For the past month, I have been working on making a number of changes and updates to the Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me! Stats Page to make working on the site’s code a bit easier to manage. The changes won’t change the user experience of the Stats Page in any meaningful way; though, it does optimize how the panelist charts pull the required data and when it is rendered. Although the update will not include any new features (more on that in a bit), the version bump a few, significant behind-the-scenes updates.
The biggest updates come from updating the code framework, Silex, to the latest and greatest version, optimizing the code that generates the HTML code, and finally, breaking some of the larger code blocks into separate modules for more efficient code review and fixes.
Version 3.3.0 of the Stats Page should go live sometime during the Thanksgiving weekend.
I got a request from one of the fans to include a section that includes the various ways that show judge and scorekeeper, Bill Kurtis, describes himself during the show. At this point, that new feature is slated to be included in version 3.4.0.
Another feature that I am working on for version 3.4.0 is to include a section that shows the running tally of points and a layered graph showing the scores from each of the three panelists. This should provide an insight on just how well panelists have scored in general.
I’ll provide more status updates and sneak peeks at what version 3.4.0 will bring over the next few weeks. My target for a go-live date is the weekend of January 3rd and 4th.