New UA Upgrade Success/Failure Tracking Site
Jan 27, 2013, 4:51 pm
#46
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: CMH
Programs: UA 1K, 1MM, HH Diamond, Marriott Gold
Posts: 745
I've gone ahead and grabbed the domain WillItClear.com for this little project.
Jan 28, 2013, 11:57 am
#47
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Washington, DC
Programs: UA 1K 1MM, AA, DL
Posts: 7,418
I've gone ahead and grabbed the domain WillItClear.com for this little project.
Let me know if you don't like it -- domains are less than the price of a latte these days, so I can always use a different one.
Let me know if you don't like it -- domains are less than the price of a latte these days, so I can always use a different one.
Some other available domains:
uaupgrade.com
ualupgrade.com
uacpustats.com
upgradestats.com
upgradeua.co [different tld]
Jan 28, 2013, 12:02 pm
#48
Join Date: Aug 2012
Location: Charlottesville
Programs: UA Gold, VX Gold, AA PLT, DL Gold, MR Gold, HH Diamond, Hertz 5* Gold
Posts: 469
I've gone ahead and grabbed the domain WillItClear.com for this little project.
Let me know if you don't like it -- domains are less than the price of a latte these days, so I can always use a different one.
Let me know if you don't like it -- domains are less than the price of a latte these days, so I can always use a different one.
Jan 28, 2013, 6:40 pm
#49
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2011
Programs: UA 1K
Posts: 8,634
Thought about some of these, though I thought I'd use something with a bit more flair -- also wanted to avoid using UA's name.
Jan 28, 2013, 6:43 pm
#50
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2011
Programs: UA 1K
Posts: 8,634
FYI: If you have any comments about the form or the questions, please let me know by Thursday at 10pm ET.
I'm hoping to switch over to actively collecting data and designing some basic data displays at that time.
I'm hoping to switch over to actively collecting data and designing some basic data displays at that time.
Jan 28, 2013, 8:44 pm
#51
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Washington, DC
Programs: UA 1K 1MM, AA, DL
Posts: 7,418
My thoughts:
1) Ought to require origin-destination. No point just saying your upgrade cleared.
2) I would take out the shorthand. E.g., "Cabins" to "Upgrade sought" and Y-->C/F to "Economy to Business or First" and C-->F to "Business to First"
3) Add after Origin-Destination "(3 letter airport code)"
4) Can you add a pop-up calendar to the date? Make today's date the default?
5) I would move elite status to the top.
6) I would put target seats last in the top group, and rephrase to "Total Seats in Upgrade Cabin"
7) For technical correctness, you should specify ranges of hours (booking, 120+, 97-120, 73-96, 49-72, 25-48, 4-24, at airport/gate, on board).
8) "United Flight Number" (so people don't use code share #)
1) Ought to require origin-destination. No point just saying your upgrade cleared.
2) I would take out the shorthand. E.g., "Cabins" to "Upgrade sought" and Y-->C/F to "Economy to Business or First" and C-->F to "Business to First"
3) Add after Origin-Destination "(3 letter airport code)"
4) Can you add a pop-up calendar to the date? Make today's date the default?
5) I would move elite status to the top.
6) I would put target seats last in the top group, and rephrase to "Total Seats in Upgrade Cabin"
7) For technical correctness, you should specify ranges of hours (booking, 120+, 97-120, 73-96, 49-72, 25-48, 4-24, at airport/gate, on board).
8) "United Flight Number" (so people don't use code share #)
Jan 28, 2013, 10:15 pm
#52
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: LAX
Programs: UA Plat MM, CM Plat, Amex Plat, Hertz CP, Hyatt Globalist, SPG Gold, Vons Club
Posts: 6,852
My thoughts:
1) Ought to require origin-destination. No point just saying your upgrade cleared.
2) I would take out the shorthand. E.g., "Cabins" to "Upgrade sought" and Y-->C/F to "Economy to Business or First" and C-->F to "Business to First"
3) Add after Origin-Destination "(3 letter airport code)"
4) Can you add a pop-up calendar to the date? Make today's date the default?
5) I would move elite status to the top.
