Charas-Project

Off-Topic => All of all! => Topic started by: Osmose on May 20, 2007, 03:28:30 AM

Title: Charas 3.0 Dev Journal
Post by: Osmose on May 20, 2007, 03:28:30 AM
In order to keep those interested up with how development is going, I'm starting a little Development Journal talking about what I'm doing and what's getting done and such. Sometimes you won't understand what I'm talking about, but I'll try and be as easy to understand for non-programmers as possible.

-----------------------------------

Well, obviously the first entry is going to be a little awkward, but oh well. As for stuff I got done today...

-Spoiler tags in and functioning. I still gotta add this to the SF Code list for posting, though.
-PHP changed to CODE and changed from grey to blue for stylistic reasons.
-Anything in brackets is now SF Code. Such that QUOTE, quote, qUoTe, etc all work for quoting if they're in brackets. No more quote bug! Whee!

Of course, all of this needs to be tested a little more extensively than what I've done, but that can wait until the Beta.
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Post by: game_maniac on May 20, 2007, 09:48:42 AM
Nice idea, better than leaving us in the dark for weeks/months.

Quote
-Spoiler tags in and functioning.

-Anything in brackets is now SF Code. Such that QUOTE, quote, qUoTe, etc all work for quoting if they're in brackets. No more quote bug! Whee!


Yay.
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on May 20, 2007, 01:04:01 PM
I think this journal thing is the right sort of idea.

We appreciate all the work you're putting into this, Osmose ^.^ Is Gary helping at the moment? I know he had stuff to do first or something.
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Post by: Osmose on May 20, 2007, 01:33:45 PM
Gary's participation is in question due to reasons I don't need to reveal here. But no matter. Progress moves forward regardless!
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Post by: GaryCXJk on May 20, 2007, 02:49:44 PM
Why would you change the PHP tag to CODE? The PHP tag was there specifically for PHP scripts. If you really would love a code tag, I suggest you create a seperate function for it.
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Post by: Osmose on May 20, 2007, 03:05:13 PM
Because there's not that much specific to formatting PHP that doesn't apply to everything else. Such that CODE would simply make all of what is typed in between it shown so you can show HTML, Javascript, PHP, whatever.

It's still got numbered lines, and last I checked there was no color coding, so I don't know what makes it so specifically PHP-exclusive.

echo "This could be Javascript or PHP";
echo "I changed the color because, as you can see, it's pretty ugly as it is. I'm fixing that black text up top that says "PHP" too.";
echo "What? Why is this white now? Didn't notice that before. Well, the new background color fixes this anyway.";
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Post by: GaryCXJk on May 21, 2007, 08:34:41 PM
You mean you didn't know about the fact that PHP started with
 
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Post by: Osmose on May 21, 2007, 09:31:48 PM
Hum. Well I stand corrected, although why it requires you start the PHP when you could be showing a snippet of code. So then I'll remove the need for
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Post by: Osmose on May 24, 2007, 12:18:29 AM
Ugh. If I am not anything, I am not a good web site designer. At least in the design sense - I know loads of HTML and such, but making an actual design? I'm utterly useless.

However, I decided to try and tackle that today, and... failed. I set out to work on what would eventually become the global-nav-thingy that would help link the site together better than it is, and all I came up with was a very unoriginal variant of what we have now. I did compress a lot of stuff into a small space, but the only problem is that there are giant square ad that I can't figure out what to do with. I might have to ask Alex about that...

Regardless, you can see what I got done here (http://img462.imageshack.us/img462/696/headerdesignpi6.png)(To my credit, I got dragged to the dentist right around when I intended to start working today). I'ma go look at the stuff mentioned in the previous post, and hopefully finish that stuff up tonight.

EDIT: Woo! Courtesy of GeSHi (http://qbnz.com/highlighter/index.php), we now have syntax highlighting for the following languages:

-Java
-PHP
-HTML (For some reason this is malfunctioning in testing :)
-Ruby (Yep, the RMXP one)
-CSS Stylesheets
-VB.Net
-C++
-Perl
-Visual Basic (I'm assuming 6, I could be wrong)
-QBasic (Just for Sai :P)
-ASP
-Javascript
-C
-XML
-mIRC Script

Some are unnecessary and might be taken out, but I already cut out a lot and only kept those that were the most likely to be used on Charas (As if anyone is going to be showing off their ASP mastery :P)

I haven't tested all of them yet, as many of them I myself don't know, but hopefully it'll be covered during the Beta.
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Post by: elementalhero76 on May 24, 2007, 02:15:45 AM
Ugh php is still here to stay but, anyways Html? I know some of it.
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Post by: GaryCXJk on May 24, 2007, 05:33:20 PM
I've got some idea. What if you had in the tags what type of code it is. The general code tag would just put everything in Courier New, with numbering in front of it or something, but for example using code=php could just load the PHP processing thing.

It's something that needs to get some testing, since you'll need to just process the code tag, then the code tag with the working code types, then process the other code tags as normal code tags.
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on May 24, 2007, 06:13:11 PM
The site design looks fairly good so far, actually. That 'click here to log in' button was way too inconspicuous, I'm glad you've put in a more user friendly thing.

