wp-SwimTeam

WordPress Google Form Enhancements

0
25 days
by in Enhancements, WordPress, wp-SwimTeam

Several people have asked for enhancements, many of which are similar. The most common request is to add either pre-filled or hidden fields based on something WordPress knows about. A recent request was to add tracking so a form could only be submitted by a user once. I am certainly not opposed to adding features like these, I think most would be pretty useful. However, there are some things to think about before implementing a solution or adding new features.

  1. To auto-fill a field or populate a hidden field, the field must be mapped from what the column is called on the Google Docs side of the form to something WordPress knows about (e.g. username, email address, etc.). How should this mapping be done? Arguments as part of the shortcode? For anything to be posted to the form processor on the Google side, the field must be defined on the form so the results spreadsheet has a corresponding column. For hidden fields, wpGForm would have to turn what is an existing field (which may or may not be a simple text box) into a hidden field with a value supplied by WordPress. This isn’t impossible, jQuery can do much of the work fairly easily but the problem is it is fraught with potential errors so I am reluctant to add it until I have a better idea how to bullet proof it. Pre-populating values is fairly easy, as long as we know what the field name
  2. I’ve considered, and posted about, introducing a Custom Post Type for forms. If I do this, then it makes addressing the tracking aspect fairly easy because the CPT id could be stored as part of the users meta data. That is pretty straight forward once the CPT exists (which it doesn’t yet). However, it does require the user to be logged into the site which many people don’t want to allow. This could also be handled by the CPT which could in theory, define a new form as anonymous or not. An anonymous form would have some limitations, tracking being one of them.

I’ve got some ideas on how to implement these features, most of which would be pretty useful. Introducing a CPT is absolutely on my radar screen but right now I am focused on my Swim Team plugin as we’re gearing up for Summer Swim Season here in North Carolina. Once I knock out my to-do list on the Swim Team plugin I’ll come back and look at adding the CPT for WordPress Google Forms which would facilitate adding some of the requests people have asked for.

wp-SwimTeam v0.2.488 – bug for scratches

702 days
by in Download, wp-SwimTeam

There was a bug in the scratch process where if you started on the Meets tab when the Scratch action was selected, there was not a list of swimmers presented for the user to scratch.  When starting on the Roster page and selecting a swimmer to scratch did work properly.  The bug has been fixed and v0.2.488 is now available for download and both paths, starting with a meet or starting with a swimmer, now work correctly.  The same bug would have affected Opt-In meets as well.

wp-SwimTeam v0.2.486 now available

707 days
by in Download, wp-SwimTeam

A couple of new features have been added to wp-SwimTeam.

  1. It is now possible to export a single swimmer’s record to CSV of SDIF.  When a single swimmer is selected, the exported file will contain the information for just that swimmer.  When no swimmers are selected, the entire roster will be exported.  Single swimmer SDIF export is useful for importing late additions into WinSwim which is something I’ve had to do a few times this week.
  2. The LSC Registration Pyramid (SDIF) can now be generated using the Age Group Age (computed base on cut off date) instead of the swimmer’s true age.  By default the real age is exported which is what wp-SwimTeam has done traditionally.  If you want to use the computed Age Group Age, change the setting on the SDIF Profile tab from the Options menu.

A new version, v0.2.486, of wp-SwimTeam is available for download from the Download page.

wp-SwimTeam v0.2.484 available

708 days
by in Download, wp-SwimTeam

A new version of wp-SwimTeam has been posted.  This releases fixes a couple minor bugs which prevented display of swim meet information in certain situations when scratching or registering from a swim meet.  This version also introduces two new features:

  1. Open or Close the registration system. When the registration system is open, users can register their swimmers for the current season.  When the registration system is closed, only an Admin or Editor can register swimmers.  This setting appears on the Registration tab from the Options sub-menu.
  2. Enable or disable user sign ups for jobs. When the job system is set for user sign ups, a user can sign up for any open job.  When the job system is set for admin sign up, users with either Admin or Editor roles can sign users up for jobs.  This second mode is good for teams where a paper or Excel list is used for job sign ups.  This setting appears on the Swim Team tab from the Options sub-menu.

Exploring Roles and Capabilities

708 days
by in WordPress, wp-SwimTeam

I’ve had a request from my team, the MacDolphins, to be able to send e-mail to the parents of specific age groups.  We do a number of activities that are limited to older kids or only for a specific age group so I’ve been aware of this need for a while.  Unfortunately I don’t have an easy way to solve it.

I think the WordPress Roles and Capabilities functionality may be the answer to my problem.  I could create a role for each age group and assign the users that have a swimmer in that age group to the appropriate roles.  By doing this, I think I can continue to use the Email Users plugin to contact specific groups of users based on the roles defined.

I need to do more research on Roles and Capabilities.  I’ve played with a couple plugins and they aren’t real straight forward.

wp-SwimTeam v0.2.482 released!

717 days
by in Download, WordPress, wp-SwimTeam

This afternoon I uploaded v0.2.482 of wp-SwimTeam.  This release introduces the new Jobs module (aka Volunteers).  Please back up your database before upgrading as this version changes the structure of one of the tables and introduces two others.

