Geocaching HQ

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - March 23, 2016 With today’s update, Premium Members can add Search results to Lists directly from the Search page! Once you’ve performed a search on Geocaching.com, you’ll see checkboxes to the left of each resulting cache listing. Check the box for each cache you wish to add to a List, then click the “Add to a List” button. (Alternatively, you can add caches to a List one by one by clicking the + button to the right of a listing.) From there, you can add the cache(s) to an existing List or add to a new List. In addition to your Lists being available via Your Profile page on the website, you can also access them via the Geocaching® app. On a related note, we had hoped to have Offline Lists available today for Geocaching® app users. The app update is rolling out to Google Play as planned, and Android users should have access to the update with Offline Lists today or tomorrow. We have submitted the iPhone update to Apple, but it is currently held up awaiting Apple approval and won't be released today. We'll update you as soon as we know that the update has been approved. Edit: Offline Lists are now available in the Geocaching® app for both Android and iPhone. Ben H of HQ’s Product Team will follow this thread and try to answer Search/Lists questions when possible.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - March 9, 2016 A new name for the grown-up Geocaching Intro app With the addition of advanced tools, 'Geocaching Intro' has officially outgrown its name. It has been renamed to the Geocaching® app — an app we made for Premium members. To differentiate the new Geocaching® app from the older paid app, we have changed the paid app's name to 'Geocaching Classic'. We want to create a single geocaching experience on mobile that can do both: serve as a simple introduction to the game and unlock the full geocaching experience with Premium membership. This is a request we've heard from players for a long time and is something we've come to agree with: your Premium Membership should include all the best geocaching tools. With the new Geocaching® app, you will have all the features an experienced geocacher needs, such as live search, Message Center, trackables and, most recently, geocache lists. What's happening with the Geocaching Classic app? On March 23, 2016, the Geocaching Classic app will no longer be available to purchase or download in the Apple or Google Play stores. For those who currently have the app, it will be supported at least through June 2016. We will keep you updated in case anything changes along the way. All of the Geocaching Classic app's features are either already included or are coming soon in the Geocaching® app. In addition, we've made significant improvements to those features. Stay tuned for information on upcoming releases. In the long run, we believe this is the right direction for both seasoned geocachers and new players alike, as we aim to meet everyone's geocaching needs. We are grateful to you for sticking with us through these changes and we promise to keep you updated on the future improvements. If you haven't already, download the Geocaching® app (Apple) (Android) and give it a try! Find more information about these changes in this Help Center FAQ. (HQ's Marketing Team will watch this thread in order to address questions when possible.)

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - February 23, 2016 Some of you may notice a change to your homepage over the next couple weeks. We’ll be sending approximately half of the logged-in website traffic to the Search page instead of the current logged-in homepage. Continue to use the site as you normally would - we’ll collect data behind the scenes to determine how quickly and efficiently searches can be executed in order to create a better overall experience. There will be a 50/50 split between users who see the original homepage and those who see the Search page. The test will run for about 2 weeks. Why are we conducting this test? We want to make it as easy as possible for new and existing geocachers to run searches on Geocaching.com. The intent of the test is to determine if users will benefit from having the Search page exposed during their first logged-in interaction. HQ’s User Experience Team will follow this thread in order to answer questions whenever possible.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - February 9, 2016 Do you need help converting old HTML or UBB log formatting to Markdown formatting? We have introduced a conversion tool that can help. Pull up a log containing old HTML or UBB formatting to see the yellow conversion bar. Click the "Convert" button to see your reformatted log. If you don't like what you see, you can click "Undo." Once you submit the change by clicking "Submit Log Entry" at the bottom of the page, it is a permanent update. (If you don't see the converter right away, you may need to close and re-open your web browser. You may also perform a hard reset of your browser's cache by pressing Ctrl+F5 (PC) or Apple+R or Command+R (Mac).) The conversion tool will convert the following content: UBB: line breaks, bold, italics, code, links, lists (ordered and unordered) HTML: line breaks, bold, italics, links, headers (H1, H2, H3), lists (ordered and unordered) The tool will also remove unsupported tags (such as color and font tags) from logs. Read more (and see screenshots) in this Geocaching Help Center article.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - February 2, 2016 Beginning today, you may notice some changes to geocache and trackable logs on Geocaching.com. In our continued effort to increase site security and promote cross-platform compatibility, we are removing support for HTML and UBB code in logs in favor of Markdown. These codes are used to add emphasis to text such as bold or italic type, or to add links to websites. In addition to improving site security, moving to Markdown means that new logs will now consistently look good across all devices. To learn more about using Markdown and what this change means for your past logs, visit the Geocaching Help Center.

