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#1: Martial (marso) on Nov 3, 2007

Funny how easy puzzles are often rated low quality.
This one was easy but fun to solve, so I boosted the quality rating!

I agree with you and I found this sad that all easy puzzle are rate low quality

I once give one of Marz puzzle a 1 in difficulty but a 5 in quality cause it was fun and beautiful

I made this WoB serie so they can be easy puzzle for starter and I try to make simple but fun image but it doesnt seem people like them that much if you check the rating

That was a good warm-up one for me. Neat pic.

I like simple puzzles too.

I haven't done this puzzle yet, but wanted to chime right in on the comments. Have you ever noticed how when you post a new puzzle and, of course it starts with no rating, suddenly the rating appears and yet there are no comments? Think of it this way Qwerty, you can't rate the puzzle unless you complete it, yes? If someone really didn't like it, why would they bother to complete it? And a puzzle's rating often changes over time as well. I'll stop now. More later when I actually do this puzzle.

Actually, you can rate a puzzle without completing it. And there are users who solve *EVERYTHING*. And some of them are too busy solving puzzles to post a lot of comments.

well when they are finished solving everything then they can start over and leave comments. ;) I WAS one of those. I'm so glad I found you all.

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no its the same think but in a "evil" and "obscure" way

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Really nice puzzle Sylvain! Fun to solve and a great image. Thanks!

my pleasure Gypso

This is really weird. I checked to see if I could rate a puzzle that I hadn't completed before I wrote #5 above and I couldn't because there were no rating boxes. I can't remember which puzzle, I chose randomly. I tried again after reading Jan's comment and of course he's correct, he did after all write the program. Sorry Jan for spreading misinformation.
This brings up a question now. Why allow people to rate a puzzle they don't complete? This doesn't seem fair to others who use the rating system to choose which puzzles they want to play. Nor is it fair to creators who might use the ratings as a guide to future puzzle creations. Is it possible to block the rating boxes from user who don't complete the puzzle? Seems to me that if the reason for not completing a puzzle was due to poor construction of some kind, any of us would still have the option of posting a comment.

good point Gypso I second that

New hinkey development. This one is still appearing as a new puzzle on the home section, even after I solved it. It was one of the ones showing up as a double, now it won't go away.

Hinkey Lol I love that word!

How do I know that they haven't solved it? Lots of people print puzzles out and solve them on paper. One of the things I plan to add to the site eventually is a way to check off puzzles as being solved, even if you haven't solved them online.

And don't you have an opinion of the puzzle long before you finish solving it? In the middle of solving it, you might say, "gee, this is a fun one" or "gee, this is a hard one". You don't need to have finished a puzzle to have a valid opinion. Your opinion might change later, but you can change your rating later too.

Actually, only a small percentage of people who solve puzzles rate them. On this puzzle, for instance 22 people have entered ratings, and 83 completed it. That's a higher percentage of raters than I usually see. My impression is that people who rate generally do so thought fully. If they don't feel like they have enough information to have an informed opinion, they won't enter a rating. I think that you can trust 99.9% of people to do that, and since the ratings get averaged, the occasional weird rating gets lost in the wash anyway.

Or maybe it's just part of my general disinclination to make a lot of rules.

I'm with you on this one Jan.

I hadn't considered those people who print and complete the puzzles on paper Jan, very good point.
If you can change your rating later, does that mean that mean that you can rate the same puzzle over and over?
So Jan your experience is that the puzzle ratings reflect a small percentage of puzzlers who you believe are thoughtful in their rating responses. That addresses one aspect of my concern and I agree with you. As to rating a puzzle's quality, how can one do that fairly without seeing the finished picture? That's not a matter of trust but of forming an opinion without most of the information.
I'm glad that you are disinclined to set rules. That's one of the many reasons that this site is popular and so fun to be on!
Overall, I understand the rating system much better and how it's being used. Thank you Jan for your answer.

Cool image!

I cone to the discussion on this puzzle late because of the method I use for choosing puzzles and because I haven't been on the site that long. However, in light of the current discussion in another forum on ratings, I think it's appropriate to add a comment about ratings here.

Personally, I don't rate the quality of a puzzle based on the ease of solvability. To me, those are two different things. Quality is how recognizable the image is, how pleasant it is and whether or not I enjoyed the outcome.

Where the two may be related is that easier to solve images are also (generally) simpler in design. This sometimes, for me, means it's also a less appealing image.

'Nough said.

BTW, thought I might add for Jan, while I had this comments window open and was typing the previous post (haven't closed the window yet) I saw a message post up on the main puzzle screen out of the corner of my eye. It's just to the right of the difficulty rating box and says: "Error: Cannot Save: 503"

Don't know if it'll go away when I close the comments window or what it's telling me it can't save. Just thought I'd bring it up because I'd never seen it before.

When you set a difficulty rating, the browser attempts to save your new difficulty setting to the web server by making an HTTP request in background. The 503 request means the server got the request, recognized it as a valid request, but was unable to fulfill it. I have no idea why. I haven't seen that happen. Probably your difficulty rating was not saved, however.

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I know when I was in school, the kids who dressed in all black were still Goth. :)

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