Retro Player of the Year Project

[Doctor MJ]

Edit: To clarify, the page is completely data driven at this point meaning that all information is coming out of the data files (with exception to point/share calculations).

It looks great! But you should take a look at the calculation of the shares, because they are not correct. Adding up the shares for James gives me 2.239, but you have him listed with 2.4496; for Bryant I get 2.196, but you have him with 2.6709. Others are also wrong. I couldn't find the pattern.

Hmm, yeah looks to me mystic's right. Here are some shares I have down (which I'm guessing are slightly more precise than mystic due to not rounding individual years):

LeBron - 2.240
Koe - 2.190
Wade - 1.306
Duncan - 1.138
Dirk - 1.000

I see one difference in the first year of voting because I let one voter submit late (because I didn't really give warning I was counting votes so soon): viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1006295&start=240

[semi-sentient]

Edit: To clarify, the page is completely data driven at this point meaning that all information is coming out of the data files (with exception to point/share calculations).

It looks great! But you should take a look at the calculation of the shares, because they are not correct. Adding up the shares for James gives me 2.239, but you have him listed with 2.4496; for Bryant I get 2.196, but you have him with 2.6709. Others are also wrong. I couldn't find the pattern.

Hmmm, I'll look into it. Is this the only discrepancy you found?


Doc: I updated the results for '08-09.

[mysticbb]

Hmmm, I'll look into it. Is this the only discrepancy you found?

I honestly didn't look for more specifically, just saw on the first glance that other players were also off.

[semi-sentient]

Alright, I found the problem. I was calculating the running total (for shares) for each player before I had the total first place votes, so I just had to move the calculations further down in the script after all the results were compiled. The script has been updated and should now reflect the correct totals.

[mysticbb]

Alright, I found the problem. I was calculating the running total (for shares) for each player before I had the total first place votes, so I just had to move the calculations further down in the script after all the results were compiled. The script has been updated and should now reflect the correct totals.

Looks good. The pages for the players are empty right now. Is that correct?

And thanks for showing me the right spelling of Amar'e Stoudemire. I seriously thought always it would be Amarè Stoudemire. I guess I learnt something really useful. :)

[semi-sentient]

Alright, I found the problem. I was calculating the running total (for shares) for each player before I had the total first place votes, so I just had to move the calculations further down in the script after all the results were compiled. The script has been updated and should now reflect the correct totals.

Looks good. The pages for the players are empty right now. Is that correct?

Yeah, no player info yet. I'm not sure how I'm going to display that just yet, and it's going to take some tricky scripting to get that all working, so I may hold off until next week to do that (will be out for the weekend).

My intent is to have a single web page that dynamically shows/hides information based on what's selected in the drop down (as opposed to reloading the page after every selection), so that makes things a bit more complicated (but more fun coding-wise... heh).

[mysticbb]

My intent is to have a single web page that dynamically shows/hides information based on what's selected in the drop down (as opposed to reloading the page after every selection), so that makes things a bit more complicated (but more fun coding-wise... heh).

Well, I guess you aren't using a SQL database (or MySQL) for that. That would make it a rather simple php script to read out the data for the individual players via a specific id for each player. You can do a similar thing with your csv files.

[semi-sentient]

Well, I guess you aren't using a SQL database (or MySQL) for that. That would make it a rather simple php script to read out the data for the individual players via a specific id for each player. You can do a similar thing with your csv files.

Unfortunately my hosting provider uses a MySQL database server located on Mars (or maybe even Pluto), as every time I try to establish a connection it times out. So, I just opted to use data files instead. For a bigger project, I would definitely use an RDBMS though, preferably MSSQL.

Still, I structured the data files as I would if I were creating a database (each contains a unique id, and the data is normalized to avoid redundancy), but unfortunately I can't "join" the results of reading from a file as I would if doing a database query. I can still link the arrays (associative) by the unique id's though so that's not much of an issue. I have all the data available to me when the page loads, so I'm just figuring out the best way to display it using DHTML to switch between players, seasons, etc.

[mysticbb]

Ah, I understand the problem. How about running a script and write the data into a single data file for each player? After that you read out the data from one data file. Well, right now we don't have many players anyway, not quite sure how many files you will get in the end.

