To see only my loans on the Journals pages

[Guest]

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[Dagfinn]

Hello all - with all the loans here I find it increasingly difficult to follow up on the individuals I lend to.  Would it not be great to have a few boxes to tick so one correspondingly would see one own' s loans, a specific geography and a my favourites so when one come along an entrepenour one want to follow it doesnt require and awful lot of navigating time.

For me the individual aspect is primary and one of the strengths of Kiva but with its success gets somewhat lost.  I do not want to be a bank lenidng out money - I want to be driectly involved with individuals and so many of the MFI's doe a great job I do not want to lose on - it is my "interest" so to speak

Dagfinn A.

[Turtle]

That would be handy.  I'd really like to be able to sort journals much like we can sort loans - eg., options for old-to-new, new-to-old, specific geographic areas, etc..  Also, to only display journals written in English (or another language/s of choice) or with an attached translation.  For people trying to track journal entries from their own loans, these can be accessed directly from one's portfolio - or easier if you have many, make sure you have turned on the option for Kiva to email you when a new journal is posted for someone you've loaned to.

As an intermediate measure, to follow a specific entrepeneur of interest who isn't in your portfolio, you could sign up with an RSS Reader like GoogleReader (for free), then click the RSS feed button on the page of an entrepeneur of interest - say you do this before the loan's fully funded, an RSS feed would notify you when the loan is fully funded, when it's dispersed, at each repayment, any journal entries that are posted, & when the loan is fully repaid.  Ideally, it would be great to also be notified if/when this particular person ever requests another loan, but as far as I know that's not yet available.

[AccountAbility]

Journals have turned out to be a big disappointment for us. About 80% of our current loans have had no journal and the percentage (which do) just seems to keep dropping. 

So more than asking for journals just on our loans (which are few and far between), I would like to see the journals section significantly enhanced for sorting.  That way I could at least enjoy journals from other loans in the same country, or in the same kind of business or whatever.

Also, someone else suggested that Kiva allow us to follow loans in our portfolio which we have an interest in--even though we aren't economically participating in them.  This would greatly increase our ability to keep track of updates on these.

Dan

[RichardF]

I support this as well.  In particular, if Kiva implemented a watch list feature for businesses, that could be used by lenders for any number of purposes, including following those with interesting journal entries.

[Christopher]

I agree so much could be done, and journals probably need a fresh coat of looking at with all of the suggestions made here and elsewhere.

Having played with a bit of trickery with displaying loan / business ID numbers on pages I wondered whether the same could be done with Journals - as an interim measure.

With a bit of trickery (Greasemonkey / Trixie script) I can get the ID to be displayed next to the entrepreneur's name.
Using a bit of trickery and magic (using the export data in Editgrid) I think I could also get it to highlight loans that you have in your portfolio (and by extension if you were to include business ID's of interest in Editgrid perhaps those as well).

At least then when browsing through the journals one's of interest could be picked out more easily.

I have tested the concept (screenshot below) and if people would be genuinely interested in using it I could devote a little time to complete it properly.
C

[redstarr]

For seeing the journals on the loans I'm in on, I just look at my portfolio, then click on each borrower, and scroll down ,past the description, past all the lenders, near the bottom are the journals from that borrower. 

I would love a sorting feature for the journals as a whole,though.  I love to read the journals, even on the loans I'm not in on, especially when I don't have the funds to lend that day and still need a "fix".  It would be nice to be able to sort them like the loans on the lending page,though. 

[Christopher]

I like to read journals on loans that I'm not in on as well, so I often just browse through http://www.kiva.org/app.php?page=businesses&action=listJournals
On quite a few occasions I would read an entry and not realise that it was one of my loans! and with an ever increasing portfolio it has got beyond a stage to click through for all my loans and scroll down to the bottom of the portfolio page - which is why I came up with a way to highlight loans as I browse.

I wish they would also flag loans I am interested in when they get new comments, which I am sure would increase the number of comments made - though that is another discussion thread...

For seeing the journals on the loans I'm in on, I just look at my portfolio, then click on each borrower, and scroll down ,past the description, past all the lenders, near the bottom are the journals from that borrower. 

I would love a sorting feature for the journals as a whole,though.  I love to read the journals, even on the loans I'm not in on, especially when I don't have the funds to lend that day and still need a "fix".  It would be nice to be able to sort them like the loans on the lending page,though. 

[Ted W]

That would be handy.  I'd really like to be able to sort journals much like we can sort loans - eg., options for old-to-new, new-to-old, specific geographic areas, etc..  Also, to only display journals written in English (or another language/s of choice) or with an attached translation.  For people trying to track journal entries from their own loans, these can be accessed directly from one's portfolio - or easier if you have many, make sure you have turned on the option for Kiva to email you when a new journal is posted for someone you've loaned to.

As an intermediate measure, to follow a specific entrepeneur of interest who isn't in your portfolio, you could sign up with an RSS Reader like GoogleReader (for free), then click the RSS feed button on the page of an entrepeneur of interest - say you do this before the loan's fully funded, an RSS feed would notify you when the loan is fully funded, when it's dispersed, at each repayment, any journal entries that are posted, & when the loan is fully repaid.  Ideally, it would be great to also be notified if/when this particular person ever requests another loan, but as far as I know that's not yet available.

Thank you for the RSS note; it's probably the best that can be done until Journals is made searchable.  Apple Mail [Leopard] has an RSS facility built in that makes this extremely easy.

[PEI Rick]

Hi Ted W

 

PEI Rick