If you're stuck on the design, keep it simple for now and worry about the stuff you're good at. Layout can be changed at any time when you feel inspired.
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Post by: Osmose on May 24, 2007, 06:29:06 PM
Quote
Originally posted by GaryCXJk
I've got some idea. What if you had in the tags what type of code it is. The general code tag would just put everything in Courier New, with numbering in front of it or something, but for example using code=php could just load the PHP processing thing.

It's something that needs to get some testing, since you'll need to just process the code tag, then the code tag with the working code types, then process the other code tags as normal code tags.


That's actually how it works right now, except that when you don't put in a code type it defaults to PHP.

For example,
Code: (perl) [Select]
I wish I knew perl formats it according to perl, and [CODE=php] does it in PHP.

How the design looks stylistically is not my issue currently, but rather how I can cram everything into the smallest space possible without looking like crap. What I'll probably end up doing for now is using the above and just having the square ad hang around until I figure out what to do with it.
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Post by: Osmose on May 25, 2007, 04:33:28 PM
Hi, my name is Internet Explorer, and I'm NOT GOING TO WORK WITH ANYTHING YOU CODE. EVER.

AKA: Table compatibility, or the lack thereof in IE, is HORRIBLE.
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Post by: Razor on May 26, 2007, 01:29:08 AM
lol IE
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Post by: game_maniac on May 26, 2007, 12:40:12 PM
Honestly, firefox>>>>>IE all the way.
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Post by: Osmose on May 28, 2007, 06:21:47 AM
Hoo boy. Spent the last three days fighting to finally get the design to work in both IE and Firefox, but got it done (Incidentally, a friend has informed me it works fine in Opera as well). The third day, today, was 8 hours of epic battle that culminated in getting the damn login box to work. If you're logged in, this is what you see (http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/3243/screen1rj2.png) (The PM link is only yellow on mouseover, but Print Screen removes the mouse, so meh).

It also notifies you with the little popup box if you have it enabled, just like the forum main page, plus it sticks you on the forum list as viewing somewhere on the main site, just in case someone wants to know that you're on the site doing something. :P

I have work tomorrow, so I don't expect to get much, if anything, done, but I'm really glad to get this done, because this was one of the big components of the whole "Unified site interface" goal. Of course, there's some kinks I still need to track down and iron out, but please bear with me, folks.
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Post by: game_maniac on May 28, 2007, 04:09:33 PM
I like it, you'll eventually fill that white space with some crap right? Also, the upper space looks a lot cleaner as a whole.

Off-topic: OverClocked Remix and Cave Story ftw.
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Post by: Osmose on May 28, 2007, 04:42:30 PM
If you mean the angled white space between the login and the Google search thing, no, that's staying blank. If you mean the space below that entire bar that is all blank, it's already filled - I took the screenshot with Firefox, and I have adblock enabled, as you can see in the bottom right. However, there are in fact google ads in the little space below the bar caused by the angle, as well as some text ads below that.
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Post by: game_maniac on May 28, 2007, 04:45:36 PM
I meant the angled thing between the login and google search, for some reason it seemed incomplete to me.
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Post by: Osmose on May 28, 2007, 04:46:27 PM
Ah. Well, this is what it looks like with ads (http://img231.imageshack.us/img231/8971/screen2yb8.png).
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Post by: game_maniac on May 29, 2007, 05:29:32 PM
Well, it still looks cleaner and less cramped. I like the generator links being centered in the page, right now it's sometimes hard to spot them.
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on May 29, 2007, 06:15:37 PM
The white bit still looks a bit odd. Would it look a bit better like this or something?
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Post by: Osmose on May 29, 2007, 06:29:00 PM
I don't think so. The bar originally was a white bar with the blue inside, and it still is with the new design, only improved. I mean, there's already quite a lot of blue on the site.

Suggestions on other improvements to the site design are welcome.
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on May 29, 2007, 08:10:47 PM
Hmm, I think you're right that blue doesn't work, but that white still has an unfinished feel.

I can't think of anything better to go there though so I'll shut up for now :p
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Post by: Osmose on May 31, 2007, 09:18:51 PM
I am an idiot. I just spent two and a half days trying to figure out when Complete Resources added users to a list of uploaders I found in the database (With the goal of eventually integrating all logins in the site into a single login), and only just figured out that the list I was working on was for the Generators, not Complete Resources.

That plus Phantasy Star Online Blue Burst has been slowing progress down the past couple of days. I'm sorry - I'm weak.  :blue-eye:
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Post by: GaryCXJk on June 04, 2007, 09:49:50 AM
One small hint, if it works on Firefox, you can be sure it works with Internet Explorer. The differences between a page loaded in IE and FF is that IE reads over errors and auto-corrects them. Firefox just interprets them as they are, just like many other browsers.

And if it doesn't work on IE, you must be using a higher version of HTML.

But you just need to remember, the
tag works on both versions, and practically do the same thing, so if you're using layers, go for this one instead of other types of tags. For CSS, I'd just stick with the more common uses of that. Finally, I'd avoid JavaScript when it's not needed. Not only will the site not work when JavaScript is disabled, it's very unreliable, as it can break at unknown points.

