Marathon Donation App - Call for testers

2011-04-25 02:37:33 pm

Quote from nate:

does no one else have webspace that supports php? i find that hard to believe. or is there something special about sda's servers that requires it to be there?

Not at all, I just don't have access to anything with php myself (and I probably should remedy that too, I need to stop thinking like a penniless student).

Quote from UraniumAnchor:

As far as 'unique id', that long number in the fifth field is a second-accurate timestamp (in milliseconds for some reason), so between that and an email should be enough to uniquely identify a particular donation, since I don't think anybody is going to donate twice in the same second.

True enough. I'm just paranoid because I used donation timestamp as a primary key last time, and it ended up making the hacktacular chip-in parser I wrote somewhat awkward, but that was just because they only displayed time information up to the minute in their formatted html. If the data in the raw html has good enough accuracy, that'll probably do fine.

[quote="nate"]does no one else have webspace that supports php? i find that hard to believe. or is there something special about sda's servers that requires it to be there?[/quote]
Not at all, I just don't have access to anything with php myself (and I probably should remedy that too, I need to stop thinking like a penniless student).

[quote="UraniumAnchor"]
As far as 'unique id', that long number in the fifth field is a second-accurate timestamp (in milliseconds for some reason), so between that and an email should be enough to uniquely identify a particular donation, since I don't think anybody is going to donate twice in the same second.[/quote]
True enough.  I'm just paranoid because I used donation timestamp as a primary key last time, and it ended up making the hacktacular chip-in parser I wrote somewhat awkward, but that was just because they only displayed time information up to the minute in their formatted html.  If the data in the raw html has good enough accuracy, that'll probably do fine.

SMK

2011-06-19 04:52:01 pm

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~umkiazyk/files/tracker-app.zip

Okay, so, some simple changes turned into more and more, but I guess I can present what I have so far at least.

If anyone is so inclined, please download it and try it out. Just unzip everything somewhere on your computer. There should be a folder named 'app', with 3 folders 'database', 'site', and 'tracker' inside it. To run the application, just execute the file at './app/tracker/tracker.jar'.

Step 1: Connect to a database
- File->Connect... will open a dialog box where you can specify the type of database to connect to
- For the purpose of testing, you can select 'HSQLDB File', and then select the file at './app/database/test/filedb/test.script' (note, the contents of this database were generated randomly, so it'll just look like complete garbage)
- Selecing 'HSQLDB Memory' will create an default in-memory database that won't be saved at all (you can use the .sql file in './app/database/test/data/' as the initialization file if you want to initialize it with some test data).
- If you happen to have a MySQL set-up on your machine, you can try to generate a new database from the schema in './app/database/test/schema/donation_db.sql', and hook it up to that, just be aware that the program expects foreign key support, so you'd have to use the InnoDB table engine instead of MyISAM

Step 2 (optional): connect to chipin
- It's possible to have the program log-in to chipin and grab donations directly from the site
- To log in: Chipin->Log in...
- In the dialog, put in the username/password, and for the chipin id, its the last part from the chipin contributor page url (i.e. if the URL of the contributor page were www.chipin.com/contributors/private/id/dead1337beef7473, you'd put in the "dead1337beef7473" part, no that page does not exist)
- from there, you can select Chipin->Merge from chipin website to grab all of the donations
- alternatively, you can grab them from a downloaded html file by using Chipin->Merge from file... (there is an example file I generated in './app/tracker/chipin-test.html', it basically contains a bunch of randomly generated gibberish, but it still works the same).
- Any time a new donation is added, it is flagged internally as needing attention of some sort. I haven't implemented anything to do this yet, but eventually I could make it so that you can open a task view that lists all comments that need to be read, or all donations that need to be linked to bids or whatever else.

Step 3: Gawk at how unintuitive the UI is
- Okay, I tried doing something different with the application, where instead of a static set of tabs, you can open a new tab for each entity type. I haven't implemented everything yet, in particular you can only search for donors and runs, and then you need to navigate to the other things from there:
- so, for example to get at a donation, you need to go Search->Search Donor... , pick out a donor from the list (you can type stuff in the fields to filter down the list by names and emails), and then open one of their donations from the table on the bottom.
- There are now 2 types of bids 'Choices' which are the things where the highest one wins, or 'Challenges' which are the 'if we collect $X, then Y will do Z'
- I've changed it so that all bids must be linked to an associated run, so to create a bid, you need to create a run first, and then create a bid from the run's tab. Similarly, you (currently) must go through the run tab to reach a particular bid. Obviously that's not at all ideal.
- I didn't bother porting any of the prize stuff from the old system yet; they're there, just nothing is being done to them.
- As you can tell, its kind of clunky, so maybe somebody else has an idea how to make this better? Or an idea to do something else? Or maybe just go back to the old system?

