Idea for improving MP

Here's the idea. MP users input their rack into their profile and MP shows the user which routes they would reasonable be able to climb given their gear selection.
I would imagine there would have to be a lot of leg work to transition the text based protection recommendations into something the software could understand. This would probably have to utilize a protection conversion capacity. Ex: User wants recommendation to reflect their friends oriented rack and the recommendation comes in Camelot's.
The end state would be slightly less time spent getting excited about routes that require five .5s or something equally excessive.
Thoughts?

I think this is a bad idea because:
- amount of protection needed is very personal and will vary widely
- no one will bother to fill in recommended protection
- no one will bother to fill in their own rack
- the majority of people who have "a rack" have a rack that covers the majority of trad climbs.
- there is no point in developing this whole complex system when something like "requires a #5" is all you really needed to know

Nathanael wrote:I think this is a bad idea

+1

- the majority of people don't want a climb's suggested gear to be that specific
- bears

Not a good idea, not really needed.

Most guide-books for an area (with trad climbing) describe what is a "standard rack" for that area, and then if a route varies from that will describe the variance.

There will, of course, be exceptions to this (Indian Creek splitters, for example). But this works pretty well most of the time.

Same for routes here, the expectation is that if you are leading trad routes, you will have a reasonably standard rack (nuts from small to moderate, cams from small to largish (BD #3/4), doubles if you're more cautious or leading longer/multi-pitch routes) and describe unusual variances (needs wide pieces).

I'd like a feature that adjusts offwidth rating according to hand / foot size.

J Marsella wrote:^ how about one that I can enter my body weight / BMI and get an adjusted grade?

Everything but off-widths goes up a grade for each 10lbs overweight according to bmi. Offwidths actually get easier based on the ability to jam flab into a crack and inchworm up. So with me being a good 50 lbs overweight according to the bmi calculator, I actually climb 5.13...sweet!

I find descriptions like the following to be helpful:

-"finger crack, fingers sized cams and stoppers",

-"protects well with offset stoppers",

-"take small gear, rps and brassies needed"

-"100' of 4-6" OW"

-author's pro recommendations are F$%^&d! is he even talking about the same climb?"

MP already accommodates this.

I think REI should give us a dividend for each post on MP--that would really improve the site.

Jonathan Cunha wrote:I think REI should give us a dividend for each post on MP--that would really improve the site.

Once you click a climb into you to-do list. The logical solution is to have REI instantly place an order for the gear you're missing for that climb.

I'm not arguing for less responsibility for the climber to interpret suggested pro. What I am arguing for is a filter so that I don't have to wade through routes which require large numbers of the same sized gear. This is obviously a small thing.
It would also be nice to not have to independently convert the scattered and disjointed recommendations into my specific gear system. Surely an organization which utilizes community input could find the man hours to translate the text "xyz" into clicks "xyz".
So much work has been put into this... It just seems silly to not extend it a bit further. It's 2016 for god's sake. What do I know though. I'm just a spoiled brat complaining about how nobody ever gives me anything.

Norman Roundy wrote:Surely an organization which utilizes community input could find the man hours to translate the text "xyz" into clicks "xyz". So much work has been put into this... It just seems silly to not extend it a bit further. It's 2016 for god's sake. What do I know though. I'm just a spoiled brat complaining about how nobody ever gives me anything.

But it isn't a simple translation of comments into gear checkboxes (for the reasons already covered).

Maybe I think a set of nuts and tricams is perfect. Another dude comes in and thinks that is dumb - cams from 0.2 to 1 are the "right" rack. Another likes that, but feels doubles around 0.5 inches are needed to be safe. What does the combined gear list look like? Or multiple racks for folks to vote on?

I can't see it providing better info than the current system and would likely make it more confusing. Just figure out what is "standard" for an area. It is pretty easy to then review descriptions and comments for routes of interest and see if they mention divergences - you are probably doing that anyway to find out if the route looks like something you want to get on?

