UPDATE review of ipsc-matches.net signup system - policies/etc

[euxx]

Omen, any chance to fix email notification about open matches? For several last matches, notification came at the time when matches were nearly fully booked. You may just as well stop sending it if it is going to stay this way.

 

[stormbringer]

There must be a problem on your end euxx.

The latest EESA match had people signing up within 5 minutes of me openning it up and that was in the morning. I doubt that people just happened to be online and monitoring the EESA match the moment I openned it up for signup.


As such it follows that they recieved notification from the system within minutes

 

[euxx]

Storm, I won't be surprised if people been watching the site and telling each other, especially knowing that notification is not reliable... Unless of course there is a special check for my name in there, though as far as I know couple of other guys didn't received an immediate notification either.

Here is email I've got (first few headers showing the time when it been sent, note PST time zone). As far as I can see it been delivered to me in seconds:

Delivered-To: ###x
Received: by x.x.x.x with SMTP id k20cs54363ibv;
Tue, 19 Jan 2010 21:02:21 -0800 (PST)
Received: by x.x.x.x with SMTP id t33mr6004382qaa.150.1263963740057;
Tue, 19 Jan 2010 21:02:20 -0800 (PST)
Return-Path: <###x>
Received: from mail.### (smaug.### [x.x.x.x])
by mx.google.com with ESMTP id 6si17108659qwd.16.2010.01.19.21.02.19;
Tue, 19 Jan 2010 21:02:20 -0800 (PST)
Received-SPF: pass (google.com: best guess record for domain of omen@### designates x.x.x.x as permitted sender) client-ip=x.x.x.x;
Authentication-Results: mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: best guess record for domain of omen@###x designates x.x.x.x as permitted sender) smtp.mail=omen@###
Received: from localhost.localdomain (vex.net [208.76.104.133])
by mail.###x (Postfix) with ESMTP id D8D101728C;
Wed, 20 Jan 2010 00:02:17 -0500 (EST)
From: omen@###x
Reply-To: omen@###x
To: ###xx
Subject: IPSC match update notification
Message-Id: <20100120050217.D8D101728C@mail.###x>
Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2010 00:02:17 -0500 (EST)

This is AN AUTOMATED MESSAGE to tell you the the following
match records were created/modifed on www.ipsc-matches.net
yesterday.

The changes might have been minor, or might represent a new
match record being created or opened up for signup for the
first time. Only clubs which you explicitly expressed an interest
in are listed here.

Thanks, and there's no need to reply to this msg, it's
automatically generated, and replies won't reach anyone.

Created/updated match records:

'EESA Blizzard Beach 6' at East Elgin

 

[omen]

The notifications are sent out just after midnight (this is the Nth time I'm saying this), for all the changes during the last 24h. There are people on the site all the time, on and off, I'm not surprised new matches are noticed quickly; making the notifications "real-time" won't change anything, it'll still be first come first serve, if 100 people get instant emails about a match with 45 openings, well, you do the math... Then it becomes a question of who can get to a PC quicker, and the majority of the really solid, long time ipsc shooters/officials/etc, well, I don't see them walking around with iPhones. Creating a system which puts those who contribute the most at a disadvantage isn't a good idea, for either the sport or the system. This is, to put it bluntly, a situation where what is technically feasible has to take a back seat to the realities of the environment in which the system had to operate. Once all those young, hip, iPhone carrying shooters become seasoned officials who create, setup, work, and tear down the matches, well, then we'll talk about real-time notifications. For now, this is what we'll have to deal with...

It sucks that matches fill up, but very simply put, the supply is smaller than the demand, so people will always get left behind. The system is just the messenger, that's all, no matter how the message gets formulated, it's still just a matter of simple math - # of shooting slots vs # of shooters...

 

[arancio]

There must be a problem on your end euxx.

The latest EESA match had people signing up within 5 minutes of me openning it up and that was in the morning. I doubt that people just happened to be online and monitoring the EESA match the moment I openned it up for signup.


As such it follows that they recieved notification from the system within minutes

I was told last night that some persons have the logon ID's and passwords for half a dozen friends. When they see a match is open they sign up everyone on their list and notify them. In turn, those people sign up and notify others and so on. Maybe omen could limit the sign ups from a single PC/source.

Omen could programmaticly delay the actual opening of a match to coincide with the emailing of the notifications.

 

[euxx]

The notifications are sent out just after midnight (this is the Nth time I'm saying this), for all the changes during the last 24h. There are people on the site all the time, on and off, I'm not surprised new matches are noticed quickly; making the notifications "real-time" won't change anything, it'll still be first come first serve, if 100 people get instant emails about a match with 45 openings, well, you do the math... Then it becomes a question of who can get to a PC quicker, and the majority of the really solid, long time ipsc shooters/officials/etc, well, I don't see them walking around with iPhones. Creating a system which puts those who contribute the most at a disadvantage isn't a good idea, for either the sport or the system. This is, to put it bluntly, a situation where what is technically feasible has to take a back seat to the realities of the environment in which the system had to operate. Once all those young, hip, iPhone carrying shooters become seasoned officials who create, setup, work, and tear down the matches, well, then we'll talk about real-time notifications. For now, this is what we'll have to deal with...

