chilihead Posted October 15, 2015 Posted October 15, 2015 Most review sites will show partial stars which helps you decide which is best when you sort. Seeing just 50 products with 5 stars, then 50 with 4 is not the same, when those are not accurate but display as so. Not talking about rating with half stars, but displaying with partial stars if a full star is not the actual score. 5 stars should only be shown if all reviews are exactly 5 stars, but it rounds here. So a 4.25 will round to a full star. Rounding to quarters, or even halves would be great. Is it because you use font awesome and not your own star shapes? I would really like to be able to display accurate ratings. Being able to rate in halves would be a welcome bonus.
Tracy Perry Posted October 15, 2015 Posted October 15, 2015 17 hours ago, chilihead said: Is it because you use font awesome and not your own star shapes? I would really like to be able to display accurate ratings. Should't be... as there is a 1/2 star in the FA font library - so if their answer is yes, then it is incorrect. It is in the code itself that they use apparently if that is what you are seeing it rounds UP to the next nearest number (which I agree is stupid and is not well programmed if so).
AndyF Posted October 15, 2015 Posted October 15, 2015 I've not looked into this but if its only permitted whole numbers then instead of 0 to 5, it could go 0 to 10, this way 1 would be a 'half', 2 would be 'one star', 3 would be 'one and a half' etc.
Tracy Perry Posted October 15, 2015 Posted October 15, 2015 And that would be as confusing as hell to the end user. A whole star is just that... a WHOLE ranking based number. Doesn't matter if it is 5 stars or 10 stars (unless I misunderstand what you are saying). Now, if the odd numbers were "smaller" than the even ones - maybe that would work, but I think it would still be confusing. It needs to use 1/2 stars (that's what they are there for).
chilihead Posted October 15, 2015 Author Posted October 15, 2015 IPS also offers a 10 star rating system with apps that have reviews enabled (5 or 10 is a global setting), but that is 10 whole stars rated and displayed, so not the same. If half stars are offered it should also apply to the 10 star system because the logic is the same. Half stars are common practice. If it's not a perfect 5 show 4 and 1/2 stars. Showing the half, it is understood that it is not a perfect 5 but more than 4. Where you round up is debatable, at some point it could tip to 5 (4.9 for example) but half stars are common and add more validity. You used to be able to hover and see the "score," but you can't do that anymore.
AndyF Posted October 15, 2015 Posted October 15, 2015 I meant the underlying logic rather than display. :)
Shariq Ansari Posted October 16, 2015 Posted October 16, 2015 +1 for half-stars... Amazon does it that way, no reason to deviate.
chilihead Posted October 17, 2015 Author Posted October 17, 2015 Yup, they are used not to show exact half values, but a rating in between the two whole stars, so I would think they could be easily added into the "math" of the way scores display. Probably between .25 and .75 would cover it, below rounds down, above rounds up, in this zone, show half star. Or similar. Not sure how others do it. (Looking at amazon, they tell you the score, and a 4.8 is showing 5 stars so it wouldn't be hard to see how they do it with a little work.) Adds more value to the review system, an extra level of ratings. The half star is an available font awesome. Would love to see this, I have some review databases planned and this would really enhance it. 9 hours ago, djpretzel said: +1 for half-stars... Amazon does it that way, no reason to deviate. Yes they also have a nice chart that shows the percentage of votes for each star, you can click to read only results with that # of stars, and when you hover the stars in search results it pops up, it's very nice. Would love to see enhancements here.
VizionDev Posted October 18, 2015 Posted October 18, 2015 On 10/17/2015, 2:37:47, djpretzel said: Amazon does it that way, no reason to deviate. Never knew IPS was just Amazon in a different package?
