Kiva / KivaFriends collaboration : General Wishlist Items / Bugs / etc

[Guest]

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[nuclearspike]

Hey all,

I should have started this thread first probably. But at the time of the other "collab" threads, I had specific questions on features that were already under development and I was looking for input from the community to make sure we were headed the right direction with those. This thread is different. It's more open.

I know asking this is like drinking from a fire hose...   but I have a reasonable amount of time allotted each cycle to work on projects for KivaFriends. I am still assigned regular tasks, but let's start checking things off that I am able to have control over: functionality, errors, display, etc. Issues of duplicate postings, problems with partners, Kiva policies, etc. I have no control over, so those suggestions would be best for the list used on the conference call or direct them at John in his thread.

For example, Henry had brought up the issue of portfolio loans not sorting properly (specifically by partner-country) if there are more loans than fit on the page. In the next release, I have a fix for this. There are some other changes going on under the covers with a different engineering team so my solution is just a patch which (once some of the subsystems are ready) will get a more complete solution. But for now, in the next release, when the loans span multiple pages, you can sort on Country/Partner by clicking the header and it will work. That's a great example of an engineering issue with relatively limited scope and I can fit that into an iteration without any problem.

Your suggestion may also be to start a new discussion separate from this "general" thread... like "How can we increase the sense of community on Kiva?" ... if a topic you are mentioning has been covered already on KF, please post a link to the thread(s).

Paul

[David2051]

Hi Paul,

I would like the ability to easily see that I am already on a loan on the team loans page, and the lend (classic...) page, and even on the loan page itself.  If a loan is fund raising for some time I frequently am attracted to the same ones on multiple occasions, and I'm always having to scroll down looking for myself!  It would make it easier to see which team loans I should join too.

It sounds like I'm senile, doesn't it?  lol 

[nuclearspike]

Not at all! Great idea. This happened to me frequently where I accidentally lent to the same person twice (using KivaBank, before I added the ability to exclude loans in my portfolio). It would be nice to have a section on the borrower page showing when you lent, for how much and what team was credited (when logged in, obviously). Potentially even show how much you've already been repaid if looking at loans that are paying back.

I love it.

Having those details on the borrower page (and indicating it on the team page "recent activity") wouldn't be too taxing for querying. I'll look at options for the Lend tab as well that won't impact performance.

Personalizing the borrower, team, and and lend pages based on the lender's activity... Excellent suggestion!
Paul

Hi Paul,

I would like the ability to easily see that I am already on a loan on the team loans page, and the lend (classic...) page, and even on the loan page itself.  If a loan is fund raising for some time I frequently am attracted to the same ones on multiple occasions, and I'm always having to scroll down looking for myself!  It would make it easier to see which team loans I should join too.

It sounds like I'm senile, doesn't it?  lol  

[RichardF]

Hi Paul,

How about a link to Kiva Bank

(Risk-Based Searching-currency exchange,non-payment,partner rating,delinquency...)

on the Kiva LEND page?!!! 

Or better yet, just replace it! 

Unfortunately, I know some folks can't access KB    so adding KB-like functionality to the LEND page would be nice too!

[nuclearspike]

Hi Paul,

How about a link to Kiva Bank

(Risk-Based Searching-currency exchange,non-payment,partner rating,delinquency...)

on the Kiva LEND page?!!! 

Or better yet, just replace it! 

Unfortunately, I know some folks can't access KB    so adding KB-like functionality to the LEND page would be nice too!

Actually, it would nice to have a "third-party search apps" (or something less boring) link directly on the lend page which would have links to apps that do loan searching (kivafolio, kivabank, etc).

[cjp1973]

repayment emails reworked so they are sent with the highest % of loans paid off showing first.  So the email you do get would show the top 25 highest paid off loans AND/OR, a color coding in my credits when a loan is 100% paid back.

I have talked to Ali about this to see if we can find out how the email is generated and if there is a sort that could be put on it, so it wasn't random....
Any idea of there is someway a sort could be implemented before the 15th so people could see their paid off loans.

charmaine

[AccountAbility]

Actually, it would nice to have a "third-party search apps" (or something less boring) link directly on the lend page which would have links to apps that do loan searching (kivafolio, kivabank, etc).

While third party apps may be fine, I am looking for tools with functionality that do not require any additional downloads or executables beyond the browser app.  I work in a computer environment where Kivabank is off limits.

Tools for my existing portfolio is high on my wish list. 

Separating active loans from total historical portfolio for each of the statistics and charts would be near the top.

Another would be to take the financial projections of each loan repayment and aggregate them onto one total cash repayment projection would be another.

A third would be to have the loan ID a separate field in My Credits, so that it can be accurately sorted by loan.  (I have a number of second loans from the same borrower and there are loans where the special letter characters in the name have changed over the life of the loan).

Dan

[RichardF]

A third would be to have the loan ID a separate field in My Credits, so that it can be accurately sorted by loan.  (I have a number of second loans from the same borrower and there are loans where the special letter characters in the name have changed over the life of the loan).

I also like the idea of easily sorting and selecting by LoanID, but that unique identifier really is about loans.  It's not about borrowers.  Introducing a BorrowerID into the Kiva universe also would help lots of functionality issues frequently discussed here.

[alan]

Hi Paul,

A couple of months ago I mentioned in an offhanded way that it might be interesting to have the ability to
"pin" specific loans to the first page of the lender page, much as you can pin icons to the top of the Windows Start menu. My recollection is that several other KFs thought it might be nice at the time. The idea would be to have some functionality to pin up to 24 loans to page 1 (and unpin, of course!), and the subsequent pages would have loans arranged in whatever the default sort is now. It would let me show my 2 dozen favourite loans to anyone who clicks in to see my lender page, as well as give me a quick way to check on those specific loans. I imagine this function would be used for a variety of purposes by a variety of people.

What do you think?

Edit: See my original comment, and feedback, beginning here.

[David2051]

Pinning loans to the team loans page would be pretty cool too.   

One of my fellow co-captains mentioned tonight that he would love to be able to pin a sticky message on the team board.  He wants to be able to post a FAQ where it could be seen easily.  He said he's been asked about a million times why Kiva has no loans in India...