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SultanOfSwing (99.53)

Dear Fool, Please don't turn Caps into Sunnyside

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April 14, 2012 – Comments (16)

If you ever watched Toy Story 3, you know that Andy's toys get transplanted to Sunnyside Daycare.  It's a place that looks promising and inviting on the surface, but if you stay there a while you begin to see all the flaws, cracks and dysfunction.

Lately, I've started to notice CAPS for what it's become - a buggy, worn out site that needs a little  "sprucing up" (some would say a total overhaul):

- I used to be able to search for a player's name.  I can't seem to now.

- The blogs page has many issues players have pointed out that take a long time to get fixed or get fixed but re-appear

- The stock screener seems to work intermittently.  Sometimes showing results, other times showing zero results

- Then there's the infamous day recently when CAPS froze.  Scores didn't update and no one could make or end any picks.  I'm still not sure how pending picks from that day were handled.

Please TMF, don't let CAPS turn into Sunnyside.  Maybe some of you TMF players can be advocates for the rest of us to keep this site fresh and bug-free.

Thank you.

Andy's Gang 

16 Comments – Post Your Own

#1) On April 14, 2012 at 10:36 PM, zzlangerhans (99.78) wrote:

Bad idea to post this on a weekend. Perfectly good excuse for them to ignore it.

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#2) On April 14, 2012 at 10:55 PM, CCharing (72.39) wrote:

Then we'll just have to keep commenting.

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#3) On April 15, 2012 at 12:21 PM, materialsman92 (35.68) wrote:

^ i agree

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#4) On April 15, 2012 at 5:02 PM, Frankydontfailme (27.33) wrote:

I agree, but we get what we pay for. I'm grateful to have such a cool service, bugs and all/

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#5) On April 15, 2012 at 11:25 PM, Sturmudgeon (< 20) wrote:

Franky:  I agree!

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#6) On April 16, 2012 at 12:02 AM, RallyCry (< 20) wrote:

I disagree that we should accept the bugs. Some of the revenues from the new blogging network should be plowed back into the free site. Its hypocritical to encourage professionals and the masses to "moneyball" the financial world by using caps as an accountability tool when it performs so miserably. How about some accountability for maintaining caps? If there was such a score it would be very low...perhaps worse than 99% of websites. The more commercialized Motley Fool gets, the less of a community we become. Hey TMF, if this keeps up, your going to lose your substance, which is all of us here!

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#7) On April 16, 2012 at 1:07 PM, TSIF (99.96) wrote:

I've been entering bug reports and did get a few replies.  Generally, I'm happy to help and give them the benefit of the doubt. The tech support staff I interface with seem eager to please, but overall, the information on the bugs either doesn't get to the programmers or the patches on patches are getting unmanageable.

Concerning searching on players names, using the top ten, other lists I took the time to actually give them step by step instructions, screen shots, and tried it from three versions of Windows and three versions of Internet Explorer, but all they did was say they tried a few tweaks, please try again. Nothing on the screen shots I sent was fixed.

The system not tracking for  a full day last week requires a bug report from a USER?? 

I fully DISAGREE with Franky and Strum....this may be a FREE site, but MF uses the data and the forum to generate copious amounts of newsfeed which they use to try to attract subscription users.  Those who dedcate time to it are adding value to MF and deserve the basics to continue working. I cited another bug to them last week, but didn't hear back on that one.

I'd be happy to go down to Washington DC and sho them how to reproduce the bugs and explain to them why.  All they need to do is cover my expenses, put up with my venting, and give me a few Foolish trinkets. My stress relief ball is already worn out just from using the system.

 

 

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#8) On April 16, 2012 at 2:23 PM, MegaShort (99.95) wrote:

The tech support staff is fine for small problems.  But there's obviously no one fixing and improving CAPS on a strategic scale.  Please TMF, make someone accountable to the community as the public face of CAPS development.

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#9) On April 16, 2012 at 10:28 PM, SultanOfSwing (99.53) wrote:

zzlangerhans,  Yeah I should've waited until Sunday night to post it, but it ended up getting enough rec's to hopefully get the Fool to notice.

TSIF,  I work a couple of blocks from the Fool headquarters.  Maybe you and I could buy the developers a cup of joe and walk them through the most annoying bugs.  If they give us jester hats for our troubles - all the better!

MegaShort, I think the current "faces" of the CAPS game are: TMFCHarris (Chris) and TMFCrocoStimpy (Xander).  Both great guys who've been very helpful in answering my questions in the past.  Perhaps the Fool has them working many different assignments. 

In general, the site and the game are wildly useful (or else I would have left a long time ago).  I just think throwing a few extra dollars of the Fool's R&D budget toward CAPS maintenance to keep the site humming like a well-oiled machine goes a long way. 

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#10) On April 17, 2012 at 1:59 AM, portefeuille (99.78) wrote:

a few useful suggestions are suggested here.

March 30, 2009, Finding the true gurus in CAPS

May 30, 2009, Ellipsis

August 23, 2009, Accomodating the specialist; innovating caps

August 28, 2009, Opening up a new continent in Caps; finally some justice for the stockpickers and a new challenge for the rest of us; innovating caps (7)

May 13, 2010, changes

February 03, 2012, What additional info would you like to get out of CAPS?

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#11) On April 17, 2012 at 1:59 AM, portefeuille (99.78) wrote:

suggestions

things

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#12) On April 17, 2012 at 2:21 AM, TheDumbMoney (58.55) wrote:

Meanwhile the feed is broken again.

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#13) On April 17, 2012 at 8:55 AM, TSIF (99.96) wrote:

Porte,  I don't think the intial concern is one of improvements, though that would be a "nice" next step. The issue currently is that the system is so buggy, it's become difficult to use and I suspect those with less invested in it aren't going to "tolerate" as much as those who have used it for awhile.

Sultan, you're close enough that maybe we should picket.  After all we are part of  the 1%!  ;)

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#14) On April 17, 2012 at 11:04 AM, EnigmaDude (96.53) wrote:

I think many of you posting here on CAPS expect too much.  Most of the time the site works fine and when bugs are reported they are usually fixed rather promptly.  Some of you are addicted to the site and want it to perform flawlessly.  I use it as a tool and a game and sometimes you just have to accept that the game/tool is unavailable for a while.

I want to thank the hard working folks at the Fool for providing this tool/game to us!

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#15) On April 17, 2012 at 11:45 AM, TSIF (99.96) wrote:

I respect that EnigmaDude, but clearly based on your response you are NOT using the features that are broken and have been broken for sometime now.  Simple queries that return error messages, including messages that you have been blocked for your behavior.  "Behavior" as simple as clicking on a link. 

I'm not looking for the features that have been discussed time and time again the last few years, just the basics.

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#16) On April 18, 2012 at 10:39 PM, bluebare (31.45) wrote:

Etc., etc., etc.  Good article.  

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