Also, try looking into caches for PHP, it could help a little in saving some bandwidth.
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Post by: Osmose on June 04, 2007, 10:02:43 PM
Firefox and IE differ enough to make my life hell when trying to get it to display the same in both browsers. Regardless, today was actually a pretty productive day (It's not over but, as stated before, I'm weak and may fall into PSO or something :P)

First, I finally finished linking all the logins together - now, if you login anywhere on the site, you will be logged in everywhere on the site - generators, Complete Resources, Forum, it's all under a single system.

Also, not only are you brought to the last page after posting, but you're brought straight to your post. Just in case you don't feel like scrolling down. :P

The biggest addon today, however, was the Quick Reply box. You can see a screenshot of it here (http://img455.imageshack.us/img455/9023/screen3az2.png). Basically, if you just want to make a quick post, simply type it down there and click post and WAHBAM! It's posted. Oh, pardon my test post. :)

As for what I'll move on to next, I'm split between revamping the forum header (To both look more like the main site header and to work with the new nifty banners Warxe made way back when) and working on more behind the scenes stuff, like bugfixes and security upgrades, or stuff that affects staff, like Global Mods being able to make news posts (Rather, linking up the news system with the user system so some people can be allowed to make news posts for, say, contests and whatnot).

I'm very doubtful I'll make my end of the summer goal, but I'm going to keep working whether I do or I don't and finish the project.
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Post by: Osmose on June 06, 2007, 03:17:30 AM
Well, after yesterday's post, I went ahead and revamped the news system - and by revamp I mean changed around a few things to allow a certain list of users update the news. I should probably make a page that allows you to change said list. But anywho.

The big thing that I did today was build half of the award system. Again, there's a screenshot to illustrate the system (http://img381.imageshack.us/img381/4729/screen4bs3.png). So far the database is set up and awards are displayed. The part that has yet to be built is the award creation system - eventually we want all members to be able to make awards. It has yet to be decided how exactly this will work.

Should we have mods approve or deny awards before they can be awarded? Should there be limits on how often they can be given? etc etc. We never really elaborated on this, as far as I can remember.

Also, this is being moved to All of All to get more attention. Since the other 3.0 threads were there, why not this one too? :P
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Post by: Dragonium on June 06, 2007, 08:52:35 AM
I like how this looks first, and I'm glad that the awards system is turning out the way I hoped it would.

In response to your questions, in my opinion:

 - Any member can make awards, but I think there should be a limit to say you have to have been a member for a certain time. Otherwise we'd have tons of people signing up and making a load of junk awards, or people making new accounts just to give awards.

 - Mods should approve awards that are submitted to them. Otherwise we get people giving each other awards like "omg u r teh gayz" award. Or "FAGGIT" award. Or something.

 - My opinion on a time limit is one award, per member, per day or week. Depends which one works out better. Ideally people would only give each other awards after a contest or special event, instead of just being cocks and sending them to each other for no good reason, ie, "award for posting in my threadz". Praps a week would work better. I dunno.

 - Everyone making an award has to submit an image for it. And not something like a badly-drawn stick figure or something; nobody wants crappy drawings cluttering up their pages. Sorry to say.

 - In my opinion the image size should be smaller. Like, 50x50 or 60x60 size. This is just personal preference. The only real reason I can see is that if someone gets a lot of awards then large images would somewhat clutter the page.

So yeah. Just my input. Keep up the good work.
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Post by: GaryCXJk on June 06, 2007, 09:53:50 AM
Quote
Originally posted by Dragonium
- Mods should approve awards that are submitted to them. Otherwise we get people giving each other awards like "omg u r teh gayz" award. Or "FAGGIT" award. Or something.
Hmmm... faggit award...
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Post by: Dragonium on June 06, 2007, 10:17:41 AM
You know, keeping track of the Awards System and what everybody's doing may be a bit of a hassle for our existing mods if they're having to keep control of the forums as well. We may need to hire new moderators.

*Not hinting at anything*
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Post by: Cosmos on June 06, 2007, 10:18:39 AM
*will take full advantage of the quick reply* Yay!!!!!
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on June 06, 2007, 04:22:35 PM
Quick reply will = awesome.

Also, awards will have no power if there's five million different ones. I suggest that people submit award ideas and they get made and put on the official list if they get approved, and then members can select an award to give someone. So awards will work like smileys.
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Post by: Osmose on June 06, 2007, 05:10:14 PM
Well me and Razor were talking about it this morning, and roughly,

All awards have a level.

Level 0 - Award created by a member. Nothing too special, but nice anyway.

Level 1 - A Mod has "endorsed" the award. Mod's should only endorse awards that they think deserve it, like a mini-contest or something given only to very skilled artists or something. A bit more prestigious.

Level 2 - A Mod and a Global Mod have endorsed the award. This award will require some work to receive - a contest is a prime candidate for level 2. Level 2 Awards are a a little rare, as they are a sign of great achievement.

