RE: Auction Software

["Frangooles, Bob" <bob.frangooles@attws.com>]

Great work Erik.  In my opinion this is a good opportunity to improve the
auction performance (though I think our teamwork has been pretty strong and
effective over the last couple of auctions).

I think perhaps the user interface on the record a bid could use a little
tuning, but I think the general framework is sound.

It might be tough to run it side by side with the current process during a
real auction.  I would suggest maybe a live practice run at a board meeting,
then if we are comfortable, use it for the plant auction with the old method
ready as a backup in case of a hardware/software failure/glitch.  We would
probably want to print sorted results periodically throughout the auction in
case of failure.  I am sure there also some other failsafes we can discuss.

Again,  great work.

Bob  

> ----------
> From:         Erik Olson[SMTP:erik@thekrib.com]
> Reply To:     gsas-board@thekrib.com
> Sent:         Sunday, November 21, 1999 6:48 PM
> To:   gsas-board@gsas.org
> Subject:      Auction Software
> 
> OK, you guys are (as usual) going to say I'm nuts.  I've written a
> database app that can track our club auctions.  It runs web-based, like
> our member database, so I have a test version up already:
> 
> Go to http://test.thekrib.com
> 
> You can register sellers and bidders, enter in their auction items,
> record "bids", and print out final tallies for bidders & sellers.  
> If you have a minute, give it a try... Add yourself as a bidder and a
> seller, maybe add a few "items" to sell.   Then try the "record a bid"
> (which is what would go on at the table during the auction).  I'm curious
> if this is totally un-intuitive & I need to rethink the approach.
> 
> I also have no idea if this will fly for something real, but it has the
> potential of reducing the stress level at the recording table and checkout
> (especially during those spells of multi-bid items, and when people are
> trying to check out).  Another nicety is that we could copy the final
> tallies to our website after the auction, making everything available
> online.  I'd like to try for one of the auctions, alongside the
> traditional approach at first.  Maybe the plant auction?
> 
> I envision one computer tucked away and running the server, and a bunch of
> cheap laptops (with nothing except web browsers) set up at the check-in
> area, recording/runner table, and checkout area.  I have access to lots of
> wireless networking cards at work, so we could move the laptops around as
> needed during the auction, i.e. at the beginning we have two or three at
> the registration table, then during the auction we move two to the
> recording table.  Also figuring we could have one printer on the
> "stationary" machine that could print out the bid sheets as people check
> out.
> 
> Anyway, take a look at the program online and let me know what you think.
> 
>    - Erik
> 
> -- 
> Erik Olson
> erik at thekrib dot com
>