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BUG - Geocache health score is to sensitive


Pinkpiggy7

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We are now getting the ''You own X Geocache that may need your help'' after only 2 DNF's,  and the reasoning for the DNF's doesnt appear to be taking into account, as an example one today was for a dnf by a relative newbie, and the other because the finder had being disturbed by muggles.   The algorithm needs to be made more logical and not such a low threshold level.   Cachers will stop hiding caches if Groundspeak insist on such levels.  There are legitimate reasons for DNFs,  most CO's will know what a reasonable threshold is based on their knowledge of a cache, and not some algorithm that just counts DNF's.   We will often go and check after a single DNF based on what is written in a log, or our knowledge of the cache.

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How would an algorithm reason, or be logical ?  It can't tell why there's a DNF, only keep a tally of how many.

 

If/when AR gets into everything,  it might be one of those "careful what you wish for" things, if you're looking for logic.    :D

"Wet log", "Log full", "Missing lid", but no NMs could be the start of a whole new maintenance experience.

Fortunately IIRC, a Reviewer is the one who eventually checks if that chs reminder is true or maybe in error.

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7 hours ago, Pinkpiggy7 said:

Cachers will stop hiding caches if Groundspeak insist on such levels. 

 

No, they do not not stop hiding caches but they do not pay attention to this kind of emails if they happens to be bogus. It took only one click to check if the cache really needs your help.  It couln't be any easier.

 

Unfortinately, many cache owners do not read the geocaching email at all, because of stream of nonsense logs from finders. Cachers have already stopped hiding caches because of low quality of the feedback they receive from finders. HQ is trying to solve this problem by introdusing a feedback mechanism for logs. I do not believe that this makes any sense. I have solved the problem by filtering out logs which do not contain enough characters to be sensible like "TFTC" etc. and I am very clad to see informative email like CHS notifications. I may have received two of them already without getting upset.

Edited by arisoft
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Looks like the cache has frequent visitors in a relatively dense urban area, and it was probably the quick succession of 3 DNF's (with one Find in between) over the past couple of weeks or so that probably triggered the "...stupid Health score algorithm...".  Judging from the Find logs, it sounds like a pretty tricky hide.  Many people talk about finding the cache on their second visit, having to read previous logs to get some clues, and PAF in order to make the Find.  It's your cache of course, but I would probably consider bumping the Difficulty up from the current 1.5 Stars to something a bit more "logical".

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The notion that you can deduce the health of a cache by counting DNF logs seems to me to be fundamentally flawed, particularly for caches that are more involved than a quick-and-easy 1.5/1.5 P&G, as there are just so many ways to not find a cache other than it being missing or defective. There's a D2/T3 multi near here (GC81MZF) that was published in late January and had DNFs for its first three logs, two of them from me when I firstly messed up a waypoint calculation and was looking in the wrong place, then the next day when I was looking in the right place but still couldn't find it. It then got found by two people caching together who said they spotted it within minutes, so I went back for another look which became my third DNF. The next weekend when I was telling my tale of woe to a muggle friend, he said he'd like to have a go at finding it so back we went for a fourth DNF. The other person who'd originally DNFed it because he thought the terrain around GZ looked to too tough for him also went back, but ended up DNFing it again, so at that point it had two finds and six DNFs. If it hadn't been pinged by the CHS by then it really should have been, as other caches have been pinged for much less, and I suspect it was since the CO has now bumped its D rating to 4.

 

A few days later the other two-time DNFer went back after getting a further hint and made the find, followed the next day by someone who found it first go. With some more intel, I went back again this morning and this time found it. The cache is fine, it isn't missing or broken, the coordinates are excellent, in other words there's nothing wrong with it, you just need to not be overwhelmed by the huge number of possible hiding places in the area, search close to where your GPSr is pointing and put your head at just the right angle to see it staring back at you. I would hope that, with everyone who DNFed it now having found it, it would have a clean CHS score, even though the log count still shows six DNFs and five finds.

 

On 2/17/2019 at 8:14 PM, arisoft said:
On 2/17/2019 at 12:19 PM, Pinkpiggy7 said:

Cachers will stop hiding caches if Groundspeak insist on such levels. 

 

No, they do not not stop hiding caches but they do not pay attention to this kind of emails if they happens to be bogus.

