CSR List by model/year

[Gimme Time]

L&G,

Maybe this has already been discussed before or for some reason it's not logical, but I believe it would be great to have an easy method to look up specific model/year boats from a member list.

I'm a pre-digital person with limited computer knowledge but it would look to me like the list could be generated pretty easy from the information we put in.

The format could be by model then year with as much additional information as the members would be willing to provide so you could contact someone with a like boat if you'd like.

Limited example of information such as the following which could be expanded on easily by people whom know a whole lot more about the needs & process than I do but here is some basic info that might be helpful as a suggested start.

420 AC, 2001, 3126 Cats, Ft. Lauderdale, Fl. Gimme Time, email address

The information could be expanded with more information that the group might feel was of intrest or useful such as email address/contact info. Not sure since I'm not real computer savy as to what should or should not be given out to a open forum since many people have access and monitor the site and there probably a hole lot of reason I haven't thought of that maybe some information should not be provide but here are my 2cents worth.

If this has already been discussed before or is avialable in some format that I just haven't stumbled upon yet, please accept my opologies and send me in the right direction.

John
:smt100

 

[Gimme Time]

Wondering why this has been veiwed by quite a few but no comment or suggestion. Is this already available somewhere or just a bad idea and I don't know it?

John :smt021

 

[Quint4]

I think it is a great Idea.

 

[Cocktail Time]

I second the idea, maybe adding that when signing on you could indicate whether or not your info is public. Maybe I'm not seeing something either but why not?

 

[CSR_Admin]

Its basically easier said than done. And who would police it for all the non-active users that may have sold their boat?

 

[fc3]

It's a moderate amount of work. The forum is PHP and MySql, so it's do-able. The profile page would have to be updated with three new fields, (year, make, and model) and linked to the user table in the database. A new page would then be needed to allow selecting from the database. With testing and all, probably as much as two days work.

Of course, not everyone puts their boat into their profile as it is, so the value of that two days of effort would be questionable.

Best regards,
Frank

 

[brimanst]

I also like the idea, but then I started thinking (dangerous I know), that I know more about my old boats than my currrent one as I am still learining the details of my current one. I also noticed that a lot of people give advice based upon their profession, friends and previous boating knowledge, so it may not be as useful as it sounds.

 

[CSR_Admin]

Yeah sure , no problem, put a couple of fields in the registration form, a page to query the database and that's it lol

If only web development was that easy. You left out the part about it not working right the first few tries, people complaining that the interface is not easy enough to use, keeping the code consistent so it doesn't screw up future upgrades, keeping all the permissions for it intact, etc. If you are volunteering to do the programming I'm all ears.....

 

[Morpheus]

I'd do it if it were in .NET but personally I hate PHP.

 

[DragonAnchor]

Maybe I am missing something here, but why is this a "good idea" ?

What would anyone do with the information if it were available?

What value would the information or database be if entering it is completely optional, there is no way to validate that it is current, or any incentive to keep it current? GIGO

Sure you could run searches to see who is in your area, who has a certain type of boat, but what are you going to do with that info?

Email owners with questions? business opportunities? low cost pharmeceuticals(sp)?

Anyone willing to share that information, has done so already in their sig line.

Anyone willing to share their knowledge about boats/boating, already does so online.

Beyond all that, adding 7 fields to a database and providing search capabilities is not a 2 day project, unless of course you are just slapping something together with no real attention to quality.

 

[VTSeaRay]

bah... windows apps... so easy...for who Bill Gates?

give me a text file to open/append to any day... and search it for results.

 

[fc3]

Yeah sure , no problem, put a couple of fields in the registration form, a page to query the database and that's it lol

If only web development was that easy. You left out the part about it not working right the first few tries, people complaining that the interface is not easy enough to use, keeping the code consistent so it doesn't screw up future upgrades, keeping all the permissions for it intact, etc. If you are volunteering to do the programming I'm all ears.....

Web development is pretty easy. Try whacking out C and C++ code for a couple of days and after doing the integration build, trying to find the memory leaks in some other guy's code.

I'll try to download a copy of the board's software and take a whack at next weekend.

Best regards,
Frank C.