site wishlist [Site]

2010 May 12
I cannot seem to find the official thread.

Add to the wishlist - allow us to post embedded youtube videos - I'm thinking mainly forums here.

2010 May 12
Forum - What are your gripes about this site?

How many of us would use that feature, besides you? Seriously. I don't watch food videos, with the rare exception of Mark Bittman. I'm not about to start because OF uses it.

2010 May 12
I'm happier starting a new thread for requests, rather than recycling the "gripes about this site" one. The reason I don't have any paging for threads is that I prefer them not to get too long...

I'll think about it, although it's a bit of a slippery slope -- if we permit YouTube videos, what about Google Video, Vimeo, etc?

2010 May 13
How about a option to input prices beside the items? (ie how much a sausage would cost at the chip wagon, etc) Would be especially useful for places like the piggy market. farm boy. etc

2010 May 13
As for videos, the way I see it, the factors to weigh are (probably in this order) :

- amount of work for FF / how difficult is it?
- is there a security issue?
- will it enhance the site?

Clearly, LWB does not thing it would enhance the site. Clearly, I do :-) I'm betting I'm in the majority, though.

Also, from a financial perspective, when you are trying to make a bit of money from ads, and your site sends people away elsewhere (e.g. to watch a video), that's a bad thing. If a user can watch the video within the site, it will probably increase ad revenue.

As for supporting other video formats than Youtube - yes, why not? It really just factors in to the first point above. You support the ones that are easiest and/or have the highest market share. This site is written in Python, right? I'm willing to bet there are off-the-shelf functions available already to support most of the major video sites.

2010 May 13
OK I've got a new request. How about some way to print individual comments. That way when someone posts a recipe I don't have to cut and paste it into a text to print only that recipe/comment.

Clearly we need an unpaid intern - where did that ad go ...

2010 May 13
I would LOVE to have a "printer friendly" option for printing threads or reviews. And now that we can sort tags by wishlist/favourites it will help me plan my weekends abit better-;) Just my 2 cents...

P.S. to zy I don't watch youtube videos either so posting embedded youtube videos would not be beneficial for me.

2010 May 13
With all this talk of printing we may be able to get Domtar to sponsor an intern :-)

www.theglobeandmail.com

2010 May 13
I'm just saying that I find blogs that use embedded video to look clunky and not be beneficial to the space. I think that embedding video in OF would do the same thing.

I really don't think that arguing in favour of more annoying advertisements is the way to go, Zym.

Printable reviews and recipes would be nice. Although, I'd also like to have a better organization of the Recipes Wiki, which would increase the automatic printability of something. (You could also use screen-capture software).

2010 May 13
The ad argument was meant for our host, not for the visitors :-)

Those who do not like ads are welcome to make direct donations to the Ottawa Foodies Server Fund.

2010 Jun 30
Is there some way of controlling reviews for places that are under controversy?? Like a lock setting on Wikipedia? I just find that whenever there's a media eruption over something, people post their comments in the review section, even after a separate topic has been created.

Also, as a wish list item, I'd like to know more about the vendors, like when they opened.

2010 Jun 30
Good idea on the first one LWB

As for the 2nd one, that type of info is supposed to be included by the person who originally enters the establishment.

2010 Jul 3
I don't quite understand the 'block user function'. Wouldn't it make more sense if instead of them not seeing your post, you wouldn't see their?

If I block a user its because I find s/he irritating, not because I don't want them to to read what I post, I'm simply trying to avoid having to be subjected to theirs....

2010 Jul 4
I thought that blocking a user just meant there could be no private messaging?

2010 Jul 4
The block user facility exists to prevent harassment. There is currently no way to actively ignore all public posts by someone you find annoying. :-)

2010 Aug 13
Fresh Foodie can we add two more tags? One for breakfast and one for take-out. The only related tags we presently have are "all-day breakfast" and "delivery". I went to the Blue Gardenia for lunch today and although they serve breakfast they do not serve it all day. Likewise I sometimes want to pick up lunch at this time of year so it would be handy knowing if my favourite restaurant has take-out available. Just my two cents...

2010 Aug 13
I considered adding a take-out tag a long time ago, but the reality is that pretty much any restaurant will give you food to go. If they're able to make a doggy bag with leftovers, they can put a meal in a bag for you. And because you won't be taking up a seat in the restaurant, they're usually happy to do so. In contrast, the "delivery" tag is more useful because most restaurants won't deliver your meal to you.

