| Redisplay Messages: Compact | Brief | All | Full Show Messages: All | Without Replies| Author: | VOTB  | | Posted: | Feb 26, 2020 20:17 | | Subject: | Re: Add to Community Experts group | | Viewed: | 67 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| Thanks, Bill for putting this up. I know we have had some great conversations
off-forum about this.
While I know that some may be opposed to the CAP I am glad that you posted it
to the community. I feel it may be one of the best ways for sellers to have a
better voice with BL. Currently, it seems that people send their request out
into the ether of the forum, some never to be heard except by other forum members.
Others scream and yell and get a response. The goal would be to have a group
who could gather concerns, ideas, and support from the community, and deliver
it in a cohesive manner to BL and TLG. The hope is that everyone's voices
will be heard, not just the loudest. Secondly, the hope would be that (in time)
BL and TLG may ask for feedback before things go public, so that a representative
group may help in identifying concerns before things go to a boiling point.
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| Author: | VOTB | | Posted: | Oct 31, 2019 20:25 | | Subject: | Re: Adding box contents for sets? | | Viewed: | 47 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| I have a source where occasionally I have just a giant tub of bags (no boxes
no instructions). The price per pound is only worth it if they are decent so
I want to hunt out the good ones.
The best I have come up with identifying a set by looking at some unique parts.
Then on brothersbrick.com find their review. They usually will lay out all
the bags and take a photo. I can usually identify what I have pretty easily.
I scored the last time and spent $70 and got $890 worth of parted out pieces.
This is not normal but it just worked out. On the other hand, I have just grabbed
$50 by weight and parted them out for $75.
When you have a full set it is much easier to part out than one bag of an unidentified
set. Plus multiple bags will usually lead to higher lot counts.
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| Author: | VOTB | | Posted: | Oct 1, 2019 13:56 | | Subject: | Re: Pulling Data For Reference | | Viewed: | 41 times | | Topic: | Catalog | |
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| I have been working on a way to do this. There are a few ways to go, one with
macros, another with web scrapers, having an API with the data would be helpful.
The main issue I come against is the server draw. I am pretty convinced this
is one of the reasons we get so many 500 errors. There are those out there pulling
pricing for hundreds or thousands of parts every day. This draws the BL server
down. I read somewhere that bots and spiders are not permitted. Therefore if
found out you could be banned. Currently, I have only scrapers pulling pricing
from retail locations, then I manually go in and pull pricing from BL on items
I feel may be profitable.
It would be nice if BL would simply publish a daily csv file that included all
the pricing of each piece. Then we could just plug that into a spreadsheet or
google doc with vlookup and have a really good simple pricing tool.
Not to get too many people riled up, but I am hopeful that XP will have some
updates that will help us in this regard.
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| Author: | VOTB | | Posted: | Sep 13, 2019 10:10 | | Subject: | Re: We have a new Catalog Associate! | | Viewed: | 74 times | | Topic: | Catalog | |
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| In Catalog, Admin_Russell writes:
| | Hello everyone,
I'm very pleased to announce that we have appointed longtime member BricksThatStick
to the Catalog Associate position. Paul served as the site's 4th Inventories
Admin during 2010 to 2011 alongside Emma (SimplyBricks). He effectively replaced
Dan Jezek, the site's founder, who had a special fondness for inventories
work and who of course left very big shoes to fill.
If you take the time to scroll through Paul's 900+ inventories changes:
https://www.bricklink.com/catalogInvChangeItem.asp?chgUserID=44744&v=3
...you will notice a sea of green, followed by a sea of blue, followed by another
sea of green. This means he continued to contribute to the catalog after having
once been an admin, which is (unfortunately) something rather uncommon. But it
demonstrates a great and correct attitude, the kind of attitude we wish to model
for all of our other contributors out there, especially the ones still cutting
their teeth.
Paul has, over the years, been very active as a seller and many of you will know
him also from his activity in the Forum. We look forward to his practical insights
and we are confident he will play a vital role in our growing catalog team.
Please welcome him back! 
Russell
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Thanks for the announcement! And I am greatful for everyone's hard work!
