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New Nearest Cache Page (Observations)


iryshe

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quote:
Originally posted by slegal:

I'm looking forward to trying out the new features you just talked about. But it sure would be nice if you'd fix the bugs that are preventing myself and many others from logging on to the cache search pages and to be able to log caches, before you make the sorts of changes you've outlined.

 

Scott


 

I have been completely unable to duplicate the problems you are having. I am also looking at possible issues without actually being able to duplicate them. This does not mean, however, that I need to sit on my thumbs while I figure out one problem instead of working on things concurrently.

 

At this point I don't know why you aren't being logged in. I am able to and the majority of folks are. Have you tried one suggested solution to clear out your cookies? (In IE, Go to Tools, Internet Options, and click on "Delete Cookies..." and see if that works). Also, if you're on a page that seems to log you out, hold down shift and click the button in your browser to refresh your page.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location™

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MY filter wont work,, all I get is the same options, am I missing something,

 

"Oh: well da! I have to put in the dang ZIP code,,works fine then,,,I do feel stupid now..if only I would have listned to those teachers in skool."

 

< Just a note: I was asked by my Dad if I could make sence out of, or read the new pages,,,He is Color Blind and it is almost impossible for him to read,,I have to admit it I would prefer the Bold and Italic's,,I know its boring but its a lot eaiser to read,,>

 

[This message was edited by Montana Latitude on June 16, 2003 at 10:40 PM.]

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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy (Admin):

 

I have been completely unable to duplicate the problems you are having. I am also looking at possible issues without actually being able to duplicate them. This does not mean, however, that I need to sit on my thumbs while I figure out one problem instead of working on things concurrently.

 

At this point I don't know why you aren't being logged in. I am able to and the majority of folks are. Have you tried one suggested solution to clear out your cookies? (In IE, Go to Tools, Internet Options, and click on "Delete Cookies..." and see if that works). Also, if you're on a page that seems to log you out, hold down shift and click the button in your browser to refresh your page.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location


 

Well, I know I'm not alone in this, but yes, I've tried everything you've suggested over and over along with all sorts of other tricks. My problem only happens on .aspx files. Is there something in my profile that you can see on the admin side? I have tried to get on with two different computers and Netscape 4.5, 6.2, IE 5.0 and 6.0. Nothing works!

 

Scott

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I seem to be having log-on problems too. Using my geocaching name Slytherin, if I go from "My Cache Page" where I'm properly logged in and then click the Nearest caches from your home coordinates link, I then show as not logged in. No amount of trying to log in will show me as logged in on the search page.

 

If I log in as my daughter "Trunchbull" then everything works perfectly. I have tried logging in on my home PC, my works PC and my laptop, using IE6, Netscape and Safari but nothing solves the problem.

 

Any ideas Jeremy?

 

Alex.

 

------------------------------------------------

Knights of the Green Shield stamp and shout.....

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Example of the graphic replacement of hidden/found status.

 

72057_3500.gif

 

While we're on the suggestion of tweaking the display, is it really necessary for the cache placement date to have it's own column? I don't know what others think, but I don't think it warrants it's own column.

 

I was thinking if you eliminated the Placed column you could use a.cache.x CSS to make the cache name/link larger and move the owner's name under the cache to read "Placed: 1/20/2002 by Johnny Cache in South Carolina (United States)

 

Also, we could abbreviate the states and country where we can.

 

Plus, while we're at it. How about a graphical representation of the difficulty?

 

These suggestions and a few from before in an example:

72057_3600.gif

 

I'm not hardcore about the actual graphics, these are just examples.

 

Thanks for listening.

 

CR

 

72057_2000.gif

 

[EDIT: was in the middle of a crash and posted what I had...]

 

[This message was edited by Sissy-n-CR on June 17, 2003 at 05:25 AM.]

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Travis' mockup is perfect -- except that I like someone's suggestion of having actual dates instead of "X days ago". I'm pretty frequently looking up what date I did certain caches. Besides, isn't the server doing some extra math to display it that way?