Anyways, please take a look if you can, any feedback or questions is appreciated.

[url]http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~umkiazyk/files/tracker-app.zip[/url]

Okay, so, some simple changes turned into more and more, but I guess I can present what I have so far at least.

If anyone is so inclined, please download it and try it out.  Just unzip everything somewhere on your computer.  There should be a folder named 'app', with 3 folders 'database', 'site', and 'tracker' inside it. To run the application, just execute the file at './app/tracker/tracker.jar'.

Step 1: Connect to a database
- File->Connect... will open a dialog box where you can specify the type of database to connect to
- For the purpose of testing, you can select 'HSQLDB File', and then select the file at './app/database/test/filedb/test.script' (note, the contents of this database were generated randomly, so it'll just look like complete garbage)
-  Selecing 'HSQLDB Memory' will create an default in-memory database that won't be saved at all (you can use the .sql file in './app/database/test/data/' as the initialization file if you want to initialize it with some test data).
- If you happen to have a MySQL set-up on your machine, you can try to generate a new database from the schema in './app/database/test/schema/donation_db.sql', and hook it up to that, just be aware that the program expects foreign key support, so you'd have to use the InnoDB table engine instead of MyISAM

Step 2 (optional): connect to chipin
- It's possible to have the program log-in to chipin and grab donations directly from the site
- To log in: Chipin->Log in...
- In the dialog, put in the username/password, and for the chipin id, its the last part from the chipin contributor page url (i.e. if the URL of the contributor page were www.chipin.com/contributors/private/id/dead1337beef7473, you'd put in the "dead1337beef7473" part, no that page does not exist)
- from there, you can select Chipin->Merge from chipin website to grab all of the donations
- alternatively, you can grab them from a downloaded html file by using Chipin->Merge from file... (there is an example file I generated in './app/tracker/chipin-test.html', it basically contains a bunch of randomly generated gibberish, but it still works the same).
- Any time a new donation is added, it is flagged internally as needing attention of some sort.  I haven't implemented anything to do this yet, but eventually I could make it so that you can open a task view that lists all comments that need to be read, or all donations that need to be linked to bids or whatever else.

Step 3: Gawk at how unintuitive the UI is
- Okay, I tried doing something different with the application, where instead of a static set of tabs, you can open a new tab for each entity type.  I haven't implemented everything yet, in particular you can only search for donors and runs, and then you need to navigate to the other things from there:
- so, for example to get at a donation, you need to go Search->Search Donor... , pick out a donor from the list (you can type stuff in the fields to filter down the list by names and emails), and then open one of their donations from the table on the bottom.
- There are now 2 types of bids 'Choices' which are the things where the highest one wins, or 'Challenges' which are the 'if we collect $X, then Y will do Z'
- I've changed it so that all bids must be linked to an associated run, so to create a bid, you need to create a run first, and then create a bid from the run's tab.  Similarly, you (currently) must go through the run tab to reach a particular bid.  Obviously that's not at all ideal.
- I didn't bother porting any of the prize stuff from the old system yet; they're there, just nothing is being done to them.
- As you can tell, its kind of clunky, so maybe somebody else has an idea how to make this better?  Or an idea to do something else?  Or maybe just go back to the old system?

Anyways, please take a look if you can, any feedback or questions is appreciated.

mikwuyma

Edit history:

mikwuyma: 2011-06-19 06:44:51 pm

2011-06-19 06:40:05 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

Okay just starting to play around with the program right now, and is there a reason why there are only 2 tabs for the challenges? Why can't I see the goal amount? There's plenty of space for a third goal amount tab.

Same thing for the choices, but instead of goal amount, the total collected. Not sure if it's feasible to divide it by the options though, I guess you'd just have to double click and go to a new tab for it.

About bids and challenges, why not make a separate menu item for them, so you can search for them?

Why can't you search for a specific donation? Just use the donor as one of the search criteria.

Is there a reason why the email area is grayed out?

I tried logging through the chipin, but the program complained about not specifying a port. Sad

SMK

Edit history:

SMK: 2011-06-19 08:19:27 pm

2011-06-19 08:19:10 pm

Quote from mikwuyma:

Okay just starting to play around with the program right now, and is there a reason why there are only 2 tabs for the challenges? Why can't I see the goal amount? There's plenty of space for a third goal amount tab.
Same thing for the choices, but instead of goal amount, the total collected. Not sure if it's feasible to divide it by the options though, I guess you'd just have to double click and go to a new tab for it.