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| Author: | VOTB | | Posted: | Jul 31, 2019 12:44 | | Subject: | Re: How to compare parts lists with my inventory | | Viewed: | 22 times | | Topic: | Inventories | |
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| If you put all the items you want into a "want list" you can visit your own store
and see what parts you have that are on that want list.
At the top of the page under your "Shop," "Terms," and "Feedback" tabs you will
see "Wanted List." If you click on that you can cycle through your want lists
and see what you have.
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| Author: | VOTB | | Posted: | Aug 28, 2018 15:17 | | Subject: | Re: Ability to Sort Inventory by Total Size | | Viewed: | 20 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, MidwestBrick writes:
| | One of the many ways that I personally change my pricing is simply based on how
much space those items take up to store them. An example is, I believe I have
about 200 6x6 plates. This takes up a good amount of room to hold these, of
which, maybe I would want to price these lower to possibly move them to free
up space. Another example is large Wheels. Regardless, it would be beneficial;
to other than knowing what items are large but also to know how much space is
being used in comparison to others if they were able to sort by total Size which
would be Quantity times the sizes that BL already has established. This would
help compare space being used for 2 x 4 plates vs 6 x6 plates vs 1x1 round plates
and also be another way to run sales on items that are large that maybe we forgot
we even had.
Thanks for the consideration.
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The real question is the size of a piece listed as a data point or simple
text. It seems like this could get pretty complicated describing so many three
dimensional pieces. Once you start looking at slopes and brackets shape and
volume get harder to calculate. I guess a 3D Studio model of each piece could
do the work.
I am still fairly new to this system but could sorting by weight/piece and weight/lot
do this? (I know this is not a current feature)
- A heavier piece would likely be bigger and take up more space.
- A heavier lot would likely take up more space, even if the piece is small.
This would let you see that drawer of 1000 1x1 bricks is likely taking more space
than the 2000 1x1 tile.
This utilizes an existing data point. The only thing is that some wheels are
hollow and are quite large, but a smaller tire could weigh more. From what I
have experienced so far, wheels and tires just take up a lot of space no matter
what.
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| Author: | VOTB | | Posted: | Aug 14, 2018 13:39 | | Subject: | Re: Visual Guide | | Viewed: | 38 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, macr237 writes:
| | This may have been asked a number of times, but as I am a n00b, I have not been
aware of it. What is the possibility of dragging information out of the database
automagically to create a visual guide to all parts? Basically one page that
has 1 image of each block with the part number that goes to a search on that
part number.
Some of the parts that I have seen, I really have no experience in describing
them and Lego can have some different naming conventions to name things that
are similar or even knowing if it is 6x5 or 5x6 (random numbers used).
I've tried looking to see if Lego have a catalogue or someone else and
no one seems to have something like this and this being the best repository for
parts, it could be a great asset.
Regards
Macr
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I am a n00b as well. And still getting my feet wet in getting all the parts
I have categorized. While I have enjoyed Lego for 30+ years it has not been
until recently that I have started working on using the proper lexicon. That
is the challenge. I still catch myself calling a plate a tile and knowing when
a modified brick turns into a bracket.
https://swooshable.com/how-to-start-building-lego
The article above is very elementary but it seems to be universal based on what
site you go to. Just having the basics down has really helped me. I also purchased
several new sets and parted them out to start. This automatically categorizes
all the parts for you. It has helped drill in the terms and names of the different
parts. I am also in the process of making my own color guide from actual bricks.
I have not been doing this long enough to pull a used brick from a pile and
tell the difference between light gray and light bluish gray.
I have started logging a HUGE lot of used tires and wheels I bought years ago.
I thought it would be a baby step into sorting used parts. Mostly because there
are fewer colors to deal with. One trick that Bricklink does have is the ability
to look at the catalog as a thumbnail gallery. It dramatically reduces the amount
of screen space and lets you see one version over the other. I can't tell
you how much time this has saved.
I have also really enjoyed those that have come before me and added photos to
parts that are commonly misidentified.
I don't know if that ramble was too much or if it even helped the topic,
but thanks for reading.
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USA, Oregon
