What's new on Geocaching Australia

[caughtatwork]

How?

A postcode boundary covers a postal code.
A locality is the name of the locality.
A postcode boundary can cover many localities.

[caughtatwork]

I was looking at how I could become a Mayor & decided I'd have to look at the incumbent mayors & plan a challenge.

The closest I could find, in numbers, was (Fuddley) Nanango QLD. Checked how many finds I had but my figure disagreed with the official GCA figure. Close examination revealed that one of my finds was in South Nanango.

Then I looked at Wollongong but despite having 8 finds they were in Wollongong, North Wollongong, West Wollongong, Port Kembla etc.

Then moved onto Sydney as relatively close. It was here that I discovered an anomaly. Unlike Nanango & Wollongong, some GCA caches located in the Sydney metro area are shown as being located in Sydney despite them being located in suburbs.

Examples: Parramatta ICEM, Maroubra Trig & Bondi North Stack Trig are shown as located in Sydney whereas they are in Parramatta, Maroubra & Bondi respectively. Parramatta is located in Sydney, West Wollongong is not located in Wollongong. If I found the Parramatta ICEM I would be making a find in Sydney, not Parramatta.

Unfortunately there is no consistency as a search of Parramatta revealed 3 trigs which are located in Parramatta.

Can anything be done to remove this anomaly?

The incumbent Mayor shouldn't worry too much as I haven't visited Sydney or suburbs since 2005. However...those robes & the perks are attractive.

Parramatta ICEM is actually in North Rocks.
http://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geo ... nsor=false
http://geocaching.com.au/cache/ga3389

Maroubra TP is indeed in Maroubra.
http://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geo ... nsor=false
http://geocaching.com.au/cache/tp4948

Bondi North Stack is in Bondi North.
http://geocaching.com.au/cache/tp5837

What happens with locales is that we do:
a. Get the locale from the Google Maps API. This is generally considered the most accurate for our purposes.
b. In the event that the Google Maps API is not available (returns a status not = "OK"), then we fall back on the postcode / locality table we have at GCA. The accuracy of the postcode locality table is less than stellar, but is rarely used as a fallback.

It would appear the 3 instances you have identified all calculated the locale via a fallback.

I'm not sure there is much we can do about this as we don't want to hold up a cache submission just because the API has failed. I'll try and think of an alternative where if you think the locale is wrong, you can click on a "refresh" locale link to force an update / check.

There is now a link, on the right hand side of the cache page, under the Actions section, called Update Locality.
Click that.
If the Google Maps API returns a different locality, state or country, then the database is updated and mayoralities are recalculated.
This is going to cause some people to lose their mayoralites and others to gain as the caches move localities.

Sorry pwags, Princess Diala is now the Mayor of Melbourne.

[Laighside Legends]

How?

A postcode boundary covers a postal code.
A locality is the name of the locality.
A postcode boundary can cover many localities.

Oh, I think I've stuffed that zones thing up...

[caughtatwork]

Don't stress. They do what they do, just not necessarily what you thought they would do. Keep building more and more, just be aware that a postcode can cover more than 1 locality and you're good to go.

[Laighside Legends]

Maybe we should call the section "localities" not post code boundaries...
That would be more useful anyway
I've got most of the western side of Adelaide - just haven't uploaded it yet

[Laighside Legends]

I've updated a few localities and they all seem to be right - maybe we need a one-off entire database update?

[pwags]

Sorry pwags, Princess Diala is now the Mayor of Melbourne.

Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. Do I now get a lifetime pension and free public transport?

Congratulations Dianne, but keep looking over your shoulder, I'll be grabbing those robes back sometime soon!

[caughtatwork]

Have you come across a non-CGA cache which has the wrong status? i.e. It's available when in fact it should be archived?

The faeries get feeds for all caches in Australia and New Zealand, but sometimes things go a little astray. If you notice a non-GCA cache which has the incorrect status, you can now set the status via the self-serve approach.

Head to the cache page.
In the navigation section on the right hand side of the page for a non-GCA cache you will now see:
Set Archived
Set Available
Set Unavailable

You can click any of these links to set the cache status.

NOTE:
Cache status changes are be sent out in the daily email, so please don't set them just for shits and giggles. You will annoy a lot of people.

FURTHER NOTE:
If the faerie feeds decide that the status is wrong, it will get changed. The faeries always triumph over the mortals. So if you notice a cache which is changing status, there could be an anomaly between the listing site and the faerie feeds. Bring this to our attention so we can investigate the matter rather than you playing "status tag" with the faeries.

Development time about an hour or $75.00

[Zalgariath]

Coolies... now to find all those OS caches of mine coming up as archived and keeping them fresh with imports each week

[caughtatwork]

Recently we have been working with mtrax to enhance the "in the field" capability of the GA Cacher Android app.
Tonight we released the website code to cater for login and logs in the field via the app.

mtrax will be testing the app to ensure that the website and the app work in perfect harmony before the app is released.

We have made changes to the logging pages and even though I spent all day testing, there is a possibility that something may not go quite right.
Normal users of the website should not see any changes.
If you notice some weirdness with the logging pages, please let us know.

[Zalgariath]

What the Munzee?! There are now QR Codes on the caches!

[caughtatwork]

CraigRat is a good worker, but a poor communicator.

Yes, surprise

Each Geocaching Australia cache page now has a QR code. That's the square black and white image you can see. The image is 72x72 pixels and is probably the minimum size for printing. You can always blow the image up to larger sizes. Just save it, edit the size in your favourite editor and away you do.

The idea behind the QR codes is to make logging "on the run" easier. Get a barcode scanner app for your mobile phone. Scan the image. It will pop up a link back to the log page for that specific cache. e.g. http://geocaching.com.au/my/log/new/gannnn You can open that link in a browser, or if you have the GA Cacher app installed, you can open it up in that app. From there you can log the cache.

The handy thing is that for the (next) moving cache race, the owner attaches the QR code. When you pick up the cache, you scan it and log it. When you hide it, you scan it and drop it off, logging the new co-ords while you're dropping it off. Makes for more sanity when you have a number of caches in your hot little hands. With integration into GA Cacher, it's as simple as pie.

You can also print them out and put them in your cache. So someone finding your cache can simply scan the QR code and make their log as they walk back to the car, making life easier for everyone. The QR codes are NOT codewords and should NOT be used as a replacement of a cache or logbook. They are there for the phone capable people who want to cache on the run.

[CraigRat]

oh, yeah, something something QR codes on caches or something

[FelixII]

You guys are too silly and simply amazing to boot!

Well done and yep we will scan where we can! Bring it on!

[Big Matt and Shell]

What the Munzee?! There are now QR Codes on the caches!

I must be going blind! I can't see one http://geocaching.com.au/cache/ga0201