geocaching.com suggestions

[Guest zelph]

Just wanted to pass on some suggestions of some possible improvements of the site (IMHO anyway). If nothing happens, no worries... but just want to put my .02 in.

 

Cache Info Page

- Number of successfull logs displayed. Like "32 users have found this cache"

- Some indication if you have found this cache or not. Maybe an image or text saying "Found" (larger version of the icon used in the GPSR's maybe?)

 

Pages Where there are a list of caches (zipcode search, caches nearby, etc)

- Link the name of the cache instead of using a "details" link. I always go to click the title (like I'm used to on Message Boards and such) and have to remind myself to use the details link.

- Ability to show more then just 25 caches per page (dropdown selectable?)

 

Create a User Page with:

- Link to list of found caches

- Link to list of hidden caches

- Link to email user

- Any other user info appropriate to this type of page, viewable by the public

 

The above would be a good link to pass onto friends as a public "My Geocaching" page. If it was done, anywhere a username shows could be linked to it.

 

Thought I had a few more ideas, but can't remember them at the moment. Feel free to add any ideas, or shoot down the above.

 

Just looking to make it a better user experience

[Guest Rich in NEPA]

Zelph, I think you have some useful ideas there. Anything that helps to make navigating a Website less cumbersome is worth an attempt to implement.

 

Jeremy's weekly Geocaching update by state is very handy, but I would like to see the coordinates for each new cache included with it's other brief details. This way I can easily spot the ones closest to me without having to jump to the Website for the complete cache report. Mostly I rely on the name of the cache placer to assume that this cache is going to be somewhere on the other side of the State, for example.

 

As always, it's just a suggestion and no feelings will be bruised if it is ignored or deemed unsuitable.

 

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~Rich in NEPA~

 

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? A man with a GPS receiver knows where he is; a man with two GPS receivers is never sure. ?

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[Guest mrcpu]

I like your ideas. I've been bugging for months now for a couple of things so here goes again (Sorry Jeremy!!!):

 

- A cookie so I don't have to keep loging in. Someone posted a way of setting up a bookmark that autologs in. Now I click that, then I click the bookmark that I had for nearest caches.

 

- I would love to be able to pull down a .loc file for my entire province or country in one click. This way I could easily maintain a MS Streets and Trips or OziExplorer import file for myself and the community.

 

- I've wanted the "My Geocaching Page" to be "public" as well. If you look at my signature below I do have links to my finds and my hides and this is not hard to setup, but having it all on one page would be cool.

 

- Having a table with Cache Name and my comments all on my page might be neat too.

 

- Having the Email Notification, subject contain the cache name would be really nice. As it is now I like that added cache name info in the body of the email but still...

 

Do you think we should get Jeremy fired so he can work on the sit full time ;-) (Insert Evil laugh here.)

 

quote:

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Originally posted by zelph:

- Number of successfull logs displayed. Like "32 users have found this cache"

 

Pages Where there are a list of caches (zipcode search, caches nearby, etc)

- Link the name of the cache instead of using a "details" link. I always go to click the title (like I'm used to on Message Boards and such) and have to remind myself to use the details link.

- Ability to show more then just 25 caches per page (dropdown selectable?)

 

Create a User Page with:

- Link to list of found caches

- Link to list of hidden caches

- Link to email user

- Any other user info appropriate to this type of page, viewable by the public

 

The above would be a good link to pass onto friends as a public "My Geocaching" page. If it was done, anywhere a username shows could be linked to it.

 

Thought I had a few more ideas, but can't remember them at the moment. Feel free to add any ideas, or shoot down the above.

 

Just looking to make it a better user experience

---

 

 

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MrCpu

mrcpu@myrealbox.com

Finds

Hides

[Guest Markwell]

I had planted, and not something that everyone intuitively looks for.

 

Jeremy has made it plain that he is upgrading the forums (see this thread) and that they will be better integrated with the main Geocaching site. Even in his test mode which used to be at geocaching dit com slash forum, you could get more info about a cacher including total finds, total hidden, a photo, etc.

 

I would guess that many of these suggestions will be solved from the implementation of the upgraded forums.

 

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Markwell

My GPS Activity Page

Non omnes vagi perditi sunt

 

[This message has been edited by Markwell (edited 22 February 2002).]

[Guest infosponge]

One thing that would be really nice would be a plain-text view of the search results page and the cache detail page.

By "plain-text" I mean no images, no maps, no extra links, no HTML table formatting, etc...

This can be read and stored by PDA (i.e. Palm Pilot) devices and save a few trees from being killed. I was using a home-grown script to do this for a while, and it was great to be able to store the pages for all my local caches in my ancient Palm Pilot Personal and carry it around with me.

[Guest robertlipe]

The geocaching.com website is clever, and I imagine that it's probably a custom piece of programming. But as a software guy, there are a few things I've found myself wishing for:

 

One (maybe two) supplemental waypoints per cache. At least locally, probably 10-15% of the caches list parking. (And before anybody flames about that, in the cases where it's done it really IS useful.) But if you use something like the ezgps thingy it won't know how to read the "park at these coordinates" stuff out of the text; it needs to be the *.loc that gets blasted out. Use cookies or *something* so we don't have to log in each time for those with personal systems. Of course, you'd still need a "logout" facility for public tubes. The current behaviour is unfriendly to those of use that use "open in new window" extensively; we have to log in for each window. Optimize login procedure. Currently we

login. What's the next thing that every geocacher does? "Visit my cache page." And from there MOST of them go to "near my home coords"; the remaining options could easily go in left frame.

Make "printer friendly" more, well, printer friendly. If optimizing ouput lose the outer frame. it consumes 10% and is there for the green background. If "crypt=y", don't output the decryption key - the text is already decrypted, it's just consuming real-estate. Actually, if you could lose the left frame and bottom bar (you don't need web navigation buttons on a piece of paper) you could buy back space, too. The goal should be that most "printer friendly" printouts should fit on one piece of paper, not 2-3 as is the norm today. Edit of logs. Currently a reasonable workaround is to cut the text to another buffer, delete it, paste it back, then do the edits.The message boards could be smarter about

suppressing messages that we've already seen and already declined to read - there's no need to show them again. (Look at a good threaded mail reader for an example of how well this can work at high volumes.)

 

And just so I'll put my money where my mouth is, I'm a programmer. If this thing is written in some language or tool I know and you're interested in a hand making it happen, let me know.

[Guest exConn]

One thing I wish could be added would be one additional forum called Other. A forum where you could go and discuss other interests that have nothing to do with Geocaching.

 

Yeah, it doesn't add any value to the game and Jeremy probably wouldn't want the additional traffic, but...

 

-exConn

 

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What is Project Virginia?

[Guest web-ling]

There have been multiple threads on this subject:

 

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/001832.html

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/000468.html

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/001981.html

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/001907.html

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/001920.html

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/001889.html

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/001882.html

 

An easy way to log in to geocaching.com without having to enter your password every time is to create the following shortcut:

 

http://www.geocaching.com/login/default.asp?S=5&username=USERNAME&password=PASSWORD

 

where USERNAME is your geocaching.com userID and PASSWORD is your password.

 

 

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Web-ling

www.web-ling.com

[Guest Ranger Rick]

Jeremy, I for one think there are some good ideas above, but I would also like you to know that all of us appreciate the work you put into keeping this site alive. I know you don't have the whole Microsoft team working in your office, and I truly want to thank you for your effort and time. Sincerely, Ranger Rick