wolfpack42 Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 For geocaching I use my iPhone. When I want to see description of a cache outdoor I have to download all the graphics of the description, which, in case of, say GC3C787 http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC3C787, makes up an enormous volume of 1.5 MB (majority of this is made by only one picture). I (and I believe many of cachers using their phones for geocaching) will welcome much smaller descriptions. Quote Link to comment
+Totem Clan Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 No no no PLEASE no!! I understand why and I agree that one cache is a bit overdone. The information could have been prestened in a better way. Putting a limit on the information you can put on a cache page would like saying you can't hide overly camo'ed caches. There should not be a top or bottom limit on what you can put on there, anymore than there should be a restriction on LPCs of 5/5 cachees. Just because every cache doesn't work the way you want it to does not mean we need more rules to limit us all. Quote Link to comment
+Huntleigh Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 (edited) No no no PLEASE no!! I understand why and I agree that one cache is a bit overdone. The information could have been prestened in a better way. Putting a limit on the information you can put on a cache page would like saying you can't hide overly camo'ed caches. There should not be a top or bottom limit on what you can put on there, anymore than there should be a restriction on LPCs of 5/5 cachees. Just because every cache doesn't work the way you want it to does not mean we need more rules to limit us all. Amen Rather than hobbling everyone wouldn't it be better to for the OP make a suggestion to their iPhone developers to have a facility to limit downloads? Actually, I've just had a closer look at that particular earthcache and it appears that the majority of the text in the cache is in a graphic file. That's just bad HTML coding and in my opinion the reviewer shouldn't have allowed it. Edited February 22, 2012 by Huntleigh Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 5, 2012 Share Posted March 5, 2012 or, if the limit existed, then the geocache owner would know that something was wrong with the html... I have the opinion that such limit should exist! It's just stupid to have PQs occupying several MBs just because some huge descriptions like these! Limiting to around 0.5 MB would be more than enough for a cache description! Quote Link to comment
+niraD Posted March 5, 2012 Share Posted March 5, 2012 As a practical matter, how would the cache description editor limit the total size of the cache description, especially when one or more images are hosted at other web sites? Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 5, 2012 Share Posted March 5, 2012 it's just the html data size that should be limited. not the actual view size. The problem is that some geocaches html descriptions are badly formed, and include garbage that come from word, etc... Quote Link to comment
+niraD Posted March 5, 2012 Share Posted March 5, 2012 Hmm... I was under the impression that there already is a limit to the maximum size of a cache's description, but I couldn't find a reference. Was I mistaken? Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 5, 2012 Share Posted March 5, 2012 I don't think it exists! I've just tried to create a description with 5 million character (5MBs) and it worked just fine... Who would ever need such a description? Quote Link to comment
+StarBrand Posted March 5, 2012 Share Posted March 5, 2012 Sounds like an issue the App developers might work into some option on the phones - but why ever limit those of us with desktop computers and wired connections using the site?? Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 because even for a desktop user, it makes no sense to download a 2MB cache description. In the limit, imagine a Pocket query with 1000 caches with just 1MB cache description, excluding logs and all other info... Do you know how big it would be? 1GB!!! Does this make any sense? I am a desktop user, using gsak, and I think that cache description data size should be limited! Quote Link to comment
Keystone Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 Actually, I've just had a closer look at that particular earthcache and it appears that the majority of the text in the cache is in a graphic file. That's just bad HTML coding and in my opinion the reviewer shouldn't have allowed it. Please point me to the section of the listing guidelines that empowers reviewers to say "no" to bad HTML. I'd love to start using it. Maybe it's in the same paragraph that bans empty cache descriptions and poor spelling. Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 if there was a limit to the cache description data size, these errors would not arrive to the reviewers... Quote Link to comment
+StarBrand Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 because even for a desktop user, it makes no sense to download a 2MB cache description. In the limit, imagine a Pocket query with 1000 caches with just 1MB cache description, excluding logs and all other info... Do you know how big it would be? 1GB!!! Does this make any sense? I am a desktop user, using gsak, and I think that cache description data size should be limited! The cache in question used a graphic file which would not appear in a PQ. So no issue. There is already a limit to the number of characters in the text. Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 so how about this cache: http://coord.info/GC38V5Z ??? doesn't it have a problem in the description? Imagine 1000 like that and figure out the size of the PQ! Quote Link to comment
+StarBrand Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 so how about this cache: http://coord.info/GC38V5Z ??? doesn't it have a problem in the description? Imagine 1000 like that and figure out the size of the PQ! Again....images are not included in PQ files. Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 because even for a desktop user, it makes no sense to download a 2MB cache description. In the limit, imagine a Pocket query with 1000 caches with just 1MB cache description, excluding logs and all other info... Do you know how big it would be? 1GB!!! Does this make any sense? I am a desktop user, using gsak, and I think that cache description data size should be limited! There is already a limit to the number of characters in the text. what's that limit? I can't seem to find anything about it, and tried with a 5 million characters description and it saved it! I hope it's not the 2GB limit imposed by the text type in SQL (1GB now that it is Unicode) or 2048GB if the new varchar(max) type is in use... Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 so how about this cache: http://coord.info/GC38V5Z ??? doesn't it have a problem in the description? Imagine 1000 like that and figure out the size of the PQ! Again....images are not included in PQ files. again... try to download the gpx of that cache and tell us the size of it. Quote Link to comment
+The A-Team Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 so how about this cache: http://coord.info/GC38V5Z ??? doesn't it have a problem in the description? Imagine 1000 like that and figure out the size of the PQ! What's the problem with that one? It has 135 kB of images (which aren't an issue as previously mentioned), and only 200 bytes of text. 1000 of these in a PQ wouldn't be very big at all. I'm sure the average size of descriptions is far larger than this one. Quote Link to comment
+The A-Team Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 1.8 MB for me... Hmm, you're right. According to this topic, any HTML should be stripped out when you receive the cache through a PQ or the "GPX file" button, but not when you use the "Send to My GPS". In this case, the HTML seems to be mal-formed, so the site isn't recognizing it to strip out. This cache is an exception, though. It shouldn't be a problem for most caches unless they have mal-formed HTML. Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 6, 2012 Share Posted March 6, 2012 yes, that cache included in a PQ that I have occupies around 50% of the size in a 400 caches PQ... Quote Link to comment
+eigengott Posted March 7, 2012 Share Posted March 7, 2012 Hmm... I was under the impression that there already is a limit to the maximum size of a cache's description, but I couldn't find a reference. Was I mistaken? Acoording to this thread the limit has been removed and unlimited length cache descriptions are a feature. Which is silly, as it breaks things like paperless caching, smartphone caching etc. Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 7, 2012 Share Posted March 7, 2012 hmmm such a nice feature! Quote Link to comment
geopt.org Posted March 7, 2012 Share Posted March 7, 2012 I would really like to see a limit being implemented again, as limitless cache descriptions are just useless and as eigengott said, break paperless and smartphone geocaching! Quote Link to comment
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