6) I would put target seats last in the top group, and rephrase to "Total Seats in Upgrade Cabin"
7) For technical correctness, you should specify ranges of hours (booking, 120+, 97-120, 73-96, 49-72, 25-48, 4-24, at airport/gate, on board).
8) "United Flight Number" (so people don't use code share #)
1) Ought to require origin-destination. No point just saying your upgrade cleared.
2) I would take out the shorthand. E.g., "Cabins" to "Upgrade sought" and Y-->C/F to "Economy to Business or First" and C-->F to "Business to First"
3) Add after Origin-Destination "(3 letter airport code)"
4) Can you add a pop-up calendar to the date? Make today's date the default?
5) I would move elite status to the top.
6) I would put target seats last in the top group, and rephrase to "Total Seats in Upgrade Cabin"
7) For technical correctness, you should specify ranges of hours (booking, 120+, 97-120, 73-96, 49-72, 25-48, 4-24, at airport/gate, on board).
8) "United Flight Number" (so people don't use code share #)
Jan 29, 2013, 12:14 am
#53
Join Date: Feb 2010
Programs: United 1K
Posts: 360
Love it. THANK YOU!!! One thing I liked in UDU Stats was being able to log in, then I could edit what I put in, being that I've made a mistake. Could we log in with our flyer talk ID? Could this be made a part of the flyertalk website? Maybe Flyertalk could help sponsor putting it together. It would be a good way to collect info not just on UA, but all the airlines. I like the notes...there's always good stuff to add there. On the udustats page, i love being able to sort the data. Anyway, glad to see this updated version with added CO planes.
Jan 29, 2013, 6:04 am
#56
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 4,645
The problem with the last website was compliance. You simply needed people to contribute to the site. Once people stopped, it didn't work. Moreover, if only a certain segment contributed, it was not useful. You created a selection bias.
The key to this site is that *everybody* need to be included. You need a way to capture all the data, not just data from people who have the time, energy, and willingness to enter it, in order to make it accurate & useful.
The key to this site is that *everybody* need to be included. You need a way to capture all the data, not just data from people who have the time, energy, and willingness to enter it, in order to make it accurate & useful.
Jan 29, 2013, 11:37 am
#57
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2011
Programs: UA 1K
Posts: 8,634
My thoughts:
1) Ought to require origin-destination. No point just saying your upgrade cleared.
2) I would take out the shorthand. E.g., "Cabins" to "Upgrade sought" and Y-->C/F to "Economy to Business or First" and C-->F to "Business to First"
3) Add after Origin-Destination "(3 letter airport code)"
4) Can you add a pop-up calendar to the date? Make today's date the default?
5) I would move elite status to the top.
6) I would put target seats last in the top group, and rephrase to "Total Seats in Upgrade Cabin"
7) For technical correctness, you should specify ranges of hours (booking, 120+, 97-120, 73-96, 49-72, 25-48, 4-24, at airport/gate, on board).
8) "United Flight Number" (so people don't use code share #)
1) Ought to require origin-destination. No point just saying your upgrade cleared.
2) I would take out the shorthand. E.g., "Cabins" to "Upgrade sought" and Y-->C/F to "Economy to Business or First" and C-->F to "Business to First"
3) Add after Origin-Destination "(3 letter airport code)"
4) Can you add a pop-up calendar to the date? Make today's date the default?
5) I would move elite status to the top.
6) I would put target seats last in the top group, and rephrase to "Total Seats in Upgrade Cabin"
7) For technical correctness, you should specify ranges of hours (booking, 120+, 97-120, 73-96, 49-72, 25-48, 4-24, at airport/gate, on board).
8) "United Flight Number" (so people don't use code share #)
Love it. THANK YOU!!! One thing I liked in UDU Stats was being able to log in, then I could edit what I put in, being that I've made a mistake. Could we log in with our flyer talk ID? Could this be made a part of the flyertalk website? Maybe Flyertalk could help sponsor putting it together. It would be a good way to collect info not just on UA, but all the airlines. I like the notes...there's always good stuff to add there. On the udustats page, i love being able to sort the data. Anyway, glad to see this updated version with added CO planes.