Level 3 - Level 3 Awards have the endorsement of a Mod, Global Mod, and Admin. These are the cream of the crop - you get a Level 3 award, you are a master at whatever you did to get it.

Level 4 - Level 4 Awards are reserved exclusively for official Charas Awards. Having one equipped gives a +50 bonus to your awesome stat.

Each member can only create one award, not counting level 2 and 3 awards. So, if Daetyrnis creates an award that gets to level 2, he may create another award. If that award gets to level 2 or 3, he may create yet another one.

When someone chooses to give an award, it sends that member a notice asking if they accept the award. Members can choose to accept or deny awards. Level 3 and 4 awards have a 16x16 icon that will display on the profile to the left of posts of people who have received them.

There's a little more, but I gotta go now.
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on June 06, 2007, 05:54:22 PM
Sounds spiffeh.
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Post by: Dragonium on June 06, 2007, 06:20:03 PM
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Originally posted by Moosetroop11
Sounds spiffeh.


Seconded.
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Post by: Daetyrnis on June 06, 2007, 08:08:11 PM
That's awesome Moose, that seems to work very well.  However, what would the difference be between a "mini-contest" and an actual contest?  Is a mini-contest any random made contest made by a member (ex. Meiscool's various mapping contests) and a real contest is a more Charas-endorsed thing?
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Post by: Osmose on June 09, 2007, 03:59:32 AM
A mini-contest is something along the lines of, say, "Hey guys, let's see who can make the funniest photoshopped picture". Basically something that is a contest but not really demanding a lot of skill to win.  Meiscool's map contest would probably be a 2, maybe even a 3 depending on if they were really big. An official Charas contest would probably go to level 3 or 4, depending on the difficulty of the challenge and the amount of awards being given out.

Phew. Spent pretty much all of today working on the award creation system (Actually making them, uploading pictures, and sticking them in the database). I tested it and it did indeed upload a new award, but permissions on the image were off (Not that big of a deal but it would be a good idea to fix that), and the date was screwed up, but those are just little fixes. However, I still need to add in an interface to view your created awards and edit them (Well, the "interface" for editing awards is there, but the part that makes it function has yet to be made). But those are small tasks compared to getting it all started like I did today.

This is really good training for me, because I'll be doing what amounts to the same as what I'm doing now only on a larger scale for most of the new features, like having entries for games and news updates for them and such. But I've got a whole summer to get to that, so I should focus on finishing what's in front of me.

Also, how about a special type of award, a "Champion" award? It would be an award that can only be held by one person at a time - the creator of the award can take the award away and give it to someone else, and cannot give it to anyone else unless it is taken from the first person? This could be used for things like "Winner of the longest topic kick game" or other stuff like that.
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Post by: Dragonium on June 09, 2007, 09:43:53 AM
Quote
Originally posted by Osmose
Also, how about a special type of award, a "Champion" award? It would be an award that can only be held by one person at a time - the creator of the award can take the award away and give it to someone else, and cannot give it to anyone else unless it is taken from the first person? This could be used for things like "Winner of the longest topic kick game" or other stuff like that.


That sounds to me like a good idea for the big annual Charas contests, like the Smiley Contest. The winner of the contest holds it for one year, until the next time the contest runs, and then it goes to the winner of that, who holds it for one year, etc.

It'd sure raise turnout to big contests; more people would enter to win the award, and the 'Champion' would have to make a special effort to make their entries high-quality to defend their title.
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Post by: GaryCXJk on June 09, 2007, 04:30:51 PM
So, CRC (Charas Resource Contest) would be level...?

And I think CRC previous winners should have their awards.
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Post by: Osmose on June 09, 2007, 04:35:58 PM
Dunno. That's something I'd probably ask the staff about what level they think they should be.
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Post by: Osmose on June 19, 2007, 09:48:23 PM
Ugh. A combonation of some badly-timed plans, a trip to a waterpark, me finally going back to work after having a nice couple weeks off, etc. have stalled work. I finally got the award system more or less finished, though. There's still some things missing, and a few kinks to work out, but it's complete enough that I am going to move on to something else.

Oh, and I'm slowly starting to realize that saying I'd be done by the end of the summer was a bad idea. I'm still trying to work whenever I can, but I also don't want to do things wrong and end up with a security vulnerability, or a crappy job done in general. Hell, even if I'm done with everything else I'll still need to look through the entire website and fix up all the messy spots of HTML, because there is so much that could be fixed to have smaller pages, faster load times, etc.

*looks at list of stuff to do to see what's next*

I guess I should move on to User Groups, next. I'm probably not going to be able to start work on it until tomorrow, but it is moot because I'd like to ask a few things:

1.Should User Groups be approved? If so, by who?
2.Should there be a limit on how many user groups a single person can create? Or a limit on how many they can join?
3.What kinds of things do you want to see from user groups? Group-wide messages, group awards, etc?
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Post by: Fortet on June 22, 2007, 02:53:55 AM
1) Yes. Moderators (Not global, just reg)
2) 1. 5.
3) Group Awards, Group v. Group contests
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Post by: Ben on June 22, 2007, 03:55:35 AM
man, this just sounds sweeter everytime...I...uh

You get the picture.
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Post by: Osmose on June 26, 2007, 04:57:10 AM
I've been swamped by work... again. But finally got some time to work on the site tonight. So far groups can be created and must be approved by an admin (Although I have yet to create the part where the admin approves it :P). Groups can be viewed and show a list of members with useful links to stuff like profiles, PM, and email.

