Cache Owner maintenance short cut?

[+Bean & Sprout]

Not sure if this is the right place to post but this is where the link from the geocaching page for suggestions took me...

 

There doesn't seem to be any easy for a cache owner to bring up a list of their caches which have a needs maintenance flag or are temporarily disabled. Could COers have an easier way of checking rather than trawling through the entire caches owned list.

 

If you only own a handful then it's easier to spot, but when you have 100+ like I do the only ways seems to be to create a new cache (where it then gives you a list of those that require attention first) or by choosing to view your public profile, then look at your caches owned (as others see them) and then you can see the red wrench and which are disabled.

 

It's a bit of a faf either way and I feel there should be a one click way offered to cache owners to help us keep on top of maintenance. Thanks

[+cerberus1]

I see this requested often enough, seems to be folks with a lot of hides and curious...

- Though I think anything that will encourage COs to maintain hides is a good thing, why not act on a hide that needs maintenance when you receive notification on it?

[+Bear and Ragged]

Anything that makes it easier, must be a good thing!

 

As a Premium Member.

Try making a PQ for caches with the Needs Maintenance attribute, that you own.

You don't need to run it, just preview it.

[+Beach_hut]

One way you can do it is to begin to fill out the form for a new cache. The very first screen brings up a list of your disabled and needs maintenance caches. You can then abort as soon as you have this without actually writing out a new cache listing.

 

I agree though, it needs to be more prominent and as others have been said, it's been requested a few times. One idea that comes up often is to bring that list up on your own profile screen (not your public profile) which I would be in wholehearted favour of.

[+Isonzo Karst]

One of these days I'll write a Help Center article on managing the ownership of many listings...

 

You need to own some pocket queries:

 

1. Caches I own that are disabled MYDisabled

2. Caches I own that have the NM Icon set MYNM

3. Caches I own that have Trackables - MY TB go through the trackables and remove the missing from your cache inventory. You can "marking missing" on the trackable page - this gets them out of your cache inventory and into an Unknown location. It won't hurt them, if someone picks them up from somewhere - they just go on from their last known location.

 

4. My Caches - if you're ambitious - run all of 'em. Drop 'em in some database (GSAK) rank for date of last find. Lower D/T hides that have gone a long time without finds may be missing. Nobody logging the DNF...

 

#1 - #3 you never need to run - just preview them.

[+Bean & Sprout]

Well I haven't got to grips with pocket queries really. So asking me to do one just for cache maintenance isn't going to get me very far I'm afraid! But thanks for the suggestion

 

And in response to the person above who asked why I don't rush out and respond to maintenance right away... Unfortunately I have a life outside of geocaching, a full time job and a child to bring up on my own and limited resources in regards to petrol costs.

 

I own a lot of caches over a wide area, some pretty remote, some with unique containers, and many with unique letterbox stamps. I can't always rush out to replace it immediately, both time wise and financially (although I do try and keep a least one spare of different or unique cache container I own). I am also currently looking after caches for a CO who is abroad so I actually have well over 200 caches to maintain over quite a wide area.

 

Today I have set aside as a maintenance day and when making my list of caches to attend too I realised there were a couple I had forgotten all about (specifically a letterbox which I needed an ink pad for, and one in a remote location and I don't often drive that way). If these had jumped out at me on a CO quick link maintenance page I would have dealt with them before today.

 

I actually have ten caches to replace today. I also have 2 others to visit to retrieve stuck TBs (at TB owners request) and another to check a log which I believe has been signed by an armchair cacher but need to check before I delete the log. I will also randomly stop by other caches I own on route to check log books and that caches are on good order. So will probably vist some 30 ish caches today alone. Most days I stop to check on at least one or two of my caches if/as I pass them.

Edited October 6, 2013 by Bean & Sprout

[+kunarion]

Well I haven't got to grips with pocket queries really. So asking me to do one just for cache maintenance isn't going to get me very far I'm afraid!

PQs are easy. Even I can do them!

 

The ones that Isonzo Karst mentioned are a cool idea. You'd look at some of the options and click them, and save the new PQ. If someone doesn't drop by soon to post the specific PQ recipes , I can try to figure out the best way to set them up, and post them.

 

I think for disabled caches, you'd type a PQ name, select "1000 caches", select "That I Own" and "is disabled", leave everything else selected as is, and test it, and save it. Then checkmark the days to run it.

 

Every day, you can get a list of up to 1000 of your caches that have issues, and you could set it up to gather lists of many thousands.

