as everyone else on this site,

Look at competitions and videos - they've never been the main focus and in the end, they got almost neglected. What I fear, as everyone else on this site, is that the level sharing aspect of our community will die out. You however feel that we should shift focus from level sharing into playing user levels, and if that is the case, then our role is already filled. People will go to each separate website to get the news of what's happening along with cunning players, instead of sticking with a community that may or may not know nothing about their favorite game.



WHAT? Not necessary? Partnership would only do us good, it can be managed by the staff and we can get help from the members. The members of the Interguild can get help if needed by players good at the actual game, and the members of our partnered site get to broaden their views.

My proposal is that we try to make friends with site such as fr2db.fr, nmaps.com, the Knytt site and so on, and that we do that as fast as possible, instead of arguing over an idea that only the website owner thinks is good because it may increase the chances of more traffic (without any new advertising).

This is pretty much my view on the partnership. A partnership with those sites will do us far more good than making a database of their levels.

And many of those communities have people that aren't just interested in their own game, but also in other games with level editors. By being about the only forum on the net that focusses on multiple games, people from other sites can go here to find new games to try out.

lol when I read that, the first thing I thought was if you knew what the word "necessary" means. But yeah, that's a misunderstanding, I meant that it's not necessary for this idea to work. That's just something that I was trying to point out, which just made things more confusing since it falsely implied that I was completely against it.

but still, we need something that'll give this site some credibility. Even if we end up making partnerships with other sites, what exactly would we do with those partnerships aside from link to each other? Maybe some cross-site comps? (which is a pretty cool idea, actually ) But then again, it'll be weird b/c we'd be running competing databases and where would you upload your levels to? their site, or ours, or take the time for both?

And we really need some kind of thing that'll give this site some purpose, something that could let us stand alone from other sites at least, whether we decide to go with the directory idea or not.

come on, I wasn't saying that as a bad thing. I just said that that's all you're worrying about, while I worry about that too plus more traffic in general, even if they don't join into the community. The more traffic we have, the greater the possibilities of someone joining.

yeah, that's an issue too, but the main reason why the video archive and the comps have been neglected is because they've mainly been dependent on me for their updates and whenever I find myself with little time, work builds up, and like most people ( ), I procrastinate on that work... But the level database is probably the single biggest thing so far because it's updated by all the members who use it. Therefore, if there are tons of levels being uploaded all the time by the active community, it should be relatively the same if we didn't have the directory levels.

And think about it, right now people are already leaving our site for their respective large fan sites (or rather they're not even bothering with this site because of those large fan sites). Adding a directory that tracks all of those levels from several sites, will certainly give us something that no other site has, which will give us more of a fighting chance than we have now against those sites in terms of traffic (though I'm honestly not sure by how much).

AND, think about it: right now, why would anyone want to really visit the Interguild for? probably so they can share levels for any games that don't already have established fan sites. HATPC would be a great example for this scenario. It's these kinds of games that give our site the most member activity, and (whether we do the directory idea or not) it's with these games that our site has the strongest level-making communities behind them. So even if we do the directory idea, most of our activity will still naturally be with the "smaller" games that don't already have super huge fan sites, and the larger games continue to not have as many members who come here for the bigger games. Therefore, how can you argue that a directory of levels will take away from our level-making focus? The directory idea will mostly affect the bigger games, which won't have much traffic here anyway. And at least the the directory idea might give us more traffic for the bigger games.

So unless you think that a large directory of levels just won't work, period, then I don't see why this idea isn't worth trying, because it'll at least increase our traffic for those big games, while not affecting much the lesser-known games, which will naturally give us more members and activity than any large game can.

looks like this topic died. and no one even replied to my last post, which I thought was really cool if a wall of text can even be cool.....

how about we do this idea as a sort of experiment and if it fails we can always get rid of it?

but then again, I still have yet to do all the revamps for videos and guides and comps archive and stuff. But you shouldn't reject this idea on only those grounds, because I have a feeling that doing this would have a bigger impact than fixing everything else first. And actually this won't take as long as some of the other things since it's just a new thing added to the level database, instead of a full revamp.

a full two days and no replies? what, are you guys boycotting this topic or something?

ehm. that be long. you expect us, the busy important people of the world, to read all that. geez...

i'd support a summary of this all. but apparantly i have time today, so i'll read it all.

