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0 Subject: On the Clock Changes: Make Your Voice Heard

Posted by: KrazyKoalaBears
- [13243814] Mon, Mar 08, 2010, 15:44

To make a long story short, I'm working on a MAJOR redevelopment of the On the Clock Draft Manager. On the Clock started as a basic online form I used to manage a draft with some co-workers several years ago and has quickly evolved to what you use today. I have been working on a major redevelopment for over 2 years now and it's never felt "right" in terms of being able to release it; it's always felt like a bunch of bandages more than necessary fixes and improvements. I now know why.

The growth of On the Clock was so rapid that all the additions and modifications made over the years had to be made to the database and web pages that were already in place. Unfortunately, as long as those structures are still in place, a meaningful overhaul is not possible.

Because of that, I'm overhauling the entire system. I'm redeveloping it from scratch. That's not to say that what is in place is going out the window; just that I'm starting the thinking of how On the Clock works from scratch and whatever fits from what is currently in place will be kept and whatever doesn't will not be. I won't be constrained to the current structure and the new version will be built completely standalone from what exists.

With that in mind, I'm soliciting feedback for changes, additions, etc. that you would like to see in a new version of On the Clock. I already have PLENTY of my own ideas for what to do, but I'm not going to post them because I don't want to sway any ideas or conversation towards what I think is useful. I want to know what you, the users, think will be useful based on your own experiences. And because I'm starting from scratch, don't constrain your ideas to what currently exists. You can certainly use the current version of On the Clock as a reference, but please don't think something is not possible because of it. As ideas gain momentum, I'll chime in for more discussion.

To help make the feedback useful, please add a priority to any particular ideas you have. The following scale should help me get an understanding of ideas I need to really pay attention to versus ideas that would be nice to implement if possible.

1 - "Must Have!"

2 - "Should Have"

3 - "Very Nice to Have"

4 - "Nice to Have"

5 - "Take it or Leave it"

I can't promise to use all ideas provided, but I can promise that they will be very carefully considered. THANKS!!!

Only the 50 most recent replies are currently shown. Click on this text to display hidden posts as well.
[Lengthy or complex threads may require a slight delay before updating.]
134Khahan
      ID: 373143013
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 10:09
When auto pick chooses a player they are not assigned a position and do not go into the grid.

Makes tracking by grid difficult, especially with a lot of autopicks.

We do have a work around in the meantime, you can go to your team and pick the player and edit his position manually. But is it possible to make it so autopick does this?
135Perm Dude
      ID: 5510572522
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 10:13
Good point. Maybe they can automatically be assigned UTIL (when batters) or P (when pitchers) if those positions are being used in the draft.
136KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 10:27
RE: 133, Should be available now. It's in the main draft nav, where it is while the draft is running.
137KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 11:06
RE: 134, I have a fix coming up that will included Auto-Picked players who have no position in the Draft Grid.

Realistically, Auto-Pick just can't assign positions because of the various positions a draft may use and how managers may want to assign a player.

It's set up now so that managers HAVE to update the auto-picked player's position before they can do anything else, so that's about as tough as I can get on the topic.

If I auto-assign a position, it takes the responsibility away from the manager, where it belongs (and increases the number of emails asking why so-and-so was assigned to a position).
138jaydog
      ID: 6228217
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 11:10
Love the idea of having both a general queue and a pick based queue. One suggestion though would be to take a pick based queue and either carry it to the next pick, or promote it to a general queue.

There have been a few times in my draft, where I wanted to set a pick based queue, but then after that pick is up I would like to carry the remainder of my queue over to the next pick.

Thoughts?
139jaydog
      ID: 6228217
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 11:16
I'd also love to see an average draft position broken down by league. I'm in an AL only draft this year, and it would be helpful to see an AVG draft position for only AL players. By position would be very helpful as well, but I don't think you have position data.
140KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 11:46
RE: 138, you could probably do that with the Pre-Rankings as the Pre-Rankings would stay from pick to pick and would only copy in players who haven't been selected.

That said, I'll be implementing a General to Pick-Based and vice-versa copying capability in the off-season.

RE: 139, By league shouldn't be a problem. By position probably won't happen in the near future because a lot of leagues use different position settings.
141Tree, not at home
      ID: 3910441615
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 11:56
KKB - the poli draft seems to be "stopped".

can you help us out of this?
142Perm Dude
      ID: 5510572522
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 12:08
Fixed, tree.
143KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 12:21
RE: Unspecified position players in Draft Grid

It's been fixed! :)

There's now a column on the far right called "No Position (Auto-Picks)" and it will list all players that have been selected, but don't have a position specified yet.

