# How to improve the weekly competitions?



## AvGalen (Aug 23, 2007)

I thought the conversation that started here deserved it's own topic.

Points made by Johannes91 so far:
-Unorganized
-Issues with fewest moves
-Results are hard to read

My answers:
-I think most competitors like it this way, those that don't can make their posts in the way they like it
-I don't think the issues he raised are really issues
-I didn't realize. Please tell me how to improve this

cin also made some remarks and this is how I would like to address those:

I agree that (from a software developers point of view) a forum is not the ideal place to host a competition, however:

-Closing old competitions: Only takes a few seconds
-and generating new ones: Only takes a few seconds
-adding new events: No problem so far, the voting system (democracy ) seems to work
-nice statisctics: Those will become available as soon as I have moved and have my own webserver again. This has been delayed a couple of times, but the final date has now been set at october 1st. Give me 2 weeks from then and the statistics will be up and running!

-Problem 1: Integrating a web-app with this forum requires login-integration (single sign-on).
-Solution 1: Don't integrate , but eventually I will figure out how to do that and then entering scores might become more automatic (but less fun probably)

-Problem 2: Lack of them to do all of this
-Solution 2: Somehow I always find time to do the things I like and this happens to be one of them. It might not happen tomorrow, but it will happen someday.

Now is your chance to discuss how to improve the weekly competitions. Don't hold back and tell me everything that is wrong with it and preferably how to improve.


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## tim (Aug 23, 2007)

AvGalen said:


> -Results are hard to read



I almost never watch at these, so i didn't realize that they are really hard to read. It's a pain to figure out, what my results were two weeks ago. But that's not your fault Arnaud, it's the forum's one .

What about tables?

```
3x3x3 :
names | #1 (date) | #2 (date) | #3 (date) |
xy       | 21.22 | 13.02 | 7.32 | 0.01
xz       | 21.32 | 13.32 | 7.42 | 0.31

...

Overall:
names | points
xy       | 14
xz       | 12
```

And the best (three) competitor(s) of every week should be marked with colors or something similiar.


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## AvGalen (Aug 23, 2007)

Two weeks ago would actually be impossible because those results are not up yet 

This is a good tip to find your results:
Option 1: Look at the first post and check your results as soon as they are uploaded.
Option 2: Set your forum preferences to show as many posts on 1 pages as possible, then use your browser to search for 2007-21 to find results for that competition, than use your browser to search for your name or just scroll down.

I don't think the table idea is possible to use. There are to many competitors/events to fit the width of the screen. If you can give me a mockup of this that shows that it is possible that would be great.

The best three competitors of every week are always listed in the first post. Do other people agree that adding colors would be a good idea?

What about posting the results of a competition in that weeks competition thread also?


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## ExoCorsair (Aug 23, 2007)

A simple bolding or underlining of the different events (and possibly the scramble number) would make it look much nicer (and more legible).

It would make reading certain scrambles (megaminx and 5x5x5) much easier for those of us with either fixed width or smaller resolutions.


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## pjk (Aug 24, 2007)

Personally, I do like the setup. However, I guess is someone is willing to write a page that will allow users to input times, and automatically post in the correct format on 1 page, that would work. I am not advanced enough with PHP yet, but I can be done. Arnaud, I think you do an excellent job.


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## AvGalen (Aug 24, 2007)

ExoCorsair: Bolding of events seems like a good idea. I will use this format from now on:

*3x3x3*
*1. *Scramble
*2. *Scramble

and

*3x3x3*
*1. *Winner
*2. *2nd Place

pjk: I don't know php yet, but I think it will be easy enough for me to learn it pretty fast. Does this forum support adding custom tags to the html? Something like [times=3x3x3]10.2, 12.11, 14.99, 15, 23.49[/times] could be a useful addition. The result could look like

*3x3x3:* (10.20), 12.11, 14.99, 15.00, (23.49) = *14.03*

With bolding for the event and the result and colorcodes and/or brackets for the best and worst time


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## tim (Aug 24, 2007)

AvGalen said:


