wp-SwimTeam

Over the past week or so I’ve been working on some new functionality that is finally ready to go.  The opt-in/opt-out module has been based on strokes since the initial implementation and this model worked well for the MacDolphins but some other teams prefer to register (or scratch) swimmers on a per event basis.

Events have been supported for a while but other than adding them to a swim meet, nothing has been done with them.  The existing event functionality is the basis for the results work I hope to complete some day.  Because the Event information is already defined, allowing the Opt-In/Opt-Out module to be based on the actual events was pretty straight forward.  There is a new setting on the Options->Swim Team tab which controls which Opt-In/Opt-Out model wp-SwimTeam uses (Event or Stroke).  By default it will continue to use Stroke since that was the original functionality.

The new functionality had a ripple effect across much of the plugin, causing changes to the Reports module and other places too.  While working on the Reports I decided to expose the Job Assignments and Swimmers Reports for all users however non-admin users will only see their own job assignments or their own swimmers.  This new functionality also came from one of the MacDolphins parents who wanted to be able to see which jobs she had signed up for.  In the same conversation, another parent asked me if I could make it so she could see if she had scratched her swimmers.  These two requests led to exposing some of the Reports in a limited fashion to all users.

The last major feature is the ability to run a report that shows the parents of active swimmers and their status against the volunteer (jobs) commitment set by the team (set it to zero for no commitment).  This is a feature our volunteer coordinator has been after me to implement for some time.  While the Report works fine, it is a little slow, particularly the first time it is run so be patient.

The new version modifies the database tables so PLEASE BACKUP your database before you install it.  I don’t expect any issues and I’ve been running it on the MacDolphins site for the last two days but it is always a good idea to backup your database before upgrading.

There are a few other minor bug fixes and cosmetic changes that I made while working on these improvements.  I ran into one very odd bug that only exposed itself on Chrome – I’ve changed the Load All Events functionality because the Javascript that pulled all of the events from one list box to another didn’t work on Chrome.

There are still some things to improve – I’d like the list of events a swimmer can be registered for be limited to the events for their age group but don’t have good solution for that right now.  I am considering using icons across the action bar instead of the drop down menu.  I had moved away from buttons because they didn’t fit but the dropdown actions are confusing so don’t be surprised to see icons in the near future if I can find some I like!

The WordPress plugin repository has been updated so the plugin should begin to auto-update soon too but in the meantime, you can find the latest release on the download page.

I have completed all of changes to support the opt-in/opt-out event model I described late last week.  I have not released the update yet as I am still doing some testing.  I have it running on the wp-SwimTeam demo site.  You can see an example of what one of the reports would look like when swimmers are registered on an event basis instead of a stroke basis.

While working on this I found some problems with the Events module which I have also fixed.  One was a very odd case which only was exposed in Chrome as it worked fine under IE9 and FireFox 4.  It turned out to be some sort of a Javascript difference between browsers so I have changed the GUI for the Load Events form.

If you switch from the stroke based model to the event based model for opt-in/opt-out, you may see some empty or unknown events for existing records.  These are due to a non-existent event id in the record.  It doesn’t really hurt anything but does look odd on the report so I plan to look into it.

I am looking for someone to do some testing before I release an update, if you want to help, get in touch with me.

I’ve had an ongoing dialog with a team in Texas using wp-SwimTeam that has a much different usage model for participating in Swim Meets than the MacDolphins do.  Instead of registering or scratching for a meet, their team has their swimmers register for particular events.  In speaking with a parent of one of our year round swimmers, they do the same type of thing for their year round meets.

Wp-SwimTeam doesn’t currently support this usage model but I can see the need to do so.  The system already allows the definition and assignment of events to a swim meet, it needs to be extended to allow swimmers to register to particular events instead of the global Opt-In/Opt-Out option which is currently available.

I don’t plan to eliminate the current usage model because it works well for our swim team but I plan to extend it by allowing what I am referring to as the Opt-In/Opt-Out usage model which will either be by Stroke (the existing model) or by Event (the new model).

Fortunately the data model I set up when I first implemented Opt-In/Opt-Out will handle this change fairly easily with one exception.  For some odd reason I called the field in the database which stores the stroke code ‘eventcode’.  This was a bad idea and I am going to change it to ‘strokecode’ in the next release of the plugin which will cause a bump in the database version.  This isn’t the first time I’ve changed a database column name so I am not too worried about it but I wanted to be up front about what I am doing and why.

In the current Opt-In/Opt-Out Stroke based usage model a user can start from a swim meet and update all of their swimmers on a per meet basis or they can start from a swimmer and update all of the meets on a per swimmer basis.  This will remain the case.