I agree that it seems like FlyerTalk could someday create a data site for all sorts of semantically-rich info that gets put in threads these days (e.g., upgrade data, upgrade pricing, compensation amounts, etc.). My goal here was to get something back up and running quickly for upgrades, but I think that it would be great if FT did that eventually.
Jan 30, 2013, 12:12 am
#58
Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 97
Great timing mgcsinc! I started a prototype on my own last week, and I just stumbled upon your thread (I was offline for a few days trying out the new route EWR-IST).
I code for a living and after seeing that udustats wasn't updated anymore, I tried to contact the owner to offer my help in adding the various requirements people have asked for over the past few months. When I didn't get an answer, I decided to re-implement it.
The prototype is living at http://www.diditclear.com/ (it looks like we roughly had the same idea for the name!) and is working in the same way as the old site:
* People can sign-in using various providers (Google, Yahoo!, Twitter, etc.)
* People can see and modify/delete their own flights
* One can search by upgrade type, city pair, etc.
Some of the key differences from the previous site:
* The code is open-source and available here: https://github.com/diditclear. This should not only help us get more features but also prevent the project from completely dying if a developer goes away
* The code is UA agnostic. I just need to input the aircraft, upgrade and status types to support e.g. DL or AA
* More than just UDU, the site can track ToD, upgrade and standby lists sizes, etc.
I went with the fully coded website approach, instead of e.g. Google spreadsheet, because I believe we can make it more powerful in the long term. As others have mentioned, the approach of people having to enter their legs manually is not scalable. We should instead build automated tools to ease the task. For instance, building an API around the site would be quite easy, which would allow us to offer an iPhone or Android app. We could also quite easily build a system where people could forward their upgrade notification emails, and the system would automatically enter the data for them.
On the .bomb scraping note, the main challenge would be to get some sort of official approval, as it would violate their ToS. The same goes with EF data. It would be great to track various inventory automatically by pulling it from EF, but scraping is again against their ToS. We could maybe come with an arrangement, where only EF subscribers could see that data?
In any case, we should collaborate on that project. Regardless of the technology route we take (spreadsheet, website, openflights.org), there is definitively a need for such stats from the community, and I'll be happy to help.
I code for a living and after seeing that udustats wasn't updated anymore, I tried to contact the owner to offer my help in adding the various requirements people have asked for over the past few months. When I didn't get an answer, I decided to re-implement it.
The prototype is living at http://www.diditclear.com/ (it looks like we roughly had the same idea for the name!) and is working in the same way as the old site:
* People can sign-in using various providers (Google, Yahoo!, Twitter, etc.)
* People can see and modify/delete their own flights
* One can search by upgrade type, city pair, etc.
Some of the key differences from the previous site:
* The code is open-source and available here: https://github.com/diditclear. This should not only help us get more features but also prevent the project from completely dying if a developer goes away
* The code is UA agnostic. I just need to input the aircraft, upgrade and status types to support e.g. DL or AA
* More than just UDU, the site can track ToD, upgrade and standby lists sizes, etc.
I went with the fully coded website approach, instead of e.g. Google spreadsheet, because I believe we can make it more powerful in the long term. As others have mentioned, the approach of people having to enter their legs manually is not scalable. We should instead build automated tools to ease the task. For instance, building an API around the site would be quite easy, which would allow us to offer an iPhone or Android app. We could also quite easily build a system where people could forward their upgrade notification emails, and the system would automatically enter the data for them.
On the .bomb scraping note, the main challenge would be to get some sort of official approval, as it would violate their ToS. The same goes with EF data. It would be great to track various inventory automatically by pulling it from EF, but scraping is again against their ToS. We could maybe come with an arrangement, where only EF subscribers could see that data?
In any case, we should collaborate on that project. Regardless of the technology route we take (spreadsheet, website, openflights.org), there is definitively a need for such stats from the community, and I'll be happy to help.
Jan 30, 2013, 7:54 am
#59
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: LAX
Programs: UA Plat MM, CM Plat, Amex Plat, Hertz CP, Hyatt Globalist, SPG Gold, Vons Club
Posts: 6,852
Great timing mgcsinc! I started a prototype on my own last week, and I just stumbled upon your thread (I was offline for a few days trying out the new route EWR-IST).