> pjk: I don't know php yet, but I think it will be easy enough for me to learn it pretty fast. Does this forum support adding custom tags to the html? Something like [times=3x3x3]10.2, 12.11, 14.99, 15, 23.49[/times] could be a useful addition. The result could look like
> 
> *3x3x3:* (10.20), 12.11, 14.99, 15.00, (23.49) = *14.03*
> 
> With bolding for the event and the result and colorcodes and/or brackets for the best and worst time



These custom tags are a great idea. The youtube-tags are also custom tags, aren't they? So i think it's possible to add such functionality.
And for php: Yes, it's really easy to learn (almost as easy as basic), but i'm sure you don't want to, if you're familiar with .net and OOP .


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## Erik (Aug 24, 2007)

Personally I like it a lot the way it is now. If we work with tables only it gets a bit less personal and now we have fun talking about the results in each weeks thread. The bolding of each events is definatly an improvement by the way but I indeed would like to see the results a bit less... messy. I don't care about the results of the previous week, I jus want to know the latest results and maybe the best results by each person per category.


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## AvGalen (Aug 24, 2007)

> maybe the best results by each person per category.


These are already in the results! I even use your 2x2x2 result in the explanation.


> *Results from competition 2007-01 (2007-01-26) untill 2007-16 (2007-05-28)*, 2x2x2, 1. Erik (3,18)
> This means Erik got 1st place on the 2x2x2 event in the 2007-01 untill 2007-16 competitions with a best average time of 3.18 seconds


These are the last results for that event:


> *Results from competition 2007-01 (2007-01-26) untill 2007-25 (2007-07-30)
> 
> *2x2x2
> 1. Erik (3,18)
> ...


And for everyone that thinks the posted results should be less messy: Please start with the way you post your own times. This is the recommended way:
Event: Times = Result
Comment:

*3x3x3:* (10.20), 12.11, 14.99, 15.00, (23.49) = *14.03*
Comment: Starting good, ended bad. Last one was a POP

*4x4x4:* 1:30.00(P), 1:20.00, (1:10.00), 1:40.00(O), (1:50.00)(OP) = *1:30.00*
Comment: Lineair 

*2x2x2_bf*: (DNF), (43.12) = *43.12*
Comment: Best ever!

This will look pretty organised, but also boring and I don't think most people would take the effort to do this


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## Erik (Aug 24, 2007)

I know that some things that I like are already done


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## pjk (Aug 25, 2007)

AvGalen said:


> pjk: I don't know php yet, but I think it will be easy enough for me to learn it pretty fast. Does this forum support adding custom tags to the html? Something like [times=3x3x3]10.2, 12.11, 14.99, 15, 23.49[/times] could be a useful addition. The result could look like
> 
> *3x3x3:* (10.20), 12.11, 14.99, 15.00, (23.49) = *14.03*
> 
> With bolding for the event and the result and colorcodes and/or brackets for the best and worst time



Indeed. With your other programming skills, I think you would pick up on PHP very quickly. This forum does support making custom BBcode, which is basically turning larger HTML tags into BBcode. I could make [times=3x3x3]10.2, 12.11, 14.99, 15, 23.49[/times], however, making the output find the lowest/highest, and calculating the avg will be tough, or even impossbile with HTML. Instead, if you write [times=3x3x3](10.2), 12.11, 14.99, 15, (23.49)[/times], the result would be something like this:
*3x3x3:*(10.20), 12.11, 14.99, 15.00, (23.49)

How does that sound? Or if you have any ideas for the calcuations, let me know. As far as I know BBcode is HTML easier, and not sure if it would support PHP BBcode, or something similar.


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## ExoCorsair (Aug 25, 2007)

No Javascript support?


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## AvGalen (Aug 27, 2007)

BBcode test: [times=3x3x3](9.99), 10, 10.0, 10.00, 10.01, 10.1, 10.10, 10.11, (DNF)[/times]

Too bad, I thought you had implemented this already. It would be great if you could implement this!

Javascripttest1: <script language="javascript">document.write('javascript test');</script>
Javascripttest2:

```
<script language="javascript">document.write('javascript test');</script>
```
None of these work either 

I don't have time to look into BBcode/PHP this week. Maybe next week.


