Souvenirs

[+Phetlern]

Our Geocaching account now has 149 souvenir badges - but they are all over the place as far as arrangement/organisation goes - as we say in Australia, a bit like a dogs breakfast. 

They are actually in alphabetical order, but souvenirs associated with activities are interspersed with those associated with a geographical location we have visited.  Even those that are associated with a particular form of activity - CITO, International Geocaching Day, Years of Geocaching, etc.  are scattered throughout the souvenirs. 

For example we have two souvenirs for the '3 Million Active Geocaches' promotion.  One is found between ' 2015 Geocaching Block Party ' and ' 31 Days of Geocaching 01 of 31 ' - ('3 million active geocaches: Thank you!') whilst the other (' Celebrating 3 million active geocaches ') is located between 'Canada' and 'Česká Republika'

As the number of souvenirs increase there is a growing need to be able to marshal like with like please.  For example, we would like to list/display all our Mega Event souvenirs in the one spot, likewise those obtained for annual events and likewise countries/states we have visited.

Could some consideration be given to providing a facility to be able to arrange awarded souvenirs in user defined/selected order please.

[+niraD]

The current alphabetical sorting is essentially random, because the Souvenirs weren't named in a way that would make alphabetical sorting meaningful.

Even sorting by the date acquired would be more meaningful than the current alphabetical sorting. Although there are a number of other options that would be more meaningful, including the Souvenir types mentioned above: mega event souvenirs, other event souvenirs, countries/states/provinces, Groundspeak's annual summer/winter promotions like the current Lost Treasures promotion, etc.

[+The Leprechauns]

I like the souvenir display options provided by Project-GC.com.  On the profile statistics page there, my souvenirs are listed in the order in which I earned them.  It makes for a nice stroll down memory lane for me, or for a fun way to learn about another geocacher's history and travels over time.

Recently, Project-GC added a Souvenir List Page that categorizes souvenirs much like the OP describes.  It is fun to see the souvenir art all collected in one place, and to track my progress.

 

[+Phetlern]

10 minutes ago, The Leprechauns said:

Recently, Project-GC added a Souvenir List Page that categorizes souvenirs much like the OP describes.  It is fun to see the souvenir art all collected in one place, and to track my progress.

 

Thanks for that link - we hadn't been aware of it.  Only thing is it list ALL souvenirs ever produced with a big green tick for those an account has found.  Do like the classification arrangement though.

[+noncentric]

The ability to sort souvenirs differently has been mentioned in several forum posts over the years. You're certainly not alone in wanting some souvenir sorting capabilities.

Some threads from more recent years include:

• Sorting options for souvenirs
• sorting Souvenirs
• Feature Request: Souvenir Groups
• Souvenirs page customizing
• Souvenir sorting
• Souvenirs page customizing
• Please make the Souvenirs page editable per souvenir

[+Bazonka]

Yes please!  Some way of sorting the souvenirs into meaningful sections would be very welcome.  Automatic or manual, I don't care, anything would be an improvement on the random mess that we have at present.

[+cerberus1]

As well as "sorting", I'd like to see a way to delete those you aren't interested in.   "Hiding" them doesn't (really) do that.

I have asked HQ to delete souvenirs I didn't want...and they did (thank you)... but we've also had times (31 days is one) that we haven't cached at all that entire time because of them.

There's another one on right now that will be hit n miss for souvenirs we aren't really interested in accruing.

Similar to The Leprechauns, we'd like to see them in the order we earned them.  Annual days (intl. geocaching day is one) and States cached in, the other 2/3rds likes the most. 

We will do a few promotions, just not the ones that require us to change our caching behavior.  

I know we're not alone in this thinking , so rather than a pile of people asking HQ  to delete them each time, I'd think it'd be easier for them to just allow us to do it ourselves.   

[+Gill & Tony]

I suggested some time ago that the souvenirs tab should have 3 options:

 

Display nothing

Display as now

Display our own HTML file, so we can customise them as we want.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

14 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

I have asked HQ to delete souvenirs I didn't want...and they did (thank you)... but we've also had times (31 days is one) that we haven't cached at all that entire time because of them.