In our continued effort to increase site security and promote cross platform compatibility, we will remove support for HTML and UBB code in logs in favor of Markdown on February 2, 2016. These codes are used to add emphasis to text, such as with bold or italic type, or to add website links. HTML and UBB code may not always look exactly as you intended them to on some devices, while Markdown will consistently look good across all devices. This change affects less than 3.5% of existing cache and trackable logs. Existing logs will display any old HTML and UBB code as of February 2. Note that starting to use Markdown language now will ensure logs display properly following the transition. Other things for you to know: After the switch to Markdown, HTML or UBB code will be displayed in all logs, since we will not respect or render the HTML or UBB Code on output. The biggest change is that Font Color and Font Name will not be supported by Markdown. But users will gain the ability to edit Font Size using the "Header." Opening and closing #s are required to create a header. Markdown has many advantages, including a better experience for mobile app users and GPX file users (the Markdown plain text formatting is more understandable than unsupported HTML code). Links will hyperlink when using Markdown code. Links not within the Geocaching/Groundspeak domains will prompt if they are to an external site (as they do now within Message Center). Smileys will continue to be supported as they are today. We will continue to respect line breaks in old logs, so these do not need to be adjusted. There will be an obvious WYSIWYG editor and preview window on the log page, meaning there is no need to learn code to personalize logs. Why are we making this change? Markdown offers increased site security. Markdown is a modern notation that works on many platforms (Web, Android, iPhone, Windows Phone, GPS-Unit, GPX-File, API). HTML is web-only. Unlike HTML, Markdown displays clearly on platforms even when they are not optimised to support it. Geocachers will now have the ability to preview the styling of their logs via a WYSIWYG and preview window to the web logging page. Only 0.45% of logs currently use HTML; 3% use UBB code. How can you learn more about Markdown? For a feel of what Markdown options can look like, see this site. It shows essentially how the web view will look at the top of the page - including the WYSIWYG and preview. Not all features listed there will be supported, such as inline image support (use of gallery images is the only way to add images to logs) or anything under "Extras Mode", and <enter> will result in a line break. Why aren't we converting old logs? Our tech team discussed the possibility of cleaning up old logs. Unfortunately, the risks associated with altering/scrubbing 560 million logs (not counting trackables) is too high to run any kind of cleanup without some bad consequences: i.e., loss of data, corruption, etc. Therefore we have decided to recommend that users convert their own logs. Information about the switch is also available in an article in our Help Center.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - December 1, 2015 We've made some backend updates to the Geocaching Profile to increase security on Geocaching.com. These changes will be invisible to most players; however, those who have added customization may want to update their profiles. Some older browsers may not benefit from these changes. If you are visiting from one of these browsers, you will be notified by a banner on the website.