Tracy Perry Posted October 18, 2015 Posted October 18, 2015 1 hour ago, RADStudios said: Never knew IPS was just Amazon in a different package? Of course it's not.. Amazon does it better than IPS does (as do numerous other scripts) in the ratings area.
chilihead Posted October 18, 2015 Author Posted October 18, 2015 Most places where you rate 5, the display shows halves based on the overall. This minor tweak in display would make the system more robust. Showing how many rated and how many rated each star, even better (for the review sections in apps, not necessarily topic ratings etc.) Clicking 5 stars for example would show you all that rated 5 stars and the reviews they left. A good sorting function for reading good-only or bad-only reviews.
Gimpymoo Posted October 18, 2015 Posted October 18, 2015 7 hours ago, RADStudios said: Never knew IPS was just Amazon in a different package? LOL - Good reply.... There was me thinking they were 2 seperate companies. Oh well. 5 hours ago, Tracy Perry said: Of course it's not.. Amazon does it better than IPS does (as do numerous other scripts) in the ratings area. Agreed. Amazon are market leaders in many areas for many reasons. Rounding up/Rounding down to a whole makes no sense.
Shariq Ansari Posted October 18, 2015 Posted October 18, 2015 @RADStudios Yeah... I never claimed they were the same company... that type of response is pretty easy/lazy: "Oh, I didn't know they were the same thing!! LOLZ!" - the point was very clearly NOT to argue that IPS should follow Amazon in every aspect of their product design or even that their platforms are comparable, but rather to suggest that deviation from feature implementation on something as fundamental as ratings should have actual THINKING behind it... do you think there was any? For any given feature, see how it's done elsewhere, with a focus on the most popular implementations, and then deviate only if you have cause - if you think you can improve upon the implementation, or if the more popular implementation presents legitimate technical difficulties. Can you tell me what's wrong with that approach, especially for something like ratings? Or are you just good for snark?
Joel R Posted October 18, 2015 Posted October 18, 2015 6 minutes ago, djpretzel said: @RADStudios Yeah... I never claimed they were the same company... that type of response is pretty easy/lazy: "Oh, I didn't know they were the same thing!! LOLZ!" - the point was very clearly NOT to argue that IPS should follow Amazon in every aspect of their product design or even that their platforms are comparable, but rather to suggest that deviation from feature implementation on something as fundamental as ratings should have actual THINKING behind it... do you think there was any? For any given feature, see how it's done elsewhere, with a focus on the most popular implementations, and then deviate only if you have cause - if you think you can improve upon the implementation, or if the more popular implementation presents legitimate technical difficulties. Can you tell me what's wrong with that approach, especially for something like ratings? Or are you just good for snark? Whoa. Simmer down. What you're suggesting sounds great in theory. I'm not privy to the development pipeline of IPS, but they're under no obligation to match best in class features and usually can't ... As any client can attest, IPS development usually falls far short of what we're used to on other websites. They can't hire hundreds of Silicon Valley software engineers who graduated from top universities. Instead of trying to argue about how IPS should develop in general, this discussion would be more fruitful if the focus was brought back specifically to why you think half / quarter / partial stars are compelling.
Shariq Ansari Posted October 18, 2015 Posted October 18, 2015 18 minutes ago, Joel R said: Instead of trying to argue about how IPS should develop in general, this discussion would be more fruitful if the focus was brought back specifically to why you think half / quarter / partial stars are compelling. I think from a UX experience, you CAN argue they're compelling simply out of de facto usage on the most prominent sites offering reviews, which would include Amazon. I'm not sure this is really a "best-in-class feature" situation - I don't think the discrepancy in implementations in this case involves a large gap in complexity or difficulty, do you? The argument goes something like this: stars are an effective means of conveying quality/opinion at a glance five stars seems like the sweet spot in terms of this at-a-glance context when reviewing items in the context of lists, it's helpful to have this type of at-a-glance information for comparison when one has whittled down the options to a few, out of many, it is helpful to then be able to dig a little deeper, with a more granular understanding of the true rating value (a 4.0 is different than a 4.4 now, in this more specific context) and also see how many reviews factored into the rating It's the difference between a list/browsing context with many options and a detail/comparative context with a narrowed selection of options that warrant more analysis. That's a pretty common use case... why not support it?