I've been wondering something: Should I drop things that are nifty but not integral (Like Awards but that's already finished, at least mostly finished) in favor of moving to the new server earlier, or should I take my time and make sure things are working and there's a lot of new stuff for the move?

The thing is, as cool as it is, there's always the chance Awards will just become a gimmick and not spark a surge in contests for awards like we hope it will. I can accept that, but it's a matter of if we should drop stuff like that and save it for later after we have all the highly useful stuff, like security fixes, quick reply, the games section, etc. etc.

I'm planning on leaving a few things for after anyway, mainly the Complete Resources revamp and the new site designs, as they are huge things that will take awhile to do, and aren't at the top of the list of stuff to get done (Only reason awards was even done first was because it seemed to be the most simple of the larger goals and I needed to get familiar with the site first). But how do you guys feel?
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Post by: Razor on June 26, 2007, 08:13:27 AM
Personally, I'd like to see the new server come after everything is ready, but that's just me.
It'd be like opening a giant present.
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Post by: A Forgotten Legend on June 26, 2007, 03:12:41 PM
A very large (charas-filled with goodies) present.
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Post by: WarxePB on June 28, 2007, 01:34:13 AM
Suggestion! Add a code thing to format text into RPGMaker code.
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Post by: Osmose on July 06, 2007, 01:42:51 AM
Quote
Originally posted by Warxe_PhoenixBlade
Suggestion! Add a code thing to format text into RPGMaker code.


Perhaps. After the initial release. Most of the big stuff should be done for 3.0, but a lot of other stuff that I will take my time on (And take more time since I'll be working out the kinks in 3.0 anyway since even a beta won't find every bug) will be for what is unofficially referred to as Charas 3.1. I should give amusing release names for these things like Charas 3.0 Revolution and Charas 3.1 Ascent or something. :P

Anywho, most of the work the last couple of days has been not in creating new stuff, but improving. Mainly changing some classes so that, instead of searching the database every time it wanted a piece of info, it only searches it once and saves all the info for reference later. And that was only one some stuff I made, I'll eventually have to do that for the already-existing classes, meaning more fun running through the entire site changing stuff to work with the new change.

I am, however, almost done with group and group member management, and will possibly get started on the approval process for groups so they can, y'know, exist.
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Post by: Osmose on July 09, 2007, 09:13:40 PM
All initial group management tools are done. You can create a group, edit the settings, approve or deny applicants (Or allow anyone to join, or deny anyone membership), set various member ranks, appoint admins to help manage the group, etc.

Too bad groups don't actually do anything right now. :P I'll be changing that soon enough, as my next goal is to allow entire groups to be set as moderators or have some forums only viewable to certain groups. While I'm at it I'll probably fix stuff like Unmod, and make it add to Forum posts (Which will be renamed, like Forum Gaming/Unmod posts or something) and be viewable by every member without showing up on the front page.

After that, I'll go back to groups themselves and add in preferences and other related changes, like allowing group admins to send PMs or emails to every member at once.

Also, yesterday was my last day at work! At least until next summer. I leave for college in the middle of August, but I have a lot more free time now that can go towards working on 3.0 (Because heaven forbid I enjoy some free time before I start college, y'know :P)

At the very least I hope these Dev Journal notes keep you guys confident that I'm plugging away at this. :)
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Post by: Fortet on July 10, 2007, 01:13:00 AM
Hooray! :D
Now get back to work :O


j/k
Enjoy your time 'til college :)
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Post by: A Forgotten Legend on July 11, 2007, 09:42:58 PM
Not kidding.  Get to work. lol.

Groups sounds neat.  This made me for get about 3.0 ... Hm...
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Post by: Osmose on July 12, 2007, 05:46:36 PM
I took all of Monday and most of Tuesday off to celebrate not having to work anymore (At the golf course). Yesterday I worked on groups, and as a result:

-Forums and Categories can now be set to be "Hidden", where they cannot be seen by anyone except administrators and groups assigned to them. So if Team Storyline (Assuming they are large enough to warrant a group) want a forum where they can discuss ideas for stories to develop or share their projects for input from other members, we can create one for them and set it to hidden so only team members can read it.
-Groups can now be set as moderators of a forum. If Team Storyline needs mod powers over their forum for whatever reason, we can simply set the group as mod and they can mod that one forum without having access to the real staff forum and all associated access.

