Freegle Tech Report 15-07-31

Freegle Tech Report July 2015
Posts 15577-15810
Members 104

General.

The problem with Yahoo.com and AOL members not being able to use the Yahoo message maker continues, and we have to assume it will be ongoing. All groups where a member has tried to use it and failed are being reported to the group owner address. In most cases the member will have been alerted to the problem and chosen to post directly to the Yahoo post address. Please be a bit forgiving if they do not format their posts exactly right. They may be annoyed enough to stop posting if their second attempt also fails. Members who have used Freegle Direct at any time should now have been provided with an FBuser email address and be able to use the Yahoo message maker. Discussions of ways of Increasing Volunteer Engagement. Mainly via measurement or some sort of points reward systems. If you have any ideas, please share them.

Mobile App

Android: Google Play:
Freegle 0.68.0
2,655 / 3,758 Current/Total installs
4.08 / 12 Average rating/Count of ratings
iOS: iTunes
Freegle 0.67.0
Total installs: ~2630
Ratings: 3 x 5*
>Kindle: Amazon
Freegle 0.68.0
Installs in last 7 days: 18
Total installs: 80
Review: 1 x 5*

We are getting occasional crash report automatic mails (from Android/Kindle) which haven't yet been tracked down.
A new version which will gently suggest that you make a donation to us if you post a TAKEN or RECEIVED and the addition of the Give it for Good option for people who WITHDRAW ie suggest alternative reuse outlets in the area. It would be useful if mods and members could add in such outlets in their area, ie charity shops, furniture reuse points, etc. as available in FD. :https://direct.ilovefreegle.org/reuse
Q. Ideally, I would like the option to be able to add some additional info before resending the message (I forgot to add the dimensions of the items). But right now, just being able to repost would be good.
A It will but at the repost interval which is in your group settings for reposts to your home group is the one which prompts the repost button. The option to add addition information would require a change to Yahoo.
The mobile app received some funding from Cumbria County Council. One of the conditions was that "Recycle for Cumbria" is listed as a fallback for Cumbrian users. I specifically add this option in within the app for users who are a member of a Cumbrian group. Outlets are not linked to a specific group; their Latitude/Longitude is worked out from the given address. The code gets the centre of each group you are a member of and works out the min and max lat and long - and finds all outlets within that square. Currently there are 71 alternatives in our database; it would be great if you could add more for your area.

Direct V2

Bold textSettings
The box where you put in the group logo to be picked up no longer works for new groups. However it is fine on older groups and those where it is picked up from their Yahoo page.
Instead it can be coded into the Group Description. If you don’t see it in the ‘More Info ‘ tab on Direct or want some changes, you can contact Jean at jean.quinn1@gmail.com, and she will have a go. Doing this however does not put it correctly on the mapping app, this will be looked into.
New Features.
As a trial, a box in the popup you see when you post a TAKEN/RECEIVED on FD was introduced, to ask people to tell us why they freegle. This may enable us to have have a useful stream of them, which can be used to:
.Make moderators feel happy about what they're doing

.Go on Facebook. .Use in bulletins.
This worked very well but cut down donations, so it will be amended to allow the pop up for donations sometimes.
Adding other Reuse groups
Members or Moderators can now add other local reuse groups. FD members will be asked to select Menu+Other reuse options then "Add a new reuse location". Any FD user can do it for anywhere. We keep track of edits so we can regress any naughty edits.
Changes to what happens when you go to FD for the first time. The location box is now an autocomplete. It tries to shorten what you choose to something sensible, to avoid the whole "City, United Kingdom" thing. You then choose a group, i.e. it doesn't ask you again where you are, because you already put that in, in the location box
Replies to posts. When a post was made that came from either an FBUser address or a membership on Yahoo if there was one, it now will always be from an FBUser address. If someone else saw it on FD and replied - that reply came from their real address. We can’t do this anymore for the same reason as the rest of the DMARC stuff. So now the reply will come from their FBUser address. This means that you should be able to exchange emails with people via FD without revealing your real email address.
Please watch out for problems with this, or any reports of replies going missing.

Events.

The link in the Community Events mail to add a new event works now.

Problems sorted.

Google+ button changed to just Google.
Once you've added a photo, you couldn't remove it until you'd submitted a post. Now you can.
The button to expand replies on My Posts expanded them for all messages, which wasn't the plan. That has been fixed now.
On the web, clicking on an event Contact email or Website link didn’t work. Fixed once reported.
It would help mods if messages for members uploading files were not subject to the mapping requests. Fix applied.
Reports of problems on the My Posts tab were received and fixed after a team viewer session.

Problems.

We are seeing a few reports to local groups of problems replying to posts. We could really use someone who sees this repeatedly getting in touch for a teamviewer. If you can find someone for whom this is the case, please put them in contact with edward@ehibbert.org.uk
A couple of reports of reminder messages going to the wrong member. Please let us know it you hear of any on your groups and get it forwarded to you for checking.
Odd response reported when clicking - Taken

Wiki

This has been upgraded to the latest version of MediaWiki. This allows the reinstatement of using Google for search results.
The FCKEditor visual editor seems to have been retired. I'm not sure if there's a replacement.
There's probably a way to add a big search box onto the home page.
If anyone wants to look into the above two things, that would be lovely.
Let us know if you see any other issues.

Q & A.

Q I have realised that there’s not a function for members to post via email on Direct a significant restriction IMO.
A 1) If we allow posting by email we will have many more spam messages to deal with, and we would need a much better (possibly paid) anti-spam service, or more clever moderation features.

 2) Posts by email are the ones which are most often wrong.  It would be interesting to do some stats on this.

Q We have a member with a membership via FD, attached to an email address from a personal domain no longer registered . Her account does not show as bouncing. Does this create an issue with Yahoogroups?
A Yes, this is an issue. It doesn't matter to Yahoo but it's possible that it damages our spammer reputation. The bounces are recorded, and something will be done with that at some point in the next few months.
Q Has anyone got any code I can put on my homepage for the mobile app like the one for the Direct button?
A You can’t put a button but you can have a link to the download page. Something like this.

Mobile Apps: There are apps available for some phones. Android 4.03 and above, iOS 6 and above and Kindle Fires 2nd Gen and above. You can get links <a href="http://www.ilovefreegle.org/mobile"> here</a> or from the app stores.

Q. I posted an offered article but it only says the name of my road and not the area I live in. I thought by using the address searcher it would include my exact location but only includes the name of my road. Without an area it isn’t very helpful.
A He needs to check what he has put in his settings and put want he want to see on his posts in there.
Q. Searching for a member on modtools brought up some odd results.
A ModTools stores four things for members:
- the Yahoo ID - the email - the Yahoo Alias- the "real" email (for Freegle Direct) The Yahoo ID and Yahoo Alias are very similar; often they are the same. Sometimes the Alias is what we are used to thinking of, and the ID is something similar but different. And sometimes the Yahoo ID is a random hex string. ModTools only displays the Alias, email and real email; displaying the ID would sometimes display the random string, which would be confusing. But it searches in all of them, because there are some members that people have tried to find which are only findable via that.
Q. Do we need permission to add local reuse groups.
A. No as they will be in the public domain.

Jean
Freegle Tech
July 2015

Help for Moderators about members or moderator issues with using Freegle Direct is also available from
support@ilovefreegle.org

Freegle Tech Report
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