It sucks that matches fill up, but very simply put, the supply is smaller than the demand, so people will always get left behind. The system is just the messenger, that's all, no matter how the message gets formulated, it's still just a matter of simple math - # of shooting slots vs # of shooters...

Okay. Have to go with a plan B then...

 

[omen]

Maybe omen could limit the sign ups from a single PC/source.

well, mixed feelings... I mean, this is no different than emailing a match director and saying "hey, could you put me, Joe, Steve, Dave, and Mike on the 9am squad, please". I do it myself, and I've signed up myself and a friend to a match myself... Plus there are families of shooters who can be signing up together.

But there is a limit to what's reasonable, I have to agree... I mean,I can't email an MD and give him a list which would fill up half the match, right.

Maybe I'll do something like 4 signups/h from a specific IP... but even that's not foolproof, by any means...

 

[hungrybeagle]

I don't see what the problem is either, as long as none of those people is a no-show. Out west, we do prepayments for registration, and many people send in their registrations together. Heck, big matches in the US work the same way, too...One person sends in registrations for a few people at the same time.

 

[omen]

I don't see what the problem is either, as long as none of those people is a no-show. Out west, we do prepayments for registration, and many people send in their registrations together.

yeah, I agree. If this starts to become a problem, I think we'll probably start heading towards pre-payment too. Personally, I'd rather have matches open months ahead of time with pre-payment, than keeping them closed until 2 weeks before, to minimize people just signing up on the chance they might have to shoot, and filling up the spots.

 

[omen]

Ok, I changed it a bit and now the notifications go out three times a day - at 10am, at 5pm, and at midnight. I looked into it, and yes, I agree, that having the emails only go out at midnight was a little silly.

There won't be any duplicates in the daily msgs, if the same match is mentioned in multiple emails it'll be only because the MD closed and opened it again.

I run a test manually already, so today's 5pm was sent out few minutes ago, around 4pm

 

[euxx]

Omen, that won't make much difference. Say, if Match is opened ad 10:05am, there won't be notification until 5pm and there will be a good chance that match will be fully booked by that time. To address such issue, you could change sending notification from fixed times of the day, to a fixed time interval after match is opened, say 30 minutes or an hour after.

 

[Quigley]

What did we do before email

The next arguement will be that it's unfair for a realtime email...because only the weenies check their email on an hourly basis (you know who you are)

If we're going to ask D to continue to make changes to the system...let's concentrate on functions that add some measurable value.

This is getting a bit silly...

hhmmmm.....funny...I was expecting to start instinctivly throwing around a few more Fbombs now that I've joined the "greener pastures" crowd.

I'll have to start working on that...err....I mean...I'll have to ####ing start working on that

 

[euxx]

Quigley, are you suggesting to leave matches to people who are checking the web site every few minutes? How are those people any better then those who are checking emails? Besides, it is not like you have to sit and refresh your email all day long, you just get a beep or something when new stuff arrives.

PS: like I said, I already have plan B, so if you have some better features for this site, by all means, please go ahead and suggest them

 

[Quigley]

Quigley, are you suggesting to leave matches to people who are checking the web site every few minutes? How are those people any better then those who are checking emails? Besides, it is not like you have to sit and refresh your email all day long, you just get a beep or something when new stuff arrives.

PS: like I said, I already have plan B, so if you have some better features for this site, by all means, please go ahead and suggest them

I know you're a weenie...so I know you undertand the concept of push vs. pull

hhmmm...I hope Madness isn't reading this thread...or Fang...or Phil (the Ontario or QC version) or....

 

[omen]

You know, for all this talk of "MATCHES GET FILLED UP IMMEDIATELY, WE NEED REAL-TIME notifications, aahhh, blah, blah." Brant opened yesterday morning. It's now 9pm, and there are still slots available, 36h later. Everyone needs to chill out a bit.

I thought about how often I'd tolerate someone setting up an outside polling script, like I did for myself with the area8 match a couple of years back (wanted to switch squads, but the destination squad was full.. Haha, they weren't using my system, with waiting lists!!). I figured once an hour was as frequent as I'd let them, so why not, I changed the notifications to go out once an hour. We'll see.

If we end up with matches filling up with techno geeks who don't actually help out, just come out to shoot, well, we won't have matches for long under those conditions. If it looks like that's what's happening, we'll deal with it then

So, please stop asking, once an hour should be enough for now.

 

[euxx]

Thanks, omen, much appreciated.
BTW, it seems Quigley wanted to ask something, please let him ask.

 

[omen]

I was told last night that some persons have the logon ID's and passwords for half a dozen friends. When they see a match is open they sign up everyone on their list

I was looking out for that, with Brant which opened yesterday. I saw 1 person signup 3 friends, and another signup 2 friends (in addition to themselves). Not too bad...

 

[omen]

There you go, Oxford notification just went out, 20min after it was opened...

 

[omen]

All right, I'm done with everything on my TODO list for now. Let's see how things go over the next few months; I need a break, so other than requests from other sections, or bug fixes, I'm leaving the system alone for a while. Happy shooting everyone

 

[euxx]

omen, before you go could you please add couple tiny things to the web UI?

* in the match list, when "signed up" for the match, also show date and time of the signed up squad
* in the "signup for email match updates" have the same links to the club web sites and maps as in the match list

Thanks in advance