So basically you have a standard rack of double cams and nuts. You want to pull up Supercrack Buttress in your MP app and have it filter out all the long splitters. Ok.

Norman Roundy wrote:I'm not arguing for less responsibility for the climber to interpret suggested pro. What I am arguing for is a filter so that I don't have to [1]wade through routes which require large numbers of the same sized gear. This is obviously a small thing. It would also be nice to [2] not have to independently convert the scattered and disjointed recommendations into my specific gear system. Surely an organization which utilizes community input could find the man hours to translate the text "xyz" into clicks "xyz". So much work has been put into this... It just seems silly to not extend it a bit further. It's 2016 for god's sake. What do I know though. I'm just a spoiled brat complaining about how nobody ever gives me anything.

Commenting on the two bolded passages:
1. there are very few areas in the country or world for that matter that
require "large numbers of the same sized gear".

2. you should gain more climbing experience so that this is no longer an issue for you

As others have said, it's a dumb idea that isn't worth the effort to code for the minimal. if any, benefits.

Just when you thought the bar could not be set any lower.....

Norman Roundy wrote:I'm not arguing for less responsibility for the climber to interpret suggested pro. What I am arguing for is a filter so that I don't have to wade through routes which require large numbers of the same sized gear. This is obviously a small thing. It would also be nice to not have to independently convert the scattered and disjointed recommendations into my specific gear system. Surely an organization which utilizes community input could find the man hours to translate the text "xyz" into clicks "xyz". So much work has been put into this... It just seems silly to not extend it a bit further. It's 2016 for god's sake. What do I know though. I'm just a spoiled brat complaining about how nobody ever gives me anything.

It seems like you'd probably like this website if it isn't already on your radar.

weighmyrack.com/traditional…

The pure variety of gear, rock types, crack sizes, and personal preference would make this into a massive project with no real benefit.

I for one like searching through the comments and seeing what others recommend (or not and keeping some surprise alive). Really though, everything requires an old style #3.5 C4.

Here's my thought on maybe improving MP.

Set up a separate website for Bouldering like the Mountain Bike site. It says Route Guide at the top of the page not Boulder Problems. There is over a 100 different areas in the Utah and Colorado sections alone. I can't find a way to tell what area has what unless you go through each one separately (please tell me if I am missing something?).

Could it help the site from having to go off line such as last night to clean things up? I can only imagine how many thousands of problems are taking up space. Would a Bouldering site get more traffic than the Bike site? Seems to me it would but I guess that would be a whole lot more work.

Any thoughts, Admin guys?

I though you were going to say add a "hide user" feature so you can effectively "unfriend" people. Sorry to Hijack the thread here, but it does follow under the title.

As for the OP - Sounds interesting, I doubt most would use it though, and the fact that a #4 BD nut = a #1DMM, and that a #2 camalot is ~ a #3 friend, etc- would make the gear list no less ambiguous than the presetn text selection unless you use the same brands as the poster.

nooky brown wrote:Here's my thought on maybe improving MP. Set up a separate website for Bouldering like the Mountain Bike site. It says Route Guide at the top of the page not Boulder Problems. There is over a 100 different areas in the Utah and Colorado sections alone. I can't find a way to tell what area has what unless you go through each one separately (please tell me if I am missing something?). Could it help the site from having to go off line such as last night to clean things up? I can only imagine how many thousands of problems are taking up space. Would a Bouldering site get more traffic than the Bike site? Seems to me it would but I guess that would be a whole lot more work. Any thoughts, Admin guys?

Howabout an Icon by any state/area/crag that shows a trad/sport/boulder breakdown in a small icon next to it. Or grade and pitch-count histograms?
That would be useful.

Ryan Hill wrote: Really though, everything requires an old style #3.5 C4.

Agreed. Especially on finger cracks

Tony B wrote:the fact that a #4 BD nut = a #1DMM, and that a #2 camalot is ~ a #3 friend, etc- would make the gear list no less ambiguous than the presetn text selection unless you use the same brands as the poster.

Nah, the software would compensate by knowing the sizes of different pieces.