As for the "breakfast" tag, I don't like having tags for food items (I plan to get rid of some, like "dessert" and even "all-day breakfast"). That said, I see value in having a tag that says "open for breakfast", so here it is: ottawafoodies.com/tag/122

2010 Aug 13
Okay thanks - point well taken!

2010 Sep 4
I'm going to have to "out" myself here as being terminally uncoordinated, but could the "mark as questionable" button be moved over to the right of the page, farther away from the "mark as read". I seem to hit the wrong one a lot, then I have to undo it. I'm probably the only idiot to do this regularly but if it's an easy change it would make me happy :)

2010 Sep 4
You know how Amazon has an algorithm that recommends other books "others who liked this also liked . . ." how about doing that for places that are given high ratings - scan through the DB for others who also gave that place high ratings, create an amalgamated list of their highest rankings, sort by aggregated rank across the same set of users, and then display.

2010 Sep 5
Being able to post comments to Facebook/Twitter would be great. I'd use that function a lot; I already do on many other sites.

2010 Sep 9
I don't know if its only me but when I click on that pink bar that says "x # of posts are being hidden....Click here to see everything". Nothing happens when i click. Is it only me?

2010 Sep 9
W.C., I'm surprised that you're running into trouble with that link. There's nothing fancy going on with it. At the risk of pointing out the obvious, please make sure you click on the actual text (when in doubt with these things, click on the word "here").

2011 Feb 1
Fresh Foodie I just have a comment about the tags section - particularly about the geographical grouping of the tags. I just added Misto Food Emporium which is in the Hampton Park Plaza. It's not in the "city west" area but not far enough away to be considered Nepean or Kanata. I did in fact hold my cursor over each area but I didn't see anywhere that covered the near west end... I also noticed the establishments in Vanier and New Edinburgh lumped together in Vanier. They are two distinctly different neighbourhoods - would you consider making a separate entry for each of them?

2011 Feb 1
The tags are intended to be very general. We are best off having the fewest tags that are still useful. I've tried to use major streets and geographical features (river, greenbelt) to delineate the neighbourhoods. So Vanier and New Edinburgh go together, mostly because there aren't enough restaurants in New Edinburgh to justify a separate tag. Also, I'm pretty sure New Edinburgh was in the former city of Vanier and they're definitely in the Vanier electoral district. :-)

Pasta lover, Hampton Park Plaza fits into the "Westboro" tag, which is defined as "Richmond/Carling between Parkdale and Woodroffe". The next tag I split will likely be this one, and I would probably split it at Island Park, where Wellington becomes Richmond.

When "approving" new entries, I always correct the tags if necessary. So don't worry too much about getting it right. I'll think about making a coloured map showing the tag regions -- I can see that being useful!

2011 Feb 1
i can't stand looking at mutant Adam Sandler

2011 Feb 1
HRSDC (gov't department) funds the hiring summer students if anyone has the energy to apply.

I find it a bit of a challeng knowing what to post where. A student might be able to make the site easier to navigate....or might just make things a lot worse LOL!!

2011 Feb 2
monty, that bobble-head crap drives me nuts too. If I could somehow opt out of just those ads I would!

2011 Feb 2
You have ads?
Sorry, I hadn't noticed.

2011 Feb 2
Ads are what pay for the site's operating costs (but not the development costs). I allow registered users to turn off ads because they typically contribute to the site's content.

2011 Feb 2
About suppressing ads... what do you mean by (free lunch)?

2011 Feb 3
haha.. good question, tourist, as I guess it could make you wonder why I'm not serving sandwiches to you around midday! ;-)

My "free lunch" comment is an allusion to this popular phrase: en.wikipedia.org

In other words, if you turn off advertising, you *do* get a free lunch in the sense that you can use the site without undergoing the pain of advertising.

Hope that makes sense!

2011 Feb 3
K That makes sense. I was worried that I owed YOU a free lunch for turning off your revenue generating ads!!

2011 Feb 3
The only thing I would like to see be more user-friendly is adding tags where apparent.

Such as - the delivery/take-out tag.

Some places I search on the site, I would like to know whether not they are delivery/take-out friendly. For the places that don't already have this tag, I would like to add it in if I come to find out that a place has delivery.

