[dvdvol] Re: application update discussion

[Aaron Cannon]

I just took a look at what the folks over at Ubuntu are doing (they
too have a project which mails free CDs to those that request them)
and they request the following fields:

(* = required)
*name:
Organization
*address1:
Address 2:
*City/Town/etc:
State/Province:
Postcode:
*Country:
*Phone:

That last is quite interesting.  I assume they collect the phone
number for customs purposes.

What do you all think of that set of fields?  Is that something likely
to give us better results?

BTW, the field lengths they use are 30 for everything but the name
(20) and the phone number (16).

Aaron

On 5/15/10, Aaron Cannon <cannona at fireantproductions.com> wrote:
> You wrote:
> "The other interesting thing is the way the system handles special
> characters. Things like " and ' come over as if I were working in html
> and have to be
> edited back to normal text. It is an obvious correction so it causes
> no trouble just a little time. If it it is easy for the software to
> make the correction
> that would be nice if not no big issue as the change is obvious."
>
> Where have you noticed this happening?  In the downloaded text or CSV
> files?  In the web pages?  Both?  This should be a simple fix.
>
> If we limit the number of chars per line (there actually is a limit
> but it's huge) how many should we limit them to?
>
> I'll give the address issue some more thought and get back to you.
>
> Aaron
>
> On 5/14/10, Johnnie CD <johnniecd at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Hello,
>>
>> For this application the system works well and it is certainly far better
>> than anything I could come up with.
>>
>> I would find it most helpful it the city, province/region/whatever, and
>> postal code were generally in the same field. It doesn't really matter
>> what
>> the field is called if the label on the form that the user fills out
>> guides
>> them to consistent entry it would be great. I realize some users will
>> ignore
>> it but I think some guidance might help. It only matters to me because I
>> like to export the data from the system and import it into the
>> application
>> that I use to generate labels. Maybe you could alter the webpage text a
>> little if it is complicated to change the guts of the program? Of course
>> I
>> don't know how it is setup I just offer my observations as an end user.
>>
>> You might even think about making 1 address, 1 city, and 1 postal code
>> fields mandatory. We still get entries with no street address or no city.
>> Undeliverable as such I suppose I could try to contact each of them but I
>> did not do so for all of the old request.
>>
>> I would also find it helpful if the webpage form limited the number of
>> characters in each field. Some folks enter strings to long that they will
>> not fit on an envelope.  I does help to know where the logical breaks go
>> in
>> international addresses. This also would not matter for everyone that
>> addresses their envelopes by hand but when exported long entries get
>> truncated and the additional text has to be edited back in manually.
>>
>> The other interesting thing is the way the system handles special
>> characters. Things like " and ' come over as if I were working in html
>> and
>> have to be edited back to normal text. It is an obvious correction so it
>> causes no trouble just a little time. If it it is easy for the software
>> to
>> make the correction that would be nice if not no big issue as the change
>> is
>> obvious.
>>
>> Microsoft is driving me nuts with their email. They are prone to spam or
>> junk anything sent from one email address claiming to be from another
>> unless
>> it is sent from inside their network. Of course their rules are not as
>> clearly published as some of the other folks which makes it difficult to
>> comply. If anyone know how to make them happy I hope they will share.
>>
>> I look forward to learning how other folks are using the software. Of
>> course
>> it would not make sense to propose any change unless it makes life easier
>> for everyone and it requires only a reasonable amount of time to
>> implement.
>>
>> Johnnie
>>
>