Edited October 6, 2013 by kunarion

[+Bear and Ragged]

On the Pocket Query page.

 

Create new query

Most settings can be left as they are, on the default.

 

New Pocket Query: Type in a name eg Maintenance

 

Leave selected Any Type

Leave selected Any Container

 

In the panelThat (And)

Select I own

 

Attributes to Include (Click to include/exclude certain attributes.)

Select so it shows as

 

Select Include Pocket Query name in download file name

 

Click Submit Information

 

You will get a search page of your caches, with the Needs Maintenance attribute.

 

The PQ will be listed on your PQ's page, http://www.geocaching.com/pocket/, and can be previewed at any time without running. (So not using One of your Five PQ's a day!)

[+NanCycle]

I see this requested often enough, seems to be folks with a lot of hides and curious...

- Though I think anything that will encourage COs to maintain hides is a good thing, why not act on a hide that needs maintenance when you receive notification on it?

 

I keep a bookmark list of caches near my home that I haven't found (called 0-Home). Whenever I receive an alert of a new cache in the area, it goes on this list until I have found it. This list is tied to a PQ that runs weekly.

Now here's the part that makes this relevant to this discussion--whenever I receive a notice of a NM or DNF on any of my own hides, it also goes on this list until I have checked on it and done whatever maintenance is needed.

[+cerberus1]

I see this requested often enough, seems to be folks with a lot of hides and curious...

- Though I think anything that will encourage COs to maintain hides is a good thing, why not act on a hide that needs maintenance when you receive notification on it?

 

I keep a bookmark list of caches near my home that I haven't found (called 0-Home). Whenever I receive an alert of a new cache in the area, it goes on this list until I have found it. This list is tied to a PQ that runs weekly.

Now here's the part that makes this relevant to this discussion--whenever I receive a notice of a NM or DNF on any of my own hides, it also goes on this list until I have checked on it and done whatever maintenance is needed.

I can't get the PQs and GSAK thing for the life a me.

Similar I guess, I simply save the email received until it's completed.

[Pup Patrol]

I was going to suggest starting a bookmark list, too.

 

The reason I was thinking of this is because not all cachers post "Needs Maintenance", but will mention a full log or a cracked lid, etc in their "found it" logs.

 

Without posting the NM, the attribute doesn't get activated, so it wouldn't show up in pq's, correct?

 

A bookmark list can be edited as often as necessary. Caches could be deleted, as the maintenance is completed, or they could stay on the list if maintenance is needed often.

 

Easier and quicker than pq's, I think.

 

That isn't to say that I don't think the original idea is not good. It is, and has been requested previously, so it doesn't look like Groundspeak is in any rush to implement it.

 

 

B.

Edited October 6, 2013 by Pup Patrol

[+Cardinal Red]

It took less than 5 minutes to scan your 5.25 pages of cache hides and see:

 

(4) Disabled Caches

(2) Needs Maintenance Caches

(1) Disabled AND Needs Maintenance Cache

 

It took a little longer to check a few details.

 

Why do cachers often make optimistic timeline predictions, and then often enough miss them?

Being less specific, and then just getting it done as soon as is possible would be a better strategy.

 

How long do you plan to continue letting that Needs Maintenance stand that was only tagged to it because broken glass at GZ makes it a less desirable location? Is that really a Needs Maintenance issue? Unless you do a CITO, does it just stay there forever now?

 

While Pocket Queries are a far superior strategy, that is not an option for Basic Members. Scanning the list of ALL your hides is open to everyone. A few minutes is not bad to scan more than 100 hides.

[Moun10Bike]

We have some steps toward this idea coming in the next release. The list of your owned caches on the "My Account" page will use the more standardized list functionality seen in search results and other locations. This will allow you to easily sort your list as well as see the NM attribute column.

[+Don_J]

We have some steps toward this idea coming in the next release. The list of your owned caches on the "My Account" page will use the more standardized list functionality seen in search results and other locations. This will allow you to easily sort your list as well as see the NM attribute column.

 

Has any thought been put into making the per page list bigger? 20 per page goes back a long way when machines and the Internet in general was a lot slower. Would it be a big hit on you guys if it were increased to 50, 100, configurable?

[Moun10Bike]

Search results are one of - if not the - most expensive hits on the database (regardless of how fast the Internet is), so the number of results displayed at one time is intentionally kept small. I'm not sure how the dev team is planning to implement this on the "My Account" page (i.e. what type of paging), but I will mention to them the desire to have more results per page.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

We have some steps toward this idea coming in the next release. The list of your owned caches on the "My Account" page will use the more standardized list functionality seen in search results and other locations. This will allow you to easily sort your list as well as see the NM attribute column.