I'm going to spend today working on a few small things, mainly being able to send group-wide PMs, and fixing it so that if you send a PM to someone with a full PM box it goes to their email instead. And probably the ability to hide your email from the public.
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Post by: aboutasoandthis on July 12, 2007, 06:17:50 PM
This sounds like more work than anything I've ever done in my life... Thank you for taking the time to do this.
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Post by: A Forgotten Legend on July 12, 2007, 06:47:05 PM
Quote
Originally posted by Osmose
So if Team Storyline (Assuming they are large enough to warrant a group) want a forum where they can discuss ideas for stories to develop or share their projects for input from other members, we can create one for them and set it to hidden so only team members can read it.
-Groups can now be set as moderators of a forum. If Team Storyline needs mod powers over their forum for whatever reason, we can simply set the group as mod and they can mod that one forum without having access to the real staff forum and all associated access.


Team Storyline feels special.
I take back what I said about:
Quote
Not kidding.  Get to work.
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Post by: Moosetroop11 on July 12, 2007, 10:29:51 PM
Wow, I almost forgot about 3.0 XD

Good job. Glad to see you still working on it. Sounds fantastic.
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Post by: Osmose on July 15, 2007, 01:45:07 AM
Well yesterday was spent(Read: Wasted) going to the orthodontist, getting a haircut, going shopping, and catching up on the sleep I've been missing, waking up at 7 in the morning after going to bed at 3 in the morning.

Regardless, I did at least get the things done that I said I would do in the above post. I am running out of features for usergroups to implement at the time, so I'm going to work on a few tweaks and then get started on the next big feature, which will be... *checks notes to see what else needs to be done*

-Games Section
-For Hire Option
-Revamped CR (Mainly better categories but I'm sure I could find some more things to do with it, suggestions welcome)
-RMXP Compatible Generators
-Forum Header
-Various Fixes including Forum Posting interface and News System

Razor says the last one, so that's what I'm doing, at least tomorrow (As the aforementioned waking up at 7 thing requires me go to bed a little earlier). Requests on what to do next MAY be considered, depending on my mood. :P
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Post by: Osmose on July 17, 2007, 05:35:10 AM
Ugh, really bad couple of days, and tomorrow has the potential to be just as bad, but I promise as soon as I can I'll post up a picture of the new posting interface. It's nothing TOO amazing but I think it's a nice change myself. If enough people complain I'll leave the old one, though. :P
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Post by: Osmose on July 19, 2007, 05:18:27 PM
I'm not even going to try and say that I'm doing as well as I want to, but to appease my own shame, here's what the new post screen will look like (http://img354.imageshack.us/img354/6384/screen5ri3.png).
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Post by: Ben on July 19, 2007, 05:38:41 PM
dont beat yourself up dude. it looks good. I like the menu icons above the text field....And the organization of the smileys too...
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Post by: aboutasoandthis on July 19, 2007, 05:57:45 PM
 Originally posted by Gemini
 
Quote
dont beat yourself up dude. it looks good. I like the menu icons above the text field....And the organization of the smileys too...


I agree. My only suggestion would be to find some way to anti-alias the little icons like Bold and Italic.
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Post by: Tomi on July 19, 2007, 06:08:43 PM
And make it so you don't need a checkbox to add an attachment.  Please.
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Post by: Osmose on July 19, 2007, 06:32:44 PM
The people demand it, so it shall be done.

Also, because of security, I'm going to limit file uploads to the following types:

Images: PNG, JPG, JPEG, GIF
Text Files: TXT, DOC
Music Files: MP3, WAV, MID
Compressed Files: ZIP, RAR

I don't think we've ever had a situation where this was abused, but it's a good idea anyway.

EDIT: After thinking about it, I'm leaning towards not removing the For Hire system, but rather making it more or less a specialized forum.

-The For Hire forum would be locked from normal posting and only be allowed to be posted in by the For Hire page (This involves adding in the ability to lock forums in such a way at all, so that's a bit of a task, and I might as well add in the "Don't appear on the front page" option as well for Unmod [more on that below]).

-The For Hire page will allow people to specify the type of posting, and a quick description for the Thread Title. The post body would include some standard information, links to PM, Email, or contact a person in another way.

-Due to technical reasons, you will not be able to edit your posting (This may change if it becomes a big problem), but you will be able to delete your own posting once you feel that you are no longer available, either due to getting a project, school, work, or any other reason.

Knowing Charas, I don't expect there to be a substantial amount of people using the For Hire feature, which is why I'd rather shunt it to a special type of forum so that at the very least the forums get some new options if it doesn't pan out, and we can remove the forum in that case as well.

Lastly, I'd like to consider re-merging Forum Posts and Normal Posts. I mean, it's kinda dumb that we really need to seperate Forum Gaming posts from Normal posts, like it really matters that anyone has more normal posts or more Forum Gaming posts. Post count shouldn't be a symbol of status or maturity.
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Post by: Ben on July 19, 2007, 10:54:57 PM
I concurr on the post-merging.
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Post by: aboutasoandthis on July 20, 2007, 12:35:35 AM
 Originally Posted by Osmose  
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Post count shouldn't be a symbol of status or maturity.


I love you.
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Post by: Osmose on July 20, 2007, 04:34:49 AM
I'm putting the For Hire option on hold until after the server update (And possibly never). I spent a lot of time working on fixing the Top 10 display (It was a horribly slow way of getting them and would miss some threads, now it's super-fast), and while I was doing that I kept thinking over the idea and it kept on becoming less and less appealing.

