Minimalist Cache Logs -- Opinions Wanted

[Hoojar]

all cache owners (COs) love to hear more rather than less in logs from finders.

Do they? You have surveyed all cache owners have you? I couldn't give a toss how little someone writes, in fact I hate logs that just waffle on!

[blossom*]

all cache owners (COs) love to hear more rather than less in logs from finders.

Do they? You have surveyed all cache owners have you? I couldn't give a toss how little someone writes, in fact I hate logs that just waffle on!

I like to hear details on caches I've taken the trouble to create. I would agree with pjmpjm that most COs probably do too, based on the various comments and discussions I've had with friends from time to time. But I guess some COs don't as well That's ok, just don't read the log if you're not interested

[juc_cacher]

Reading me email this morning, someone has just gone through an area where I have a few caches on my watchlist and just logged "1" and the next "2", then "3" and so on.

That's a bit poor I reckon. Makes "TFTC", or "Found" seem like War and Peace !

[blossom*]

Reading me email this morning, someone has just gone through an area where I have a few caches on my watchlist and just logged "1" and the next "2", then "3" and so on.

That's a bit poor I reckon. Makes "TFTC", or "Found" seem like War and Peace !

Yep, I reckon iphones have certainly detracted form this side of caching in a big way

[Happy Chappies]

Reading me email this morning, someone has just gone through an area where I have a few caches on my watchlist and just logged "1" and the next "2", then "3" and so on.

That's a bit poor I reckon. Makes "TFTC", or "Found" seem like War and Peace !

Check back in a few days - I had the same issue a week or two ago, but turns out it was someone temporarily logging in the field, and then they went back and did a proper log later.

[juc_cacher]

Reading me email this morning, someone has just gone through an area where I have a few caches on my watchlist and just logged "1" and the next "2", then "3" and so on.

That's a bit poor I reckon. Makes "TFTC", or "Found" seem like War and Peace !

Check back in a few days - I had the same issue a week or two ago, but turns out it was someone temporarily logging in the field, and then they went back and did a proper log later.

Yep, I have to eat my hat there.

I just went and checked and indeed, there is a "real" log on the actual cache page.

My Bad.

[pjmpjm]

Yep, I have to eat my hat there. I just went and checked and indeed, there is a "real" log on the actual cache page. My Bad.

Yes, it's a whole new ball game these days, with the mobile phones in everyone's hands, and the ability to send 'logs' (of whatever length) straight from 'the field' being exercised by more and more geocachers.

It's really great for GCA moveables -- letting others know that the cache was found and won't be at the coords any longer -- but is a temptation to some to enter only the 'minimalist cache logs' being discussed here. Glad you got some decent comments in the end!

[Richary]

It's really great for GCA moveables -- letting others know that the cache was found and won't be at the coords any longer -- but is a temptation to some to enter only the 'minimalist cache logs' being discussed here. Glad you got some decent comments in the end!

And as I've mentioned in another thread, typing on the phone doesn't really excite me. It's too easy to hit the wrong key on the screen and so on. So the temptation would definitely be there to write short logs. For that reason I don't tend to log caches on the phone (or in Geosphere while in the field for later uploading).

However I will in the case of moveables during the race so people know not to venture out if they haven't already left home (sorry rogerw3 - there's a 3 hour window from when you can last check the page). Now it's not race time I probably wouldn't bother as there isn't such a mad rush to find the things.

[Bronnie_1990]

I've been logging the movables on my phone as soon as i get them (ok, if they turn up on the first page of the logs page, as my phone web browser wont let me search!)
If my mobile-phone log is shortish, i do normally expand it when i'm infront of a computer..

I'll admit, i'm not the biggest fan of people who have little logs that dont really mean anything (apart from, thanks, or look at me i have an iphone)

I also disapointedly noticed, when my rover crew/scouts were geocaching, out of the 4 of us (which is pretty crazy in itself) that have accounts, i think our logs were like this.
Person 1: Rovers.
Person 2: Found.
Person 3: Found on our crew caching night ran by me. Thanks.
Person 4 (me): *insert log here about how the 20 of us walked up here from such-and-such cache, enjoyed the views, lots of prickles and kangaroos, blah blah blah etc*

The sad part is, when the 3 of them were standing around their iPhones, i am pretty sure i passive agressively said, "write something more than just thanks!!"

sol, if you are reading this, i'm sorry for the logs on all of your caches around cooleman ridge a couple of weeks ago...