chilihead Posted October 18, 2015 Author Posted October 18, 2015 1 hour ago, Joel R said: this discussion would be more fruitful if the focus was brought back specifically to why you think half / quarter / partial stars are compelling. 5 whole stars is level jumping. The more fluid, the better representation of the actual tally, much more informative when sorting by highest rated and reading the page, or even viewing solely. Half stars would be great, I've seen more fluid representations, but a half adds another level to what we see now, and with that, I would be happy. If they want to code 1/4s or 1/8s, or some fluid meter that filled them, I wouldn't stop them. But 5 whole stars is good for rating only, not showing the results. It is not accurate or informative with those level jumps.
VizionDev Posted October 19, 2015 Posted October 19, 2015 9 hours ago, chilihead said: 5 whole stars is level jumping. 90% of ratings on IPS are faked by it's own author. You can five star your own thread. 10 hours ago, djpretzel said: @RADStudios Yeah... I never claimed they were the same company... that type of response is pretty easy/lazy: "Oh, I didn't know they were the same thing!! LOLZ!" - the point was very clearly NOT to argue that IPS should follow Amazon in every aspect of their product design or even that their platforms are comparable, but rather to suggest that deviation from feature implementation on something as fundamental as ratings should have actual THINKING behind it... do you think there was any? That was very heart felt thank you. It means a lot that you are able to convey such passion. @Joel R hit it right on the head though and to reiterate the purpose of my response: Quote: "Amazon" allows half stars. In your context: To "deviate" from something means you were originally on track with it. Next minute: IPS is selling Books and Kindle Tablets.......... I also think developers have much more to be concerned about than allowing half stars to please the few so anal about it. P.S "LOLZ" is not something I would ever say, please don't commit fraud on my quotes
chilihead Posted October 19, 2015 Author Posted October 19, 2015 2 minutes ago, RADStudios said: 90% of ratings on IPS are faked by it's own author. You can five star your own thread. I'm more concerned about reviews where you rate with stars and leave a written review, for databases in the Pages app. You can create a review system similar to amazon or Yelp. Similar to the Marketplace here, as the Downloads app also has reviews.
VizionDev Posted October 19, 2015 Posted October 19, 2015 Just now, chilihead said: I'm more concerned about reviews where you rate with stars and leave a written review, for databases in the Pages app. You can create a review system similar to amazon or Yelp. Similar to the Marketplace here, as the Downloads app also has reviews. Good point: You should also be concerned about how you can generate a purchase for your second account for any paid marketplace product, and create a fake 5 star review that even IPS staff approve without looking into it.
Tracy Perry Posted October 19, 2015 Posted October 19, 2015 1 hour ago, RADStudios said: 90% of ratings on IPS are faked by it's own author. You can five star your own thread. In that case, it's just one more design failure in the script.
Makoto Posted October 19, 2015 Posted October 19, 2015 4 hours ago, RADStudios said: 90% of ratings on IPS are faked by it's own author. You can five star your own thread. *cough* Have tried to get that changed for a while. It's silly.
chilihead Posted October 20, 2015 Author Posted October 20, 2015 I've been meaning to turn topic (and some content) ratings off myself but there is no global setting, you have to do each forum one by one so been putting it off. Honestly they are pretty useless, Likes have taken over. Reviews are different. They use the stars yes, but you also have to leave a written review and the stars are part of it so there is no anonymity. A duplicate account could be moderated, but let's bring this back to showing half stars in the overall score, thanks.
chilihead Posted October 23, 2015 Author Posted October 23, 2015 Could a mod do this? Anyone interested? Seems it would be possible, only deals with display, not actual rating. Thanks
Makoto Posted October 24, 2015 Posted October 24, 2015 1 hour ago, chilihead said: Could a mod do this? Anyone interested? Seems it would be possible, only deals with display, not actual rating. Thanks I think it should definitely be possible to implement. I'll try and have something done by tomorrow.
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