No reason other than I hadn't considered it yet. One thing I could do for choices would be to display a simple drop-down on that table's cell with the name - amount for each option under it.

Quote from mikwuyma:

About bids and challenges, why not make a separate menu item for them, so you can search for them?

Just haven't gotten around to it yet.

Quote from mikwuyma:

Why can't you search for a specific donation? Just use the donor as one of the search criteria.

I suppose this could be helpful too. I guess other critera could be a time range, range of amounts, etc...

Quote from mikwuyma:

Is there a reason why the email area is grayed out?

Because I'm setting the state of the text box incorrectly and haven't bothered fixing it yet. It's just supposed to be set to read-only (right now its being set to disabled), because once a donor has been associated with a chipin donation, I don't want their e-mail to change (since that's the only way to link them to said donation).

Quote from mikwuyma:

I tried logging through the chipin, but the program complained about not specifying a port. Sad

Hmm, I can't seem to reproduce that at all; there isn't even an option in the HTTP library I'm using to specify the port. Can you send me the exact text of the error message, and the exact sequence of steps you're taking from program startup when getting that error?

[quote="mikwuyma"]Okay just starting to play around with the program right now, and is there a reason why there are only 2 tabs for the challenges? Why can't I see the goal amount? There's plenty of space for a third goal amount tab.
Same thing for the choices, but instead of goal amount, the total collected. Not sure if it's feasible to divide it by the options though, I guess you'd just have to double click and go to a new tab for it.
[/quote]
No reason other than I hadn't considered it yet.  One thing I could do for choices would be to display a simple drop-down on that table's cell with the name - amount for each option under it.

[quote="mikwuyma"]
About bids and challenges, why not make a separate menu item for them, so you can search for them?
[/quote]
Just haven't gotten around to it yet.

[quote="mikwuyma"]
Why can't you search for a specific donation? Just use the donor as one of the search criteria.
[/quote]
I suppose this could be helpful too.  I guess other critera could be a time range, range of amounts, etc...

[quote="mikwuyma"]
Is there a reason why the email area is grayed out?
[/quote]
Because I'm setting the state of the text box incorrectly and haven't bothered fixing it yet.  It's just supposed to be set to read-only (right now its being set to disabled), because once a donor has been associated with a chipin donation, I don't want their e-mail to change (since that's the only way to link them to said donation).

[quote="mikwuyma"]
I tried logging through the chipin, but the program complained about not specifying a port. :(
[/quote]
Hmm, I can't seem to reproduce that at all; there isn't even an option in the HTTP library I'm using to specify the port.  Can you send me the exact text of the error message, and the exact sequence of steps you're taking from program startup when getting that error?

mikwuyma

2011-06-19 08:38:14 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

Okay here's my connection info:

Connection type: Mysql server

Server name: http://www.chipin.com/contributors/private/id/b9001480086fbd91 (this is jrdq)

database name: test (am I supposed to put in the title of the chipin drive here?)

user name: donations@speeddemosarchive.com

password: not giving this one away Tongue

I get the error message, "Must specify port after ':' in connection string." Then it says, "Could not connect to database server."

SMK

Edit history:

SMK: 2011-06-19 08:50:32 pm

SMK: 2011-06-19 08:50:01 pm

2011-06-19 08:49:15 pm

Ah I see, sorry, that probably isn't very clear. You're trying to use the database connect dialog, which is separate from logging into chipin (since you're grabbing the info from chipin, and putting it into the other database). Just connect to a HSQLDB Memory database for the database connection, and then use the Chipin->Log in menu item, and then there should be a dialog with 3 fields for username, password, and the chipin Id. Also, for chipin Id, just put in the 'b9001480086fbd91' part, not the entire URL.

mikwuyma

2011-06-19 09:30:39 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

Okay, you should fix that so it's more clear. How about make one of the drop-down options chipin login?

mikwuyma

2011-06-19 09:36:19 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

Okay the merge with chipin option worked. Is there a way to make people's names display instead of their emails? Maybe some kind of toggle?

SMK

2011-06-20 08:56:55 pm

Quote from mikwuyma:

Okay the merge with chipin option worked. Is there a way to make people's names display instead of their emails? Maybe some kind of toggle?

Good to hear. I can flip around the display priority for name vs. email, I just wasn't sure which would be better to show by default.

