Skip to content
← GLM & SLM Idea Lab

How can we improve GLM and SLM? Search or submit ideas below.

GLM & SLM Idea Lab

Categories

JUMP TO ANOTHER FORUM

(thinking…)

Changing character count to word count

I searched and didn't see this in the idea archive. We receive a lot of compliants about character count. I am guessing character count gives you a better estimate of space needed but folks are accustomed to using word count for other applications. I think word count is the norm.

Idea posted June 20, 2013 by Erin Baird, Allegany Franciscan Ministries

3 votes

We're glad you're here

Please sign in to leave feedback
Signed in as (Sign out)
Close
Close

We’ll send you updates on this idea

Ideas shared this idea  ·   ·  Report…  ·  Admin →
How important is this to you?

We're glad you're here

Please sign in to leave feedback
Signed in as (Sign out)
Close
Close

We're glad you're here

Please sign in to leave feedback
Signed in as (Sign out)
Close
Close
Submitting...
An error occurred while saving the comment
  • Chris Dahl commented  ·   ·  Report

    Hi Erin,

    Thanks for the additional comment. At some point, it might be possible in the user interface for us to keep track of both the number of characters as well as number of words, and give users some visual feedback in terms of a count, but I'm not sure what we will be able to do beyond that.

    If we come up with any interesting options, I'll be sure to let you know,

    -chris

    posted July 28, 2013 by Chris Dahl, Foundant Technologies

  • Ideas commented  ·   ·  Report

    Chris-

    Thanks for the explanation. I figured it helped better gauge memory needs. Just sharing feedback from our users. We survey users about the application process after each application is submitted.

    Erin

    posted July 2, 2013 by Erin Baird, Allegany Franciscan Ministries

  • Chris Dahl commented  ·   ·  Report

    Hi Erin,

    Thanks for you comment. I've seen a variety of sites that use one or the other, but regardless, the issue we are most concerned with - for obvious reasonss - is data integrity.

    Since people's responses are stored in our system, and since we want to have the system e able to perform at a reasonable level (i.e. when people do look ups involving a lot of data), we have to be able to tell the database how much room to set aside for each potential piece of data (i.e. an answer to a question). And since computer systems measure memory in something that can be translated to a "character", we use characters as a counter. This was pretty standard when we initially built the system, and it prevents us from having to truncate responses that may be under a certain number of words but over a certain character length (and thus too long to store in the database field that is set aside for the response). For exampe, one 400-word response might be 2,500 characters, but another 400-word response might be 3,200 characters.

    As we go forward, we could look at essentially over-allocating the database field ... say be 30% ... and moving to a word count. However, this is not a trivial change and may have implications on what we support for a maximum response. Given the amount of work, the risk that we could STILL be having to truncate responses, and the other things on our priority list, we'll probably be staying with a character count for quite awhile.

    That said, we will keep this on the roadmap as a potential enhancement at some point.

    Thanks,

    -chris

    posted June 20, 2013 by Chris Dahl, Foundant Technologies