There's even a tally at the bottom that can be useful for draft admins who want to keep an eye on how many of these players exist in the draft.
144Khahan
      ID: 54138190
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 12:48
awesome kkb, thanks!
145KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 13:45
RE: 139. Done! :)
146KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 15:37
Bit thanks to bh for pointing out that the "Queue Empty" emails still had an issue. I've put the fix in, so it should be resolved.

As with before, the fix will only work with picks from this point on. You still may receive a few "Queue Empty" emails for picks made in the past.
147KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 15:53
Should be "Big thanks to bh" :)
148Guru
      ID: 330592710
      Thu, Mar 17, 2011, 16:50
nah... - bit thanks are ample....
149Khahan
      ID: 373143013
      Fri, Mar 18, 2011, 12:17
functionality request with the queues.

In the general queue, can we get a button put in that will let us add a player directly to a specific queue? this would make the round specific queues much easier and quicker to set up.
150judy
      Leader
      ID: 7771722
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 00:31
for the draft grid -- can you use a smaller font so more of the grid shows at once?
It works that way on the iPad and I can see the whole thing (mostly).

It makes it easier to scroll through.

Also, could you put the position at the bottom of each column as well as the top?
151KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 12353217
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 12:05
RE: 149, I think that will be much easier once I implement the copy between queues functionality in the off-season, so I'll hold of for now and see if that helps once football rolls around.

RE: 150, I'm leaning towards implementing a font size chooser during the off-season that will be universal for the site, including the Draft Grid.

The position at the bottom is an easy fix and I'll get that worked up soon.
152KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 12353217
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 12:52
Positions are now at the bottom of the draft grid, too.
153Guru
      ID: 330592710
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 13:17
[150] You could try hitting "[ctl] -" (control minus)

That often shrinks the display. Control + increases. I sometimes do that for the grid.

154Guru
      ID: 330592710
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 13:19
KKB - when putting in keepers, it would be useful if we could view all keepers on one page as a final review before finalizing. Now, in order to double check the entries, I had to cycle through all managers, one by one.

Perhaps you could show the draft grid with all keepers inserted? If nothing else, that would help to spot check to make sure no manager was missed.
155KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 12353217
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 15:43
RE: 154, added to the "to do" list for the off-season. I have some other changes I'm going to make to Keeper Entry that should help make it a bit speedier of a process, so a review page makes a lot of sense.
156Great One
      ID: 48281723
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 15:47
FYI - for comparison, Yahoo has what I would call a holding area... you click the player name and it pull them out of the main list and puts them on a separate list to the right. Then you have that list of 7 guys or whatever -- and you hit submit once for each team.
157judy
      Leader
      ID: 7771722
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 20:09
{153} for the MAC?
158judy
      Leader
      ID: 7771722
      Sun, Mar 20, 2011, 20:36
{153} Aha I can do zoom out, but have to do it 3 times each time I open the grid...
159Ref
      Donor
      ID: 539581218
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 13:31
KKB, I am impressed with drafttime. Nice work!
160Khahan
      ID: 373143013
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 15:02
For snake drafts, I thought I remember choosing a field to have the turn picks not get a double clock. We jsut had a turn pick time out and it started a new 4 hr clock for his second pick.

Either I filld in the league info wrong, or this feature isn't working, but I cannot find an option under admin to change this now.
161Perm Dude
      ID: 5510572522
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 15:07
It has been mentioned elsewhere but not here, I don't think, and so it is all in one place:

Admin should have the ability to pick for any manager after the draft starts, regardless of whether the manager has a queue or selected the Admin as a DP. We've had a couple of cases in which a queue was empty or unavailable to others and the manager phoned or texted in a pick that no one could actually make.
162KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 16:12
RE: 156, I've seen that in action and it's a good system. Not sure I'll go with something like that, but the whole keeper entry piece will get simplified in some manner. :)

RE: 159, thanks! :)

RE: 160, which draft?

RE: 161, if the queue is empty, the admin has the opportunity to make the pick. It's only when there is a queue with players and it's marked as unavailable that the admin doesn't have the ability. That will change over the off-season and the admin will have the ability to make ANY pick in the draft.
163Perm Dude
      ID: 5510572522
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 17:00
But that ability doesn't occur if the Admin is not the DP, right?
164Khahan
      ID: 373143013
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 17:09
162 - KKB, this is in the RIBC AA Underdog league. I used the skip pick feature to keep us on track. Again, you have options in there for a work around.

