Chart your progress

[Alan W]

On daily Chihuahua puzzles, there's now a little histogram-style chart at the bottom of the scoreboard. (You may need to reload the Web page to see it.)

Hopefully its meaning is fairly obvious. Once you've started playing a puzzle, there will be a blue arrow showing where you currently stand.

You can move the mouse pointer over a column on the chart to see the numbers it represents. You can also move the pointer over the blue arrow and learn how you're going against other players, in percentage terms.

If you switch the scoreboard to show or hide rare words, the chart will adjust itself accordingly.

[greenone]

What fun Alan - thanks for always improving the site.  Only downside is that now I'll be able to see how poorly I'm doing in comparison to others !! :'(

[ellen fremedon]

Alan,

I'm always wildly impressed with your innovative thinking. When I consider all the changes (for the better!) you've made to the game since I started playing (registered since 2006 ), I am astonied.  Even more so when you realize that the none of the changes has detracted from the fundamental fun of playing anagrams!

Well done, Alan!!

Ellen Fremedon

[technomc]

No added pressure then to see how many folk are ahead of you on the bar chart!!!!!!???

[actually i think it's fun...]

Goodness knows what you'll come up with next!!

[Tom44]

Just what a competition freak like me needs    Now, I suppose, we need a chart that's adjusted for percentages, too, such as #words times % correct hits......

Lets just forget I said that.

[technomc]

Perhaps we can introduce a handicap system, for those having a 'fat finger day' or are pre-menstrual, or who have gone on a diet, or given up smoking, or need chocolate or are just having a stressy day....

[greenone]

Oh T - I like that idea!!  Can I just register for a handicap EVERY day

[Nova]

The new scoreboard has only one fault:

There is now less space on the front page, and as I have set as my goal
making my way at least that far, the game just got a bit more
challenging...

Hopefully this will spur me to get those elusive last common words
more often, getting a Rosette feels so wonderful!

These last couple weeks have been very busy, have been folding paper and
stitching for our local parish, the spring charity bazaar is coming, and
the pile of ready work does not seem to grow quickly enough...
Another week and then I should have more time again 

[technomc]

It's nice to hear from you Nova..good luck with the bazaar...

[rogue_mother]

Alan, I have noticed an interesting phenomenon with the new chart. On the IE6 browser that we use at the office, some of the bars sink below the x axis, whereas on the IE7, Safari and Firefox browsers that we have at home, all of the bars sit on top of the x axis. This is not a big deal to me; the rest of the chart still works fine.

[anonsi]

I also noticed that the bars sink below the x axis on IE6.  I thought that was the way it was supposed to be, and found it confusing. It makes a lot more sense if they're all above the line!

[technomc]

Do what!!??? 

[Alan W]

Honestly, who'd be a webmaster?

Or, at any rate, who'd be a webmaster without having a roomful of computers, all with different operating systems and browsers installed on them? I've no sooner installed IE8, so I can investigate problems people are having with that browser, than I have to un-install it, and then un-install IE7, so that I can look into a problem with IE6. Am I to spend my whole life installing and uninstalling software?

(Unfortunately, there's no simple way of having different versions of Internet Explorer installed on a computer at the same time. And although IE6 is now two versions ago, it's still the second most popular browser among Chi players - almost 30% use it. So I don't like to allow errors to continue, even if they're relatively minor.)

Anyhow, I think I've fixed the problem of the bars going below the line. IE6 was enforcing a minimum height, to allow room for a line of text - even though the bars contain no text. So I had to set the font size to zero, and suddenly everything was OK.

[birdy]

You've got my sympathy, Alan.  I hate sitting in front of the computer installing programs.

[rogue_mother]

Alan, I can vouch for the fact that the problem is fixed.

Many corporate purchasers of software such as my employer are very slow to adopt the newer versions of software. Microsoft is well known for having its users debug their products, and large-scale companies don't want that kind of headache.