Otherwise if you thing the look is workable I'll go ahead and finish porting the rest of it and adding the other searching methods.

mikwuyma

2011-06-20 10:12:29 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

I think the program is workable, but I feel like the interface can be improved. However, I don't think we'll really know how to improve it until we start using it for a marathon. One thing that I noticed is that there should be some way to display donations and comments with the most recent on top, like in chipin, and maybe a function that lets the user see which donations are new since the last refresh/chipin sync (hopefully that was worded well enough).

BTW, way far in advance, but is there a chance we could have an online version of this program so we could use it for an online marathon?

BTW, awesome job with the program so far, you've made a lot of progress since the agdq build.

Mystery

2011-06-21 05:12:28 am

Do you need a server to test on, to get the online system working to try and test?

SMK

Edit history:

SMK: 2011-06-21 06:23:23 am

2011-06-21 06:21:50 am

Quote from mikwuyma:

One thing that I noticed is that there should be some way to display donations and comments with the most recent on top, like in chipin, and maybe a function that lets the user see which donations are new since the last refresh/chipin sync (hopefully that was worded well enough).

Yep, I actually already have plans for this. Internally, all donations are being flagged as to whether they have a bid attached to them or not yet. What I'm going to do is make a task view that will list all donations with comments that haven't been assigned bids yet, such that the person can just grab that list and work through it at their leisure. I'll be doing a similar thing for the commentator, such that they can get the list of donations/comments that have not yet been read, and then it will just clear the flag for it when they hit the next button.

Quote from mikwuyma:

BTW, way far in advance, but is there a chance we could have an online version of this program so we could use it for an online marathon?

Actually, the client is theoretically ready to go for online; as long as you have a MySQL server to connect to. Admittedly I haven't tried it out on a non-localhost database, but I have been able to have 3 instances of the client all merging stuff in from chipin at once successfully to a local db. Also, if you look in the './app/site' folder, there is the very humble beginnings of a web view that can show the status of all bids on a website. Again, haven't tried it out non-locally, but it should work just the same.

Quote from mikwuyma:

BTW, awesome job with the program so far, you've made a lot of progress since the agdq build.

Thanks.

Quote from Mystery:

Do you need a server to test on, to get the online system working to try and test?

I appreciate the offer, and I wouldn't mind using it for testing at the moment, though I really should set up my own dedicated web host for this eventually. Does anyone have any suggestions for a good web hosting service?

[quote="mikwuyma"]One thing that I noticed is that there should be some way to display donations and comments with the most recent on top, like in chipin, and maybe a function that lets the user see which donations are new since the last refresh/chipin sync (hopefully that was worded well enough).[/quote]
Yep, I actually already have plans for this.  Internally, all donations are being flagged as to whether they have a bid attached to them or not yet.  What I'm going to do is make a task view that will list all donations with comments that haven't been assigned bids yet, such that the person can just grab that list and work through it at their leisure.  I'll be doing a similar thing for the commentator, such that they can get the list of donations/comments that have not yet been read, and then it will just clear the flag for it when they hit the next button.

[quote="mikwuyma"]BTW, way far in advance, but is there a chance we could have an online version of this program so we could use it for an online marathon?[/quote]
Actually, the client is theoretically ready to go for online; as long as you have a MySQL server to connect to.  Admittedly I haven't tried it out on a non-localhost database, but I have been able to have 3 instances of the client all merging stuff in from chipin at once successfully to a local db.  Also, if you look in the './app/site' folder, there is the very humble beginnings of a web view that can show the status of all bids on a website.  Again, haven't tried it out non-locally, but it should work just the same.

[quote="mikwuyma"]BTW, awesome job with the program so far, you've made a lot of progress since the agdq build. [/quote]
Thanks.

[quote="Mystery"]Do you need a server to test on, to get the online system working to try and test?[/quote]
I appreciate the offer, and I wouldn't mind using it for testing at the moment, though I really should set up my own dedicated web host for this eventually.  Does anyone have any suggestions for a good web hosting service?

nate

2011-06-21 09:41:20 am

dreamhost.

just don't store any videos.

arkarian

2011-06-21 11:02:27 am

gamelogs.org

hostmonster.

apparently, store whatever the fuck you want.

Mystery

2011-06-21 11:56:59 am

Quote from SMK:

I appreciate the offer, and I wouldn't mind using it for testing at the moment, though I really should set up my own dedicated web host for this eventually. Does anyone have any suggestions for a good web hosting service?

Well, in case you want or need anything, just give me a PM. I'll be happy to set something up for you.
Since it's my server, I can offer a lot of things that you normally don't get with web hosting.
Web, email, svn, php, mysql, cgi, native cgi... you name it.

Quote from nate:

dreamhost.

just don't store any videos.

