Dr Brain

Sure, we've been having lots of trouble getting a new client for the PC, but an iPhone should be no trouble at all. I'll see if I can have it done by tomorrow.

The motivation for new billers (I think) comes from the perception that the SSC application process won't change. People work on a new biller so that they *can* change the application process. They add technological features to the biller to keep themselves entertained (it's what programmers do, after all). So, let me rephrase your conclusion: We would do better to put the resources for the new biller into getting access to the current one.

IPv6 will never be an issue. For starters, it's been around so long that it's a joke. Secondly, it's so easy to tunnel one inside the other that it won't be a serious issue.

A lot of the core modules are tightly interlinked, but there are only a few that deal with the login sequence. I wouldn't imagine that it'd be too difficult to add an extra step. I thought you were trying to write an entirely new protocol, which would be pretty much impossible. Extending isn't too bad.

ASSS stands for A Small SubSpace server. The subspace specific stuff goes with the title. Take out the subspace code and you're left with a loadable module framework, and not much else. As for the population stuff... Hyperspace has had peaks of 90-100 players before. I'm pretty sure HZ has run 150 players for events and such. There's really no reason stability would change at higher populations. All the code is present to deal with pids exceeding 255, so that's not an issue.

I think the game lives from the top down and dies from the top down. The problem isn't that there aren't enough new players or that old players are leaving. Those are symptoms, not the fundamental problem. The problem is stagnation. The game isn't growing, because the people holding all of the power don't care anymore. My personal opinion is that it's too hard for new, creative zones to start up. Why bother going through all the hassle of creating a zone if no one is even going to join your server because you don't have SSC access? And of course you can't get SSC access unless you personally know someone who's willing to break the rules on your behalf. It's easier to move on and do other things with your life. Small zone owners drive this game, and their souls are being crushed one by one. That is what is happening to the community.

I developed a system a couple of years back using private/public encryption that made it possible to authenticate clients to zones without the zone needing to know the users password...It can't be used with continuum of course...but it might be worth a look at if you are looking for some inspiration. I can describe how it works in detail here. Biller has private key. Clients come with public key Clients encrypt password with public key + salt Zone forwards encrypted password to biller. Biller decrypts password and checks it matches Biller returns to Zone players UserId (which is then used to track the player) This avoiding the zone ever coming into contact with the players password Of course this system relies on keeping the biller private key secret. http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.p...lease_id=578122 Its currently implemented as a HTTP web service Only works if you don't have zones being part of new player registrations. Otherwise, yeah, public key cryptography and md5 hashing with salts is the way to go for authentication.

I've always thought that maps going into another zone's folder would be a big turn-off.

I'd switch Hyperspace to a new biller if newbie and test zones are were not denied from connecting to the biller. I've long thought that disallowing fledgling zones has hampered creativity in this game. The security issue is just a sham (there are security issues, yes, but there have always been acceptable solutions). The real issue is that the people in charge don't care to change the way things are. The authorization system for the biller that exists now is a joke. Hyperspace was disconnected from the SSC biller for 8+ weeks (I don't recall the exact number) because not enough people on the council were alive to approve the server change. No one said no, mind you. Just not enough people replied to say yes. You ask what has come of this community? Quite simply, it's killing off its most important resource: aspiring zone owners. If the people on the council truly cared about this game, they'd give up the stranglehold they've got upon it and allow the game to grow again. Maybe that's what spawned Polix's original post. I hope so.

lol, panic attack much? When have I said that I was against new mods? All I said was that I didn't see a need for one. Besides, it's not my call. I haven't been the guy in charge of mods for years and years. I don't know why you say it's rapidly dwindling. The population has been fairly constant over the past month. People have short memories. The zone's population is very cyclic. This time of year, it's low. Population correlates well with development activity (that's correlation, not causation), and two thirds of the way through the spring and fall semesters is always the low point. Around finals time it always picks up.

I've used geometry and trig countless times in engineering projects, carpentry and some of the more artsy programs I've written (I've even used it developing Hyperspace in a few spots). Yeah, people who go on to be historians and CEOs probably don't care (even then the deductive skills will probably be useful at some point), but any future scientists or engineers need geometry badly.

Not really dying. It has been consolidating somewhat, though.

I like the fact that players care enough to put their setups into Excel. Makes me smile

In this case, it takes about the same amount of time to make an imperfect system as to make a perfect one.

It'll be a while yet. There's still a bunch of work to do on the item related stuff.

That's our current avenue of approach.

We like to slow down the income of money when you get to higher levels, not speed it up. Helps keep the footing even between newbies and vets.

Back online now.

Still could only figure out about half of what you were talking about. Some of the things you suggested will be addressed as part of hscore3.

Reading forums don't take much time, and habits are hard to break just because you've got a lot to do

PD copies what it's owner is doing.

This post is getting off topic. If you guys want to talk about sigs, start a sig topic.

I've been working this zone for almost 9 years. The fact that anyone at all plays it means I must be doing something right. The population dropping is not the zone dying. I know what it takes to get the population back to 30-40, and when I get the time, it'll happen. I've been sick for three weeks (and still am), and I have my master's thesis due in less than a month.

What is an Activity Director going to do differently than Unix did? Providing any sort of power, even arena owner, is a huge security problem. Giving someone arena owner is enough to let them gain sysop level access to the zone. That means we're extremely cautious in hiring people, since we've been bitten in the past (see exhibit A: Quigybobo). The higher level commands also have a bunch of huge flaws, meaning it's easy to crash the zone if you don't know exactly what you're doing. I'm pretty sure everyone with staff level access has crashed the zone at least once using a command they weren't intimately familiar with. I haven't been convinced that there's a good reason why I should give someone that sort of access.

"fc", "ad", "aw". I assume you're asking me to take multiple hours out of my life to implement whatever it was you were talking about. I don't think it's unreasonable for me to ask you to take a few extra minutes to clean up your post so I can actually understand what it is you're asking.