However, for the Event based usage model all action will have to be initiated from the swimmer, it will not be possible to update multiple swimmers for a single meet.  This change is due to the swimmers being in different age groups so the events have to be relevant to a swimmer which isn’t possible (or easy anyway, I guess anything is possible) for multiple swimmers.

What about swim ups?  I am not sure how I want to handle swim ups right now.  In the first implementation I will allow an Admin user to register a swimmer into any event but a parent/guardian (standard user) will only be allowed to register their swimmer for the events that correspond to the swimmer’s age group.

Feel free to comment on whether or not I have missed anything and I am looking for someone to validate the usage model once I have it up and running on the wp-SwimTeam Demo site.

I have just released wp-SwimTeam v.1.5.579, you can find it on the download page and shortly, via the automatic plugin updater.  This release fixes an issue which has bothered me personally for a long time.

There was a problem in the E-mail Confirmation code for both registrations and opt-in/opt-out.  This same code was used for the new Jobs module so it existed there too.  For a long time the confirmation e-mails were duplicated and if a swimmer had to two contacts, only one of them would receive the e-mail.  I have finally found and fixed this problem so e-mail confirmation should be cleaner and sent to the appropriate people.

I have just posted v1.1.533 of the wp-SwimTeam plugin.  This version includes the first pass of Contextual Help for all plugin screens and forms.  I have added and/or clarified some of the information to (hopefully) make it more clear what particular areas of the plugin are for and the actions which can be performed.

This version also fixes a number of minor bugs that I encountered, most were due to typos in the SDIF constants that were exposed when I turned the WP_DEBUG flag on.

I added one significant new feature:  It is now possible to configure the Opt-In/Opt-Out system to support opting in or out of Full, Partial, or Both types of swim meets.  Control over this setting, which defaults to BOTH, is on the Options page under the Swim Team tab.

This afternoon I posted a new version of wp-SwimTeam.  This version adds e-mail confirmation to the opt-in/opt-out process.  It now behaves much like registration does, sending a confirmation e-mail to the swimmer’s guardian and to the e-mail address configured to receive opt-in/opt-out notifications.

There were a also a few minor bugs addressed but nothing of any real consequence.

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.

Quick turn-around on a release as there was a bug which was really bothering me.  The Opt-In/Opt-Out report was pulling swimmer label from the active season regardless of which season a meet was created against.  This was fine for the current season but messed up reports from any prior season.

The report now pulls swimmer labels from the season that the meet is created against so looking back a a report from last season or two seasons ago will still show correctly.

I haven’t posted much but I have been working on wp-SwimTeam off and on now that the MacDolphins summer season is over.  I haven’t released anything yet but I’ve made some significant improvements. 

Opt-In/Opt-Out

Improvements have been made to the Opt-In/Opt-Out process to make it much less confusing.  The Opt-In/Opt-Out form is now smarter, only presenting the list of strokes to the user when a Partial Opt-In/Opt-Out is selected.  The ability to Opt-In/Opt-Out has also been added to the “My Swimmers” tab to make it easier to find.

Login Redirect

I’ve also added a new option to control what happens when end users login to a site running wp-SwimTeam.  For most users, landing on the WordPress Dashboard page is confusing.  They don’t care about 99% of the stuff presented to them nor should they.  The plugin now allows definition of a login redirect so the user can be sent to either the home page or the Swim Team Overview (which is what I expect to use most of the time) page.  Landing on the Swim Team Overview page makes the most sense for most users since when they login, they are most likely doing some level of interaction with the swim team functionality.

Results Import

Results import is still  in progress, the other two areas mentioned above are complete.  At this point importing results does little more than perform a first pass validation that the supplied file is indeed a SDIF results file.  Now that I have the uploading and validation complete, I need to work on the data model to store results.  Results will be connected to swimmers and meets and events.  Since a new table will be created, results will change the database version when it is released.

Initially I expect to simply report results from a meet and be able to look at results for any given swimmer.  Longer term I want to use Open Flash Chart to plot results on a per swimmer basis over the course of a season or possibly several seasons.  I don’t expect to get to this until much later this year though.

WordPress 2.8.x

I am still working with WordPress 2.7.1 in my development environment.  I haven’t even tried 2.8.4 yet so I have no idea what the impact is.  I will likely do so once I am done with the results.

A quick update that fixes exactly one issue – v0.1.400 is now on the download page.  I unleashed the opt-in/opt-out system on the MacDolphins today and quickly found that having the Participation column with “Register” and “Scratch” displayed for the users was confusing as parents thought that the Register or Scratch wording indicated the statue of their swimmers.  For now I have removed the column and I will add the ability for parents to see a summary of their Registers and Scratches.