[CamBendy]

Reading me email this morning, someone has just gone through an area where I have a few caches on my watchlist and just logged "1" and the next "2", then "3" and so on.

That's a bit poor I reckon. Makes "TFTC", or "Found" seem like War and Peace !

Check back in a few days - I had the same issue a week or two ago, but turns out it was someone temporarily logging in the field, and then they went back and did a proper log later.

Yep, I have to eat my hat there.

I just went and checked and indeed, there is a "real" log on the actual cache page.

My Bad.

Yes, as a cache owner on GC you don't get an email when somebody edits a log. Pet hate with me. Certainly a feature that wouldn't go astray.

[jonnosan+2]

Yes, as a cache owner on GC you don't get an email when somebody edits a log. Pet hate with me. Certainly a feature that wouldn't go astray.

The counter to that is, I sometimes edit a post 4 or 5 times in quick succession (especially if it's a long one) as I reread and notice typos etc. It would be very annoying to the CO if they got emailed each time.

[gmj3191]

Yes, as a cache owner on GC you don't get an email when somebody edits a log. Pet hate with me. Certainly a feature that wouldn't go astray.

The counter to that is, I sometimes edit a post 4 or 5 times in quick succession (especially if it's a long one) as I reread and notice typos etc. It would be very annoying to the CO if they got emailed each time.

Well you can just set up a filter and a special folder in your email client and send all the logs to it.
Read 'em in detail if you have time, mark 'em as read if you're snowed under.
If you do this, the actual number doesn't really matter, and you can focus on caches you are interested in if you like.
I do this with my own caches, and I have a separate folder for my watchlist.

[CamBendy]

The counter to that is, I sometimes edit a post 4 or 5 times in quick succession (especially if it's a long one) as I reread and notice typos etc. It would be very annoying to the CO if they got emailed each time.

True, although the option to be able to receive edits would work, would it not? Simple...

[Huurtle]

Just weighing into the debate...

I generally take a 'tftc' and similiar entries to mean they didnt enjoy the cache, it was boring, etc. That is their opinion, no need to get cut up about it, since that is generally similiar to what I put in a log if it is a boring 'under a bush on roadside' or 'another of the seemingly endless mint tins in parks'. Yes I do log them as a find since I am already there, why not?

Many of the park ones get muggled eventually and the owners then complain that the last finder didn't re-hide it properly! Has nothing to do with the finder hanging around a piece of play equipment for 20 mins searching for a damn nano with very few if any cache notes about the hide, just about the wonderful park you are now standing in looking like a paedophile!

So to summarise my rantings.... It goes both ways sometimes, If you just get "TNLNSL" in the log then it isnt just phone apps fault, as I was saying the above well before the apps came in!

PS: I do sympathise with the CO's who put a lot of time into their cache to give me some of the history (not too much) and a nice placement, I then enjoy the experience, to then get blank logs makes you wonder if the finders were there with their eyes open!

I'll leave you guys a quote from a CO's note on one of his cache after a finder wrote tftc...

"Presumably you don't live at Wilpena Pound so you must have driven up there past much of the rugged beauty of the area. I also presume you weren't choppered into the cache location, so you would have had to have walked in through the small gorge and seen the historic relics of the pioneering past, before climbing up onto the rim of the Pound and surely gazed in awe at the vistas there - and all you feel you can say is "TFTC"!"

And just to add insult to injury, there is a blank online log to the same CO on the Wandering Heroes Series to honour him, along with a plethora of cut and pasted logs!! Go figure!!

[stainless-steel-rat]

When i first started caching i did a bit of both very short logs and ones with to much waffle, now since i use Neongeo on my Android phone as soon as i have found the cache i log it using the phone with a log that says just "wll" or "full log to follow",

When back at home i then spend sometime writing full logs about each cache, if i've only done a few i sort out any pictures taken and upload them at the same time, but if i've had a busy day caching i'll just flesh out the logs and then the next chance i get i'll edit my photos and upload them.

Depending on the cache I may well have not much to say or quite a bit, if the cache was just a film can at the base of a post then there is not much to say, on the other hand if its a cache container that is different then i'll have lots to write about without giving anything away that could be a spoiler.