been posed on this thread. Anyone see anything wrong with this approach? I think it should be an opt-out thing (default is that a cache can be listed on a public bookmark list), but if a cache owner really wants to be a hermit, it lets them.

  10. I don't see how this could work. I have done traditional caches that are much more difficult than some multis. I have even done a multi where you didn't even have to do the first stage in order to find the final cache if you read the hint! Should that one count for two smileys, while the micro that I spent 45 minutes looking for only counts as 1?

     

    You might say we should use the difficulty system in order to mitigate for this, but the stars are so subjective that I don't think that would be possible either. One person's 4-star might be another's 2-star.

  11. This drives me nuts, too.  It is a Firefox problem; the site uses a non-breaking space ( ) after the waypoint instead of a regular space, and Firefox doesn't seem to know that it is a space-like character.

    You know, I thought it was the non-breaking space at first too, but after experimenting a bit, I think it's a different bug. The only thing I could come up with is that if you double-click to select a word that is followed by a link, it will also select the first word of the link. For proof, try double-clicking on the two words before the link below. There's no nbsp involved:

     

    Foo bar Google foo bar blah blah.

     

    I don't think there's a way for me to put a real   tag in a forum post, so I'll leave that as an exercise to the reader, but in my tests, with simple text separated by   characters (no links involved), FF correctly selected only the first word when I double-clicked.

     

    Anyone know if this buggy behavior has been submitted to Mozilla as a bug?

     

    Edited to add that I'm running FF 1.0.7 on Windows.

  12. when will PQs include the option to pluck archived caches, if ever?

    Okay, at the risk of stepping out of turn into an... er... passionate discussion with my first post ever on these forums, it sounds to me like Jeremy stated it pretty clearly. PQs are not going to allow searching for archived caches. There is a plan to address the particular request, for finding all found caches including archived caches, but it's not going to be via a PQ. Am I missing something?

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