 

Has any thought been put into making the per page list bigger? 20 per page goes back a long way when machines and the Internet in general was a lot slower. Would it be a big hit on you guys if it were increased to 50, 100, configurable?

 

On a similar note, on ones profile page, there is a "Recently Viewed" section which lists the five most recently view cache listings, followed by the Your Logs (Last 30 days). Since I've never done a power trail and posted hundreds of logs I don't know if the last section is pages, but I have gone, on quite a few occasions, 30 days without posting any logs. I end up with a Profile page with very little content in the left column with all the "Stat Bar", "Search Options", "Premium Features" sections on the right. It would be nice to be able to have the "30 days" configurable to "7 days, 30 days, 60 days" so that ones "MyProfile" page better represents how one geocaches.

 

 

[+NYPaddleCacher]

Search results are one of - if not the - most expensive hits on the database (regardless of how fast the Internet is), so the number of results displayed at one time is intentionally kept small. I'm not sure how the dev team is planning to implement this on the "My Account" page (i.e. what type of paging), but I will mention to them the desire to have more results per page.

 

There was a thread a long time back about re-organizing the "my profile" page (which, I assume is the same as the "My Account" page) such that it was more "iGoogle like". For example, there are several sections along the right hand side (Hello "Cacher", Stat Bar, Favorites, "Search Options", Premium Features, Account Options, etc). Since this is the users profile page, it would be nice if we were able to customize it to some degree be reorganizing or hiding some of the sections. For example, the "Hello geocacher" section at the top has the number of Finds and HIdes. It's followed by the Stat Bar which has...our number of hides and finds. Personally, I really don't need to see the "Your GPS" section every time I look at the page, nor the Geocache Google Earth Geocache Viewer section (I downloaded the viewer a long time ago). I use the "Filter out Finds" link and the Premium Features section more than anything on that page so I'd like to have them at the top instead of having to scroll the page every time I want use those links. Obviously, different users are going to placed higher importance on different sections so having some way to customize the layout would be nice for everyone.

 

 

[+J Grouchy]

It seems like all it would take would be to have the "Your caches" page show up in the same format as the "Your Found Caches" page. Then you could immediately see the little red wrench symbol in an "Info" column.

 

Example:

[+J Grouchy]

It seems like all it would take would be to have the "Your caches" page show up in the same format as the "Your Found Caches" page. Then you could immediately see the little red wrench symbol in an "Info" column.

 

Example:

 

Okay...I may have to take back any previous complaint about Groundspeak 'unresponsiveness' to suggestions. I looked at my "Owned" cache page and this is what I see now! Awesome! This is EXACTLY what I was hoping for!

 

[Jayme H]

Okay...I may have to take back any previous complaint about Groundspeak 'unresponsiveness' to suggestions. I looked at my "Owned" cache page and this is what I see now! Awesome! This is EXACTLY what I was hoping for!

 

Thanks buddy! So glad you love it. We are, indeed, listening to our awesome community and trying our best to implement your great ideas. Thanks for your patience while we took the time to make it happen.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

It seems like all it would take would be to have the "Your caches" page show up in the same format as the "Your Found Caches" page. Then you could immediately see the little red wrench symbol in an "Info" column.

 

Example:

 

Okay...I may have to take back any previous complaint about Groundspeak 'unresponsiveness' to suggestions. I looked at my "Owned" cache page and this is what I see now! Awesome! This is EXACTLY what I was hoping for!

 

 

Nice. However, I don't think the column for D/T rating is all that useful. Instead, I'd rather see a Last 3 log types column which could display the icons each log type (i.e. red wrench/frownie face/smiley face)

[+Don_J]

I love the new list. The first thing I noticed was a Geocoin in one of my caches that I was not aware of. It was put in 18 months ago and is probably missing, but I've put it on the agenda to go check.

[+J Grouchy]

I love the new list. The first thing I noticed was a Geocoin in one of my caches that I was not aware of. It was put in 18 months ago and is probably missing, but I've put it on the agenda to go check.

 

And I hope you mark it missing if it's not in there!

 

For some reason, nobody ever puts trackables in my caches. They get a lot of trackable "visits"...but I've only seen one or two actual drops go into any of my caches.

 

Anyway, I'm glad they're working on this particular part of the site. Now, if only we could get them to show DNFs on the map somehow...