 

Flat_MiGeo_B88.gif

Well the mountain was so beautiful that this guy built a mall and a pizza shack

Yeah he built an ugly city because he wanted the mountain to love him back -- Dar Williams

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I don't think this has been mentioned so here is my one suggestion/criticism.

 

I almost always hide my caches with jungle green and we go back and forth on whose account is used.

 

But now the search list shows only the actual account name and not the submitted name. Some of our hides show jungle green and some show orange. But they were all submitted with orange & jungle green or jungle green & orange.

 

I liked it better when it showed the info that was put on the submitted cache form. Since it indicated a combined effort and not that of just one cacher.

 

Any chance of getting that back?

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quote:
Originally posted by Sissy-n-CR:

Can't you do that from your My Cache Page?


Yeah, you can, but it's more jumbled. Maybe I have more Not Founds than you do. icon_biggrin.gif Alright, I relent, since I have a workaround.

 

I see the Last Found date is working now (before it was the same as the date you found it). Excellent.

 

Flat_MiGeo_B88.gif

Well the mountain was so beautiful that this guy built a mall and a pizza shack

Yeah he built an ugly city because he wanted the mountain to love him back -- Dar Williams

 

[This message was edited by Dinoprophet on June 17, 2003 at 05:57 AM.]

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The f=1 option almost does it, since it makes most of our usual search criteria bookmarkable.

 

Would it be feasible to add additional filter types that would exclude specific types of caches (such as locationless)? It would be perfect if there were checkboxes for each type of cache to be excluded (found, unfound, locationless, multi, etc) and each combination had a unique filter number that we could include in our bookmark.

 

Jon & Miki

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OK, just one more suggestion - this one is a jenuwine enhancement request, not a complaint.

 

Would it be practical to provide another parameter in the URL to indicate what field to sort on? Right now caches are delivered in a search sorted by distance, but it would be pretty handy to be able to sort by other criteria, such as date last found by anyone, date last found by me, date hidden,cache type, hider, etc.

 

That option doesn't seem like it would add any work to the server since the server is already sorting the finds, in this case by distance from an arbitrary point of origin.

 

Of course, I'm not the guy that has to implement it, so my opinion of the difficulty is naive at best. Still, it seems like a nice feature if we can get it.

 

Jon & Miki

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quote:
Originally posted by jon & miki:

Would it be feasible to add additional filter types that would exclude specific types of caches (such as locationless)? It would be perfect if there were checkboxes for each type of cache to be excluded (found, unfound, locationless, multi, etc) and each combination had a unique filter number that we could include in our bookmark.


 

I would also find great benefit in excluding locationless caches from regular searches. If this exclusion were configurable, as mentioned above, so much the better.

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quote:
Originally posted by Slytherin:

I seem to be having log-on problems too. Using my geocaching name Slytherin, if I go from "My Cache Page" where I'm properly logged in and then click the Nearest caches from your home coordinates link, I then show as not logged in. No amount of trying to log in will show me as logged in on the search page.


 

I'm seeing the exact same thing.

 

--RuffRidr

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Well, I have an observation. I hope I am not just being stupid here. First the simple facts:

 

When querying nearest caches for GC40F7, the report shows GC64C4 39.9 km away and GCB99F 106.2 km away. But GC64C4 and GCB99F do not appear in each other's list of nearest caches, even though the distance between them must be less than 147 km.

 

Then the elaboration, which may help shed some more light on the phenomenon:

 

Actually there are many such pairs. GC64C4 is one of four caches in the extreme east of Denmark, on or near the island Bornholm. GCB99F is one of maybe 100 caches near Copenhagen, Denmark, well within the 240 km range of the search. It seems that for the purpose of the "nearest cache report" these two classes are miscalculated as being much further apart. In both cases, caches in Sweden and Germany appear in abundance, but caches in "the other part" of Denmark do not appear.

 

I hope someone else will try to reproduce this curious observation before Jeremy and his huge staff of debuggers spend too much time on it.

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Deleted all cookies and all temporary files. Rebooted and used different browsers but still cannot log into system at individual cache pages only to "My Cache Page". Can't log finds--since the system does not recognize us as logged in nor can we edit our caches.

