Easier way to report a bunch of bugs in ScoutBook?

[HighAdventureLover]

I have a growing list of issues - both bugs and feature requests - and would love to know if there’s an easier way to get a list shared with those in charge/ability to actually address these shortcomings? Just a preview, but:

BUGS:

1. P1: Auto-deletion of composed emails after returning to ScoutBook due to background logout.

2. P2: NO easy way to create a new thread in ScoutBook discussions.
   2a: Why no “new” button”? It’s a main feature in Discouse, just not enabled for ScoutBook is what the Discourse team has shared. WTF?! I just accidentally stumbled on the keyboard shortcuts and found “c” will do it, but not in the main UEX??!? I literally spent 2 days looking in Discourse for an answer…

3. P3: Main Menu is not well organized, and hard to use.
   a. My Dashboard: Messages, Events, Reports,
   b. My Scouting Home page - JUST WHY here?
   c. Administration doesn’t show the “more” arrow on the right ; hiding all its contents.
   d. Why is MB counseling nested UNDER Admin and not at the top level?
   e. Why are Forums, Change Log and Legacy Forums not nested under HELP?
   f. PROPOSED new structure: Events > Messages > My Units > My MB Counseling

4. P4: No “Sent” in Messages. Why not? As a Scout Leader, I send lots of messages, and it would be great to be able to see what I’ve sent.

5. P4: Message: UEX issue - function button to “Select All” is the same appearance as the table header (white, bold) and NO visual queue it’s a functional button. Bad design / hard to see it’s active.

FEATURE REQUESTS:

1. Please consider restructuring the Main page for easier visibility, more logical organization? 90% of the screen is “empty” at present - not helping anyone. Can you look at top features used and organize based on that data? E.g. if most send messages have it 1st, or if Events is used most, list it first….Proposed just based on our troops needs:

a. Events > Messages > My Units > My MB Counseling (only show for those with this feature)
b. My Account vs other UEX elements in Administration - why different? Why not list in the big empty area under My Units?

2. No way to see more event items in the Event area without clicking “My Calendar”?
   a. Most sites that present a list of items have a “more” at the bottom. Consider this?

3. No way to easily email JUST the scouts and parents signed up for an event
   a. User Story: As a trek leader, I want to be able to easily communicate with scouts and parents JUST for treks I’m leading without having to manually figure it out by bouncing back and forth between Events (signed up list of people) and Messages.
   b. EXPECTED: Leaders should be able to send a message from the On the My Calendar event page AND from the Messages area to a quick sub-group of all people.

4. Help direct communication by including a “WHO” on every event. Could be both scout AND adult, or just scout, since BSA is scout-led.

5. Facilitate easier messaging: include a “contact leader” on the Event page that will generate a new message addressed to the “Who” scout or adult leader for that event.

6. Main screen top toolbar has items that appear and disappear - really bad user consistency. Please persist whatever buttons are used by vast majority of users.

7. Main Screen top toolbar is not well structured. First item is “quicknav” - and it only displays one item “my dashboard”

8. Mobile AND desktop optimization needed, as desktop experience defaults to mobile UEX, and frankly, is a waste of space and hard to use.

Much more documented…but this doesn’t feel like the best way to provide this info. Happy to discuss with anyone who has an ear - please email me or call me: douglaswski@gmail.com or 408.497.6161

[CharleyHamilton]

Bug Item 1: No arguments here from me. I find the auto-logout effects to be frustrating. That said, the BSA has already provided feedback via SUAC that the auto-logout will not be removed. However, one thing that helps mitigate the effects of the auto-logout is the Feature Assistant Extension, which does provide warnings (3 minutes prior?) of upcoming auto-logout. It only works under Firefox and Chrome, but it provides a lot of useful features not (yet) implemented in native Scoutbook. I also now compose in another program, then paste into the Scoutbook email box. It saves me a lot of headaches if I miss the “warning dialog” from the extension.

I’m confused about your Bug Item 2. Is this button (red arrow) not what you’re looking for?

Bug Item 4: I know that this has been requested before, and I believe that the response was that it entailed too much long-term system storage for the BSA to pay for/maintain. I work around this by making sure that I include myself on any outgoing messages I send.

Feature Request 2: I think this has been previously requested. My recollection of the response is that UI/UX changes are not planned until the new calendar is implemented through the IA2 interface.

FR 3: I believe that this can be done based on RSVP status using the Feature Assistant Extension I referenced above. You can also create specific local (to your machine) email groups using the FAE. That doesn’t necessarily help folks who are using multiple machines, but it make some things easier.

FR 4 & 5: This is easily included in the body of the event. I’m not sure that having a dedicated data entry location for this would be an improvement. Consider events that have multiple contacts for different purposes.

[HighAdventureLover]

Not all browsers actually SHOW that button! Here’s MY toolbar as displayed in latest release of Safari

!!! NOR presented in Firefox

[HighAdventureLover]

AND, if all these plugins are only for Chrome, there are other problems, as I’m caught in an endless loop of: login, no captcha, “complete the captcha” error, captcha finally displayed, need to refresh window" error, password is incorrect (but works on both Firefox and Safari…)

[RonFedele]

These screenshots are at the forum list level You need to choose and go into a forum to see the new topic button

[CharleyHamilton]

That’s a good point, @RonFedele. I hadn’t caught that. The BSA has limited who has access (forum admins only, I think) to create a new Category. However, creating a Topic within a Category should work fine for anyone (or nearly so).

It could see the button on my wife’s iPad in Safari, so I wasn’t sure why it wouldn’t show up within a Category for you. I’ll freely admit to not being an iPerson, so if there are subtleties to the Apple systems that might play into things, I’m almost guaranteed to miss them.

[JoseOrdinas-Lewis]

@HighAdventureLover A workaround I have found to the session expiring is to open a new session in a separate tab before performing an action like sending a message, particularly if I have been spending a little while to draft a message.

IMHO Auto-logout functionality is poorly implemented and really frustrating - however as @CharleyHamilton has mentioned, not something which will be changed, so we have to work around it.