U.S. Decorations Ribbon Rackbuilder Redesigned!

[Lukasz Gaszewski]

Dear John and Friends,

The U.S. Decorations Ribbon Rackbuilder has been entirely redesigned and expanded. This is a result of several months of attempts and hard work. The new rackbuilder is easier to use and more flexible than the old one. It has the following:

- Decorations, unit citations, service medals and ribbons of all services
- All ribbon devices (oak leaf clusters, stars, letters, numerals, etc.)
- DoD and Services awards for civilians
- Decorations and medals of departments and agencies (DoT, NASA)
- Merchant Marine Medals
- Civil Air Patrol and Coast Guard Auxiliary awards
- Older military awards and medals, beginning from the Civil War
- Republic of Vietnam decorations awarded to US servicemen
- Other countries' decorations awarded to US servicemen
- Awards of international organizations (UN, NATO, etc.)
- National Guard decorations, medals and ribbons
- Organizations' and societies' awards
- Unofficial commemorative medals
- Most frequently encountered badges of all services
- Variable arrangement of ribbons, depending on service selected
- Possibility to combine all the awards displayed (for example Air Force and CAP)
- Ribbons arranged three or four per row
- Straight or inset arrangement of the ribbons
- Added names of all the ribbons displayed
- Possibility to add one's own caption in a plate-like style
- Easy and intuitive navigation
- Neat and pretty layout

As the rackbuilder actually repeats the ribbons on US ribbon charts I have decided to quit the latter. The National Guard charts will remain until all ribbons already on display are copied to the rackbuilder. I have done my best to remove all bugs I could find, but I am aware I may have omitted some. Hence any information, comments and suggestions will be welcomed.

And one more thing. Please don't find this rackbuilder any competition to yours. I highly appreciate Ultimaterack and the effort you have put in it. And if I can be of any help to your project, I'll be with pleasure.

Visit the rackbuilder

[John Asendorf]

No "competition apologizing" required Lukasz! Your site has always been top notch and I must say that you were part of the inspiration for UR. As always, great job.

John

[John Asendorf]

P.S. That's some nice javascript you got there...

[SgtArky]

luke. I finally seen your site. I dont know where you got all those arkansas ribbons. however I think you need to put most them in the obsolete section. The ones I put up on this site are the offical ar dated 1oct 2005 , actually 2 where added since the last change.

[Lukasz Gaszewski]

Thank you very much. What regards the Java scripts I originally did not plan to use them at all but at one point I felt completely lost with that multitude of awards. I decided to use scripts to be able to make changes quickly... and they remained. BTW I like the idea of expanding charts you use. I allowed myself to hack it from you. Otherwise probably no graphic card would endure so much graphics on a single page.

Now to SgtArky: I have put 5 Arkansas NG ribbons to the obsolete section as you suggested. A question: are you absolutely sure that multiple awards are ALL denoted by bronze diamonds rather than by stars? Does it regard the recruiting ribbon as well? Are the diamond placed horizontally or vertically?

Is there anything like a silver diamond as well? I am asking because when you demand 6 or more awards the diamond that appears looks identical to the bronze one!

Some other remarks on NG ribbons. I wanted to put them in the NG section, but it will probably be faster here.
1. Delaware National Guard Medal - any subsequent award is denoted by a gold star (see http://www.delcode.state.de.us/title20/c007).
2. Washington NG - are you sure that subsequent awards are all denoted by OLCs? - what about bronze stars for service ribbons?
3. Can unit citations be awarded more than once?
4. When you select the ribbons of more than one NG (eg. Alabama and Alska) all the ribbons are displayed by state alphabetically. Thus ALNG Recruiting Ribbon comes BEFORE AKNG Legion of Merit. I know this is rather a theoretical possibility for as far as I know NG members are not allowed to wear NG awards other than their own, but such a situatuion may happen. I have decided to divide NG awards into decorations and service ribbons. Decorations of all states come before the service ribbons. I was thinking of preparing a detailed precedence list, but eventually thought it would be too much trouble.

Best regards to all,
Lukasz

[John Asendorf]

Regarding the diamond (or lozenge as I think it is officially called)... the position is horizontal... and I just ahven't had a chance to make a silver one yet... so I'm using the bronze for both the bronze and the silver

When you select the ribbons of more than one NG (eg. Alabama and Alska) all the ribbons are displayed by state alphabetically. Thus ALNG Recruiting Ribbon comes BEFORE AKNG Legion of Merit.

Actually... NG ribbons are ordered by current NG state... hence the alphabetical default is WRONG... and this is a known problem. I need to totally alter the way I'm doing the ordering for them... but, like I said, this is a known issue that I just haven't had time to fix.

[SgtArky]

luke, yes all take the lozenge, except ones that have stars printed on them of course the Medal of honor, recruiting and military cross. now, they will be RARE, the arkansas service ribbon gets the most for the oldtimers and the emergancy service ribbon gets quite a few. I talked directly to the person who sets the standards. I will ask him when those other ribbons became obselete.

[SgtArky]

quick question if you know it. I was told lousiania may give us a ribbon for helping them out. It is my understanding that I cannot wear it unless I am in the lousiana national guard......or does it go to the bottom of my arkansas awards?

[mechinfantry]

from what I have heard is that you can wear any ribbon awarded by any state. The award goes in the order of presedence. Such as if you have a LA award and a WA award and are in the WA guard LA would still go first because the individual states haev there presedence then the states go by the alphabet. You should find out from your rediness NCO to get and details on individuel state regulations

[PA-SGT]

It is also my understanding that you can wear other state ribbons and as stated above your current state takes precedence. When I moved from Maryland to PA I had to change the order of my state ribbons so that MY current state was higher. So I do not see any issues off accepting and wearing the ribbon.

PA-SGT

[John Asendorf]

IN REALITY:
Current state takes precedence.

IN "SCREW-UP ULTIMATERACK" WORLD:
States are alphabetical.

[mechinfantry]

Unless you want to make it complicated. I noticed on Lukasz site that you can select which guard unit is your unit and that state takes precedence. Can you work that when you figure out how to scroll the NG awards?

[John Asendorf]

That's a future endeavor...

the only problem with that particular fix is that after your state come your state ribbons in the order earned. Hence if you have THREE states' ribbons, you have to be able to order them also....

[mechinfantry]

Yea lets not do that I dont want to help code that LOL

[GeorgeF]

Lukasz, I tried out your site. Very awesome graphics. There is an error on the NCO Professional Development Ribbon (Army), though. Instead of stars, it uses numerals for each additional school.

John, this site is really taking off. It is pretty awesome to see this in its growing stage.

Kudos to both site admins and to those that are contributing.