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quote:
Originally posted by The Leprechauns:

There are a dozen or so posts saying "I liked it better the old way." Well, fine... let the site crash and burn like it has the past couple of weekends. Do you not understand? This update was moved quickly into production to keep the website from dying under its own weight. The nearest caches page, with all the customizing for caches you've found, hidden, etc., was the biggest single drain on the hamsters that power the server, according to TPTB.

 

I am sure that some tweaking can occur to address legitimate comments. But "change it back to the way it used to be" is not a legitimate comment.

 

I'm very happy on my slow dialup connection to see a site that loads quickly, with some neat new search features. I look forward to future improvements as the new geocaching.com is rolled out.

 

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Some mornings, it just doesn't pay to chew through the leather straps. - Emo Phillips


 

First: Sorry that you have dialup.

 

Second: Crashes are do to the fact that the servers are inadequate for the site. The servers needed upgrading not the website. By upgrading the servers one could retain the old site and also add more functionality to the searches. By doing what is being done know just puts off the inevitable for a year, 2 at the most. New servers would have solved the problems now. This is a short term fix and we are faced with a major disaster if this sport keeps growing at the current rate. I have seen too many places die because they don't bite the bullet and make the changes that are needed, but instead only do quick fixes to solve long-term problems.

 

Maldar

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quote:
Originally posted by maldar:

First: Sorry that you have dialup.

 

Second: Crashes are do to the fact that the servers are inadequate for the site. The servers needed upgrading not the website. By upgrading the servers one could retain the old site and also add more functionality to the searches. By doing what is being done know just puts off the inevitable for a year, 2 at the most. New servers would have solved the problems now. This is a short term fix and we are faced with a major disaster if this sport keeps growing at the current rate. I have seen too many places die because they don't bite the bullet and make the changes that are needed, but instead only do quick fixes to solve long-term problems.

 

Maldar


I paid my $30 membership fee to help finance things like new servers. Elsewhere, Jeremy has described his hardware upgrade plans. What have YOU done to help?

 

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Some mornings, it just doesn't pay to chew through the leather straps. - Emo Phillips

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quote:

 

"I liked it the way before" is pedantic, at best. Keep the comments constructive. Obviously your (constructive) input will ultimately improve the search tools.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location


 

But ignoring this "pedantic" comment shows that you don't care that a larger percentage of your users are disappointed with the new layout. Sometimes it's easier to add new features to a proven product that to introduce a new product and lose your customer base to competitors.

 

Maldar

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quote:
Originally posted by maldar:

But ignoring this "pedantic" comment shows that you don't care that a larger percentage of your users are disappointed with the new layout.


 

Actually its an extremely small percentage. And bollocks that I don't care. If I didn't I wouldn't be trying to respond to everyones issues/questions.

 

quote:

Second: Crashes are do to the fact that the servers are inadequate for the site. The servers needed upgrading not the website.


 

A simplistic observation.

 

The database is now running at between 5-20% CPU utilization on average now. Before the change it was at 96%-100% - with the upgrade coming of a new web server we should be able to support our continuing growth as we move more pages to a better programming base.

 

You must not be a programmer. Inefficient programming is the major contributor to slowdowns on web servers online. The geocaching.com web site was created as a hobby 3 years ago with the intent that it would be used by a small group. Since we're now at 14 million pageviews per month you can understand the need to create more efficient programming to deal with the increased server load.

 

Of course we couldn't have gotten this far without the financial support of geocachers. Our monthly traffic bill is now over $2,000. So thanks for that 1 travel bug purchase, maldar!

 

As for the new page, there are far more features with the new rollout of the nearest cache page than before. Most of the requests for changes are cosmetic and will be applied over the next week.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location

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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy:

You must not be a programmer. Inefficient programming is the major contributor to slowdowns on web servers online. The geocaching.com web site was created as a hobby 3 years ago with the intent that it would be used by a small group. Since we're now at 14 million pageviews per month you can understand the need to create more efficient programming to deal with the increased server load.