On the bright side, that cuts down the to-do list a bit. Roughly,

-Games Section
-Revamped CR (Mainly better categories but I'm sure I could find some more things to do with it, suggestions welcome)
-RMXP Compatible Generators
-Forum Header
-Various fixes (News, post count, tweaks, etc.)

The forum header is being put off until I can get in contact with Warxe and get those rotating banners he made a while back. After I finish each of these goals, we'll enter what should be a relatively simple beta process - I get a group of people I trust to go in and try out everything. If they find something wrong, it gets added to a to-do list. Once everyone is generally satisfied with the new additions, we go back and make any final changes needed (Mainly optimization, as a lot of things could use some updates to make them run faster), and then we go back to Alex for the server move.

The main issue here is the transfer of the database - it's been a few months and we will probably move the server again, but this time there's been changes - the new database contains a lot of new fields and tables and might not be compatible - I'll have to consult Alex about that.

Of the tasks above, the only one that really worries me is the Games Section - it's a hairy situation balancing server space and bandwidth with such a feature. Again, I will consult with Alex, but a few questions:

1. According to Bill (First person I could find online who knew anything about RPG Maker), the average RPG Maker game, compressed, is between 8 and 30 MB. Those are big file sizes. Would you guys be willing to use an alternative file hosting site like MediaFire (http://www.mediafire.com/) and link to it from your game page? I'm unsure about whether images should take up the same amount: We could limit the size like we do attachments. Midis are tiny, too. A game using MP3s will just have to suffer with an alternative host. >=D

2. The Games section will introduce commenting and voting on all things, like screenshots, demos, blog entries. Do you think the Games forum should stay if the Games Section picks up?

3. Should users be allowed to have unlimited Game Entries or should there be a limit?
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Post by: Ben on July 20, 2007, 04:44:57 AM
i think a fair limit is practical. as long as one can delete an old entry.

Not that this applies to me... Ive been here like.... 3 years... and have yet to publish a working version of my game.

one day.... one day....


the xp compatible generator is a stellar thing. Other xp gens are lacking ive found.  That oneidus mad hatter dude that flammed and trolled us last year has made some progress on his, but its all flash based...and i dont like the resources.

theres a spanish one.... but its flawed.

A Scripts forum...sub categorized into Battle systems, Menu systems and Game systems would be something to think about for the future. I know the demmand isnt here now... but with the XP generator, were bound to get some scripters coming around. Ive got friends on other forums who have promised some scripts when the new charas is running.... And Ive got a couple of lame scripts i whipped up myself. But they suck... mine that is. I script like a mute man sings.
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Post by: Osmose on July 20, 2007, 05:06:33 AM
I was considering enabling text file uploads for CR and just creating a scripts area there, but a forum is possible as well.

Charas is made up of 3 parts - The Forums, the Main Site, and the Generators. The Forums and the Generators get most of the traffic, while the main site is mostly an inbetween and the way you get to Complete Resources. One thing I'd love to do is revamp the design and make the site feel more whole - add in a global side bar and header, clean up the whole site. Keep it blue and styled similar to how it is, but, y'know, better. It would make the CR and the generators feel a little more part of the site.

Someday I'll just have to sit down and do it, but that's post 3.0 business.
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Post by: Osmose on July 21, 2007, 05:13:51 PM
Whee. Front page news is now ripped directly from a special Site News forum. Only mods of the forum can make new topics (IE Admins, Global Mods, and the News Usergroup that will be given mod powers over the forum), but anyone can reply to topics. A comments link is shown below news showing the number of replies to the news topic and linking to the thread where you can both view them and post your own.

Also, Forums can be set to not appear on the Front Page, IE Unmod, Staff Forums, etc. Lastly, the resources bar on the right is now cut - names that go over the 18 character limit are cut down to 15 letters plus "..." so it doesn't stretch like it usually does because people like to name their resources "Mr_bobs_super_fancy_red_cape_that_also_serves_as_a_cloak" and such.

Next up: Complete Resources
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Post by: Ben on July 21, 2007, 11:50:14 PM
I think the Text upload is decent... But from other forums..Ive noticed alot of the people downloading the scripts have insane stupid question about some of the more complex scripts (Nicks TBS, ZTBS, Near Fantasticas Squad Based Battle system...not to mention a bauldurs gate Battle system in dev.... these are popular scripts and also confusing to the nubcakes)

Perhaps one forum for FAQs about scripts, and a CR section devoted to it as well? but that may be redundant...just throwing that out there...


Having a forum also helps for Debugging scripts in development.


just saying
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Post by: Osmose on July 22, 2007, 12:11:19 AM
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Originally posted by lucas_irineu
When 3.0 will be released?


Good question.

It'll get released when it's done enough to warrant releasing. Rather, it'll be done when I'm finished with the list I posted and enough people have tested it to prove that it's not broken anywhere important. I originally estimated that it would take me until the end of the summer, but I'm willing to add some more time onto that, especially with college and all. But I'll try to do as much as I can.
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Post by: Osmose on July 23, 2007, 11:21:12 PM
Been working HARD on the Complete Resources. I'll wait until it's done to show what's changed. :)
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Post by: Osmose on July 30, 2007, 01:36:15 AM
It's been nearly a week since I started working on the new CR and all I can say is...