I code for a living and after seeing that udustats wasn't updated anymore, I tried to contact the owner to offer my help in adding the various requirements people have asked for over the past few months. When I didn't get an answer, I decided to re-implement it.
The prototype is living at http://www.diditclear.com/ (it looks like we roughly had the same idea for the name!) and is working in the same way as the old site:
* People can sign-in using various providers (Google, Yahoo!, Twitter, etc.)
* People can see and modify/delete their own flights
* One can search by upgrade type, city pair, etc.
Some of the key differences from the previous site:
* The code is open-source and available here: https://github.com/diditclear. This should not only help us get more features but also prevent the project from completely dying if a developer goes away
* The code is UA agnostic. I just need to input the aircraft, upgrade and status types to support e.g. DL or AA
* More than just UDU, the site can track ToD, upgrade and standby lists sizes, etc.
I went with the fully coded website approach, instead of e.g. Google spreadsheet, because I believe we can make it more powerful in the long term. As others have mentioned, the approach of people having to enter their legs manually is not scalable. We should instead build automated tools to ease the task. For instance, building an API around the site would be quite easy, which would allow us to offer an iPhone or Android app. We could also quite easily build a system where people could forward their upgrade notification emails, and the system would automatically enter the data for them.
On the .bomb scraping note, the main challenge would be to get some sort of official approval, as it would violate their ToS. The same goes with EF data. It would be great to track various inventory automatically by pulling it from EF, but scraping is again against their ToS. We could maybe come with an arrangement, where only EF subscribers could see that data?
In any case, we should collaborate on that project. Regardless of the technology route we take (spreadsheet, website, openflights.org), there is definitively a need for such stats from the community, and I'll be happy to help.
I code for a living and after seeing that udustats wasn't updated anymore, I tried to contact the owner to offer my help in adding the various requirements people have asked for over the past few months. When I didn't get an answer, I decided to re-implement it.
The prototype is living at http://www.diditclear.com/ (it looks like we roughly had the same idea for the name!) and is working in the same way as the old site:
* People can sign-in using various providers (Google, Yahoo!, Twitter, etc.)
* People can see and modify/delete their own flights
* One can search by upgrade type, city pair, etc.
Some of the key differences from the previous site:
* The code is open-source and available here: https://github.com/diditclear. This should not only help us get more features but also prevent the project from completely dying if a developer goes away
* The code is UA agnostic. I just need to input the aircraft, upgrade and status types to support e.g. DL or AA
* More than just UDU, the site can track ToD, upgrade and standby lists sizes, etc.
I went with the fully coded website approach, instead of e.g. Google spreadsheet, because I believe we can make it more powerful in the long term. As others have mentioned, the approach of people having to enter their legs manually is not scalable. We should instead build automated tools to ease the task. For instance, building an API around the site would be quite easy, which would allow us to offer an iPhone or Android app. We could also quite easily build a system where people could forward their upgrade notification emails, and the system would automatically enter the data for them.
On the .bomb scraping note, the main challenge would be to get some sort of official approval, as it would violate their ToS. The same goes with EF data. It would be great to track various inventory automatically by pulling it from EF, but scraping is again against their ToS. We could maybe come with an arrangement, where only EF subscribers could see that data?
In any case, we should collaborate on that project. Regardless of the technology route we take (spreadsheet, website, openflights.org), there is definitively a need for such stats from the community, and I'll be happy to help.
Jan 30, 2013, 8:43 am
#60
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2011
Programs: UA 1K
Posts: 8,634
The prototype is living at http://www.diditclear.com/ (it looks like we roughly had the same idea for the name!) and is working in the same way as the old site
)! Very funny about the name similarity. Happy to give up the willitclear domain, as well.The site looks great so far. I'm going to hand this project over to you in terms of further development. There are some really great suggestions here, so I suggest flipping through the thread and taking them into account. If you'd like to start a new thread on your tool, go for it, or I can edit the OP in this one and your tool can take over this thread.
Let's be in touch by PM about how we can collaborate further -- for what I lack in technical skills, I might have some other useful skills up my sleeves.