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Birdguides new system (1 Viewer)

My first mega popped up through the app, you get a "!!!" By the name via the notifications, a different sound, and a symbol as below in the app listing.

Nice differentiation of megas, but would appreciate further levels of rarity to be distinguished too - the basis of a very good app is definitely there!
 

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I've tried to give a bit of time to get used to the new website but it's not happening for me. Just feels like less information in the same amount of space and much harder to navigate. All very disappointing.

I will probably keep subscribing for the app although I only really use it when birding elsewhere (e.g. Norfolk) as my home county has a free site that most birders use to submit sightings. I wouldn't really be sad to see BirdGuides go now. They seem to take almost of all their content from elsewhere (county websites, twitter etc) and then charge you £50/70 for it!
 
I compared the RBA and Birdguides app while I had them on free trial. Over a 2 day period looking at 4 counties reports Birdguides averaged quicker with the reports. For the phone app service which includes push notifications, full sighting details and access to the website its £159 with RBA and £50 with birdguides if I understand the pricing correctly. As for the Birdguides website I can't see what all the fuss it about. Its different to the old one but works fine for me.
 
Thought I’d give the new set up time to grow on me before I said my piece, and having given it time my first opinions haven’t changed.

I really still don’t like the website, but have nothing to add to what’s already been said, but the greatest loss for me has been the scrapping of Bird News Anywhere and its replacement with, well, nothing at all. Nothing of any real equivalence anyway. I see people praising the app, and don’t really understand, because it’s a colossal step back from what we had before. The app simply vomits a great indiscriminate stream of news which you then have to trawl through to find what you want. Sure, you can set up filters, which is great if you know in advance what information you’re going to want to extract, but is far from versatile. The beauty of BNE is that you could interrogate it, quickly and easily, getting the gen you want, when you want it, without reams of irrelevant information. This has now been replaced by a dumb list. Oh, but we get a teeny tiny picture of what the bird in question might (but quite likely doesn’t) look like (whilst no longer being able to quickly link to photos of the actual bird), and a comically unreliable pin on a map to show you where the bird probably isn’t. Anyone looking to provide a bird information system via smartphone would do well to address this ability to interrogate the information quickly and cleanly, from being able to extract news by rarity, regionally and a combination of the two without the need to set up filters in advance, to being able to access complete accounts of a bird’s stay rather than just where it is and what it happens to be doing today.

I do wonder if any of the original Birdguides Team is upset about what has been done to their good work, because it really was very good. If so, then you have my heartfelt sympathies and most sincere gratitude. If you actually think this new set up is an improvement on what you’d done before, well then, I do not understand you.
 
Couldn't agree more with JWN A. And today my 'free subs' expired so I think I'm getting no bespoke news at all despite paying real subs just a few months ago. I am really on the brink...
Andy
 
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Couldn't agree more with JWN A. And today my 'free subs' expired so I think I'm getting no bespoke news at all despite paying real subs just a few months ago. I am really on the brink...
Andy

That happened to me too, but I've contacted them and they've sorted it out
 
Have just given in and logged on via my laptop having seen post 106 - a few minutes later booting up, and indeed the website is much better! - why on earth can't they enable this version by default for logging on via an ipad??

This is almost like we had previously, and that worked fine on an ipad?!

........bingo, request desktop site and we're getting there :t:

....Although doesn't like to sort filtered results :-C

....it is possible though, seem to have managed to sort my filtered results by rarity by playing with the url....

https://www.birdguides.com/sightings/?SecondSortBy=RarityId&OrderDesc=true&CurrentPage=1&HasFiltered=true&SightingsFilterType=All&SpeciesId=&SubLocationId=&UseMyFilters=true&UseMyFilters=false&LongStayers=false&OnlyParents=false&DateFrom=11%2F08%2F2017&DateTo=11%2F09%2F2017&SiteId=&RarityId=&ItemsPerPage=100

..I am therefore hopeful greater functionality will follow!
 
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Hadn't looked at those screenshots on post 106 properly before. That's much better, but it's exactly what I want to see (and don't see) on my iPhone - and can't find any way to get it. Being short sighted, tiny font size is no problem, I could easily read that on my phone if I lift my glasses, as I always could with the old system.
 
Not sure if something has changed, but after applying my filter I can now sort by rarity - pretty sure this didn't work last night!

On an ipad you get the desktop version via the below, presumably iphone is similar with the website, you may have to scroll across for the request desktop site option though, I did on my ipad...

Also attached is the start of my filtered list, sorted by rarity :t:

You can also click a county or location, then click show all records at the bottom of that list to generate a list of say Norfolk for the day.

Look forward to the app having some of this funcionality, and also a toggle to set desktop site would be handy when looking via a mobile device.
 

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Can you still search for sightings for a particular area like Norfolk for previous years and dates? I can't find anything but may be looking in the wrong place.

Geoff
 
There seems to be more changes to the lay out the last day or two, but I still prefer the old system which was perfectly adapted to what I needed.
 
I find the map almost unusable, for a start it only shows the last 100 records as the preset not the whole day. Then the zooming in and out of it is awful, do we really need the whole of Europe to start with, and the pop up boxes stick open then you have to close them all the time. I used the old map all the time, this is definitely a case of complexity for the sake of it.
 
I find the map almost unusable, for a start it only shows the last 100 records as the preset not the whole day. Then the zooming in and out of it is awful, do we really need the whole of Europe to start with, and the pop up boxes stick open then you have to close them all the time. I used the old map all the time, this is definitely a case of complexity for the sake of it.

I think you're looking at the small map on the sightings page. Try the BirdMap proper at https://www.birdguides.com/sightings/birdmap/

And it isn't "complexity for the sake of it" - we were constantly being asked for a zoomable BirdMap on the old site, which wasn't deliverable with the old BirdMap code, hence the switch to Google Maps.
 
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Loving the 'Mega Alert' email that arrived at 5.19pm today for...Yellow-billed Cuckoo on Scilly. Probably not the best bird to choose to roll out the service...
 
I started to go through their new British species list but didn't go beyond "B" after finding Aquatic Warbler listed as scarce - I thought it had been reinstated to the rarities list? - and Barn Owl classed as Mega!

Dave W
 
I started to go through their new British species list but didn't go beyond "B" after finding Aquatic Warbler listed as scarce - I thought it had been reinstated to the rarities list? - and Barn Owl classed as Mega!

Dave W

Where are you looking for that?
 

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I'm trying to find a way of searching the database as you used to be able to, but can't find anything apart from searching the Rarities Archive which is not what I want. Is it still possible?
 
I'm trying to find a way of searching the database as you used to be able to, but can't find anything apart from searching the Rarities Archive which is not what I want. Is it still possible?

The search facility on the main sightings page allows you to search in numerous ways - is what you are trying to search for not covered by this?
 

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