 

Rather than delete unwanted souvenirs I'd rather see a mechanism for opting in.  Instead of just adding a souvenir to ones profile, send a "you have qualified for XXXX souvenir.  Click here to cliam it" message.  

 

I have not intentionally participated in any of the promotional souvenirs for the past few years.  However, as I do most of my geocaching while traveling, and that travel sometimes coincides with the qualifying period for a promotion I may still want to find some geocaches but have no interest in the souvenirs.  For example,  I'm taking a one week vacation that will involved going through three states during the last week of he Hidden Creatures promotion.   I'd like to find a few caches in some of the new places I'll be visiting and will have to go into my souvenirs page to hide any hidden creature souvenirs if I don't want to show them.

[+cerberus1]

53 minutes ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

Rather than delete unwanted souvenirs I'd rather see a mechanism for opting in.  Instead of just adding a souvenir to ones profile, send a "you have qualified for XXXX souvenir.  Click here to cliam it" message.  

 - snip -

I'd like to find a few caches in some of the new places I'll be visiting and will have to go into my souvenirs page to hide any hidden creature souvenirs if I don't want to show them.

 

Okay, I'd be good with a "You've earned ...... souvenir.  Click here to claim it" or similar if that's all that's available.

 - But if there was going to be any "Opting in" , I'd like it to be for the promotion itself.  Right now, you're in whether you want to or not.

Not clicking on that "Opt in" should forever make unwanted souvenirs a non-issue.   

[+purpletrumpet]

YES!  My husband and I care most about place souvenirs, states, countries, territories.  It's hard to find them in all the random souvenirs that were earned because I found a cache on a given day.  I didn't know you could ask for them to be deleted.  That is something I might do.  I am really not motivated to cache for the current Mythical Creatures souvenirs.  I really am trying to avoid getting them, but hey, some days you gotta cache.  I would love to be able to sort them!!!

[+cerberus1]

10 minutes ago, purpletrumpet said:

 I am really not motivated to cache for the current Mythical Creatures souvenirs.  I really am trying to avoid getting them, but hey, some days you gotta cache. 

 

This is one of a couple times now that I'm not caching because of a promotion that would have me change my behavior to "just find a lotta caches." 

I don't go after anything for a "smiley" either. 

Right now a series is going on near me, sort of a light competition with others locally. Most with some walking to do.  I'm missing them because of this promotion.

 - But sometimes ya  gotta stick to your guns.  My pm comes due next month...

[+Harry Dolphin]

1 hour ago, purpletrumpet said:

YES!  My husband and I care most about place souvenirs, states, countries, territories.  It's hard to find them in all the random souvenirs that were earned because I found a cache on a given day.  I didn't know you could ask for them to be deleted.  That is something I might do.  I am really not motivated to cache for the current Mythical Creatures souvenirs.  I really am trying to avoid getting them, but hey, some days you gotta cache.  I would love to be able to sort them!!!

 

Yes.  I would like to see different files for places and others.  

[+Freima]

I knew that if I looked I'd find this subject had already come up - and I wasn't disappointed.

I would like to be able to arrange souvenirs into some semblance of order.

 

My daughter plays an online game called Dragon Cave, and she can arrange her 'dragons' in any order she wants. It's a free game and loads really quickly; it's not at all graphics-intensive. I mention this because I assume that if players being able to change the order were difficult it would not be a feature of a free game run by, I think, one person.

 

If that one person can include a 'custom arrange' in a relatively small game, can't the website people at Groundspeak do the same? Please?

[+The A-Team]

1 hour ago, Freima said:

If that one person can include a 'custom arrange' in a relatively small game, can't the website people at Groundspeak do the same?

Yes, but how much effort it takes to make it happen will vary for each project. In the case of geocaching.com, the site was designed over 15 years ago and has had many modifications over the years, which makes it more difficult to make additional changes or implement more modern and easier technologies or techniques.

[+noncentric]

6 hours ago, Freima said:

If that one person can include a 'custom arrange' in a relatively small game, can't the website people at Groundspeak do the same? Please?

Because that is not an apples-to-apples comparison.

 

Honestly, when users say "it should be easy to program" without having any technical insight into how the underlying system is designed, then it's not really a fair comparison.  It happens all the time though and most developers have heard it often enough.