Thus, making searches with tags ("Westboro/Delivery") more useful to the everyday user.

2011 Feb 3
proulx, that's where my benevolent dictatorship comes into play. I need to have control over stuff like that in order to maintain a certain amount of quality. Believe me, when the owner of a business adds tags, they go nuts: "Vegan" tag because they have pasta primavera on the menu, "Celiac-friendly" because they have rice noodles, "Pub" because they serve beer. Most of that becomes noise and it hurts the usefulness of tags.

The right way to add a "Delivery" tag is to click on the "+See something wrong or missing? Click here." link and let me know about it! A simple "add Delivery tag" is all you need to write.

There is no Take-out tag because 95% of restaurants will happily make takeout for you. If they have doggy bags they will take your money in exchange for food!

2011 May 18
I wish there was a way to weed out the 1 time horrible review of tonight's dinner new users... haha.. actually they are sometimes funny to read.

2011 May 27
Hi FF

Would it be possible to be able to view pictures in their native size? The way they are embedded in the post makes them small and i'd really like to zoom in for more detail.

example ---------->

thanks

2011 Oct 15
Is it possible to "disconnect" a food from a vendor? In the same way that vendors are crossed out that no longer exist, if a restaurant stops serving a signature dish, or a food that is connected with them, that should probably be noted. The example I'm thinking of is Play's Weekend Brunch. It makes me sad everytime I look at the Play review page and remember I can't have brunch there...

2011 Oct 16
lady who brunches, everything is possible! But only I can do it.

I've unlinked Weekend Brunch from Play Food and Wine. If they are ever reconnected (one can always hope!), the couple of reviews that apply to that connection will once again become visible.

2012 Apr 19
On forum topics that get really long, like New Openings Around Town (400+) or What I Ate for Dinner etc., how about dividing them up into years? I know the problem then is keeping them together (if someone did want to read the whole thread) without using the "Find" button with key words.

Maybe a header/footer post could be added if they were separated into years with...
"See previous year" link in post.
"See following year" link in post.

Sorry FF. I spend my evenings thinking of ways to make more work for you. :)

2012 Apr 20
I like that idea, AMR! I've struggled with how to limit the length of forum topics... I figured people just naturally create a new topic after the size reached something in the 50-100 range, but clearly that isn't always the case.

2012 Apr 20
I agree with the concept AMR proposes...I've noticed the forum software does a good job of streamlining long threads, but if you want to read something from a few weeks, or even a few days ago on some threads, you have to load the whole thread and scroll down to the bottom to find it. Is there anyway to archive anything older than, say, 180 days on multi-year threads and provide a link to the archived content if people want to read it?

2012 Apr 20
I wish warby would learn to parse his own links :-)

e.g. if I post a direct link to his last comment above, it gets all messed up :

Forum - site wishlist?post_id=48501#post_48501

2012 Apr 20
Until FF gets around to changing the parsing thingy, I'll just use a URL shortener.

htttp://ottawafoodies.com/forum/2825?post_id=48501#post_48501
!
V
goo.gl
!
V
goo.gl/fukIo

An extra step ... but you Ottawa Foodies are worth it.

2012 Apr 20
Zym, you're just hoping that if you keep mentioning it I'll do something about it! As you know, parsing web links is regular expression hell. Ideally, you account for all kinds of special cases, and you'll still end up being wrong some of the time. Still, I think it bugs me at least as much as it bugs you so I wouldn't rule a fix out at some point! ;-)

2012 Apr 21
Oh I HATE regex stuff - I failed that part of my spy test - but they still called me in for an interview :-)

2012 Apr 21
You know, I could have sworn I saw a good regex for that kicking around the Internet somewhere.

Ah! There it is! I can't tell regexes just by looking at them, but would this one work (assuming I haven't suggested it already and just forgotten)?

daringfireball.net

2012 Apr 22
That looks promising, thanks! Can't try it out now but will save it for future use.

2012 Sep 3
Is it time for threaded comments on the review pages?

Recently there have been a lot of instances of reviews that create reactions and discussion on the vendor pages. Sometimes it makes sense for them to be moved to the forum, but other times not. Regardless, it creates clutter for people who are trying to use this site as a resource. On the other hand, the discussion is good, it just needs an appropriate home. The thumbs up/down button is a great start for this, but it seems that people want to put their 2 cents in.