I think there are no replies because we're done considering it... ?

I have no reply because I've already given my opinion.

Fine I'll post. Partnership sounds good, but a huge-multi-site-multi-game level gallery filled with peoples levels who we don't even know I don't like. We should get more members and popularity before making that kind of move.

now that's just insulting. You're implying that everything in that post has already been said and that you've already responded to it all, which is not true. It can also be interpreted to say that you refuse to consider other opinions and that yours is supreme or something-- not that I actually believe that....

I dunno, it looks like I have a really different perspective on what this will be like than what all of you think. Actually, while I'm still reading implications , I could probably take what you just said and take it to mean that you just don't like large databases of levels because you don't know anybody there.

But still, on the whole idea of us holding different perspectives, I've always seen it as a directory (not an actual level database) which has been added onto our current level galleries, but that you still have the convenient feature of searching through both at the same time. The purpose of directories is to link people to stuff that are in several places, so this idea actually serves purpose, and it'll be much more enjoyable to browse through a combined level database and directory than it will ever be to browse our current database, and at its current rate of growth of hits/popularity, too. (In fact, that rate is probably less than or equal to zero right now....)

And if you read my last post , I proved that the such an idea will not affect our current balance of activity for certain games in a negative way. In fact, the largest games here on the site won't have much popularity here anyway b/c everyone will go to their respective large fansites for levels rather than us. These are precisely the games that will mostly be affected by the directory, and with the directory, these games will increase in use/popularity on this site.




And another thing: you have to think from the perspective of newcomers to the site. New members don't care about what the database used to be or what it could've been; they see what is there and they get impressions from what they see.

So what do they see when they see our current system? They see an ambitious level database that attempts to stock levels for any games its members desire (made all the more crazy with the "Add New Game to List" button under the games menu). This gets them mildly excited, so they look through some of the available games, they see Free Rider 2 and remember how much they love Free Rider 2. So they click on it and then.....! They are somewhat disappointed to see that we only have like 30 FR2 levels. After trying some, they look at some other games. N! no that doesn't have many levels either... Zelda Classic? What's that? only 3 levels? no wait, one of those levels is a "series".. Then they find that the major bulk of the levels belong to a game called Hannah and the Pirate Cavess, but all of the other games are generally empty. At the end of their visit, the member is rather disillusioned and decides to leave this little sad-looking database, because they just remembered that they rather do something else.

But what will they think when they find something called the Interguild's "Level Database and Directory"? Like in the previous scenario, they will be fascinated by our ambitious plan to include all games members want, all the while wondering what a "database and directory" could be. So they start browsing and they see that many of these levels have a marking of which sites they came from, and they realize: "wow, this is a giant collection of levels from all across the web! I think I'll start looking around this place". So they go to look at some of the games in the system. They see collections for Free Rider 2, notice that several of them are from fr2db.fr, while some others are from trackmill.com, still others from freerider2.org, others from sites they've never heard of, and finally, they see tracks that are uploaded straight to the Interguild. At this point they realize: "you can upload levels straight to this site too? That makes this place even more impressive ". So they look at some of the other games on the site. When they find their favorites (assuming they're into some of the bigger games, which would represent the average person), they are excited to go looking through the list. If they don't have time, they may bookmark us for later. They may be disappointed if they find some empty game databases, but this may not matter to them if they have no idea what these games are and if they are still impressed with the games that do matter to them. Plus, all that may change, since the increase traffic may lead to more people willing to try those games, and eventually to upload levels to our site. At this point, they will realize: "this is cool. Not only is this one giant collection of levels from my favorite games, but they also give me a place to share my Red Remover levels! It sure is cool how they even let you share levels for any game, no matter how obscure it is. " And all of that will tie back into the idea that the Interguild is here to help fans further enjoy their favorite games [that have user-created content], no matter how unpopular or popular those games are.