There's YouTube for that Wink

arkarian

2011-06-21 12:02:40 pm

gamelogs.org

weird ... afaik any decent web host will give you all those things

arkarian

2011-06-21 12:02:52 pm

gamelogs.org

except svn i guess

Mystery

2011-06-21 12:20:08 pm

Yeah, of course, it depends on the price class. You can't except CGI on a free web host, for example. Some might have it, some might not.
You're not likely to find a host that offers ASP and/or native CGI for free. ASP is somewhat rare AFAIK, so you'll have to pay a little to get it.
But, of course, I am offering this free.
That's not something you can beat easily. Of course, the disadvantage is limited bandwidth, not very good performance and average security. But none of this should present a problem to testing the system.

UraniumAnchor

2011-06-28 12:29:57 pm

Not a walrus

Dreamhost just likes to "encourage" you to upgrade to one of their more expensive services if you have too much bandwidth use. I know somebody who stores a giant video collection on Dreamhost and has for years.

SMK

2011-07-01 12:03:07 pm

Thanks for the feedback. I've registered a site with hostmonster, since they seemed to be the most well liked in general. Unfortunately my main computer went up and completely died this week, and I haven't had a chance to do anything about that yet. I stlil have my older computer as a backup, so I should still be able to get this up and running soon, but I had forgot to push my most recent changes (again, haven't had the time to recover them this week). so that's part of why I haven't posted anything.

Darkwing Duck

2011-07-13 04:10:16 am

Highly Evolved

Will this thing be user friendly for someone who has little technical knowledge? I'm more than willing to help out with donations and prize giveaways, but I fear I won't be able to use the application.

Sir VG

2011-07-13 07:05:31 am

Fucking Weeaboo

If it's anything like what it was (or better) at AGDQ, it'll be easy enough for anybody to handle.

SMK

Edit history:

SMK: 2011-07-13 07:49:25 am

2011-07-13 07:48:27 am

Quote from Darkwing Duck:

Will this thing be user friendly for someone who has little technical knowledge? I'm more than willing to help out with donations and prize giveaways, but I fear I won't be able to use the application.

There's not much 'technical knowledge' required, but its not exactly super obvious how to use it one first glance (no help docs, etc.). Probably the most involved part right now is just executing the program (since you need to know how to run java applications, or have .jar files associated with executing java (another reason I should have used C#)). There might also be some funkyness involved with connecting to the remote database, but I'll try explaining that when I have the website ready (which should be soon, I promise).

My best suggestion is to download it and try running it and clicking on stuff (and then ask questions when nothing makes sense). Unfortunately I haven't updated the download file in quite some time; I'll post an update tonight when I get a chance, so maybe wait until then.

... Its halfway through July already? Yikes, this is supposed to be ready for August!

[quote="Darkwing Duck"]Will this thing be user friendly for someone who has little technical knowledge?  I'm more than willing to help out with donations and prize giveaways, but I fear I won't be able to use the application.  [/quote]

There's not much 'technical knowledge' required, but its not exactly super obvious how to use it one first glance (no help docs, etc.).  Probably the most involved part right now is just executing the program (since you need to know how to run java applications, or have .jar files associated with executing java (another reason I should have used C#)).  There might also be some funkyness involved with connecting to the remote database, but I'll try explaining that when I have the website ready (which should be soon, I promise).

My best suggestion is to download it and try running it and clicking on stuff (and then ask questions when nothing makes sense).  Unfortunately I haven't updated the download file in quite some time; I'll post an update tonight when I get a chance, so maybe wait until then.

... Its halfway through July already?  Yikes, this is supposed to be ready for August!

SMK

Edit history:

SMK: 2011-07-13 07:22:28 pm

2011-07-13 07:22:10 pm

I've posted a new version of this, on my ~~new~~ website:

http://inlovewithladyada.com/files/tracker-app.zip

See the other post for instructions on unzipping and running.

Not too much has changed, I've just finished adding the stuff that was missing to put in line with the previous version of the program (bids and prizes). I also added two tabs designed to help make reading donations and assigning bids easier. If you want to try it out and need help running or using it, or you want to point something out, please post or PM me. I'd explain more, but I'm currently feeling awful.

* Apologies for double post

SMK

2011-07-19 06:22:53 pm

I've tried putting together a _very_ basic idea of a website together:

http://inlovewithladyada.com/sdatest/index.php

A little hard on the eyes no? I unfortunately know little to nothing about making things look good, and I don't know how much I can do about it between now and SGDQ. Does anyone else know how to do web layout better than me? Is it still worth it getting a site up in time for August? Thoughts?

If you want to connect to the remote database with the client to try to insert stuff, PM me.