MYSTERY - CHECKER - FEATURE REQUEST

[SWH]

Hi. Would be nice to create a new checker. I think it's odd to "stay anonymous" on the existing apps. Should always show the CO who is solving their puzzles, (or at least who entered coordinates)

 

 

[Bolling]

42 minutes ago, SWH said:

Hi. Would be nice to create a new checker. I think it's odd to "stay anonymous" on the existing apps. Should always show the CO who is solving their puzzles, (or at least who entered coordinates)

 

 

How can Cachly be a mystery checker?

[AnyMules]

As @Bolling pointed out, Cachly isn't designed to be a Mystery Checker, and would not know the final coordinates to all the caches to be able to check for a right answer or not.  Groundspeak has recently introduced a new checker on to their web site that COs can chose to use if they don't want to use one of the others that are available out there.  Some of the third party ones can show you who has entered the correct coordinates if you allow them to).

[BigChiefS4]

You're confusing Challenge Checkers with geocheckers for mystery caches. 

The Challenge Checkers on Project-GC only help you determine if you meet the qualifications for a challenge. Project-GC does not have any way to check to see if you have the correct solved coordinates for a puzzle.

There are a few geocheckers for puzzle caches to determine if you solved the puzzle correctly and I can't see how you would implement every one of them into Cachly. Some of them allow for keywords instead of coordinates, which would increase the difficulty of implementing it.

[BethKatzPA]

Geocaching recently introduced a coordinate checker for mysteries. I was surprised that it does not display in Cachly or the official app. I gather they do not allow access to it from the API? I was very disappointed. We published geo-art, and the checkers only show on the web site. I know we can use third-party coordinate checkers. 

[rragan]

Geocaching.com seems to be bent on their app being first among equals by letting it do things not allowed by the API so third-party apps have fewer features. Seems odd as they don't make any money from the new app and just frustrate those who have outgrown it or just prefer something different. 

[hidegoseek]

2 minutes ago, rragan said:

Seems odd as they don't make any money from the new app and just frustrate those who have outgrown it or just prefer something different. 

 

I'm thinking that they've made plenty of money with their "free" app; it's kinda like the free razor business model.  Since their goal is to market and sell premium memberships you'd think they would facilitate more third-party apps features that would further drive annual subscriptions.  

[rragan]

Another view is that they have put the API on the shelf and are putting their development dollars on their app and the web site. They haven't issued any new API keys in years so don't seem to want new apps to be built. They do sometimes fix bugs in the API but that's about all. 

[rragan]

1 hour ago, BethKatzPA said:

Geocaching recently introduced a coordinate checker for mysteries. I was surprised that it does not display in Cachly or the official app. I gather they do not allow access to it from the API? I was very disappointed. We published geo-art, and the checkers only show on the web site. I know we can use third-party coordinate checkers. 

If you view the description in Geocaching.com from Cachly, you can see their checker and use it but you have to know to do that. 

[BigChiefS4]

1 hour ago, BethKatzPA said:

Geocaching recently introduced a coordinate checker for mysteries. I was surprised that it does not display in Cachly or the official app. I gather they do not allow access to it from the API? I was very disappointed. We published geo-art, and the checkers only show on the web site. I know we can use third-party coordinate checkers. 

Do you have an example cache page that uses this? I haven't seen it.

 

EDIT: never mind, I have seen it on a few local puzzles. I didn't think much of it because I always use Certitude.

[Nic Hubbard]

18 hours ago, rragan said:

Another view is that they have put the API on the shelf and are putting their development dollars on their app and the web site.

I can confirm that this is not true. API is for sure active.

[SWH]

Hi everyone. Perhaps I was not clear enough in my original statement. I think cachly should create their own checker for cachers to use to add to cache pages. I think it's funny people assumed I meant "challenge checkers". LOL. It shouldn't be anonymized listing of people who "solved" A mystery puzzle.

[Nic Hubbard]

11 hours ago, SWH said:

Perhaps I was not clear enough in my original statement. I think cachly should create their own checker for cachers to use to add to cache pages.

I am not sure how this would be done. We are only a third-party developer and don't have direct access to the database, so this isn't something that would be possible.

[AnyMules]

On 1/10/2018 at 3:58 PM, SWH said:

I think cachly should create their own checker for cachers to use to add to cache pages.

A third party developer doesn't have access to the Groundspeak databases to be able to check that the entered coordinate is correct for any of the existing caches.  If you could just make an API call to get the final location of a cache, then puzzles wouldn't be much of a challenge at all.

For any new caches, having cachly being the only way to check a coordinate restricts too much of the population of cachers (all those that don't have an Apple device), so there wouldn't be any point in doing this either and excluding the majority of the geocaching community.

With many checkers already in existence (Geochecker, Geocheck, Certitude, or Groundspeak's own one), there are plenty of existing checkers for a CO to chose from, and not a lot of point in @Nic Hubbard spending time developing yet another one, taking his time away from fixing other more important things with the app which benefit a greater proportion of the Cachly users.

[ShammyLevva]

On 10/01/2018 at 5:28 AM, SWH said:

Hi everyone. Perhaps I was not clear enough in my original statement. I think cachly should create their own checker for cachers to use to add to cache pages. I think it's funny people assumed I meant "challenge checkers". LOL. It shouldn't be anonymized listing of people who "solved" A mystery puzzle.

A checker for a puzzle to add to cache pages would only be of use to cache owners. It would need to be accessible by ALL cachers not just those that run Cachly. Thus such a checker would impossible to add to Cachly as it would be rejected by the reviewers. 

For that reason this isn’t at all possible or desirable within Cachly.