Im April diesen Jahres haben wir eine Pause für die Einreichung neuer Challenge-Geocaches begonnen, um Informationen zu sammeln und auszuwerten, welchen Einfluss sie auf das Spiel haben. Nun wollen wir auch von Euch hören! In dieser Umfrage könnt Ihr uns wissen lassen, was für Erfahrungen Ihr mit Challenge-Geocaches gehabt habt. Was ist ein Challenge-Geocache? Mit Challenge-Geocaches können Geocache-Owner eine Herausforderung ("Challenge") stellen, welche erfüllt werden muss, bevor dieser Geocache-Typ geloggt werden kann. Eine Qualifikation für einen Challenge-Geocache kann z.B. sein, Geocaches an allen Tagen eines Jahres zu finden. Challenge-Geocaches machen Spaß. Aber obwohl sie im letzten Jahrzehnt in der Geocaching-Community immer beliebter geworden sind, haben sie auch oft zu Verwirrungen geführt und können extra Hürden für die ehrenamtlichen Reviewer in der Community darstellen. Indem Du an dieser Umfrage teilnimmst, kannst Du uns helfen, ein besseres Rahmenwerk für Challenge-Geocaches zu bilden - für mehr Geocaching-Spaß. Vielen Dank!

Last April, we paused accepting submissions for new challenge caches to collect data and reevaluate the impact they have on the game. Now, we’d like to hear more from you! Take our survey to tell us about your experience with challenge caches. What’s a challenge cache? Challenge caches allow geocache owners to create “challenges” you have to accomplish before you can log a specific geocache, like meeting the challenge of finding a geocache on every day of the year. They’re fun. But as challenge caches have grown in the geocaching community over the last decade, they’ve also often caused confusion for players and can add extra hurdles for community volunteer reviewers. By taking this survey, you will help us build a better framework for challenge caches — one designed for even more geocaching fun. The survey is open for 3 weeks, until December 21, 2015. Thank you!

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - October 23, 2015 Ready for your next installment of Message Center updates? We recently wrapped up work on a few biggies. You can now: Reply to geocaching messages directly from your email! See images in Message Center email notifications. Check out this blog post to see other updates we’ve made to the Message Center in the past few months.

Today, Tuesday, October 6, 2015, the search feature of Waymarking.com will experience 2-3 outages of up to 20 minutes each while we perform some basic server maintenance. The work will begin at approximately 3:30 pm PDT. (Convert to your local time here.) Sorry for any inconvenience!

Today, Tuesday, October 6, 2015, the search feature of Waymarking.com will experience 2-3 outages of up to 20 minutes each while we perform some basic server maintenance. The work will begin at approximately 3:30 pm PDT. (Convert to your local time here.) Sorry for any inconvenience!

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - September 8, 2015 The latest updates to Geocaching.com include: You can now load more conversations in the Message Center. Updated the Recover Username/Password page to make it easier! Geocaching HQ started sending occasional emails to geocache owners when it appears that a geocache needs maintenance. Visit the Help Center to learn more. Here's an example of what these emails look like:

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - September 1, 2015 For your next installment of Message Center updates: notification settings! You can now opt to receive a notification to your email for every message you receive or after 30 minutes of inactivity in a conversation. You can change your notification preference in Account Settings. http://img.geocaching.com/cache/a8ba6f5d-6b2b-491a-90d7-c946ff8cb2de.jpg?rnd=0.6124842 And, of course, more Message Center updates soon!