Please let me know if you have any problems with this version.  I’ve done a fair amount of testing and I have it up and running on the MacDolphins web site.

The jobs module introduces two new short codes:

  • wpst_job_descriptions
  • wpst_meet_job_assignments

Example usage of these two new short codes can be found on the wp-SwimTeam demo site here and here.

There is also a new release of the phpHtmlLib plugin which wp-SwimTeam requires available.  This build addresses a minor issue exposed in WordPress 3.0 beta testing.

Hopefully the new Jobs module will be helpful for your team, I know it will be helpful for mine!

Jobs up and running on the Demo Site

719 days
by in wp-SwimTeam

I have update the wp-SwimTeam demo site with a preliminary version which includes the new jobs module.  I expect I will release it over the weekend at some point.   You can see what a sample page or post would look like for a swim meet.  From the Administrative perspective, a similar report is available but includes more details (e.g. phone numbers).

I had a chance to show this to the woman who coordinates volunteers for the MacDolphins and she was pretty excited about it.  It should make her job much easier and it will also make it much easier for parents to know when they have signed up to volunteer.

I want to do a little more testing on it before I release it but I am pretty confident it is working pretty well.

Jobs module is almost done

721 days
by in wp-SwimTeam

This past week I have made quite a bit of progress on the jobs module.  Everything seems to be working, I just have some polish and testing to finish up before I will release it.  The basic job work flow works like this:

  1. Define a job – title, description, duration, etc.
  2. Allocate a job to a season or to one or more swim meets.  This action connects a job to a specific season or meet and defines the number of positions required.
  3. Assign job ownership.  This can be done by either the administrator or by end users themselves.  End users cannot assign themselves jobs which are already assigned to another user.  An administrator can change the assignment of a job from one person to another.  Job assignment can be performed in couple different ways:
    • Full or Partial Season long jobs can be assigned from the Seasons tab.
    • Full or Partial Meet long jobs can be assigned from the Swim Meets tab.
    • A specific job can be assigned from the Jobs tab.

The Swim Meet Report has been enhanced to include a Job Assignment section and a new short code has been defined to allow a meet specific job report to be added to a page or post easily.  The wp-SwimTeam demo site will be updated shortly to show some of the new features.

Export Roster to Meet Manager

735 days
by in Download, wp-SwimTeam

If you have followed my posts on this blog you know that I have been frustrated by Hy-Tek Team Manager and Meet Manager along with Hy-Tek customer support.

While I may not care for Hy-Tek or their products, the fact is they have a dominant market share and a lot of teams use Team Manager, Meet Manager, or both.   I was  contacted this week by a high school coach who was looking for some SDIF assistance in getting his roster into Meet Manager.  Now I don’t have access to Meet Manager but I do have pretty good understanding of the SDIF specification so I was able to help him out with some example SDIF files.

In the process of helping him out I came across an old e-mail regarding importing a roster into Meet Manager.  At the time I was interested in Team Manager so didn’t give it a lot of thought.  Looking at the old e-mail I realized that if it worked, I could export the file format very easily from wp-SwimTeam.  I went ahead an implemented it, now I am looking for someone to try it out.

Sample Reports

Download Sample Exports Version v1

The zip file above contains three versions of the same roster – CSV, SDIF (.sd3), and Meet Manager Registration (.re1).  Extract the Meet Manager Registration file from the zip file.  It is an ASCII file that contains swimmers records, one per line with the following fields delimited by semicolons:

  1. Registration number
  2. Last name
  3. First name
  4. Middle initial
  5. Sex
  6. Birthdate
  7. Club abbreviation
  8. Club name
  9. Preferred first name
  10. ?? – unknown what this last field is; it’s always “N” in the examples provided

To import the file into Meet Manager, follow these steps:

  1. Set up a new meet database.  You only need to go through the first setup screen, the one where you put in the meet name, date, and length of course.  To make my particular file work, select “USA Swimming” for the ID format.  If you have something other than USA Swimming numbers for swimmer labels, select “Other”.  Normally, for a kids’ meet, you’d select “USA Swimming” for the ID format or “Other” if you are not using USA Swimmer numbers for simmer labels.
  2. From the main Meet Manager menu, select “FILE”
  3. Select “IMPORT”
  4. Select “REGISTRATION FILE”
  5. Locate and choose the .RE1 file that contains the roster.

After completing these steps, go to the “Athletes” screen in Meet Manager.  The swimmers contained int he RE1 file should bYou should see all of the athletes’ names that you saw in the RE1 file.

If this works for you, please leave a comment!

Volunteers progressing

741 days
by in wp-SwimTeam

Over the last couple of days I have finally made some visible progress on the Jobs module. I am still not wild about the term “allocate” but it is the best I have come up so I am proceeding with it.

At this point I am able to define jobs, allocate a job and quantity required against a swim meet and make some refinements of the allocation. I also have the beginning of the assignment to a specific user GUI done but not the backend functionality. I am optimistic that I may finish a first pass this weekend.

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