John Seto calls for comments, testing of world masters rankings site

Masters rankings guru John Seto says the demonstration site for world masters rankings is running. See it at mastersathletics.co. John adds: “This site is still being modified, but you will see changes and improvements often. The only results in this system are from the 2013 WMA championships. Athletes will be able to start entering their results this week. It is much earlier than I estimated before partially because I would like your feedback about the results entry forms so I can improve them – this is your system so I want to make this as good as possible for you.” This man’s on fire! Keep him busy.

rankings-grab

John continues:

Most of what is on the site is an interactive link. Please click around (and let me know if there are any broken links)! Here are some of my targets:
• Navigation tools for going between Countries and World Rankings: February 7;
• Athlete Entry Form (US Athletes should use the old form): February 7;
• Feedback Form: February 11;
• Whole meet result spreadsheet: February 13;
• Fully functional site incorporating feedback: March 30;
• Merge US and International systems: April 14;
• 2013 World Rankings (you will see these grow dynamically): April 30;
• 2014 Indoor World Rankings: May 15;

Please note that these are my potentially aggressive targets and not definitive dates.

There have been many offers to contribute and other suggestions on how to secure other funding. There is a link for Supporters (mastersathletics.co/support.php) which has the information for financial contributors. This site will also provide acknowledgments for those who contribute in tiers. We hope to get contributions from the WMA and other countries’ Athletics organizations.

Thanks to everyone who has given me feedback, suggestions and insight already. Please contact me via email or Facebook (facebook.com/USATFMastersRankings) with any comments, suggestions or support (both help and financial).

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February 4, 2014

3 Responses

  1. Sully - February 5, 2014

    Thank you Mr. Seto for all do for Masters Track and Field…..
    Sully

  2. John Seto - February 5, 2014

    World and International Masters Athletics Rankings Website is Running!!! (http://www.mastersathletics.co/)

    I said yesterday that the demonstration site is running which may be misleading: it is really a working site with real information (2013 outdoor rankings if there was only one meet – the WMA Championships). Almost all the text on the pages are links. I hope this makes easy and intuitive navigation.

    Navigation between countries’ and world rankings now works. All the ranking numbers on a ranking page will be the athletes’ World or country’s ranking. You can select a specific country by clicking on any country’s ISO initials in meet or rankings lists or go to the select county page. Please let me know if anything doesn’t work quite right.

    Please contact me via email or facebook (https://www.facebook.com/USATFMastersRankings) with any comments, suggestions or support (both help and financial). There is a direct link to PayPal on each page to make a donation. Donations help me while I am taking time away from other responsibilities to develop this site and will help me afford to maintain the rankings well. I appreciate anything and everything you can and have given.

  3. Ken Stone - March 5, 2014

    Status report from John Seto:

    Please keep telling people; encouraging athletes to use the system, submit their own results, navigate around and provide feedback on features, issues, etc.; and most importantly, encourage anyone who can afford to and thinks it is a worthwhile venture to contribute (there are donation links and links to an address for mailing on the sites). These donations are the only means of helping me afford to develop and maintain the system so far.

    It just occurred to me that some people are only seeing some of my frequent posts so they are not necessarily informed on what I am talking about. Those who are not familiar please review the postings on http://www.facebook.com/USATFMastersRankings which start on January 30, 2014.

    I was able to correct a fair amount of duplicates today (and got bleary eyed so I stopped). Also was able to convert and insert performances from The Netherlands and Portugal (I forgot to mention Portugal yesterday). The 2013 rankings are slowly taking shape with the few thousand performances I added over the past couple of days. I hope you are asking anyone you know to submit their marks and asking your country’s representatives to get me performances so the rankings will come together quickly. I will be able to get any files sent to me done quicker as I refine and improve my methods.

    Let’s not forget 2014 indoor and outdoor seasons. My priority has been to try to get the programs working and get 2013 performances gathered. I have received some 2014 Indoor and Outdoor results and will try to get as many of the indoor results inserted before the WMA Championships so you can see how people are doing before you get there.

    US Athletes: Please note I am holding off merging the US performances with the world until I have finished with the database structure so I only have to covert the data once. Please be patient. You can enter your 2013 marks into the World ranking if you would like to either “play” with the system (please enter real marks so they are not distracting to anyone) and 2014 marks too. The 2014 marks will remain in the database – the 2013 results will be deleted when I do the merge.

    There was a small change I made over the past few days I forgot to mention: all country abbreviations are per the IOC (Olympic) – they seemed more recognizable that way. Does everyone like the website? Please let me know how I can improve it.

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