English Chess Forum

Dare I suggest that some bigger questions ought to be asked? Does the ECF understand what it it owns (I assume that it does own CoM) and what involvement has it had to date in the development of the system? For example, was it involved in drawing up the requirements? Was it involved in user acceptance testing? Has it signed off the system - and if so, who signed it off and what were the acceptance criteria?

Dear Michael,
Perhaps I meant as things stand it will be difficult to make a substantial surplus on individual credits sold due to the high cost of the distribution of the certificates. Once that is done automatically on the internet, matters will be more financially satisfactory.

Angus,
Yes, the ECF does 'own' the COM in the same way as a publisher owns a book, although it is written by an author. I drew up those contracts. Andrew Martin, the ECF Manager of Coaching, is the principal creator of the system, under the direction of Chris Majer. There was some testing of the product. That has been chronicled elsewhere on this forum. A number of people had a hand in the formulation of the launch statement, including its date of publication.

Stewart Reuben

Angus, could you transform your hidden agenda into a visible one so that we are clear as to what you are suggesting?

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John, I don’t have a hidden agenda. But I’ll try to explain why I asked the questions I did.

I am concerned that the ECF is rushing into endorsing the CoM product and pinning hopes on it as a revenue generator. However, I rather get the impression – from what has been written on this Forum - that the ECF has had little involvement in the development of the product; that you and your team have done all the running. And now some questions have arisen about the product offering (the pricing of – was any research done on this, BTW - and the rewards).

On Stewart Reuben’s response to my questions: Does a contract define the requirements of a project? More likely it would be for implementation of requirements which are defined elsewhere, wouldn’t it? Perhaps Stewart can give us a summary of what he believes the requirements to be? Yes there was some testing but it wasn’t user acceptance testing, was it? At least not in my understanding of what UAT is - I didn’t involve the owner of the software, did it? Has the product been signed-off by the ECF?

Even now it's easy to get php errors John...

Warning: Missing argument 4 for form_registration(), called in

For example - the rest in a PM...

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Cheers
Carl Hibbard

Thanks for that. You are the first to report this one.

J.

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IT Manager for the British Chess Magazine: http://www.britishchessmagazine.co.uk
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I don't see how as it's very easy to cause the site problems?

In my opinion the hosting server should also be set not to show me php errors with line numbers etc.

I still feel the site is not stable enough to be live, sorry

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Cheers
Carl Hibbard

I'm concerned by this. I know that level 1 is not the same as the old CoE Bronze (it is tougher). But my experience at Castles JCC was that less than half the members who took the bronze went on to the silver (exact figures being 36 out of 86). (Also, they personally paid nothing, it was paid from club subs.) Most of these were primary school aged members. Peter Turner can give a clearer indication of nationally how many went on from the bronze to higher levels.

Noted.

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Chess Images: http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess
IT Manager for the British Chess Magazine: http://www.britishchessmagazine.co.uk
Twitter: @jeupham
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/john.upham

I'm pleased to mention that a number of CoM packages have been sold to schools.

Six of those packages have been bought by schools who have requested free sets but not yet received them.

This is very encouraging news!

There is a steady stream of student registrations and credit purchases.

_________________
Chess Images: http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess
IT Manager for the British Chess Magazine: http://www.britishchessmagazine.co.uk
Twitter: @jeupham
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Will monthly/quarterly figures be made available at the appropriate times?

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February 16-17: 2013 BUCA Team Championship
April 20: 2013 British Blitz Championship
July 27-August 10: 100th British Chess Championships

There will be excellent news the day before the AGM!

_________________
Chess Images: http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess
IT Manager for the British Chess Magazine: http://www.britishchessmagazine.co.uk
Twitter: @jeupham
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/john.upham

We had our first internationally located CoM student register today.

The students' ISP appears to be located in Portugal so I will assume that he is located there rather than living here and using Portuguese IP connectivity via a bizarre route!

Another first I believe and something to be pleased about.

_________________
Chess Images: http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess
IT Manager for the British Chess Magazine: http://www.britishchessmagazine.co.uk
Twitter: @jeupham
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/john.upham