Software that makes placemats

[jdaw1]

So there are two types of error.

The wrong circles can be joined:


Or the choice of circles is OK, but some within-circle reordering is required, of which the most general case yet seen is:

[jdaw1]

+WaterCountMaxRowLengths done.

Changed again. Parameters were specifying the size, and fitting in as many as possible. It better fits how I use the program to specify some measure of how many (WaterCountNumSideTriangle), and have the program choose the size based on that (though subject to WaterCountSizeMax).

[jdaw1]

Somebody in Belfast (probably Daniel) suggested that there should be one extra page, fixed and unchanging (bar fonts), being a check list for the organiser.

Item to go on checklist include:

• â–¢ Reserve venue.
  â–¢ Glasses: n people × m wines ⇒ at least nm recently cleaned glasses.
  â–¢ Print and bring placemats.
  â–¢ Bring sample jars.
  â–¢ Bring T-corks.
  â–¢ Bring a good corkscrew.
  â–¢ Bring a decanting funnel.
  â–¢ Bring muslin or coffee filter.
  Also:
  â–¢ Invite JDAW.

Presumably the list was to be longer than this what else?

Please could that Belfast person say what else is to go on the list, and please could others comment on the idea.

As items are suggested I’ll edit this post.

[djewesbury]

Somebody in Belfast (probably Daniel) suggested that there should be one extra page, fixed and unchanging (bar fonts), being a check list for the organiser.

Item to go on checklist include:

• â–¡ Invite JDAW
  â–¡ Glasses: n people × m wines ⇒ at least nm glasses, which have been recently cleaned.
  â–¡ Room hire.
  â–¡ Print and bring placemats.

Presumably the list was to be longer than this what else?

Please could that Belfast person say what else is to go on the list, and please could others comment on the idea.

As items are suggested I’ll edit this post.

I think it was Derek. Interestingly I had just written glasses = people x ports when you edited your post.

Perhaps
â–¡ Bring 'All-Eventualities Port Kit': sample jars / T-corks / good corkscrew / decanting funnel / muslin

[DRT]

I think it was Derek.

Guilty.

[jdaw1]

List updated.

Though echoing the suggestion, I’m not convinced by it. Often it isn’t the organiser who prints the placemats. And often enough the person who prints the placemats doesn’t really look at them until set-up time, that is, until it is too late. So I’m not (yet) convinced of the merits of the extra page.

[Glenn E.]

+1

I doubt I would use the feature as printing placemats is one of the items on my list.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

[PhilW]

Though echoing the suggestion, I’m not convinced by it. Often it isn’t the organiser who prints the placemats. And often enough the person who prints the placemats doesn’t really look at them until set-up time, that is, until it is too late. So I’m not (yet) convinced of the merits of the extra page.

I probably wouldn't use this on the placemat sheets, as I'd rarely create and certainly never print without having done all the other tasks. However, such a list could be a useful sticky post somewhere (In Organising tastings sub-forum, probably), both as reminder-checklist but perhaps especially for someone who hasn't organised a tasting before?

[jdaw1]

A variant. Open the bell stickies, and observe that on each page of sticky labels (pages at the end) that there is a little note that can be opened. That note doesn’t print. Should there be, top-left of first page, such a sticky note, that opens to a list of things to consider remembering?

Though proposing this variant, my enthusiasm is only slight (though slightly more than for a extra whole page). However, it has the merit of being very easy to do.

[DRT]

This suggestion came about as a result of Daniel failing to remember to order glasses at a new venue. Both parts of that scenario are very rare events. Whilst pleading guilty to being the one who made the suggestion I must confess that my enthusiasm for it is very low.

Perhaps we should simply add a check list to this thread?

[djewesbury]

I agree with Derek. Having a checklist available somewhere is handy. Including on the placemats is unnecessary.

[jdaw1]

Perhaps we should simply add a check list to this thread?

Done.

[djewesbury]

Sorry. I suggest that

â–¢ Glasses: n people × m wines ⇒ at least n × m recently cleaned glasses

is insufficiently clear. Spares are needed for stink, breakages and bonus bottles. Perhaps a fraction of n × m can be found that is a correct number of spares?

