Secret resales 2015

[siblin]

7 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

that'll be the whatsapp group that's eight minutes slower to alert people than the system I'm building.

That eight minutes will see all of the tickets gone.

Bit of competition eh Neil?

[cityboy75]

3 minutes ago, franathy said:

I thought it worked really well last year? (looking at the old thread seemed like everyone got tickets). I have other alerts set up but just want to maximise my chances! 

It did work I think everyone got a ticket

[cityboy75]

1 minute ago, siblin said:

Bit of competition eh Neil?

No one was disappointed last year were they Al ;-)

[eFestivals]

5 minutes ago, Homer said:

What is the system eFests is working on and how do I join? Sorry, this thread is 125 long!

I'm building a page monitor. The monitor part is working, and alerting the test users. Yesterday it was 8 minutes earlier to alert to a change than whatsapp group.

I'm still working on the user interface for it, so unfortunately you can't join yet.

I'm not trying to knock the whatsapp grpoup, because anything might work out OK - but eight minutes difference is a very long time for a very limited ticket sale.

 

 

Edited April 28, 2016 by eFestivals

[The Gentleman Rhymer]

Just now, eFestivals said:

I'm building a page monitor. The monitor part is working, and alerting the test users. Yesterday it was 8 minutes earlier to alert than the to a change than whatsapp group.

I'm still working on the user interface for it, so unfortunately you can't join yet.

I'm not trying to knock the whatsapp grpoup, because anything might work out OK - by eight minutes difference is a very long time for a very limited ticket sale.

 

 

Sounds awesome! Is there an ETA for when it will be available?

[siblin]

5 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

I'm building a page monitor. The monitor part is working, and alerting the test users. Yesterday it was 8 minutes earlier to alert to a change than whatsapp group.

I'm still working on the user interface for it, so unfortunately you can't join yet.

I'm not trying to knock the whatsapp grpoup, because anything might work out OK - by eight minutes difference is a very long time for a very limited ticket sale.

 

 

But most of the people in the what's app groups already have such notifications systems setup (not just my own, but app based ones)

[eFestivals]

6 minutes ago, siblin said:

But most of the people in the what's app groups already have such notifications systems setup (not just my own, but app based ones)

yep ... tho they're all slower (the testers I'm using are reporting the differences). We're not talking seconds, we're talking a number of minutes on every occasion (how great those minutes are depends, I think, on how well the page change and the page check coincide).

Whether or not my system will have the same problem when the number of test users is ramped up I don't know. I suspect there will be an impact (and quite possibly a quite significant one) - so I'm not claiming perfection for my system, I'm pointing out the systems being used aren't particularly great.

Edited April 28, 2016 by eFestivals

[eFestivals]

12 minutes ago, The Gentleman Rhymer said:

Sounds awesome! Is there an ETA for when it will be available?

I'm hoping there might be something workable before the middle of next week.

The page-checker itself is fairly easy (and about finished [it's good enough to do the job], tho i'm aware of some ways it could be improved). It's the user interface - logins, email and sms verification, page-to-check set-up, etc - that's a chore.

[siblin]

1 minute ago, eFestivals said:

yep ... tho they're all slower (the testers I'm using are reporting the differences). We're not talking seconds, we're talking a number of minutes on every occasion (how great those minutes are depends, I think, on how well the page change and the page check coincide).

Whether or not my system will have the same problem when the number of test users is ramped up I don't know. I suspect there will be an impact (and quite possibly a quite significant one) - so I'm not claiming perfection for my system, I'm pointing out the systems being used aren't particularly great.

Thats a bit of a dig My system will email a few hundred users  (that just needs a simple fork to remove the delay) and has a resolution of 30 seconds (when ramped up during resale week - at the moment its set to a minute).  The  limitation there is email, so the users need push notifications or IMAP idle.  I can get it to SMS but that costs money, and I could get it to tweet but that kinda removes the personal nature of it.

[cityboy75]

How many times have I had to say include your number if want the whatsapp group lol 

[cb4747]

12 minutes ago, cityboy75 said:

How many times have I had to say include your number if want the whatsapp group lol 

You'll probably be saying it a few hundreds times more too! 

[eFestivals]

10 minutes ago, siblin said:

Thats a bit of a dig My system will email a few hundred users  (that just needs a simple fork to remove the delay) and has a resolution of 30 seconds (when ramped up during resale week - at the moment its set to a minute).  The  limitation there is email, so the users need push notifications or IMAP idle.  I can get it to SMS but that costs money, and I could get it to tweet but that kinda removes the personal nature of it.

It's really not a dig.

I chose to comment specifically on the whatsapp group, where the delay yesterday was eight minutes - probably too long to have a chance at tickets. There were posts on these forums much sooner.

As for your own better system, the variance reported back to me appears to be greater than what you say above should account for - tho of course there's more than just your own system at play before a user knows of an alert its sent out. I might find my own system suffers a similar lag when there's more users in that system. I'm fully aware that the larger the system the slower it can work for those towards the back of the queue.

[T-Mouse]

6 minutes ago, cityboy75 said:

How many times have I had to say include your number if want the whatsapp group lol 

CityBoy75! Mate thank you again for last year. I was inspired by you to set up one for this year. The more groups the more chance of success for people. As things stand ive got 256 in group 1. A second will be set up soon with 150+! I dont want it to look like im stealing your thunder! You worked wonders last year!

There is no question that siblins and neils (once its live) will be faster than the whatsappp group. Whatsapps simply more convenient and more invasive than emails. Hopefully this pays off for people like last year. Pretty sure i got a whatsapp message 1 minute in to the resale last year.

[siblin]

43 minutes ago, cityboy75 said:

No one was disappointed last year were they Al ;-)

Not at all dude.  The whatsapp group was great as it helped people who might not have had instant email access, and also allowed people to get help from others in the group.

