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Writing trip reports

Posted by Bob S on May 29, 2010 (last modified on May 31, 2010)
permanent post

Multiple report authors

Trip reports are designed to be a collaborative effort amongst trip participants. Often the trip leader will write the report or ask another participant to do so. The leader may also ask participants for photo contributions. After the report is completed, other participants can add their own observations if they wish.

To avoid confusion as to who contributed what, I think it would be a good idea to add your first name to the end of your section of the report. For example, if Jane wrote the report, and Dick added to it:

It was a fantastic trip, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
The view was awesome from the summit, and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Thanks everyone for staying together, which made my day so much easier! (Jane)
I noticed a bear on the way back! blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. (Dick)

This way if Dick says something silly, Jane doesn't get credit for it. Also please refrain from editing others' contributions. Even Her Majesty, the Queen of England, will not mind if it ain't perfect..., and neither should we.

Entering (and Losing) Text

It is really annoying, after slaving over your wonderful report for an hour, to somehow lose it in cyberspace. This sometimes happens for a variety of reasons: a) the server times you out after an hour, or goes 'down'; b) you suffer from 'fat fingers' and hit some wrong control key; or c) just plain #%@*$ computers!

What I do when composing some lengthy report is to use a text editor like 'Notepad' for Windows, or 'TextEdit' for Macs. When I'm done, I copy and paste the report to the form's text entry box. If somehow it gets lost, I still have the copy in the text editor to try again. Note, I do not recommend using 'Word' or other word processor which may introduce some odd formating into your report.

Coordinating data entry

A loss of data may occur when two (or more) participants try to create and/or add to a particular trip report at the same time. Initially I thought the chance of this happening would be vanishingly small..., but as it turns out it may have happened already. If someone spends a lot of time typing the report directly into the form's text entry box, and someone else simultaneously starts uploading multiple photos, a conflict could occur at the server. Rather than adding a software locking technique to the server, I would prefer if report contributors could coordinate their efforts..., perhaps by email, or by adopting a 'adding photos first', or 'adding report first' convention. Again, writing your report in a text editor, then copying the report to the form's entry box, would reduce the chance of data loss grief.