[jdaw1]

insufficiently clear. Spares are needed

â–¢ Glasses: n people × m wines ⇒ at least n × m recently cleaned glasses, plus spares.

[jdaw1]

At Daniel’s request, www.jdawiseman.com/papers/placemat/page ... dvice.html has been updated. It now includes the following chart.

All page sizes are assumed to have margins of 30 points ! ≈ 0.42″ ≈ 10.6 mm. On the chart colours are pages sizes (  A4 in dark blue  ,  A3 in light blue  ,  US Letter = 8½″×11″ in red  ,  US Legal = 8½″×14″ in brown  , and  US Ledger = 11″×17″ in orange  ). The various marker shapes are the classes of elements of PermittedPackingStyles. The thick lines show the largest for each page size, these being reached or almost reached by the default value of PermittedPackingStyles. The thin lines are the values for /PostsAndLintel, assuming that the flag /CentralGlasses is at the default of 0.

Making the chart uncovered some obscure bugs, so was worth doing. (Well, uncovering the bugs in my code was worth doing. Uncovering those in Excel was fruitless pain.)

Comment welcomed.

[jdaw1]

Despite a minimal amount of waste, having 2 sets to each sticker sheet (with a blank column) means that certain people do not have to juggle two individual (and fiddly) strips of stickers during the tasting. For some reason i adopted Ray's stickers last year and had to deal with this - was not ideal. If the blank column could be the middle column, that would be perfect in terms of a quick "chop and distribute". Obviously disregard if it requires a lot of code.

How should this be parameterised?

As a reminder, the current StickyLabels parameters are:

Code: Select all

/StickyLabelsNumCopies 0 def
/StickyLabelsTypes [0 1] def

/StickyLabelsPaperType {[/A4 /A4] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsByNameWhichReplaceCirclearrays {StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitNumRows StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitNumCols mul 24 gt} def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitNumRows {[4 13] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitNumCols {[2 5] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitGapL 12 def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitGapR 12 def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitGapT {[36 31] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitGapB {[36 31] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitGapBetweenRows 0 def
/StickyLabelsWithPagePortraitGapBetweenCols 8 def
/StickyLabelsOrientationAutomatic true def  % of labels, not of paper. Boolean.
/StickyLabelsOrientation /Landscape def  % of labels, not of paper. /Landscape /Portrait. Ignored if StickyLabelsOrientationAutomatic.
/StickyLabelsColumnsChangeFaster {[true false] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsFirstPageStartPosition 0 def
/StickyLabelsPaddingWithPagePortraitTB {[12 6] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsPaddingWithPagePortraitRL {[6 3] StickyLabelsTypeThis get} def
/StickyLabelsReverseOrder false def
/StickyLabelsRemoveDuplicatesByWithinTitles true def
/StickyLabelsSortByWithinTitles true def

[PhilW]

How should this be parameterised?

I'm going to have to read the manual to understand the current parameters... One simple suggestion could be:

/StickyLabelPadWithBlank true def % true, false
/StickyLabelPadLen 12 def
/StickyLabelPadAfter odd def % odd, even, all, none

This would allow addition of padding after label set 1,3,5 etc (middle columns on 5-column sheets) or after 2,4,6 (right column on 5-column sheets).

[jdaw1]

Hmm. How about a boolean StickyLabelNewPageAfter, intended to contain arbitrary code?

[jdaw1]

Hmm. How about a boolean StickyLabelNewPageAfter, intended to contain arbitrary code?

That suggests StickyLabelNewColOrRowAfter, which doesn’t quite allow a blank row or column. Hmm. Maybe an integer StickyLabelColOrRowEndings, 0 being do nothing, 1 starting a new one, 2 starting a new one with a skip, etc. That works, but is uglier than pretty. Hmm.

And forcing the parameter to contain code, probably complicated, limits usage to me. Yuck.

[PhilW]

How about /StickyLabelsAllowAcrossPages which when defined as true works as currently, but when false you calculate how many attendees' labels will fit on one page, and then pads the rest? Padding could be after, or equally spaced between (the latter woul provide for RAYC's request.