hey this turned out to be a pretty cool wall of text

I have only scanned the latest posts, but I agree with this

Livio, you seem to be the only one pushing this and I still feel that the galleries are better with active users contributing levels. I don't think you can sway my opinion and that is probably the same for jell. The idea itself can't change drastically and so I see your arguements as being quite similar.

but what I'm saying is that you guys have a completely different perspective on the idea, so I've been trying to make you guys see it through my perspective. I seriously think this is a really good idea, and you guys haven't really tried to prove to me why it isn't. And the fact that I think it's so great and that you guys don't think it's good at all leads me to think that we just have different ideas on what this idea really is. 0_o

If you want us to view it from our perspective try to view it from ours.

I said this before, but the whole idea reminds me of the cavelist. This whole discussion reminds me of the "cavelist-->galleries movement" idea we decided against a while back. If this system were an extension of the cavelist and not the level databases, then I definitely would find the idea less objectionable. Please be patient as I work through the logistics of this system.

If we made the cavelist into a directory of HATPC levels, and included the uploaded levels as one potential source of HATPC levels, a problem becomes apparent when it comes to keeping the information up-to-date. Currently, this is done through viewing the information, but, since it's currently a database of usernames and not of levels, it doesn't really matter whether the information is correct or not. I'm not really sure how we would go about keeping them up-to-date. I think Marz has the levels of his database scanned in small bunches, periodically, as well as when they're viewed. HATPC levels coming from other sources, like the interguild's HATPC section of the level-database, could be updated when the levels themselves are updated. Now, this would be easy for us to implement, since we ourselves control the level database.

So, this system would work for levels that do not change. Red-Remover levels are one example, but I'm pretty sure there are others; I think all the URL-Based levels work in this matter. Assuming we can find a way to verify whether a Red-Remover level exists, a cave-list-esque directory could be set up tomorrow. A problem arises when we start including databases, like our own level-database, but those that we do not control. How do we keep those maintained? If we can convince other sites to partner with us, and then provide them code which will update our directories... that'd kind of cool, actually. I'm not sure how they'd automatically maintain it for us. Allowing them, and thus, anybody, to arbitrarily add/delete/modify the levels of our directory is dangerous, so if all they do is prod our database, the same way that quick-searching for HATPC levels does, that could work, and then all they have to do is prod us every time a level is added/modified or deleted. I'm sure Livio would have a fun time writing code to parse all of these different databases, depending on which one is prodding him. If they do not wish to partner, information would have to updated periodically, since it's doubtful that relying on the levels to be viewed would be sufficient enough.

So, I think this would work as an extension of the cavelist. It'd have an "add/update/delete" page, which is open to anyone, where you select a database, provide a level id, and then that page of that database will be parsed, and the level is added if it exists, updated if it has changed, and deleted if it exists no longer. Partnered sites would add code to their pages to automatically prod our "add/update/delete" page whenever a level is added, modified, or deleted. Livio seemed to not have been able to do this, both with the COTW bot, and when we updated ours and Marz databases; hopefully this is possible. I don't see how the cavelist is able to display cavecodes if it can't load other pages. Question for Livio: If you open a cavelist page the same way you open pirate_level_load.php, is the cavelist's information updated? We'd have to track different information depending on which game the level is from and even which database is being used. There'd also need to be a back-up plan, if the Interguild happens to be down when the update is attempted.

OK, that's enough thinking out loud. If this were a cavelist, with its searchability, lack of forum topics, unobtrusiveness, automation, and praise system, that'd work for me. That said, I can't help but think there are things that need our more immediate attention (I'm looking at you, guides, video archive, and bunches of other stuff).

yes? Well, when you open the cavelist page, it loads pirate_level_load.php, and before the page displays that information, it goes through it picking out any information that we need, and then it saves it. So we can apply this to other sites as well. For example, if you went to this random level at nmaps.net:
http://www.nmaps.net/178363
We could automatically load that page, and automatically pick out the title, the date, the level code, author, description, and anything else we'd be interested in recording.