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## ExoCorsair (Aug 27, 2007)

I have no idea what the HTML code tag is for.

```
<b>hi</b>
```


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## AvGalen (Aug 27, 2007)

The HTML and PHP tag are probably just for showing people

a) That something is HTML/PHP code
b) What the HTML/PHP code for something would be

The HTML/PHP tags are apparently not meant to output interpreted HTML/PHP.


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## AvGalen (Aug 27, 2007)

I followed most tips for the new competition and for the results. Did I overdo it, or should I make more/other changes?


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## ExoCorsair (Aug 27, 2007)

AvGalen said:


> The HTML/PHP tags are apparently not meant to output interpreted HTML/PHP.



Unfortunately... But then it's no different from the regular CODE tag.



AvGalen said:


> Did I overdo it, or should I make more/other changes?



It looks fine, I worry though, that it might be too much work for you.
I do not think it is necessary that the people in the rankings in the competitions be bolded, but again, it looks fine.


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## AvGalen (Aug 27, 2007)

Doing the bolding is not much extra work. All it requires was to at "[b ]" before each line and then do a search/replace on ". " with ". [/ b]".

A little string manipulation is very easy to do in Excel with the "&" operator.



> I do not think it is necessary that the people in the rankings in the competitions be bolded


That shouldn't happen. Are you sure the names are bolded?


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## ExoCorsair (Aug 27, 2007)

I meant ranking number of each person, sorry.


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## AvGalen (Aug 27, 2007)

So you would like to see the numbers that come before the scrambles bolded, like 
*1. *D F D' F'....

but not the numbers that come before the rankings? so like
1. AvGalen (73)

What about the numbers that come before the results? like
*2x2x2
1. *Erik (4,05)
or like
*2x2x2
*1. Erik (4,05)


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## ExoCorsair (Aug 27, 2007)

AvGalen said:


> So you would like to see the numbers that come before the scrambles bolded, but not the numbers that come before the rankings?



Yes, pretty much, but that is just my own personal opinion.


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## AvGalen (Aug 28, 2007)

Well, bolding the numbers was your idea so I will just change it back for the next results.

Hopefully I will get some more feedback in this topic. I would have liked for Johannes91 to put his suggestions here.


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## Johannes91 (Aug 28, 2007)

pjk said:


> This forum does support making custom BBcode, which is basically turning larger HTML tags into BBcode. I could make [times=3x3x3]10.2, 12.11, 14.99, 15, 23.49[/times], however, making the output find the lowest/highest, and calculating the avg will be tough, or even impossbile with HTML.


Impossible, as HTML isn't a programming language. According to this link, it seems that editing the BB code is very restricted. If that window is the only way, then I don't see how this could be done. Editing the actual PHP code that handles the custom tags could be an option, but I don't know anything about this forum software so I don't know if that's an option.



AvGalen said:


> The HTML/PHP tags are apparently not meant to output interpreted HTML/PHP.


If everybody could post whatever JavaScript or PHP they want to, that would be a huge security risk. That's why many forums have their own safe tags for formatting posts.

So those are just code-tags but with some colors to highlight keywords etc..



AvGalen said:


> I would have liked for Johannes91 to put his suggestions here.


The new results look much nicer IMO. I personally prefer to have things very organized (e.g., when learning a new language I usually study the specification if it has one rather than tutorials/guides), but most people seem to like the competition the way it is now, so it should be kept that way.

Even if it was exactly as I wanted, I wouldn't participate every week and in at most a few events.


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## AvGalen (Aug 28, 2007)

Thanks for reacting and glad you like the changes.

If you think of anything else you would like to see changed/added/removed, just let me know.


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## pjk (Aug 28, 2007)

Sorry about the delay. Yes, I can do that, however, I am not going to allow HTML and/or Javascript on the forum. There are many dangers to it, and therefore I have decided not to let it happen or take a chance. However, I will create custom BBcode soon. I have been very busy, so please give me a while. I will let you know when I get to it.

Pat


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