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - August 19, 2015 When we launched Message Center, we promised we’d keep improving it based on your feedback… So here’s the first step: Raised character count limit to 4000 characters Added validation to TB and GC codes in messages (meaning random codes will no longer automatically hyperlink) TB names now pre-populate when contacting trackable owners Don’t see your request in this list? Don’t worry! This is just the first of many improvements we’ll be making to the Message Center. We’ll be sure to keep you posted. And of course, this is all in addition to the usual bug extermination, which included fixing a particularly ornery bug that had previously caused geocachers to submit logs with incorrect dates.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - July 7, 2015 Hello everyone! Today is an exciting day for us: we are finally removing the beta banner from Geocaching.com’s Message Center! We have been hard at work on this project since late last year from both a development and design perspective (even longer when you take into account the user insight gathering and testing we did before that). We are proud of what we've accomplished. The best part is that the results of the survey we conducted through the Message Center banner and other usage statistics confirm what we hoped: the overwhelming majority of geocachers use it and like it. Since first releasing Message Center beta, we’ve added a few things and tweaked a few others based on your feedback: The envelope icon in the header now updates every 15 seconds to alert you that you have updated conversations. You can contact another player just by clicking the link on their profile or you can access their profile by clicking a player’s avatar image from the Message Center. Messages now display the content of the message that triggered an email notification in the email itself. You can contact a geocache owner directly from the geocache page. The GC code and name will be automatically inserted into the message. That being said, there are still many suggestions that we have not yet addressed. Let me assure you that we are NOT done with the Message Center on web or mobile. There are new features we’d like to add and existing features we plan to update, including getting email notifications up to par with expectations (both yours and ours), making it easier to contact other players from across Geocaching.com, increasing the character count limit per single message, and improving usability with more mobile browsers and other usability concerns (I'm looking at YOU, text entry box that doesn't expand while typing). I just wanted to publicly say thank you to my brilliant team (meet a few of them in about the making-of Message Center), the volunteers, our beta and usability testers and to our players for helping shape the Message Center into something that makes it easier to connect with other geocachers around the world, on any platform they choose. I promise that we'll continue to look at ways to make it more usable, useful, and intuitive for the majority of our community as time goes on. - seandynamite Product Owner for the Discovery Team

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - June 5, 2015 This week’s updates to Geocaching.com will help you plan your summer geocaching adventures! Take a look at the brand new Geocaching Road Trip ‘15 landing page: Keep track of upcoming souvenir opportunities. Check out the Official Road Trip playlist. Read what geocachers around the world are saying using #Geocaching15. Also new: See which geocaches belong to a GeoTour with the new geocache search. You can click through from the search results to learn more about the GeoTour.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - May 19, 2015 A quick update today! The main search box now includes cities in the dropdown suggestions, making it easier to run a search in your favorite spot.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - May 18, 2015 Psssst... We think you'll like this update! In response to community requests, we updated Message Center beta email notifications to include message content. Notifications will be triggered when: You receive a message from a geocacher who you have not received a message from before. You receive a message from a geocacher and at least 30 minutes have elapsed since the last message in the conversation. Notifications will include the text of the first message only. If the message consists exclusively of an image, then no message text will be included in the email. You can turn on/off notifications in your Account Settings.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - May 13, 2015 Well, hello there! This week’s updates to Geocaching.com include: You can now send messages from a Trackable details page with the TB code pre-populated in the Message Center text field. Added link to player profiles from the avatar images in Message Center. Gave the Send Email to User page a new look. Made the latest round of translation updates. Fixed bugs such as: A 404 error on “Clear Search Filters” in Internet Explorer 11. Pressing enter after previewing a location on the cache submission map now allows you to continue the cache submission process.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes - May 5, 2015 With today’s release, we’ve made the following changes to Geocaching.com: Search for geocaches using a GC code as an origin point. Click through to geocache details pages directly from the suggested search dropdown. Added profile images to “Not Found By” and “Hidden By” search filters. You now have the option to “Message this owner” from all geocache details pages. And the usual round of bug bashing! Click through to geocache details pages directly from the suggested search dropdown. “Message this owner” from the geocache details page. See profile images in the search filters.

Read previous Release Notes Release Notes Hi everybody! This week, we’ve continued making improvements to the Message Center beta (and more!). Highlights include: Newly created conversations now appear at the top of the conversation list New message text now updates the “Me:” text instantaneously Moved the “Block User” hover state to the right of the username Corrected linking for URLs in Message Center beta Opening Message Center will display your last conversation Browser tab now displays number of current, unread messages Clicking a link in a notification email will now direct players to the relevant conversation Updated profile image display to 68x68 on the Profile and Account Settings pages and updated requirements text Distances on www.geocaching.com/seek/nearest.aspx will now respect your unit preferences Fixed display of metric units on www.geocaching.com/seek/nearest.aspx Thanks to everyone who responded to the survey and reported bugs for the Message Center beta! We really appreciate your feedback. If you haven’t already, let us know what you think by taking this survey!

