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 what to change 
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Posted on: Sun Sep 30, 2012 11:11 pm




Posts: 3296
Joined: Thu May 12, 2011 11:58 pm
Post what to change
(this post and the next "split" from the "sword-like icon" post in
the Killer Sudoku forum)

opacitaviola wrote:
For me this is a downer.

Sorry to hear that.
I still wonder what the direction of the site should be, and if/how I should
reduce the number of puzzles.

Every day I get the "compute weekly totals" e-mail that also
shows the number of active users in the past month, and that
number has been steadily going down for a _long_ time now.
(so the number of users who sign up in a day is consistenly
lower than the number of users who leave the site).

So I must be doing something wrong [confused]


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 5:34 am




Posts: 428
Location: Canada
Joined: Fri May 13, 2011 2:43 am
Post Re: sword-like icon
pnm wrote:
opacitaviola wrote:
For me this is a downer.

Sorry to hear that.
I still wonder what the direction of the site should be, and if/how I should
reduce the number of puzzles.

Every day I get the "compute weekly totals" e-mail that also
shows the number of active users in the past month, and that
number has been steadily going down for a _long_ time now.
(so the number of users who sign up in a day is consistenly
lower than the number of users who leave the site).

So I must be doing something wrong [confused]


Sorry this has nothing to do with the sword-like icon... so, off topic...

When was the last time it was going up? And has it been steady in the past? Actually, I loved calcudoku until shortly after I subscribed. It sounds weird, but maybe I felt almost pressured to do all the puzzles simply because I had paid for the extras. And then also there were just more puzzles to do everyday like the killers and 6 more timed puzzles... not that it's a lot of time... but doing a bit more everyday does add up. I still like doing the puzzles, but I've been thinking that I should "quit" after my subscription is up... like next summer. But that is just me. I don't know if it's like that for others. Probably the ones becoming inactive are not the subscribers anyway. Or maybe I'm getting just a bit bored of the same old, same old. Killers were interesting to me because I had never done them before. Maybe instead of adding more though, there could be more variation. For example, for 6x6 and 9x9 there are special patterns. Maybe 4 different patterns in a set or something. For several months at a time, change the pattern set. And why not patterns for 7x7, 8x8? There's already a 12x12. Why not change it up to 11x11 once a month or something? Just throwing out ideas...


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 12:48 pm




Posts: 3296
Joined: Thu May 12, 2011 11:58 pm
Post Re: sword-like icon
sneaklyfox wrote:
Sorry this has nothing to do with the sword-like icon... so, off topic...

No problem, I was the one who went off-topic..
I now moved this thread to a separate topic.
sneaklyfox wrote:
When was the last time it was going up? And has it been steady in the past?

There was the big peak in March (when I published the article about
the correlation between solving speed and browser choice). Since then
it has been going down every day.

In the past the number always went up steadily.
sneaklyfox wrote:
Actually, I loved calcudoku until shortly after I subscribed. It sounds weird, but maybe I felt almost pressured to do all the puzzles simply because I had paid for the extras. And then also there were just more puzzles to do everyday like the killers and 6 more timed puzzles... not that it's a lot of time... but doing a bit more everyday does add up.

I see. I think things are pointing to reducing the number of puzzles.
I'm now thinking of doing the following:
- for every day, cut certain puzzles (for example, no 7x7 or 8x8 on a Monday, no easy puzzles on a Friday, etc.)
- for subscribers, those puzzles would still be available, but give you no points (this so I don't take away anything
that people paid for)(other than some points)

A site like killersudokuonline.com has many more people puzzling, and it has 2 puzzles a day (!)
sneaklyfox wrote:
Or maybe I'm getting just a bit bored of the same old, same old. Killers were interesting to me because I had never done them before. Maybe instead of adding more though, there could be more variation.

Yes, variety is important. It would be good (I think) if I can end up with fewer
puzzles each day, and maximize variety.

thanks for the feedback,

Patrick


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 3:22 pm




Posts: 3296
Joined: Thu May 12, 2011 11:58 pm
Post Re: what to change
Alright, here's a proposed new schedule ("O" means puzzle on that day. "X" = extra puzzle)
(rest should be self-explanatory):

Image


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 5:18 pm




Posts: 428
Location: Canada
Joined: Fri May 13, 2011 2:43 am
Post Re: sword-like icon
pnm wrote:
A site like killersudokuonline.com has many more people puzzling, and it has 2 puzzles a day (!)


I wonder if that has to do more with the fact that they are killer sudokus or that it only has 2 puzzles a day. Probably more because they are killer sudokus, I think.