 

Inefficient programming is do to bad coding. In this case you only minimized the amount of code. I only know HTML currently, but am taking classes in VB which will lead to more languages.

 

As for my monetary involvement in Geocaching.com:

 

You only mention one item and I know I have purchased more than that. It's most likely more than any other college student has contributed to gc.c. Not to mention that is a cheap shot from someone that does not like to be proven wrong and censors what others have to say by locking out post only a few minutes after they start. It's a good thing that GC.c has no stockholder as they would have removed you long ago.

 

Maldar

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quote:
Originally posted by maldar:

Inefficient programming is do to bad coding. In this case you only minimized the amount of code. I only know HTML currently, but am taking classes in VB which will lead to more languages.


 

Great! I look forward to discussing this topic after you've increased your knowledge of coding.

 

And yes, sadly, I am a bad coder. I prefer to call myself "programmically challenged" though.

 

quote:
As for my monetary involvement in Geocaching.com

 

I thanked you for your travel bug purchase. You seem to be pretty defensive about the whole thing.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location

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quote:
I only know HTML currently, but am taking classes in VB which will lead to more languages

 

Now I know why you are shooting off at the mouth... YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT... =)

 

Give them time... I will work out...

 

B

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quote:
Originally posted by maldar:

Inefficient programming is do to bad coding. In this case you only minimized the amount of code. I only know HTML currently, but am taking classes in VB which will lead to more languages.


 

Don't you just love people who are experts because of what they're going to know?

 

CR

 

72057_2000.gif

 

[EDIT: Grammar]

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Two updates:

 

Added two background colors. A grey for caches you have found and a light yellow for caches you own.

 

The "my cache page" link has a (filter finds) option which adds the F=1 to the end of the query. Click on that if you want your finds and hides filtered. It's a good temporary solution.

 

Next I'll be re-adding glasses for items on your watch list, and filtering out locationlessc caches (as well as allowing searches for just locationless caches).

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location

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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy:

Two updates:

 

Added two background colors. A grey for caches you have found and a light yellow for caches you own.

 

The "my cache page" link has a (filter finds) option which adds the F=1 to the end of the query. Click on that if you want your finds and hides filtered. It's a good temporary solution.

 

Next I'll be re-adding glasses for items on your watch list, and filtering out locationlessc caches (as well as allowing searches for just locationless caches).

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location


 

I love the latest background colors and the "filter finds" feature is nice as well. I'm going to have fun playing with all the new features.

 

Thanks for the hard work Jeremy! It is appreciated.

 

--CoronaKid

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Very nice! The addition of the "Filter Finds" link should eliminate a lot of the double-searches (having to click "New Search" to go back and filter).

 

Keep up the good work and thanks for listening!

 

homer.gif

"Just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't understand."

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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy:

 

The "my cache page" link has a (filter finds) option which adds the F=1 to the end of the query. Click on that if you want your finds and hides filtered. It's a good temporary solution.


 

SWEET! Wow, that works SO cool now! Think about it... one click from your My Cache Page now shows you the 20 nearest caches to your home coordinates that you haven't hidden and that you haven't found! That is so much easier and faster!

 

I'll admit, when I first saw that we'd lost the page categories (Not Founds/Founds/Hiddens/Archived), I too was a bit upset. But, that was just because we were used to that page, AND because it was kinda cool to see that we'd cleaned off our nearest 25 caches page.

 

However, it meant MUCH more work to find the next nearest caches that you had yet to find, since you had to go from page to page, looking at just the first few to see what you had or hadn't done. This new version requires only 1 or 2 hits on the server, and that alone must free up server resources incredibly!

 

Although I understand many people are still having login problems (I know I am when switching from ASP to ASPX pages), since we all know it's temporary, we can certainly have some patience and wait till it's fixed.

 

Is it also possible to exclude Archived caches at the same time that Hidden and Found caches are excluded? No need to look at archived caches on your list when they aren't available, right? Once locationless caches are excluded, this would simply leave a list of caches for you to find, which is what I'm really here for anyway.

