JK Final Details

[rf_fozzy]

Does anyone know what the standard bike track symbol looks like, and how the direction is indicated?

MTB_Track_Symbol

Middleton Park MountainParkTrack.jpg (30.2 KiB) Viewed 14420 times

I'll get it added to the website now. It is apparently a standard BOF symbol now.

[awk]

Yes. It's 2025 not 1995!

So, therefore, technically straightforward to produce FDs as a PDF, so that people have a choice. Believe it or not, not everybody has a smartphone, nor should they be expected to have one.

And no DJM is not the only one by any means.

[pete.owens]

Does anyone know what the standard bike track symbol looks like, and how the direction is indicated?

Middleton Park MountainParkTrack.jpg

I'll get it added to the website now. It is apparently a standard BOF symbol now.

That still doesn't indicate the direction - ie how do we know whether it is an uphill or downhill (uncrossable) section ?

Is the BOF standard published anywhere?

[NeilC]

Is the BOF standard published anywhere?

I can't find it. It isn't in the May 2024 BOF Symbol set (as linked from the BO website).

[rf_fozzy]

Yes. It's 2025 not 1995!

So, therefore, technically straightforward to produce FDs as a PDF, so that people have a choice. Believe it or not, not everybody has a smartphone, nor should they be expected to have one.

And no DJM is not the only one by any means.

Well. According to a number of reliable sources of data (e.g. Statista), something like 93-94% of UK adults have a smartphone..... (sorry cannot post link as I don't have a statista account, but ask google and it should give you some links if you don't believe me - ignore the generative AI nonsense of course).

So, yes I do think that the vast majority of people have a smartphone. Given the relative affulence status of most in the orienteering community, it's pretty unlikely many won't have.

So given that fact and that all 4 areas over the weekend have excellent mobile coverage, accessing the website is not an issue.

The other reason there is no single pdf is that it is likely to lead to incorrect information. With all information on the website there is a single source - which when updated is up to date. I have no control about when you download and print the final details, so if something changes this you then have incorrect information. Duplication of the information in this way is therefore silly.

I did do a pdf version of the final details for the British Nights on Ilkley Moor - I was the only person putting event information on the AIRE website and generating the FD pdf and still I got things wrong and the information in pdf wasn't correct when a few things changed at the last minute.

Now imagine you have 4 organisers, all working to their individual timescales, challenges, plus the central team managing things across days and then keep on top of changes with duplication. It is just a recipe for mistakes (which the Nopesport posters will moan about of course).

After BNOC, I came to the conclusion that trying to do a pdf was a fool's errand. It was the best way to do things 10 years ago. Not in 2025.

And it seems to me that arguing for the archaic way is the "we've always done it this way, so I don't like change" fallacy.

(plus of course as an organiser for even a 'normal' event, I have enough to manage and check without having to spend a couple of hours or more translating it to a pdf for the 2 people without a smartphone).

[rf_fozzy]

Does anyone know what the standard bike track symbol looks like, and how the direction is indicated?

Middleton Park MountainParkTrack.jpg

I'll get it added to the website now. It is apparently a standard BOF symbol now.

That still doesn't indicate the direction - ie how do we know whether it is an uphill or downhill (uncrossable) section ?

Is the BOF standard published anywhere?

The planning has taken this into account. That is what the website means - no-one should cross on a downhill section because of the way the courses have been planned.

[Scott]

I'm one of those few non-smartphone-owning British orienteers, and even I would agree that producing PDF final details in 2025 is more trouble than it's worth.

What I would say, however, is that assuming that the JK website uses the same CSS every year - and I note that it's had a bit of an overhaul for 2025 after not changing for quite a while - it should be pretty low effort to (pay someone to) write a simple print stylesheet so that the day details webpages print nicely every year.

[rf_fozzy]

I'm one of those few non-smartphone-owning British orienteers, and even I would agree that producing PDF final details in 2025 is more trouble than it's worth.