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 7:04 pm




Posts: 65
Joined: Mon Mar 05, 2012 8:17 pm
Post Re: what to change
Interesting stats Patrick - Just my observation from my starting point last March would be that there are currently more great puzzles solvers than when I began here. I am surprised that your stats show a downward trend. Competition is very keen at the top of the leaderboard with many daily 100% puzzle solvers especially since the subscriptions started in June. Right now its just a matter of daily jockeying for position to attain the top of the leaderboard based on usage of banked extra puzzles and other slight tweaks. There should be a better way to do this. Personally, I have come close to reaching the burnout factor as I am spending too much time on this and my wife laughs at me! [biggrin] So I plan to reach a nice round total points number here in a few weeks and then see if I can cure my addiction, cold turkey..Will still check in from time to time to keep sharp but no longer accrue any total points beyond 20,000..


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 10:11 pm




Posts: 80
Joined: Sun Mar 04, 2012 3:43 am
Post Re: what to change
More variety and more "interesting" puzzles would make me happy. I would do a 5x5 negative and 6x6 pattern every day.

Patrick, it seems like you have your puzzle creation algorithms all set. I would go the other direction and have more puzzles. Why not just make one of each puzzle available for every day? Let people pick which ones they'd like to do. Implement a daily/weekly point maximum if that's what's best, but give people the choice.

Perhaps do that for subscribers, but with a small point limit. Have just a few puzzles a day for everyone.

If you implement something like your sketch, I think you're focusing on the wrong things. Why keep so many 4x4 puzzles at the expense of 5x5 and 6x6? There's usually not much difference between the Medium and Difficult 4x4. I would keep at least one easy 4x4 every day for the kids and beginners, but maybe be a little bit more judicious about the 5s and 6s; keep at least one of each every day.

I think the concept of the 7x7 negative puzzle is proven; add that to the regular mix. (Sunday difficult?)

Add a 16x16 that one has a week to solve.


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Posted on: Mon Oct 01, 2012 11:08 pm




Posts: 855
Joined: Fri May 13, 2011 6:51 pm
Post Re: what to change
pnm wrote:
Alright, here's a proposed new schedule ("O" means puzzle on that day. "X" = extra puzzle)
(rest should be self-explanatory):



Very sad to remove the 9x9 on tuesdays (one of the more challenging during the week). Anyway it would be interesting to wait some time before implementing a so different schedule then having more opinions.
In the other hand, the actual decrease of puzzlers may not be related to the schedule itself (the variety is very good though it can be improved) (killersudokuonline does not assign points, right?) but to the previous excessive increase after your paper on the browsers, and the old and constant calcudokers stay, right?.
Perhaps the words "killer sudoku" are more known in general than "calcudoku" or "newdoku". Why not changing the name of the page to www.calcudokukillersudoku.org ? in this way many people searching for puzzles would come and try it.


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Posted on: Tue Oct 02, 2012 12:02 am




Posts: 931
Location: Ladysmith, BC, Canada
Joined: Fri May 13, 2011 1:37 am
Post Re: what to change
Could the drop off be explained because of the season (ie: nicer weather outside in the spring/summer/fall and hence more to do)
It will be interesting to see if there is a user increase in the "winter months"!!??


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Posted on: Tue Oct 02, 2012 12:15 am




Posts: 116
Joined: Sat May 14, 2011 3:18 am
Post Re: what to change
I think one of the most difficult tasks you have, Patrick, is trying to keep everyone happy. [confused]

For myself, unlike clm, I would not miss the Tuesday 9x9 one little bit, and unlike jake4, I despise the negative puzzles -- though I always do them. I think there are some puzzlers who enjoy the modulo puzzles, but I dislike them too.

I like all the pattern puzzles and the bitwise OR and the 12x12s. I also love the killer sudoku, but we heard they're a downer for Opacitaviola.

You really can't please all the people all the time. [thumbdn]

I wonder if some of the people leaving are those who found too much of a good thing? Like rickt, I have thought about trying to quit cold turkey. Or maybe wean myself off the site gradually. Or maybe just stick around a while longer now that I've moved up on the leaderboard somewhat... OK, my addiction is pretty bad. [tongue]

Like clm, I am also curious whether the loss of participants has more to do with equalizing after the unnatural spike in March. Are the numbers below their pre-March levels?

It makes me wonder what would happen to the participation level if there weren't any points/scoring. Don't know how that would affect retention of the old-timers, though. I like jake4's suggestion of having one of everything available every day. He could do his 5x5 negatives, and I could do the 8x8 patterns...

Before you do anything drastic, would it be possible for you to try to find out why people are leaving the site? Maybe put a survey together and send it to everyone who participated regularly for at least a month (for example) but who hasn't returned to the site in the past 30 days.

I think more data would help you to understand what course to take.


Last edited by pharosian on Wed Oct 03, 2012 11:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.



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