I agree with Ref, this is a great site you have. Thanks!
165Guru
      ID: 330592710
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 17:14
[163] PD - if the queue is empty, the admin should be able to pick even if not setup as a DP. That's how it's been working for me.
166Perm Dude
      ID: 5510572522
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 17:18
Hmmm. I'm just getting a "Queue Unavailable" message next to the manager's name.
167KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 12353217
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 19:09
RE: 164, I'll look into it. My guess is that the culprit is the skipping of the pick. If the clock had run out, it should have jumped past the manager for both picks, but skipping the pick resets the clock for the next pick and I'm assuming I didn't take into account whether or not you specified double or single clock.

RE: 166, that means they have a queue and have it marked as unavailable. In that instance, nobody has access to it. If it was empty, it would say "Queue Empty" and would give the admin the opportunity to make the pick.
168astade
      ID: 78462922
      Mon, Mar 21, 2011, 23:21
Just a thought...If there is an Auto-Pick/Delayed it might be nice for other managers to do a mouse-over and see the timer that was set. That way they can 'check back in' at the appropriate time.
169KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Tue, Mar 22, 2011, 08:45
RE: 168, great idea! Should be able to implement that sooner rather than later as it's a simple text display deal.
170Perm Dude
      ID: 5510572522
      Tue, Mar 22, 2011, 18:38
KKB, can you eliminate the emails to the DP when the manager has an auto pick and a non-empty queue?
171KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 12353217
      Tue, Mar 22, 2011, 19:08
RE: 168, added!

Also added some functionality bh pointed to. You can now click the Time Per Pick amount in the Draft Home page and get detailed info of Total Clock, Total Time, and Time Per Pick for every manager in the draft. The columns are sortable.

RE: 170, shouldn't be a problem. I'll add it to the "to do" list.
172Bh
      ID: 426111516
      Tue, Mar 22, 2011, 21:51
How about a c clock? G20 has that. If your running time is over 12 hours, you lose clock privileges and get zero for each pick. Better set those queues!
173KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 09:42
RE: 172, already on the "to do" list thanks to numerous suggestions.

It's definitely an off-season addition/modification, but I'll have to see how it works out. When I implement the idea, I want to give it enough flexibility to work for most drafts that want to use it, so it may take longer than just this off-season. We'll see.

-----

If you're experiencing issues with the drag-and-drop functionality, particularly with IE9, make sure you clear your browser cache and then re-access Draftime. I've installed the latest version of the code that makes that work and it included a fix for that issue.
174blue hen
      Dude
      ID: 710321114
      Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 11:11
KKB, this is great - the time per manager. However, it's not available in G20 (league 28). Any idea why?
175KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 12:04
RE: 174, should be working now. It was an error when dealing with the "Custom" draft type.
176KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 15:21
RE: 170, you shouldn't receive any more emails as a designated picker when the next pick is set for auto-pick.
177Guru
      ID: 330592710
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 15:31
I wish there was an option for a pick-based queue that prohibited it from rolling over to the general queue if empty.

My general queue has a bunch of names which are sometimes not fully researched and sequenced. If I set a pick-based queue, I'd like to have an option that says if the pick-based queue is empty, then wait for a manual pick.
179KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 517068
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 16:42
RE: 177, if you do not have your General Queue set to auto-pick, the system will not rollover to your General Queue.

The Queue Management section of Help details this...

1. Pick-Based Queue for current pick, if auto-pick is turned on
2. General Queue, if auto-pick is turned on
3. No Auto-Pick

Of course, I can be more explicit and state it as: "General Queue, if General Queue Auto-Pick is turned on"

I'll update that.
180Guru
      ID: 330592710
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 17:43
[178] Thanks. When all else fails, read the instructions...
181GoatLocker
      Leader
      ID: 060151121
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 18:10
Great Job KKB.
Really like the changes and improvements you have made.
Just really stream lines everything.
182GoatLocker
      Leader
      ID: 060151121
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 22:43
KKB,
Quick question on the Auto Delay.
Is there a max time it can be set to, and is that tied to the Pick Clock?

183KrazyKoalaBears
      ID: 12522422
      Thu, Mar 24, 2011, 23:52
RE: 182, technically, there's no max time, meaning your pick could timeout and be missed if your delay is longer than the pick clock.
184revvingparson
      ID: 35213277
      Sun, Mar 27, 2011, 08:13
KKB as others have said it's a very nice set up now and makes drafting and administering the draft a lot easier. Being able to able to eliminate prospects from the draft pool was a welcome addition.

As always it's the human element that can be frustrating. Even with the queue management this year if a manager doesn't take advantage of it things are still slowed down. (I know nothing you can do about that part :) )
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