Military Time for League Games Schedules

[rickmc]

Am I the only one who hates having to convert "military time" into "real-people" time when it comes to the TUC game schedules? I can't tell you how often this has caused confusion for people that it's frustrating.

Honestly, I can understand it's usage if there were morning and evening league games...but since the only morning games are playoffs in the summer (and they're handled in Excel anyways), then I'd say the liklihood of needing military time within the TUC website is slim to none.

So how about just changin the coding so it displays 07:00 or 7:00pm....rather than 19:00?

Please??

[tommythecat]

I believe the use of military time was motivated by the assumption that most or all TUC players would have at least the equivalent of a high school education, and as such would have basic math and life skills. With ultimate players getting younger and younger, it seems eventually a switch will need to be made. However, since I believe 24-hour time is taught in primary school, this shouldn't be necessary until we start to see significant interest in ultimate among 10-12 year olds.

[Wartank]

actually, if it wouldn't be too much effort, i'd cast my vote for non-military time as well...

[march]

is it really that hard to subtract 12 from the military time to get the PM time?

[rickmc]

<deleted>

[rickmc]

is it really that hard to subtract 12 from the military time to get the PM time?

Not at all. But why use it when everyone else uses regular time? It's pretty rare to see military time in use today - particularly outside of military or institutional regimes.

[ashunter]

but since the only morning games are playoffs in the summer (and they're handled in Excel anyways)

One of the medium range goals is to get TUC tournaments (there's more than just playoffs!) into league runner and off of excel spreadsheets. When this happens, using a 24 hour clock will have a more visible benefit.

Right now we only have one guy, Greg, who's doing all the maintenance on the site. So if he changed this to 12-hour, he'd likely have to change it back to 24-hour when the tournament part is working. He only has so many volunteer hours he can put into this (though I know it seems infinite). I think it's better to move towards long term goals than short term fixes for things that are a matter of taste.

I'm pretty sure though, that if anyone wants to get their hands dirty and isn't afraid of some hard work Greg would like to have some assistance maintaining the site. Right now I don't know what we'd do if he froze all his fingers off playing at Snowplate or something.

[tommythecat]

I'm sorry. I probably went a little too far and was a bit of an ass.

Since an explanation has been asked for:

I don't disagree that 12-hour time would be easier. In fact, I've thought the same thing myself while looking at the schedule. However, if this is a serious issue for you or your team, I think you've got far bigger problems. I realize some people are a little bit scatterbrained, but I think the effort required to take a second look at the schedule and get it right is pretty minimal. If someone can't make that effort, they're really showing a pretty serious level of disrespect to their team-mates. I have the same issue with people who complain about Warren's e-mails being too long or can't be bothered to learn plays (on teams that have them). It's not really about whether or not people are smart enough to read a 24-hour clock (I hate the term "military time"), because everyone here should be able to do that, but about taking responsibility for one's self rather than expecting the league to wipe our bottoms for us.

[Peeters]

<devilsadvocate>

Am I the only one who hates having to convert "military time" into "real-people" time when it comes to flight schedules? I can't tell you how often this has caused confusion for people that it's frustrating.

</devilsadvocate>



I think what it boils down to is that...

Time to make the coding changes to the system to support 12-hour clock >>> Expected benefit of such change

Leaguerunner was not built from scratch by TUC, and using the 24-hour clock is how it was designed, like how airport systems work. It came this way. But the lovely thing about Open Source apps like this is that you have control over it (unlike airport systems, plus, a lot of the world operates on 24hr clocks), thing is, Greg simply has other things that need more immediate attention. But I'm sure he wouldn't say no to somebody volunteering to do it. Perhaps somebody with a strong desire to change it?

[rickmc]

Thanks everyone. Sounds like this isn't a quick fix and there's intentions (and opportunities) to use this feature in the future. While I'd love to change it, the reality is that I haven't written code in 6 years so the failure risk >> benefits. So case closed.

Tom, apologies for getting my knickers in a knot.

[GregS]

As others have suggested, it is not just a 2 minute fix. It would certainly be possible to append AM or PM to eventually differentiate between morning and evening games when we get Leaguerunner working for playoffs, but this would need to be done in a number of places, and should be configurable so that OCUA could still use military time if they preferred (presumably, they had some good reason for choosing this display format). As a result, it's probably one to two hours of work to do it properly, and the focus for now is on adding missing functionality rather than altering things that work well enough. I will add it to the TODO list for later.

[GregS]

Better late than never... You can now set your preference for date and time displays! Let me know if there are display options you'd like that aren't available, it's easy to add more.

[jmccully]

Man keeps a list... checks it twice... what else can you say, but thanks!