[semi-sentient]

That might be over complicating it. Ideally, I would love to use a true database because that would allow me to build a system where posters can go to the site and cast/update votes (assuming they have registered accounts in the DB), so perhaps I'll explore alternatives in the future. I'm using PHP right now to read from the data files, but writing back to files and updating those files gets a bit tricky. My hosting provider is in the process of migrating to new servers, so hopefully they'll provide something better in the near future.

[Sedale Threatt]

Damn, dude, did you get laid off or something? That's a hell of a lot of work.

[mysticbb]

That might be over complicating it. Ideally, I would love to use a true database

Well, I can only agree with that. Without a true database it needs to be tricky. The only other solution which pops up in my mind would be a big data file with a row for each player and like 250 colums (5 for each year). Read the data per row and calculate the voting points, the problem is that you still need to count the amount of voters for each year to calculate the shares. Well, that would be quite a mess in the end. I obviously would use a SQL database, but that is something we agree on, but your provider right now unfortunately not.

Anyway, nice work!

[JordansBulls]

What about starting a new thread on the same day the previous one finishes. Monday morning to Wednesday morning, Wednesday afternoon to Friday afternoon. A nice, tight schedule, with no real overlap and no need for a break with weekends off.

I like this idea. Basically have one start up on Monday, Wednesday and Friday

[semi-sentient]

OK, so showing the individual player results wasn't as hard as I expected. The page has been updated to show each player, and from glancing at a couple of players everything seems to be in order.

[Tim_Hardawayy]

OK, I didn't have anything to do at work today, so I banged out most of the sortable data views.

LINK: http://www.dolem.com/poy

I still have some work to do in terms of showing what each individual player has done (years that they received votes) and allowing yearly selection, but everything else works.

So that there's no question about manipulating results, the data files are located here:

Voters: http://www.dolem.com/poy/data/voters.csv
Seasons: http://www.dolem.com/poy/data/seasons.csv
Players: http://www.dolem.com/poy/data/players.csv
Results: http://www.dolem.com/poy/data/results.csv

Feedback and suggestions are welcome. I can't promise that I'll be able to fulfill every request, but I'll do what I can.

Edit: To clarify, the page is completely data driven at this point meaning that all information is coming out of the data files (with exception to point/share calculations).

That looks really great.

And I know its crazy that Kobe may not get #1 in any one year (I could see an argument for 02-03 but Duncan will almost certainly get it that season, I probably would have gave it to him over KG in 07-08 as well), but I'll bet if you add up his POY shares from 00-09, he will lap the field, with only Duncan even close. Speaks to his amazing longevity as a player.

EDIT: Just noticed there is a calculation of that as well, nice. Duncan will probably just edge Kobe in that category now that I look at it.

[Doctor MJ]

What about starting a new thread on the same day the previous one finishes. Monday morning to Wednesday morning, Wednesday afternoon to Friday afternoon. A nice, tight schedule, with no real overlap and no need for a break with weekends off.

Okay, first, if we're going this approach seems like we should plan to have no downtime at all, and we should also make sure to maximize time on the weekend thread. So I'm going to propose:

Mon morning to Wed morning
Wed morning to Fri morning
Fri morning to Mon morning

Let me know if you like/dislike.

Second, let me know your thoughts on a break if we switch to this schedule. Does it render the break unnecessary? If not, how long of a break are you thinking of? 1/3 of a week? 2/3? A full week?

[DumbyTheWizard]

What about 09/10 "retro" POY?

I know its just now happening, but it doesnt mean we should just use the media MVP votes. I think we need to make a 09/10 thread too, what do you guys think?

[Doctor MJ]

What about 09/10 "retro" POY?

I know its just now happening, but it doesnt mean we should just use the media MVP votes. I think we need to make a 09/10 thread too, what do you guys think?

Plan is to do that after the playoffs end. It was debated about whether to have an ongoing thread for that, but consensus was against it.

[DumbyTheWizard]

What about 09/10 "retro" POY?

I know its just now happening, but it doesnt mean we should just use the media MVP votes. I think we need to make a 09/10 thread too, what do you guys think?

Plan is to do that after the playoffs end. It was debated about whether to have an ongoing thread for that, but consensus was against it.

Oh, Yeah, I forgot this is not only a RS POY... My bad...

[semi-sentient]

Have more participants been added or is the list on page 1 up to date?

Was Tesla added?