[cityboy75]

4 minutes ago, T-Mouse said:

CityBoy75! Mate thank you again for last year. I was inspired by you to set up one for this year. The more groups the more chance of success for people. As things stand ive got 256 in group 1. A second will be set up soon with 150+! I dont want it to look like im stealing your thunder! You worked wonders last year!

There is no question that siblins and neils (once its live) will be faster than the whatsappp group. Whatsapps simply more convenient and more invasive than emails. Hopefully this pays off for people like last year. Pretty sure i got a whatsapp message 1 minute in to the resale last year.

Your not mate I already have a ticket so am just doing this to help others I don't get what all the comments are about the whatsapp to be honest I and many have other alerts and it's just a way that as soon as anyone gets an alert they can message everyone else it increases the chance of everyone getting one and like I said I think everyone got a ticket last year so there was nothing wrong with the system 

[thenavyone]

1 hour ago, Chuggs said:

What what what?! Was that a real secret resale just now then?

The page changed but it didn't lead you onto the next page!

[siblin]

47 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

It's really not a dig.

I chose to comment specifically on the whatsapp group, where the delay yesterday was eight minutes - probably too long to have a chance at tickets. There were posts on these forums much sooner.

As for your own better system, the variance reported back to me appears to be greater than what you say above should account for - tho of course there's more than just your own system at play before a user knows of an alert its sent out. I might find my own system suffers a similar lag when there's more users in that system. I'm fully aware that the larger the system the slower it can work for those towards the back of the queue.

yeah thats an issue - on resale week it needs to fork and use more processor power, so i move it to an amazon instance.

[eFestivals]

7 minutes ago, siblin said:

yeah thats an issue - on resale week it needs to fork and use more processor power, so i move it to an amazon instance.

with the potential added-issue of your presumption of when resale week is. :P

That sound like it should be a decent set-up.

My system doesn't fork at the moment either, one of the many things on the to-do list ... tho of course it's not needed with just a small number of test users.

[siblin]

1 minute ago, eFestivals said:

with the potential added-issue of your presumption of when resale week is.

That sound like it should be a decent set-up.

My system doesn't fork at the moment either, one of the many things on the to-do list ... tho of course it's not needed with just a small number of test users.

indeed - i up the power after the refund deadline which seems to have worked in previous years.  Could be caught out of course!

The other things ive had to contend with (im sure you've already spotted) is some of the weird periodic changes see tickets do to the pages, changing serial numbers and whitespace etc, so i've filtered those out before the diff.  I also use some perl modules (CutyCapt and ImageMagik) to render the page into an image and compare the difference, though as yet i havent found a way to reliably check that the page has visibly changed.

I experimented with SMS's with AQL's SMS gateway, which works great but costs a me a bomb so i dont use it.  You might have better buying power with them instead of paying them 10p a pop.

[eFestivals]

48 minutes ago, siblin said:

indeed - i up the power after the refund deadline which seems to have worked in previous years.  Could be caught out of course!

The other things ive had to contend with (im sure you've already spotted) is some of the weird periodic changes see tickets do to the pages, changing serial numbers and whitespace etc, so i've filtered those out before the diff.  I also use some perl modules (CutyCapt and ImageMagik) to render the page into an image and compare the difference, though as yet i havent found a way to reliably check that the page has visibly changed.

I experimented with SMS's with AQL's SMS gateway, which works great but costs a me a bomb so i dont use it.  You might have better buying power with them instead of paying them 10p a pop.

Yeah, I just picked up on some of those periodic changes. No other posts on here about a page change when I started to write this post.

You're doing a bit more to process the page data than, tho I reckon how I'm checking is adequate ... but I wish I could filter those periodic changes (will think on that one some more).

I'm going the texts route too, tho I'm having some issues with that at the moment (tho I think I know what they might be, now).

[Donkeyradish]

1 minute ago, eFestivals said:

Yeah, I just picked up on some of those periodic changes. No other posts on here about a page change when I started to write this post.

You're doing a bit more to process the page data than, tho I reckon how I'm checking is adequate ... but I wish I could filter those periodic changes (will think on that one some more).

I'm going the texts route too, tho I'm having some issues with that at the moment (tho I think I know what they might be, now).

This all sounds super complicated - but if I can help out in any way, just give me a shout! I'm not a complete technophobe (I work in telecommunications and capable for fairly complex diagnostics) so happy to lend a helping hand!

[cb4747]

16 minutes ago, Donkeyradish said:

This all sounds super complicated - but if I can help out in any way, just give me a shout! I'm not a complete technophobe (I work in telecommunications and capable for fairly complex diagnostics) so happy to lend a helping hand!

I've been reading the thread like 'yup, yup, okay, gotcha' absolutely no clue what they are on about! My technical expertise goes as far as forums, playing sims and sending complaint e-mails to Tesco. 

[RAMMAN]

3 hours ago, cityboy75 said:

But the point is like last year and it worked as soon as anyone gets an alert they message on the whatsapp group :-p

What Siblin and Cityboy did last year helped so many people and i am sure the same will happen this year! The whattsapp group works great for those who are not sat at a PC all day like myself.....get the message and used my phone....simple

[Washangel]

I know this is a bit late in the day but a member of Vloody I wonder if anyone help me join the Whattapp group for alerts to the secret resale? and how can I get other people's numbers so I can alert others if I get lucky

Edited April 28, 2016 by Washangel

[carlosj]

1 minute ago, Washangel said:

I know this is a bit late in the day but a member of Vloody I wonder ifanyone help me join the Whattapp group for alerts to the secret resale? My number is  and how can I get other people's numbers so I can alert others if I get lucky

I suggest you edit your message and send it by PM, otherwise some joker may use your number for spam calls.