Project Dev Boost

[aquarius]

the idea is to let anyone test their maps and such without waiting on someone - should be simple, just needs to give any player the abli!@#$%^&*y to type ?startdev and the module will grant the player an arena identical to his/her playername where he/she has a list of commands to upload and test their developments - powers only work in their arena, and ?cd is not one of their options (security)

 

note: i will be making a little ASSS tutorial website aimed at noobs so they can figure out how to include .conf's in .conf's and such, and make sure the map is set correct in arena.conf

 

commands:

 

?putfile - this will be used to upload to the players' arena folder only, the module will have to direct the file there - Note: player can not upload any .conf files, or recieve the in-game editable .conf panel because of security issues.. unless somehow the module can scan the conf for security breaches (edits in illegal settings) - but i doubt that, so the player needs to be able to use ?seta (or a similar mirrored command) to edit settings, and not be able to recieve the in-game .conf (esc-c) or use ?quickfix - this should be possible but the only conflict is within intelligence - will the players be smart enough to use this thing without being able to use esc-c, quickfix, or upload .conf files?, will they be able to simply use ?seta? the answer is yes because i'm putting together a very nice chart on the tutorial website which they can use for a reference for all purposes

 

?seta - this will give the player access to almost all arena and ship settings, only excluding the ones that are harmful to the zone

 

?objon and objoff - for lvz toggling

 

?warpto - for warping around the map to test different spots quicker

 

 

 

as for testing modules - this can crash the zone so we will need to approve people for this so module developers will be recruited as usual for now unless any of you module programmers already here can think of a way to implement a means of module testing without breaching security or making zone crash (i personally doubt it)

 

if any fellow ssdev can think of more commands needed, or find a problem in any of this, please speak up - and if anyone is willing to take this upon themselves to give the average pilot the ability to dev quick and easy, enhancing our development comminty - please speak up and let us get this done

 

thanks in advance from everyone who will be using this

[aquarius]

Just realized I made this post. I'd still like to see this happen. Shouldn't be too hard.. We have SSCA Subspace Dev. which is ASSS. So we can create a Usergroup with said commands.

[aquarius]

bump this is a good idea

[Hakaku]

?seta - this will give the player access to almost all arena and ship settings, only excluding the ones that are harmful to the zone

Why would a setting be harmful to the zone? Settings are per-arena only. I see no issue with granting a player the ability to play with any of the settings (?quickfix, ?getsettings, esc+c). The worse that can happen is they screw up their own arena, making it unplayable. In this case, I would suggest a command that completely cleans their arena file back to its original format.

 

?putfile - this will be used to upload to the players' arena folder only, the module will have to direct the file there - Note: player can not upload any .conf files, or recieve the in-game editable .conf panel because of security issues.. unless somehow the module can scan the conf for security breaches (edits in illegal settings) - but i doubt that, so the player needs to be able to use ?seta (or a similar mirrored command) to edit settings, and not be able to recieve the in-game .conf (esc-c) or use ?quickfix - this should be possible but the only conflict is within intelligence - will the players be smart enough to use this thing without being able to use esc-c, quickfix, or upload .conf files?, will they be able to simply use ?seta? the answer is yes because i'm putting together a very nice chart on the tutorial website which they can use for a reference for all purposes

The only thing that players should be allowed to do is upload new maps and possibly .lvz files, there's no reason for allowing anything else. Changing maps can already be accomplished with the ?putmap command, though you'd need to create your own ?putlvz command. To avoid map clutter, I'd suggest modifying the ?putmap command so that the uploaded map's name remains constant (e.g. have it always use the name of the arena + .lvl), so that it replaces the previously existing file.

 

You might also want to add ?recyclearena, so that players don't have to exit the arena and wait 30 seconds to have the arena changed.

[aquarius]

You're right. I never looked at it that simple..

 

We still encounter a problem when it comes to users having the same powers in all arenas (not based on their username) and could mess with other peoples stuff, and this is asss and unlike subgame they can mess arenas up by not knowing what they're doing..

 

For now I will allow these powers to everyone considering ssca ssdev is basically deserted. But I guess what is needed in the long-term is a module that creates an arena for every user upon seeing them

[Hakaku]

Well if users have those powers across the entire zone, how are you creating arenas in the first place? You could create a command like ?makearena that automatically creates a new arena, adds the player into the specified group for that arena only (you might want to take a look at how ?setgroup works), which would then grant them powers to mess around with their own arena without affecting anyone else's. If they want it to be collaborative, or simply have numerous aliases, perhaps adding a command that they can use to add other players as members of that arena.

 

This way, you're not uselessly generating files, and the powers remain restricted to a single arena.

[»Lynx]

I don't want to put down this idea, because I do think that it is a good one, but I believe that due to players having to go down this route states that there are problems elsewhere in our system. Currently, even setting up a local server can be tedious to the average user, so I propose that instead of this we provide an entire hosting solution that is easy to utilize.

 

I'm going to look into setting up an online UI that can allow SSC users to have their own hosting solution running quickly, which can be managed from the web. In my head, I've thought out pretty much all of the security concerns and I guess the zones will need some T&C's (in case I get 50 empty zones overnight, I will need some kind of population control that will more than likely be very lax) but I think it shouldn't be *too* hard to setup.

 

The only reason I'm mentioning this is because I believe that putting a map up is only 10% of all zone development. Players will ultimately need to tinker with a lot more, and I also believe that a web UI to utilize these changes will be a lot more beneficial to your average Joe, who typically isn't even aware of how to change directory in asss.

 

I figure the easier we make it, the more we secure our future. Either way, I'll have a go at my own proposed idea (unless somebody says something that will persuade me out of it) and will make a post here once it's done.

[L.C.]

Does this relate to your idea, Aquarius?

 

http://www.ssforum.net/index.php?showtopic=24072&st=0&p=257878&fromsearch=1entry257878

[aquarius]

I figure the easier we make it, the more we secure our future. Either way, I'll have a go at my own proposed idea (unless somebody says something that will persuade me out of it) and will make a post here once it's done.

 

I'm just going to launch a zone for the public and see what happens. Probably nothing, except a few people actually developing.

You guys should keep at those plans though.

[»Lynx]

Well, I've coded most of the backend, I've decided to go for Python and Django as asss already uses a lot of Python, and I've never used Django so it can be a learning experience for me.

 

I'll make another post once I've got the web UI up and running (i.e. after I learn how to use Django properly/securely).

 

Currently, I've planned:

 

User logs in with their SSC credentials, which is a limitation I've made among others to prevent a whole bunch of people signing in at once.

 

User is then passed to setup page, where they provide their password for the webUI, zone name, website name (I'll add more features as I get around to getting the webUI working)

 

The server then creates all of the folders necessiary, and edits the asss system.mk and conf files - the user will then be passed to their administration page where they will be able to edit any changes, then start/stop/restart their zone.

 

I'm hoping to add an upload dialogue for maps/settings/lvz but as I said I'll look into that once I've actually got my head around Django, it seems quite different to Rails which I'm accoustomed to - so I don't know how long until I'll have something tangible up.

 

If I can, I'd like to completely remove the need for ftp and ssh, but I'll see how things go first.

[aquarius]

You still working on this lynx?