#3 Need decision engine

[Anonymous]

We always have trouble deciding which place to eat, not
who to eat with.

When people register to Lunch Master they should be
required to enter their 5 favorite restaurants. Then the
decision engine should search through each group and
provide a "suggested" restaurant based on the group's
preferences. Each day of the week, the decision engine
should keep track of it's last suggestion, so that it does
not repeat the same place each day. Therefore, it won't
return the same suggestion again until 7 days later. In
addition, it should be slightly random so that the same 5
places aren't returned in the same order each week.

Each person in a group should also be able to sign up
for one Veto (of a restaurant that they do not like). They
should be allowed to apply their veto once a week/mo (it
would be nice if this was configurable).

Advanced functionality - Give the lunch group users the
ability to record where they ate for the day and rate each
place. The Decision Engine would then use these
ratings to calculate it's suggested restaurant the next
time it is run.

The Decision Engine could also have a birthday feature.
When a user registers, they should have the option to
enter their birthday. Then when their birthday comes,
the decision engine will automatically suggest their
favorite restaurant, and not allow any vetos on that
restaurant for that day, unless it is their own veto.

The Decision Engine should be set up with 3 radio
buttons that will be used to determine the type of lunch
people request to have:
Quick
Medium
Long

Suggested Restaurants should each have their own
profile. This profile will store information such as how far
away it is from the work location. The average time
spent eating at this restaurant, etc. The Decision
Engine can use this data as additional criteria when it
sorts through it's suggested restaurants.

[Dean Stautberg]

Logged In: YES
user_id=539182

I acknowledge the "business need" for having LunchMaster
help in deciding where to eat, though I'm not sure if your
Decision Engine proposal is the best solution. Perhaps we
discuss this in more detail in the Lunchmaster-dev Yahoo
Group, so the rest of the developers can participate. You can
join the group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/lunchmaster-
dev/join. -Dean