And speaking of the cavelist, one of these days, I'm going to merge the cavelist database table with the level database table so that you can search through them at the same time, but without doing anything to the CaveList pages. Except, that these levels wouldn't have ratings or forum topics, and may in fact just redirect you to their cavelist pages instead. And the way that they will be displayed when browsing is that it'll have some kind of italicized, colored text under its title that says "CaveList Entry" or something. And this would probably be the same way directory levels would be displayed throughout the database too. The only reason I want to keep them together with the directly-uploaded levels is so that they can all be searched through in one place.

As for updating, I think only the recently-added levels should be periodically updated. Levels that are more than multiple weeks old will most likely not be having any updates. So it's not like we would have to run these massive checks on the entire database.

But since all of these levels are going to be browsed through the regular level database, I was thinking that we might as well let people rate levels and comment on them when they want to [meaning that topics would be created upon first comment], because that would add more coherence to the overall collection of levels and make it easier to search through, while also letting people recommend the levels to others. The comments aren't really necessary for reasons other than rating, but I guess it would also be interesting because you could comment on multi-year-old levels here and unlike on other sites where those levels are long dead, people might actually reply to you here, so you can ask for help with beating the level and stuff.

but yeah there's tons of stuff to do. I actually got a lot of cool ideas for the guides revamp today, but I'm too busy with getting that Aeon demo out as soon as possible, but I can't do that because of all the homework I've been getting, and I also really have to apply for colleges and some scholarships that are about to reach application deadlines soon. So yeah, I'm really busy lately...

Oh, and as for that idea of putting code for partners to update our database alongside with their's, yeah, it would have to be kinda like what you said. I'm actually not sure if I understood what you said, but lol, in order for our partners to update our levels simultaneously, the best way would probably be to simply make them load or include a page of ours, which will only need to know the id and the site it's for, and then do everything else automatically, whether it's removing, updating, or adding a new level. That will reduce hacking attempts at least.

"yes? Well, when you open the cavelist page, it loads pirate_level_load.php, and before the page displays that information, it goes through it picking out any information that we need, and then it saves it. So we can apply this to other sites as well."
What? I mean, if, say, the COTW bot, instead of adding all the information to the cavelist itself, opened the cavelist page for the username it finds (instead of adding it to the cavelist manually), using the same mechanism it used to open the COTW page. Would that succeed in adding the username to the cavelist? ... I'm not sure what question it was that you just answered.

"And speaking of the cavelist, one of these days, I'm going to merge the cavelist database table with the level database table so that you can search through them at the same time"
NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is the same as what we're arguing against!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You missed my point entirely!!!!!!!!! What you're proposing for this whole directory thing is JUST LIKE the cavelist, EXCEPT it's going to include levels from more sources than just the uploaded HATPC levels. DON'T merge it into the galleries, bring references to levels from the galleries into it, BUT keep the galleries as THEIR OWN ENTITY, separate from the list.


It's like the only thing you read of my whole post was the part where I specifically called you to answer a question.


MAIN POINT: TURN THE CAVELIST INTO YOUR DIRECTORY.

SECONDARY POINT: Levels from our own level database will be included in this directory, and this connection will be implemented the same way as the connection to other level databases (not by merging them together).

oh.... no, it adds the level to the database itself. I thought it would be inefficient to load neopets, then load the cavelist, which then loads the level code.... but it would still work.

lol I truly stink at communication.... what I was proposing was a change in the back-coding of the whole thing without changing any pages, other than the galleries, which would have a new option to mix cavelist results within the regular results (you can do that right now but they are not mixed in; it looks ugly). And then I suggested that we could take advantage of this and add other features.

if the directory will include our levels, then that fixes everything. But to have two separate systems..... But then that would make the regular database obsolete for people who just want to browse through levels (assuming the directory will give you options to limit searches by site), and the main database would only be useful for uploading levels to this site, so there's no reason, pragmatically, to divide these two systems.