What I would say, however, is that assuming that the JK website uses the same CSS every year - and I note that it's had a bit of an overhaul for 2025 after not changing for quite a while - it should be pretty low effort to (pay someone to) write a simple print stylesheet so that the day details webpages print nicely every year.

This would not solve the version control issue

(Written on my budget smartphone)

[Scott]

That exists regardless of whether people are printing the details - you can no more control how far before the event people last choose to look at the website than you can control when they print it out. The solution to that is just to declare the details "final" at a certain point - as JK2025 has done - after which those who want to print them are free to do so, and ensure that any critical changes after that time are pushed to participants by email rather then relying on them coming across them passively.

[rf_fozzy]

That exists regardless of whether people are printing the details - you can no more control how far before the event people last choose to look at the website than you can control when they print it out. The solution to that is just to declare the details "final" at a certain point - as JK2025 has done - after which those who want to print them are free to do so, and ensure that any critical changes after that time are pushed to participants by email rather then relying on them coming across them passively.

Except you've missed the main point: there is one source. The website.

So we have version control. There is one version.

Changes can be highlighted as you say and critical changes emailed out, but the crucial thing is that there is only ever one set of live details.

This is the essential point.

And now I'm done as I have to go to Middleton to check one final thing for Monday.

This "moan to the organiser session" is terminated!

[Scott]

I perhaps haven't explained that very well. If you(/whoever maintains the JK website long-term) creates a printable CSS, the website is still your only live version of the details. The CSS is not a second copy of the details; it just tells your browser how to apply some nice print-friendly formatting to the existing webpages when you press the print button. The organiser only has to update the details in one place.

If you mean that you want to force people to refer to the website every time and prevent them from printing the details off, or making their own handwritten summary, or remembering an old version of the details in their head, then that is unlikely to be achievable.

This "moan to the organiser session" is terminated!

I don't think this should be an organiser's responsibility to sort out - the JK website is an enduring, British Orienteering-owned utility.

[Snail]

So given ... that all 4 areas over the weekend have excellent mobile coverage, accessing the website is not an issue.

But can you guarantee that where everyone is staying has excellent mobile coverage? If not, then you can't really complain if people fail to comply with some requirement that they don't know about until they arrive at the event, or don't allow enough time to get to assembly / starts, or whatever. And such issues would arguably not be the competitors' fault, so the organiser would have to sort out the consequences!

The other reason there is no single pdf is that it is likely to lead to incorrect information. With all information on the website there is a single source - which when updated is up to date.

That might be a rational argument if YHOA weren't producing a printed document anyway! Given that such a document IS being printed, it shouldn't be too difficult to provide a pdf version of it for people to print in advance.

Or follow Scott's solution - but that isn't as useful as it could be when the website splits the information over multiple pages

[SeanC]

Yes, most orienteers will have a smartphone.

But also most orienteers are of an age where they can't read the text

Personally I'm happy reading the details before the event (on a giant screen of course) and making a note of the key details somewhere on my phone.

[rf_fozzy]

I perhaps haven't explained that very well. If you(/whoever maintains the JK website long-term) creates a printable CSS, the website is still your only live version of the details. The CSS is not a second copy of the details; it just tells your browser how to apply some nice print-friendly formatting to the existing webpages when you press the print button. The organiser only has to update the details in one place.

If you mean that you want to force people to refer to the website every time and prevent them from printing the details off, or making their own handwritten summary, or remembering an old version of the details in their head, then that is unlikely to be achievable.

This "moan to the organiser session" is terminated!

I don't think this should be an organiser's responsibility to sort out - the JK website is an enduring, British Orienteering-owned utility.

https://whatif.xkcd.com/59

Or if you prefer the audiovisual version: https://youtu.be/RgBYohJ7mIk?si=pfXbBeonlow7oGNo

For my next event, I'm going to post the details only on Tiktok.

[Scott]

Give it another ten years and you can just send out updates to the final details in real time via the chips that Elon has implanted in our brains.