Pre-Flight Ribbon Set Selection

[John Asendorf]

I am considering changing the first page of UltimateRack to a "Pre-Flight Ribbon Set Selector" kind of page. Users would select all of the sets they want to choose from before going to a second page where the ribbons from those sets would be displayed.

As it is right now, even though they're not visible, the client machine has to download over 500 tiny PNG files. This is huge both for the client and my bandwidth. This way someone could select, say, DoD, Army, and North Carolina National Guard before getting to the page with the drop-down ribbon selectors. That page would only have those groups in the selection area.

Advantages: less scrolling through the page for items, significantly lower bandwidth

Disadvantages: unless I move to a cookie-based system (which isn't going to happen in this version of UR), going back to add another set to the selector would lose any ribbons already selected forcing the user to start over...

Comments? Pitfalls I'm missing?

[Glaug-Eldare]

BETTER LIVING THROUGH GRATUITOUS STATISTICS

[John Asendorf]

BUWAHAHAHAHAHAA....

[John Asendorf]

To get an idea of what I'm talking about, see this page:

http://ultimaterack.ajandj.com/index2.php

[PA-SGT]

I like it!! nice and easy

[mechinfantry]

that is so much better, One suggestion. Can you put the boxes side by side so the page is not so long, because it will be get a lot longer once all the guard states are up.

[John Asendorf]

Yeah, what's there now was just a rough work-up to see if I could even make it happen. I'll make it prettier in the final.

[mechinfantry]

Cool, I like pretty

[John Asendorf]

Alright... just for Kevin, I've made it a bit prettier... with some popups which tell you what's in each group... tell me what you think.

[PA-SGT]

Well John, I like the layout it is easy to read and select your options, however I am not so sure about the mouse over or pop up, I can see it maybe for the federal awards but it gets too busy once you start doing the states, just my thoughts, no matter how it turns out I will be using it

PA-Sgt

[Glaug-Eldare]

Well John, I like the layout it is easy to read and select your options, however I am not so sure about the mouse over or pop up, I can see it maybe for the federal awards but it gets too busy once you start doing the states, just my thoughts, no matter how it turns out I will be using it

PA-Sgt

Yeah... I don't think the mouseover would be useful, either.

[John Asendorf]

I'm thinking of the first time user... we obviously know which group to look in to find a particular ribbon. I just don't want someone to get 9 ribbons in to their rack to discover they needed another set.

[PA-SGT]

I agree that this would help for the federal, DOD and the Civilian, but I think most people that are coming to this site will know which branch of service and or states they are looking for. So maybe if you could just limit the mouse over option it would not have the cluttered feel to it that I am currently getting

Just some food for thought

PA-Sgt

[John Asendorf]

What about an optional pop up list which the user has to click? Would that be less obtrusive?

[PA-SGT]

I think an optional popup to check would work, that way you are providing the extra info to those that want or need it.