I'd suggest some sort of structure by which there could be "threaded" reviews, or comments that are visually linked to a specific review. This could allow reviews to be contextualized if necessary, while trying to maintain the readability of vendor pages as a resource for newer members, and visitors to the site.

I'm sure that FF has all the time in the world to implement something like this..

2012 Dec 6
So, following on from the conversation in the turkey thread, what do you think to the idea of a page for local farmers to enter details of their farm, what they sell, where they are, how to contact them etc? I'm thinking more in terms of farms who will sell to me direct as a consumer - I'm not the type to go for a drive in the country and look for things myself, but if there is something specific I'm after that I can find in a directory, call to ensure availability and then drive there to purchase, I'd definitely use the facility.

Would others use it? Is it feasible, FF?

2012 Dec 6
I think Johnny English has an interesting idea. In some ways, it might be re-inventing the wheel, as there are already lots of farmer directories out there, but there is always room for more.

Some farms will list with some, and some won't. Same goes for customers, some would be willing to check out one listing, but maybe not another.

One of the down sides of it might be that some farmers aren't always good about updates. I'm the worst for updating my website, I'm not much better for farmer profiles.

2012 Dec 7
Johnny English, I don't really understand what you're asking for that is new. A farmer is simply a vendor, and there's already a tag for Farm: ottawafoodies.com/tag/19

Funnily enough, before OttawaFoodies even got started I was maintaining a directory of Ottawa-area Farms and Farmer's Markets using an interactive (Google) map. So it isn't a stretch to say that a farmer directory lies at the root of this site's existence. :-)

2012 Dec 7
I guess my request may be rooted in a lack of understanding of how the site works: how would I search the site for farmers who sell turkeys?

2012 Dec 7
You would not really be able to do that.

2012 Dec 7
Google found me this map, which still may not do what you want

www.justfood.ca

2012 Dec 7
Awesome. That does exactly what I was asking for.

2012 Dec 7
I really like the www.justfood.ca site too. I like that you can search it in so many ways, and I like the info they give about organic status, and eating local, etc.

BUT, I know me and a bunch of other farmers have been trying to get them to add on our names for years, and it never happens. We know it's not a geography issue, because they'll often list a farm that's next door, or just down the road.

So in many ways it is an extensive listing, but also missing many farms, including ones with turkey, Johnny English! ;-)

2012 Dec 7
just to play Fresh Foodie for a brief second (assume he's out enjoying his Fri-nite) ... you can do a search for Turkey as a tag, which will return the single vendor currently associated with it:

Turkey

So, the functionality is here, users just need to tag vendors more.

And here's the index of all food tags:

ottawafoodies.com

2012 Dec 7
Hey Mark! Could you, you know, redo the entire site so it is more user-friendly, workable and searchable? I need something that can work on my new WonderPhone as well as being the greatest thing since sliced beer on my home UberMachine. I want to be able to mute certain users as well as getting push notification of exactly (and only) the types of things that might appeal directly to me. I don't want any ads or spam messages to get through and it would be really great if you could organize a free lunch for us once a month or so.

Okay? Thanks.

Oh, is it okay if I use your forum to point everyone here to my own food-related site where I make a living off of stealing content from other bloggers about the very same topic?

Great. Love your site!

2012 Dec 7
itchy feet, I think I love you! ;-)

Rizak, hahaha... ok I get your point. But the suggestions are good. They tell me what I need to focus on and they remind me that I shouldn't let things stagnate. :-)

2012 Dec 17
Can you make the ads pop out a new tab if I click them, instead of replacing this window? I actually click them fairly often just for the sake of it ... but that is a PITA

2012 Dec 17
I can't do that unfortunately... Google is pretty strict with how their ads are presented. All I can suggest is to right-click and choose "Open in new tab" or simply shift-click them. That should work in most browsers.

2012 Dec 26
It would be good for ME if you could move the IGNORE THIS TOPIC button to the right. Like, ALL THE WAY to the right. Centered in the page, I click this a couple of times a week when trying to post something. It is the most intuitive button to press.

2014 Jun 1
(1) a quick link to this forum topic so we don't need to search for it

(2) forum subject line repeated at the bottom as well as the top. When going through all the unread forum topics you don't by default get the forum topic in most cases.