Following on from @TerryPG’s post here, about having a dedicated place for the leaderboards, the discussion flowed into perhaps having a better index. On this I have to say this right upfront, I had no idea that some had difficulties in finding the relevant leaderboards that they were interested in. It just goes to show I’ve been so focused on producing them that I neglected to consider the ease with which they could be found. Of course I have tried to address this in the past by having an index within my Connect signature and @MortenCopenhagen has been maintaining an index in his How to find the leaderboards post. At the suggestion of @JustJake I think it was, I also implemented cross indexing within each leaderboard post to previous month’s posts. Other’s like @Rednewt74 use different techniques like maintaining their own personal index folders with shortcuts. So there are a lot of links to the different leaderboards and to add to this, I was surprised that @MortenCopenhagen in his comment here suggested that the current structure is a mess and so he resorted to creating bookmarks which require constant updating.
Well Morten went on to say "So while we wait for a revised Connect structure the best solution would probably be that Adam creates and maintains a yearly or permanent index page to the leaderboards. So we users need to make one bookmark only Well at first I have to say that I wasn’t understanding this idea but then @Rednewt74 suggested “Collections” and while unfortunately collections does not provide for sub-collections and so this approach may be limited in the long run, together with the great discussion in Terry’s post, collections got me thinking and I undertake to give it some thought. This post is the outcome of that deliberation.
So how will it work?
Well my thinking at this stage is that users can bookmark this post or a create a shortcut to it on their device and from there fly immediately into the leaderboard area of interest. At the moment I have included the “static” leaderboard related posts, that is the 2024 star albums and discussion posts that won’t change until 2025, and shortly we will add the “dynamic” leaderboard posts, that is those that change each month. Of course all leaderboards and related posts will continue to have the cross-referencing to each other and the previous month’s dynamic boards.
Now having said all this, I do have some reservations and I listed these below and I’m looking to the Community for feedback:
Does it serve as a better index?
Is there anything missing that you’d like included?
Is it mobile friendly (iOS & Android)?
Is it accessibility friendly?
Sadly the current Connect is very limiting in terms of what I would like to do and on what we can do but let’s see what we can do within the available constraints. If there’s any suggestions on what you would like to see then add these in a comment here and let’s see if we can improve this idea and make it work for everyone.
@AdamGT vielleicht wäre es gut wenn sobald jemand zu den Bestenlisten schreiben will erst Mal ein Stop Schild erscheinen würde mit dem Hinweis nur Starfoto oder Video
I did call the structure a “mess”. Maybe I should modify it a bit. There are two aspects:
Finding the latest monthly leaderboard is not easy for us users. The post titles are very long and very similar, and the graphics are changing every month, so photographic memory does not help us. That is the indexing issue.
The leaderboards have constantly been evolving, and knowing what metrics to be found in which type of leaderboard and where the leaderboards are posted is not intuitively easy for users to remember. I understand the structure is apparent to you. That is the structure issue.
I think it would be beneficial to all leaderboard users if this index could include links to the latest leaderboards. Instead of maintaining the index in your signature, the links to previous leaderboards, and the index I have been maintaining, it might be less work in total to have only one index = this post. Having one index will be super helpful to users who no longer need to search for or update bookmarks every month.
If the index could also clearly show which leaderboards have been updated for the month, this will also save time for us users.
@AdamGT love this new Index to the leaderboards! It’s really well done that you have matched the images to the content so you don’t really even need to read the captions to know where to go But for those that do read the captions perhaps making them links as well as the images would be a useful feature?
This looks exactly right! I love the matched pairs of albums and discussions. Also that they are immediately at the top of the post. So this index is basically done for the year.
And this establishes it works for mobile and desktop users.
May I suggest that for the monthly Leaderboards you do this. Either 1
You create a post, say 2024 Leaderboards, and place 13 or so comments for future use. For January go to the last of these and place the collection links there. This way the most recent month would be at the top of the post. Then place a link to this post (or the specific monthly comment) in this album /discussion comment.
Create a new post each month with the relavent Leaderboards in and the link here.
I believe the effort required would be about the same.
The main difference is that in option 1 the entire year’s discussions would be in one post.
Either way please consider delegating some of this to someone else.
Bravo! And thank you for considering my idea and working on the issue.
Thank you @PrasadVR hopefully it makes things easier for everyone. Time will tell. I’d like to know if it’s mobile friendly on both iOS and Android and it’s important to know how accessible friendly it is.
Looking good @AdamGT nice work. This is an excellent landing page for access to all the Leaderboards and their discussions. While some users will never be satisfied unless it’s setup the way they see best, your dedication to this project and it’s continuous improvement are very much appreciated by the majority!
@AdamGT ein zusätzlicher Hinweis damit nicht wieder Diskussionen in die Bestenlisten geschrieben werden. Mansch Einer ist ja so in Hektik, dass er nicht richtig hinsieht.
Übrigens funktioniert auf meinem Smartphone alles gut.
Firstly, I’m pleased that you’re thrilled with this new index @MortenCopenhagen and thank you for clarifying what you meant by a “messy structure”.
If it is decided that we go ahead with this new index then I’ll try to accommodate everyone’s positive ideas and requirements but in particular @TerryPG 's comments mentioned repeatedly in his post and comments therein about making it easy to find the leaderboards and related discussion posts.
I’ve also noted your comments and yes the intention is to include links to the latest leaderboards, which will be posted and added to the index soon. OK then if there is some kind of majority agreement then we can make this the one index.
Great that you also like this index idea @tony_b and indeed you are seeing what I and everyone else are seeing. It is intended and will include all leaderboards. Believe it or no it took quite some time to get what I have shown thus far to work and because of the time involved, and given that new leaderboards are about to be posted, I decided not to include last month’s leaderboards in this mock-up.
That’s awesome @AdamGT . Will stay tuned for the finished product.
Regarding the upcoming leaderboards, I seem to remember you spent almost all of January on the last set. With this increasing workload, I hope you get to enjoy part of February for yourself.
but let’s see what we can do within the available constraints. If there’s any suggestions on what you would like to see then add these in a comment here and let’s see if we can improve this idea and make it work for everyone.
But for those that do read the captions perhaps making them links as well as the images would be a useful feature?