 

I haven't stopped hiding caches since getting my CHS ping two years ago on a D2/T5 multi I knew wasn't missing (the one and only DNFer had been looking in the wrong place due to muggles setting up camp close to GZ, which we confirmed with an exchange of photos, and she then went back a week later and found it), but I've changed my hiding style, avoiding anywhere T4 or higher that I can't get to at the drop of a hat and also making the description and hint as big a give-away as I can to try to prevent DNFs. So far it's almost worked, with the ten caches I've hidden since then only having two DNFs between them, one because someone messed up a waypoint in a multi and got coordinates that were out to sea, and the other someone DNFed when they thought the hiding place was in a spot they couldn't reach (it turned out it wasn't and, reassured, they went back and made the find). That contrasts with the 57 DNFs I've had on my earlier hides (only two of which were due to a cache problem). Is this good for the game? If you think caching should all be about quick and easy finds with a guaranteed smiley then maybe it is, but for those who like more challenging hides where the chance of DNFing is high, then perhaps not.

 

On 2/17/2019 at 8:14 PM, arisoft said:

It took only one click to check if the cache really needs your help.  It couln't be any easier.

 

The CHS email tells you to go and visit the cache, repair whatever needs fixing and log an OM, disable it until you can or archive it. That seems to involve more than just one click, unless you're referring to the archival option.

 

Edited by barefootjeff
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1 hour ago, Keystone said:

This cache has never received a cache health score notification.  But, thanks for your concern.

 

Thanks for checking and that's good to know, as I was a bit worried about logging so many DNFs on it, particularly with the CO being fairly new to the game, but each one told a different aspect of my long drawn-out search which I thought might be helpful to future seekers. Strange, though, that it seems trigger-happy on the OP's caches yet was very forgiving of my string of DNFs on this one. Maybe it's figured out that I'm a Blind Freddy when it comes to finding caches and ignores my DNFs :wacko:.

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There have been lots of threads that discuss the CHS and the merits of it relying, in part, on DNFs.  I really don't understand why this one was pinged and you received the email, seeing as how you had an OM log that supposedly resets the CHS to 100% and then finds until the last two DNFs.  

 

That being said, there's not much you can do about it.  There's no way to provide feedback regarding the false positive you received, other than to email your reviewer to let them know that this was truly a false positive.  I really don't know how they could tweak the algorithm to prevent it from happening again, but that's really the only recourse you have in this regard.  I will say that if it were that sensitive all the time, I would certainly find it annoying enough to consider archiving those caches that continually get the email. 

 

I think it would be great if they allowed COs the occasional opportunity to ask to see their CHS on a particular cache.  Continual access to the scores could (and would) lead to some COs trying to "game" the system so that their caches are always above the threshold.  Limit those opportunities to once every 6 months for each individual cache so that if a CO suspects that a cache might be close to getting pinged, they can address it proactively and keep the reviewers from getting involved, other than in response to the CHS request.  Most COs have a feeling about the status of a cache, based on the logs, and we can usually tell when something is wrong.  This might just help verify it for us and allow us to take care of it.

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On 2/23/2019 at 11:59 AM, the Seagnoid said:

So... a health score based on difficulty rating? e.g. two DNFs in a row trigger an might need maintenance email if D<=2, three if D>2?

 

Keystone answered it as best as possible, without being overly specific because the CHS is meant to be kept hidden from users.  The algorithm takes into account the D and T of a cache so that the higher each score is, the less negative scoring there is as it pertains to a DNF.  The lower the D/T, the less DNFs it should take to trigger a CHS email, the higher the D/T the more DNFs it should take.  That being said, there is no "hard" count regarding consecutive DNFs.  Finds count to the positive as do OM logs while NM logs and DNFs count to the negative.  I"m not sure how it is applied, but it also appears that the length of time between finds also plays a small part when calculating the score

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On 2/23/2019 at 9:50 AM, Keystone said:

Yes, the Cache Health Score algorithm takes into account the difficulty and terrain ratings for the cache (among several other factors).  All other things being equal, the CHS email would be triggered earlier for a Difficulty 1 cache than it would for a Difficulty 3 cache.