It feels weird, but if that's what it takes to get this idea approved, then sure...

The idea was, there'd be a stripped-down add/update/delete php page that other sites, when their own levels are added, updated, or deleted, would just make a connection to that page using their site id and the level id, and the level would be updated, automaticaly. We'd just have to get our partnered sites to add a very small amount of code to their add/edit/delete pages. Any sites where the levels are constantly changing (like the uploaded HATPC levels, and not like red removed levels) and whose database owners aren't willing to automatically update our list, would need to be updated somehow, other than just view or quick-searching the level, and even the automatic ones would need a back-up plan, if we happen to be down at the time the level is updated.

The difference is that the directory is not really part of the community. There's no forum, no karma ratings, no level/difficulty ratings, no obtrusion into the community. Only the praise system, to help with searches and to provide some minimal feedback. The level-database is for the members and the community. That's the difference.

Also, why don't the game-specific options work when viewing levels from all games? Why do they even show up when you're not? You could make it so that, when you select those options, it only limits by those options when returning results of that game only. The cavelist results do look kinda gross, though, lol. I like that they're separate, though. I think it'd work better if the cavelist only returned a few (say 10) select (say, most-praised) results, always returned when searching levels of games compatible with the list, and appeared smaller and at the bottom, with maybe a link ("More...") to the equivalent search of the cavelist (or directory, or whatever). Do ALL the search options apply to the cavelist, like uploader-glitchiness (which would need to be determined in a different way, and wouldn't be 100% conclusive; same way Marz says "it may be broken"), for example?

actually, I think that's lying to you when it says they only work when you pick their games... Maybe it should say that they "work best" when you pick their respective games.

well, I guess my suggestions would be to make it automatically "not part of the community" but it can still be part of it if people want certain levels to be. Like, only if you want to comment on it or rate it, will it even have topics or ratings. I dunno, it's watered down, and I don't see what the big deal would be.

but what I was saying is that to avoid hacking, the best way to make it work would be to just make a page that will only need to be told which level to update. Then it'll check that level to figure out what has to be done. If it's not in the database yet, then it'll add it. If it's only been updated, then it'll update it. And if it no longer exists, then it'll delete it. All to avoid any hacking...

I tried it using all-games searches, and it did not work. Also, the cavelist results disappear after changing pages. Is this supposed to happen?

If you want to comment on it or rate it, contact the person who wrote it and convince them to join and add their levels to the database.

The page I was suggesting would need to be told only what level to update as well? Of course it'll need to know the site and that site's level id for it, or else, how could it possibly "add it", using say, only our own level ID? I don't know what, but I think we're suggesting the same thing? The idea is that the other sites could just tell one of our php pages a site ID and the level's ID, and then it gets updated, without us having to raise a finger. The problem is if we're down, then there'll have to be, like, an error log on their side, and every so often we'd have to manually (or through a bot we could write), go through all the error logs and update the levels within, and then tell that site to clear the logs...

You gotta love the interguild for how political everything gets. It's probably a good example of why direct democracy would never work.

As fascinating as this database debate appears to be, I unfortunately don't have the time to pick out all the points that have been made by Livio/csd in these large posts. However, I saw someone talk about a partnership and I find this an interesting topic. About a year or so ago, I received an offer from the owner of a large Neosite and we discussed the idea of merging. The only reason that I refused was that the interguild would become a subordinate 'branch' of this Neosite - despite getting high levels of traffic, we would lose our sense of identity. I have always believed in interaction with other sites, but the problem is getting two sites to actually mingle with each other. I wish I had more time today to talk about this - maybe I will later.

lol I just posted seconds before this saying "maybe they're just tired of reading large posts".

speaking of Interguild politics, I just realized that the original idea of separate guilds joining forces and NOT being a merge is very similar to the federalist system form of government in the U.S. We must be geniuses.

sounds like I should exercise my power and launch the Interguild into a grand experiment..

yeah because you're really supposed to go to the cavelist to see more results. I didn't want to have to work out a pagination system that takes into account two different lists of data.