Ah, a tfw'er finally speaks!
Diving right in...
The major pain, for me, is the speed in which everything is loading.
When you say everything is loading slowly, do you mean just in general, or when browsing? How much lag are we talking about? A few seconds, or more than 30? Are you on dial-up? Is it the images that are taking a while to load? One thing that I could do would be to make an extra-small thumbnail size to use when viewing in "details" mode. Know that I'm always working on performance, but I really need to hear the details before I can know where to look for trouble.
The other thing is, the search function. When you search for something specific, it works wonders. But if you want to maybe browse everything in a line, it's kind of a pain.
Well, the best way to see everything in a line is to simply browse to it using the links in the hierarchical tree over on the left. Are people not noticing those? Maybe that would explain some of the frustration...
Also, maybe when you search for something, it could come up as a list with no pictures, so you can see everything at once, instead of the 10-20 per page.
You could always just change the number of results--crank it up to 100 if ya like. Maybe what I'll do is set the number of results in a cookie, so you don't always have to keep setting it. And if you want more compact results, you can click on "details" to get a sleeker list.
And, Im just kind of going with whatever comes to mind now, if you do implement a list in the search function, add check boxes for "add to collection" so people can add multiple figures at once, and then go into their collection later and change all the details.
Excuse me while I go kill myself--I spent 6 months getting rid of those old checkboxes! But the new system is still one-click, and yes you can wait until later to go back and update the details. Are you seeing a lot of lag when clicking on "Add to collection"? If so, that's something I need to work on. How long is it taking, on average, to add a toy?
Im probably not being very clear about this search thing. I've just pulled a 14 hour work day and a bit tired. Right now, when you search, the drop down menu only has "Transformers" in it. Im sure you are working on it, but I would love to search by "Line" "Country" "Faction" "Exclusives" ect. ect.
The shmax search engine is the most useful feature that no one ever uses. Nobody has really discovered it yet, but it's incredibly powerful. You don't need a drop-down to choose a faction search--you just do it. Search for "autobot", and all toys with autobot factions will turn up. You can also search for form (ie. "ferrari", "combat jet", or "cassette"), color ("red", "green", "chrome", etc), manufacturer ("hasbro", "kabaya"), exclusive store (ie. "botcon", "Target"), upc, product or assortment number, or any combination you like (ie. "red missile 1984 Takara"--awesome for identifying figures or loose parts), or pretty much anything else you can think of. If you want even cleaner results, you can use the "Advanced Search" form. That way when you search for the faction "autobot", you won't turn up toys with the word "autobot" in the name, like "autobot ratchet"). The drop-down next to the search box
will populate with more options, but only when you've already drilled-down into some sub-category using the categorical links over on the left. In this sense it works much like eBay or Amazon.
And one more thing. Can we break the boxed sets up into single figures?
Meaning what, exactly? If you only own one figure out of a set, simply uncheck the others in the checklist when editing your collection.
That's about it as far as Im concerned
But otherwise, I love what you are doing! It's fantastic.
Why thanks! You sure wouldn't know it by all the grumbling over on tfw. But I'm not giving up--I figure if I can please those guys, then the rest of the world should be a snap.