 

Apparently, the CHS does not take difficulty and terrain ratings into account in a sufficient manner:

 

 

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On 2/19/2019 at 9:33 AM, niraD said:

And of course, the "friendly email" still does not offer an option for what to do when the email is a false positive. :(

Here's another example of the "friendly email" pressuring a CO to archive a cache that was perfectly fine.

 

When is Groundspeak going to edit the text of the "friendly email" to avoid pressuring COs to archive caches that don't need to be archived?

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I can relate to this. I own a cache that is hidden under a bridge, and can only be reached by entering the water, but it gets visited by a lot of newbies and/or people that don't read the cache description in advance and only find out at GZ that they don't have the means to access the cache. So naturally, a lot of DNF logs, and thus a low Health Score even thought the cache is fine. Now every time I go to geocaching.com I get this annoying "Some of your hides may need attention"  message that I can't remove. How can I get rid of this, other than by deleting all those DNF logs?

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1 minute ago, Geo-Jeddak said:

I can relate to this. I own a cache that is hidden under a bridge, and can only be reached by entering the water, but it gets visited by a lot of newbies and/or people that don't read the cache description in advance and only find out at GZ that they don't have the means to access the cache. So naturally, a lot of DNF logs, and thus a low Health Score even thought the cache is fine. Now every time I go to geocaching.com I get this annoying "Some of your hides may need attention"  message that I can't remove. How can I get rid of this, other than by deleting all those DNF logs?

 

If you know the cache is fine, post an Owner Maintenance log saying that. This will reset the CHS.

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13 minutes ago, Geo-Jeddak said:

How can I get rid of this, other than by deleting all those DNF logs?

Deleting the dnf logs will have no effect on the CHS score/notification, as far as I understand. In my area, if you do nothing after getting this notification the reviewer steps in. 

I've gotten so many dnf logs on puzzle caches that weren't solved. Noobs! 

The CHS score has improved over the years in my opinion. I've gotten one after just ONE dnf, but that was some time ago. 

If I know for sure that the geocache is fine I will log an OM. 

 

Edited by Max and 99
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@Geo-Jeddak

If you would share the GC-code of the cache in question instead of just anecdotes, it would be easier for people here and HQ staff to take a look and make a more informed assessment of whether something is off or not.

 

We all are frustrated sometimes, and yet right now it seems like you just came here to vent instead of being interested in an actual solution or answer to your problem.

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14 hours ago, Geo-Jeddak said:

I did, and for a day the CHS was gone. Now it's back again.

 

Is it Overspanning? It has a D2/T4.5 rating. 

 

Seems like a difficult cache to find even after putting on hip waders. 

 

Quote

 

Didn't find it Didn't find it

08/13/2021

Today we drove here from Alkmaar especially because of the d/t value we need. Waders on and searched for a very long time, felt everywhere and looked at every cm, but unfortunately the cache did not show itself. It's best to bale.

 

 

 

 

A D3 or D3.5 might be a better D-rating and will likely decrease the number CHS notices you get. 

 

Also, you might get fewer DNFs if you mention in the description that hip waders are needed, so people come prepared. It seems that some come to the site without any idea that hip waders are needed so they log a DNF and have to come back another day. 

Edited by L0ne.R
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On 1/20/2022 at 4:56 AM, Geo-Jeddak said:

I did, and for a day the CHS was gone. Now it's back again.

 

You can't see the health score on a cache.  So I'm not sure what you mean here? 

 

I would speculate that a cache that triggered a Health Score email might show up on Cache Owner dashboard as needing attention, or however that's phrased. I'd expect some server lag in clearing that.

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If this truly is about "Overspanning" https://coord.info/GC5R5VF the cache triggered the maintenance reminder on the dashboard on January 18.

 

The cache's most recent 10 logs before the Owner Maintenance log were:

  • 1x Write note by the CO (deleted)
  • 4x DNFs
  • 5x Find

The Owner maintenance log reset the health score as expected on January 19. Before that, this relatively low difficulty cache, based solely on the logs had a find quota of 50%. The lower the difficulty of the cache, the more this will make the health score drop.

 

As this is an algorithm that does not know whether this is a wading cache or does not understand Dutch, I see no malfunction in the health score. 

 

The health score reset appropriate after the CO used the appropriate log type. If he still saw the banner for another day this may have been due to caching or other delays.

 

Not taking automated processes personally may be the best course of action in this instance.

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