I ****ing HATE CSS MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE IN THE ENTIRE ****ing WORLD CSS NEVER DOES ANYTHING I TELL IT TO DO AND IT ALWAYS FUCKS UP **** AND NO MATTER WHAT I DO I ALWAYS SPEND HOURS TRYING TO GET SOMETHING TO LOOK RIGHT BECAUSE CSS IS BY FAR ONE OF THE SHITTIEST THINGS IN THE ENTIRE WORLD AND I WISH I HAD A COMPLETE CR TO SHOW YOU BUT ****ing CSS HAS HELD ME UP FOR A CUMULATIVE 3 DAYS.

To make up for it:
Everything's all shiny, and it loads quick! (http://img214.imageshack.us/img214/5171/screen6wi8.png)
Previewing a Midi before downloading it. (http://img53.imageshack.us/img53/2087/screen7xk7.png) These popups are all in-browser. You never reload the page while using the CR. It's the same effect the Super Smash Brawl site uses for viewing pictures (Free script that they took, so no I'm not stealing it. :P)
Even uploading resources will occur on the same page. (http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/3008/screen8ow8.png)

All of the new stuff I'm adding in will require Javascript, so for our javascript-disabled friends I'll be updating the old interface to work with the new system. Oh yeah, the design isn't quite final - I don't really have any intention of changing it, but it's just a candidate.

Once I get this damn CSS to work properly.

EDIT: Remind me to murder the W3C for gimping tables specifically to force people to use divs instead... not that you even understand what that means.
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Post by: Razor on July 31, 2007, 02:56:54 AM
I think more people should be looking at how awesome those screenshots are.
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Post by: Osmose on August 04, 2007, 02:09:02 PM
Those screenshots are of the CR without the site header that you can see a few pages back. With it comes those flags as they're a part of it.

One problem, however, is that I'm using new text instead of old text, so it'll have to be re-translated when it's done. I'll probably be asking various people to help update the translations later on.

As it is I'm staring at the generator code attempting to understand what's going on. :P
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Post by: aboutasoandthis on August 04, 2007, 03:41:55 PM
...wow...
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Post by: A Forgotten Legend on August 05, 2007, 05:43:49 PM
These screens are awesome.
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Post by: Phayre on August 05, 2007, 08:55:54 PM
It looks so pretty! I'm now officially excited, which I probably should have been a while ago. Thank you, all working on this. So nice. *hug*
Title: Hey.
Post by: aboutasoandthis on August 06, 2007, 12:54:07 PM
Is there a place for articles and tutorials on the main site? I'm not talking about the Charas Wiki. I mean moreso the section that Gary and Kairou posted in. I'm thinking we could make separate sections for like...RPG Maker, other Programs, Art, Music Composition, etc. What do you think of the idea?
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Post by: Osmose on August 06, 2007, 01:00:21 PM
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Originally posted by aboutasoandthis
Is there a place for articles and tutorials on the main site? I'm not talking about the Charas Wiki. I mean moreso the section that Gary and Kairou posted in. I'm thinking we could make separate sections for like...RPG Maker, other Programs, Art, Music Composition, etc. What do you think of the idea?


Actually, my intention was to add a tutorials section to the Complete Resources, but it might get its own section.

But there are more important questions, mainly:

I'm not going to lie. Anything I do towards the Games section will be just a different setup of the Games forum. At least right now - with lots of work it can become better, but that'll take awhile.

Besides that the only things left to do are tweaks and addons, and the Beta - if I shove the Games section into 3.1, we could have a server move and 3.0 much sooner than expected.

Should I forgo the Games section and start gearing up for the server change?
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Post by: aboutasoandthis on August 07, 2007, 02:26:26 AM
I think you should go ahead, but there is something I need you to do first. Can we PLEASE have a way to tell what page we're on in a thread? Even if it's just the number being colored? It's a little annoying going through big topics.
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Post by: Vlad Shadeu on August 07, 2007, 02:39:34 AM
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Originally posted by aboutasoandthis
I think you should go ahead, but there is something I need you to do first. Can we PLEASE have a way to tell what page we're on in a thread? Even if it's just the number being colored? It's a little annoying going through big topics.


aye, what you say.
we need it badly.
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Post by: Osmose on September 08, 2007, 10:37:20 PM
And over a month later... jeez, I didn't think college would take this much damn time. >_<

Either way, The beta testers helped me compile a list of bugs, which today I have cut down by half and plan to hopefully be mostly done before I go to bed. Once all these bugs are worked out I give them a few days to find anything else, and then go to the big guy upstairs and give him the go ahead for the server switch.
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Post by: Roland_Deschain on September 08, 2007, 10:42:17 PM
So 3.0 will be up soon?
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Post by: A Forgotten Legend on November 23, 2007, 09:42:30 PM
...any news?

*readies for something to yell at me for the over two month kick :blue-eye: *