Read the previous Release Notes Release Notes Today we’ll be releasing a few updates to the new geocache search — in response to requests from geocachers like you! You will now be able to: Search for all geocaches in a region from the main search box. Access home location and current location searches from the main search box. Find events in your region or the oldest geocaches near you with just one-click. Check out these new featured searches to help you earn the 15 Years of Geocaching souvenir on May 2nd or 3rd! We will also be updating the Search for Nearby Geocaches box on the homepage. It will now deliver results using the new geocache search, with the exception of GC code searches which will continue to direct you to the relevant geocache details page. Questions about the geocache search? Check out this FAQ on The Geocaching Blog. Additionally, you will now have the option to “Send Message” via Message Center beta or “Send Email” through the email system from a player’s public profile.

This information is also posted in the General Geocaching Discussions. Challenge Cache Submissions Moratorium Beginning April 21, 2015, a one-year moratorium is in effect on all new "challenge cache" submissions. It does not impact previously published challenge cache listings. Why is a moratorium needed? Challenge caches encourage cachers to set and achieve fun goals. They run the gamut from finding caches on every day of the calendar year to finding one for every Difficult/Terrain combination. However, there are many aspects of challenge caches that can make them frustrating for the community. They are neither a separate cache type nor do they have a specific attribute, so the logging requirements are easily misunderstood. Challenge caches can also be very difficult to publish due to the large amount of subjectivity involved relative to other geocaches. While they account for only ~1% of all geocache submissions, challenge caches comprise the bulk of appeals made to Geocaching HQ. In order to properly evaluate and fully focus on the challenge cache system, it is necessary to have a period of time that is free of new submissions. What happens during the moratorium? HQ will work with the community and Community Volunteer Reviewers to address shortcomings in the current system, with the goal of adding clarity and retaining what makes challenge caches so much fun for players. The process starts with you. Visit the User Insights forum to tell us what you like and don't like about challenge caches currently. We'll use your feedback to create a survey that will be available later this spring. Once we've gathered data from the community, we'll get to work on building a better framework for challenge caches. In the meantime, the thousands of challenge caches that already exist will still be out there, waiting for you to find them! Note: The moratorium does not apply to challenge cache submissions that were enabled for review as of 12:00pm (19:00 GMT) on April 21, 2015 and met all geocaching guidelines at that time.

Challenge Cache Submissions Moratorium Beginning April 21, 2015, a one-year moratorium is in effect on all new "challenge cache" submissions. It does not impact previously published challenge cache listings. Why is a moratorium needed? Challenge caches encourage cachers to set and achieve fun goals. They run the gamut from finding caches on every day of the calendar year to finding one for every Difficult/Terrain combination. However, there are many aspects of challenge caches that can make them frustrating for the community. They are neither a separate cache type nor do they have a specific attribute, so the logging requirements are easily misunderstood. Challenge caches can also be very difficult to publish due to the large amount of subjectivity involved relative to other geocaches. While they account for only ~1% of all geocache submissions, challenge caches comprise the bulk of appeals made to Geocaching HQ. In order to properly evaluate and fully focus on the challenge cache system, it is necessary to have a period of time that is free of new submissions. What happens during the moratorium? HQ will work with the community and Community Volunteer Reviewers to address shortcomings in the current system, with the goal of adding clarity and retaining what makes challenge caches so much fun for players. The process starts with you. Visit the User Insights forum to tell us what you like and don't like about challenge caches currently. We'll use your feedback to create a survey that will be available later this spring. Once we've gathered data from the community, we'll get to work on building a better framework for challenge caches. In the meantime, the thousands of challenge caches that already exist will still be out there, waiting for you to find them! Note: The moratorium does not apply to challenge cache submissions that were enabled for review as of 12:00pm (19:00 GMT) on April 21, 2015 and met all geocaching guidelines at that time.