[jdaw1]

How about /StickyLabelsAllowAcrossPages

Oooh, missus, very good. And /StickyLabelsAllowAcrossColumsnOrRows.

Edit: both would have to be ignored when things are too big. When things have to flow past a column/row/page, it must make an effort to minimise the number of undesirable breaks. Perhaps better expressed with opposite booleans, !Eschew! rather than !Allow!.

[jdaw1]

Done, as StickyLabelsAvoidAcrossColumnsOrRows and StickyLabelsAvoidAcrossPages, both of which are ignored unless StickyLabelsByNameWhichReplaceCirclearrays is true.

[jdaw1]

(I tried to add a comment (‟Oeneophiles desirous of the placemats might like to know that they were made using the free program at http://www.jdawiseman.com/placemat.html”) but it wouldn’t let me create an account except via Facebook. So I couldn’t.)

[djewesbury]

You have a twitter account. You can sign in with that as well. Or shall I?

[jdaw1]

You have a twitter account. You can sign in with that as well. Or shall I?

I dislike cross-sign-in. So I tried to create an account, which seemed to require FB, which in turn seems to require all your private information, and the right to do anything with it (also disliked). If you can and are willing to cope, please do so.

[djewesbury]

Ah yes. I see what you mean. Having logged in via Twitter, asking me for my Facebook account details seems unnecessary.

[jdaw1]

Roy Hersh has drawn my attention to the ‟competition” at winefolly.com/tutorial/wine-placemats/.

Different, and not without merit, but I prefer mine. Comments welcomed.

[djewesbury]

Roy Hersh has drawn my attention to the ‟competition” at winefolly.com/tutorial/wine-placemats/.

Different, and not without merit, but I prefer mine. Comments welcomed.

Fussy and didactic. Also, how can you read what's under the glass? Maybe for beginners or a taught class but otherwise not liked.

[Glenn E.]

Meh. Might be useful for a beginner's class on wine tasting, but far too fussy for the kinds of tastings that we hold.

[DRT]

JDAW's placemats win hands-down.

[djewesbury]

Apart from anything else, how are you supposed to write in all those spaces on the placemats Roy sent, once you have glasses in the way..?

[jdaw1]

Horses for courses. For somebody rather shy and uncertain, wanting to have a small informal event with a few friends perceived as non-expert, it could provide structure and thereby confidence. For our needs, and in particular our scale of tastings, not so much.

What I found surprising is that they are available in only 8½″×11″, not A4. Yes, Americans can be rather parochial a side-effect of living in a big country but a wine person should know that there is a rest of the world, and it uses A4.

the placemats Roy sent

Roy didn’t really send them; he drew my attention to some made by a third party, not obviously endorsing or criticising.

[jdaw1]

I did like the rating system, which could be added to my TN pages (perhaps for only some people?):

but in extracting this detail from the page noticed the grey speckles. What are they for? To make the paper less white, so one is less able so see the colour of the wine?

The branding is also a bit OTT: I see seven mentions of WineFolly.

[jdaw1]

I am now traveling and on a diff computer and don't have TPF log in info here or I'd have responded in the thread.

If you can please just quote me directly:

'This young lady is sharp in that she won the IWSCompetition in London a few weeks back, for Best Wine Blogger 2013, actually a worthy honor. She fact checks and often teaches Somm classes and especially server trainings etc. where six-eight wines are the norm for tasting. I don't believe that Madeline ever conducts tastings like you folks do in London or we do here in the USA with Port and Madeira etc. Two different purposes. Nobody will ever create a program like Julian has for complex tastings. My original email to him was tongue in cheek with the title, "competition" but in reality, there is none.'

FTR, I thought that the term ‟Competition” was entirely fair. A sufficiently similar idea that there might be overlap in the audiences, that’s all.

[jdaw1]

Maybe the scoring tasting-note sheets could have added something like:

which might be used, if scoring three from five, as


Comment?

(Edited to lessen ambiguity.)

[DRT]

That would make adding up when full of port even more difficult than it is now.

[jdaw1]

Not on the voting sheets, on your TN sheets. Would that help you score your drinks? (My fault: I said ‟scoring sheet”.)