 

Thanks, Jeremy, that fix on the My Cache Page just made the site so much easier and faster for me. Keep up the good (and tireless) work. We appreciate it.

 

"Not all who wander are lost." - J.R.R. Tolkien

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Jeremy,

 

I'm still not able to log in to nearest caches even on three different computers and using three different browsers - all of which worked Saturday afternoon.

 

I realize that you are under pressure to fix this thing but may I make a suggestion? The changes are fine but not if everything else is being messed up. Go back to your previous coding (hopefully you saved it) prior to Saturday and work out your problems with the new coding before making it public. Put it through another port and ask some of us to try it every now and then as you solve the problem.

 

I can't get anywhere near my 'nearest caches' and have about seven caches to log. The colors are OK (orange in my case - not yellow) and nothing shows up on the search for nearest caches.

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FYI - this is what I get when I try to access a page from my nearset caches. Line 79 was colored red.

 

(I removed this since it was only for my benefit)

 

[This message was edited by Jeremy (Admin) on June 17, 2003 at 03:06 PM.]

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quote:
Originally posted by AnchMike:

 

I realize that you are under pressure to fix this thing but may I make a suggestion? The changes are fine but not if everything else is being messed up.


 

Thanks for the suggestion but I am actively working on bug fixes. I had assumed that all of the login issues had been solved until your post. as you can tell from the login issue specific post that many folks experiencing the same problems you are - are no longer experiencing any issues.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location™

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As I understand it, archived caches ARE being excluded from nearest cache searches. It's the 'temporarily unavailable' caches that you see with a line through them. I do agree, however, that these could go, since from my experience they rarely get reactivated. Let's see what the J-man thinks. The new site has definitely grown on me...great job, Jeremy!

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quote:
Originally posted by IntotheWoods:

It's the 'temporarily unavailable' caches that you see with a line through them. I do agree, however, that these could go, since from my experience they rarely get reactivated. Let's see what the J-man thinks. The new site has definitely grown on me...great job, Jeremy!


 

They need to be listed. If they aren't no one will complain about them and they will exist in the wild forever. Please report the cache as "should be archived" if it goes untended for longer than a few weeks so we can keep the data fresh.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location™

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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy (Admin):

They need to be listed. If they aren't no one will complain about them and they will exist in the wild forever. Please report the cache as "should be archived" if it goes untended for longer than a few weeks so we can keep the data fresh.


 

AHHH. I see. Sorry, never quite understood that about the caches with a line through them. Thanks for explaining it. The cache closest to me is one of these temporarily unavailable caches. I'll contact the owner and see if he plans on archiving it since it's been several months, I think.

 

Thanks again for making the site a better place!

 

"Not all who wander are lost." - J.R.R. Tolkien

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Jeremy Thanks for all of the hardwork on the site. I don't believe the naysayers gave it enough time to really make judgen=ment calls. I have cable and I've noticed a big difference thanks to the server load! the page features (1 2 3 > ) is a GREAT and long over due addition! and now with the filter finds on the "my cache page" I don't know how the site could be much better. the color coding does do wonders. And now I'm just waiting to see the update on the cache maps! Thanks so much for the hard work!

 

Photo Trekabout

www.geocities.com/photo_trekabout/

www.geocities.com/jason_r_budd/

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quote:
Originally posted by Quoddy:

I must have missed something...What's the difference between _BOLD_ and Regular type Cache names?


 

Bolded are ones you haven't clicked on before. Non bold you've viewed before. Good way to see whether you viewed one of them before.

 

frog.gif Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location™

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Jeremy,

 

I'm rather impressed with your diligence in resolving the log-in problems--Kudos!

 

Thank you for sharing the "&f=1" and adding that link to the "My Cache" page--that's very responsive and returns a lot of the original functionality back.

 

Now I have one last question, is there a similar way to manually enter a URL to get to the 2nd page of the listings without enabling Javascript and waiting, and waiting some more for it?

 

I did enable Java and went there to see, but the apparent URL of the second listings page didn't change from the first page!

 

Thanks,

 

Randy

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