Random Suggestions (Was: 0.2.8.3.1: What to put into it)

[Z-Man]

I'll be trying something different this time, to keep the pure bugfix release 0.2.8.3.1 as pure as possible. I'm going to maintain it purely on SVN and only merge those changes in from 0.2.8 that are clearly bugfixes. For that to work, I'll obviously need a list of those changes So if you fix a bug, please post the revision here. Can be from SVN or bzr.

The rough time for the release of 0.2.8.3.1 would be when the product of the number of significant changes (a bit weighted, a normal change gets 1, a tweak gets .25, a security fix 100) times the number of weeks passed since the previous release is 9 or more.

[Z-Man]

First batch of patches:

Code: Select all

------------------------------------------------------------------------
r9316 | bazaarmagetron | 2010-01-20 23:13:21 +0100 (Wed, 20 Jan 2010) | 1 line
Manuel Moos: Fixed typos.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r9315 | bazaarmagetron | 2010-01-20 22:16:30 +0100 (Wed, 20 Jan 2010) | 2 lines
Manuel Moos: Added shuffle suppression texts.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r9314 | bazaarmagetron | 2010-01-19 02:28:41 +0100 (Tue, 19 Jan 2010) | 2 lines
Manuel Moos: Sound no longer stops for entire rounds if you alt-tab away.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r9309 | bazaarmagetron | 2010-01-16 19:01:46 +0100 (Sat, 16 Jan 2010) | 2 lines
Manuel Moos: Made GCC (4.1, with --pedantic) happy, again.

The sound fix is the important one, counting as 1. The others.... let's generously say combine to another one. We're at two effective changes and four weeks away from releasing the thing.

[[NNJG]Ben]

I would like to see in the dedicated version: Built in Map Creation Software. That would really expand Armagetron Advanced

[compguygene]

you really should try a trunk, or .3 series server. sine.wav's racing server, adventures in tron:racing uses a .3 series binary, and seems very stable. The reason for his use of a .3 series server is to have map rotation.

[Z-Man]

Yep, this one is bugfix only. I should have put it into the dev only section, it's really only of interest internally.

(You can request a backport of that feature to 0.2.8 in general, where we'll have to to one more release anyway, but it's likely to get denied, too, because we're very careful about backports.)

[sinewav]

How about something to filter space/characters at the beginning of names in the server browser? It's getting more and more ridiculous to sort the list by name. Now we have a bunch of "[NNJG] Servers" with 3 or 4 spaces in front. WTF.

Oh wait, here is an even better idea! How about something that works like mates filtering, but the opposite of bookmarks? You can tag servers to "hide" and toggle them on and off from the list.

I mean this is getting out of hand. There are substantially more servers than players. Imagine how fast the browser would load if we didn't have all these... wait, wait, Phytotron said all this already. Sorry.

[Z-Man]

That's not a bugfix Trunk is already doing that filtering, IIRC, and for the anti-bookmark suggestion, you can already give individual servers a negative score bias by pressing - on them, moving them down the list and getting them pinged last the next time.

[Lucifer]

I'd kind of like to have an option to hide servers with 0 players. I'd like that information sent to the master server so I don't have to watch it download 200 server names and only show me 5.

[Z-Man]

Two problems with that: if you do that, who will start playing on an empty server? And the masters don't really poll the servers often enough ('course, that could be changed).

[Phytotron]

Lucifer is being sarcastic, right?

[Z-Man]

Hard to tell

[Lucifer]

Oh right, I forgot the master doesn't ask such things. No, I wasn't being sarcastic. I do want to not sit and watch the download of 200 server names, knowing that only 8 of them are occupied, and I'm either going to an occupied server or shutting down the game.

Beyond 0.2.8, maybe we could have the master poll more often and track usage, so the servers that get used the most can be marked accordingly, and the client only show those? (optional, of course, and I do see how it would make it harder to bring in a new server, so that's a problem to solve)

Maybe we could just get downright bitchy with the master server and tell people that if their server doesn't get enough traffic, it'll be delisted? Then have them jump through hoops to fix that?

(I'm sleepy, give me a break! )

[DESiRE]

I think you should add a integrated system that let's users know when there is an updated version of the game.

Also, make the forums more popular. Let users somehow know in game of new messages they may have on here, new announcements, etc.

[Phytotron]

Well then, I must absolutely object to Lucifer's suggestions.

So, what, a player connects to the MSL and only sees the populated servers? And what if he wants to play in an empty server, or browse the server list to check out what's available; he's just shit out of luck? And how do those populated servers get located and become populated in the first place; server owners are just going to have to provide custom connect IP's somewhere on the web? Then players are just going to have to somehow stumble upon them, custom connect, and hand-edit bookmarks to return? And de-listing unpopular servers is downright assy. Who the hell are you to make that decision?

This isn't a ******* popularity contest.


This game really has become a lot of "let's implement Lucifer's latest whim that he conceived irrespective of any consideration of anyone or anything other than what he fancies for himself." And that is why I've suggest you make your own game; you clearly want it to be yours.

Or maybe go join the T2O team, so you can lord over their server list.


(Surely you're aware of score biasing and sorting the list by Users. Like it takes more than a few seconds?)

[DDMJ]

On the Master Server List, you should add a "Armagetron News - Click Here" link above the host your own server thing. When you click it, it loads some screen that rincludes some txt file online that can be edited by Z-Man or Tank to show the latest news and updates and even have links to the respective forum topics that players when clicked (via the mouse or enter on the keyboard) launches their internet browser.

Obviously there are a ton of things about this idea that would have to be tweaked (i.e. how to launch internet browser if arma client is in fullscreen mode), but I'm just throwing out an idea inspired by DESiRE's post above.