[DRT]

Ah. Yes, it would encourage lazy people like me to venture a score.

[jdaw1]

Ah. Yes, it would encourage lazy people like me to venture a score.

I didn’t want to put it so indelicately, but yes, that would be its purpose.

And though I attempt to describe, I rarely score. It might nudge me as well.

A PM has been sent to the Placemat makers group requesting comment.

[DRT]

Ah. Yes, it would encourage lazy people like me to venture a score.

I didn’t want to put it so indelicately, but yes, that would be its purpose.

It is not often that you are less direct than me. Perhaps you are enjoying Christmas too much?

[djewesbury]

Make it an option, certainly. As an aside (perhaps interesting to placemat makers) I found scoring and voting difficult at The Bell because of the number of different pieces of paper, the eccentric numbering, and the need to drink up before drinking more. This was purely my own lack of experience with the set-up - but I think it shows that the usual arrangement, with glasses and tasting pages, makes the job of scoring very much simpler.

[DRT]

I found scoring and voting difficult at The Bell because of the number of different pieces of paper, the eccentric numbering, and the need to drink up before drinking more.

All compromises that have to be made if we want to keep up the tradition of using that venue at Christmas with more than four people at the table. I find that trying to take notes in that environment quickly becomes a frustrating distraction to the event, so prefer not to try.

[djewesbury]

I found scoring and voting difficult at The Bell because of the number of different pieces of paper, the eccentric numbering, and the need to drink up before drinking more.

All compromises that have to be made if we want to keep up the tradition of using that venue at Christmas with more than four people at the table. I find that trying to take notes in that environment quickly becomes a frustrating distraction to the event, so prefer not to try.

I completely agree. But by the end of the night I'd pretty much forgotten what I'd tasted at the beginning. Hence my votes were rubbish.

[jdaw1]

There are three obvious ways of arranging a row of stars.

1. Alternating orientations, as already shown.


2. Facing sideways.


3. And on their feet.


For my taste, the third uses too much space, and I favour 1 over 2. But if there is to be more than one row (e.g., for Tom’s scoring system), then each row will look the same, in which case 1 and 2 differ by only a rotation. I still favour 1 over 2.


Any strong views?

[djewesbury]

2 rows is far too confusing and probably difficult to use. I also prefer 1.

[jdaw1]

2 rows is far too confusing and probably difficult to use.

The default parameters will specify one row of five stars, but the code will allow multiple rows.

[Glenn E.]

I like the stars, but would probably never use them. I prefer the 100-pt system because that's what I'm used to. But for those who use the 5-star system, this would be ideal.

[jdaw1]

I prefer the 100-pt system because that's what I'm used to.

OK, I concede that one.

[djewesbury]

Of course a 100-point system is really only a 30-point system at most since anything below 70 would equate to "do not drink". Why not just mark out of 30?

[PhilW]

There are three obvious ways of arranging a row of stars.

1. Alternating orientations, as already shown.


2. Facing sideways.


3. And on their feet.


For my taste, the third uses too much space, and I favour 1 over 2. But if there is to be more than one row (e.g., for Tom’s scoring system), then each row will look the same, in which case 1 and 2 differ by only a rotation. I still favour 1 over 2.


Any strong views?

I much prefer 2 over 1, both aesthetically and for compact packing. For multiple row, alternate rows could be tilted in opposite directions, which would both distinguish rows and enable further packing if wanted.

Overall, however, I see no need for this on our sheets. We have many different ways of scoring between us, and I don't think any of us use marks out of five? Though I'm sure we could translate, it's probably easier for us to mark by whichever method we finds suits us. Is there a desire for a common format?

I quite like the WineFolly sheets, they seem well designed for the purpose I assume they are intended for: a small informal tasting of a small number of wines. I could also imagine a port variant, with scales for colour and such-like, but perhaps for a small informal group of relatively inexperienced tasters; not especially suitable for TPF events I think. The one thing it reminds me is that I must print out, or obtain/create an android app, or similar for a flavour wheel, as I really would like to improve my ability to recognise/name the flavours. However, while the WineFolly sheets do provide a basic nudge for that, I think it is probably too basic, and impractical on sheets with more than four glasses.