Survey posted 2004-04-05 03:11 by Morgan.

Contribute ideas to surveys by sending a mail to survey@ticalc.org.

I, like all authors, wish for more feedback on my programs. That would make updates easier to plan.

"Have your files been rated?"
How can I find out?

Precisely what I was going to ask. I searched around and the only ratings you can see are the ones on the toplist (unless I'm missing something).

SO HOW DO WE FIND OUT???

I don't see it anywhere on the page in any way, shape, or form.

It's listed at the top, under the number of downloads, assuming there ARE any ratings for the file.

*feels stupid*
Oh, wait, I see now. I just assumed it would be near the ratings radio buttons. *embarrassed face*

In that case... I think my answer still may be a no. I can't believe I didn't see that before, though.

Would showing a files weighted average influence the votes of others? Just thought I'd bring that up.

Hmm... well, if they've actually downloaded and tested the file out, they should have formulated some kind of opinion on the file on their own. So, unless people are just randomly clicking on files, looking at the screenshots, and saying "Hey, this looks cool" *makes vote* (which I'm hoping nobody does), then they probably shouldn't be too influenced by others votes, but I really can't say for sure.

It's called "response bias." But it's not sugnificant enough to sweat about. It's not as though a slightly biased rating will endanger anyone, or cause them to lose a lot of money. Also, some people will intentionally vote opposite of everyone else, while some people will vote the same way as everyone else, resulting in almost no effect. I'm in statistics right now.

But, say a program has a "9" and someone votes against it with a 1 and someone votes a 10 to go with everyone else, then the 1 really does significantly affect it...the only time there wouldn't be a significant effect is if the score is "average" such as a 5 or 6...

That's easy. Then you go and kill the person who voted the 1! :-D ... j/k

But first you crack ticalc.ticalc.org and remove the rating from the database.

Would showing a files weighted average influence the votes of others?

i dont see it...wait, wait...i still don't see it

The file must have four or more ratings for this to appear.

I agree, but no one is nice enough to send us any feedback. lol

Maybe you could put ratings on the Program Info Pages. All I see is the voting buttons, not the current rating.

The rating is there fro any file that has had at least four votes.

00h! A fro! :)
And no, that's "oh", not $00.

?

I don't see it... I looked at the ZShell program's file page (which has well over four votes) and I didn't see any current rating for it (except for on the top-list). Maybe these sch00l computers are just weird...

There are now three lines of stats for rated files:

File ranked xxx with xxx downloads
File ranked yyy this week with yyy downloads
File rated zzz with an average rating of zzz.

Yeah, I see that now.

You know what's really weird? I log on at home, and a new news article will be posted. Well, when I log on the next day at school, sometimes, that new news article won't appear. The site looks like a copy of the page from a few days ago. This happens to me pretty often. Anybody know why it's doing this? It can be rather irritating.

Sounds like your school computers are caching the pages. I would try either clearing the cache in the Options menu of your browser, or hold Shift while clicking Reload to make sure you're seeing the newest version of a page.

That happens to me too - it's a pain in the neck.

Really? What browser are you using?

MS IE 6.0.2800.1106

AAAH! USE FIREFOX (or at least SOME form of Mozilla)!

It's not _my_ choice, it's the school's decision! :(

Why don't you download Mozilla at home and put the install program on a CD? Then you could run it at school and put Mozilla on the network. You might get in trouble if they discover who did it, though. I got banned from my school's computers for a year when I did something similar :(

Most high schools prohibit the placement of data on C:\, and some even disable access to it. Likewise, most have limited accounts for students, preventing them from installing programs. You were lucky you weren't expelled.

I did that at our school and, because you just copy the files and don't actually install anything, they can't do anything about it (except write something up in the computer use agreement). Most people can't tell the difference, though, so a lot of teachers still don't know I'm using it. It's really handy though.

Me too. Something to do with the schools idea of optimizing :)

Really? That's weird. I don't know WHY it would do that. It's never done that to me at home. But thanks, I'll try those ideas.

And I use IE (at home).

The school computers are probably SET to do that (it's not a default) because they don't want a lot of traffic. That would really slow down everything if everyone went to the internet every time for opening a page.

You're probably right. I never thought of that.

*stupid school computers*

I tried shift+refresh, but I don't think it worked. It was weird- I came in, and half of the comments weren't here. I thought they were all deleted for some reason, but then I came back home, and they were all there again. Stupid caching. Next time I'll try getting into the Temp. Internet Files.

When I open IE, I automatically type www.ticalc.org, then press [F5]. :-D

F5? *presses*

---

Ooooh. I see :) But that doesn't fix the problem for me. :-\

Like I said. School's idea of optimizing.

Our school computers suck, but our internet connection is actually pretty good so I don't have that problem. We share a T3 line with a few other schools in the area so things load pretty quick. Also, isn't it weird how this conversation jumped from ratings to school computers?

More like the proxy server caching it... That's happened to me at my school while working on the school's web site. Funny thing is it JUMPED BETWEEN THE NEW VERSION AND THE OLD VERSION. Couldn't tell WHICH version was live. :o Had to VNC to my home computer.

(Clearing the browser's cache and using a different computer yeilded the same results.)

Oh, really? That's stupid. I've noticed it only seems to do this with ticalc.org, though, and not other sites.