Check that the number of Places in destination guides updates correctly, excluding Permanently Closed ones.#288

First example is Tirana, where there are 2 permanently closed Places, leaving only 3 that can be visited. Yet the destination guide says “5 Cool, Hidden, and Unusual Things to Do in Tirana, Albania”: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/tirana-albania

To me it would make sense to leave the closed ones out of the count, since they tend to only be informational rather than practical for visitors.

With the new rankings by number of Places in the homepage, the closed ones can also inflate some counts. London has almost two full pages of Closed Places at the end of the guide, for example.

Related to this number, the destination guides will often have too many or too few Places than what is actually there. This guide says “6 Cool, Hidden, and Unusual Things to Do in Angahuan, Mexico”, but there’s actually only 4: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/angahuan-mexico

On the other hand, “3 Cool, Hidden, and Unusual Things to Do in Monterrey, Mexico” is now 6: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/monterrey-mexico

This extends to the Gastro subsections in each Destination Guide, as seen in these screenshots. First is from the main guide, second is after having accessed the link.

Hi linkogecko thanks for these, here are my responses to the separate issues:

1. Excluding closed places from the count: We don’t intend to exclude closed places from the count since we still think there is value to them being able to be remembered or explored online. I do see how it could be confusing that it says # of things to do so we can consider if that is the best wording.
2. Destination guides count is higher than number of actual places: This bug (ex. Edinburgh or Angahuan, Mexico) we discussed in Discord and it should be fixed now!
3. Destination guides count is lower than number of actual places: I’ve checked out Monterrey, Mexico and it appears both the count and number of places is 6. If the count appears lower, it’s probably due to caching we have in place and should correct itself over time when the cache expires.
4. Count in the gastro subsection yellow button is lower than the count on the gastro subpage: This may be a bug and I am looking into it, thanks!

Hi @Nicola, thanks for responding and working on these. For point 1, I can definitely see how deleting a Closed Place would prevent it from being remembered or explored. I’m not sure how not counting it would affect that, though. The Place would still be there, just not counted.

For point 2, I’ve given it a few days just in case it was cache-related, but I’m still seeing two counts being off. Probably the biggest discrepancy is Pune, India, with 30 entries but still showing 9. Porto do Son only has 1, but shows 2. These might be isolated issues however, as all other guides I’ve seen since are up-to-date:
https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/pune-india
https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/porto-do-son-spain

Finally, you’re probably aware of this now, but just like the post above, user @Bara 138 has posted several spam links responding to various threads of this section.

@linkogecko thanks - I must have missed pune india and porto do son. I thought I had updated all the destinations that were affected. They should be updated now (though unfortunately, that means porto do son guide is no longer available since it only has 1 place.)

and thanks I’ve banned that user and deleted all their comments.

@Nicola I think this is still happening. Pune should be at 32 now, and Ibiza, Spain has 4 on the site but there are actually 5. I don’t think that cache should be an issue still as it’s been days.

@linkogecko thanks yeah - it seems like for some destinations it updates, but some need to be done manually? still haven’t figured out the logic around that bug… but i’ve just manually updated these two.

@Nicola I’m aware you’re still working on this, so I’m just bringing up the following guides as examples in case they help pinpoint the issue:

Cancún should have 3: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/cancun-mexico

Valladolid, 6: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/valladolid-mexico

Playa del Carmen, 4: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/playa-del-carmen-mexico

Mérida, 4: https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/merida-mexico

Edit: and Haarlem should be 4 too, but looks like that’s a different issue
https://www.atlasobscura.com/things-to-do/haarlem-netherlands

@linkogecko thanks! I’ve manually refreshed the place count for the first 4