Forums » General
Hello Vendettians!
As some of you may have noticed, I have recently taken over the lack of management of the guild BLAK, with the intention of turning it back into the glorious trading guild* it once was. While this is indeed something I would like to do, the real reason for gaining control of BLAK was to provide a backdrop for intorducing my plugin project.
Over the course of the last way-too-many weeks I have been working on a plugin that uses the game's TCP connecting ability to link up to a server in order to let players trade information about the game between each other. This trade works in a way similar to some retail-store return policies. A player sends information to the server, in exchange for credit that can be used to access other informations stored on the server. This credit is not the same as in-game credits and can only be used to purhcase information from the server.
I believe this sort of information trade provides an incentive to send information to the server, which means more information will be available, creating an incentive to use the service in the first place.
Although this sort of trade could be applied to a great deal of information within the Vendetta Universe, I've only had the time and energy to implement two types of data available to trade: ion storm information for sectors and detailed trade good information. Perhaps with some time I'll get around to adding the originally planned but scrapped records for player sightings and asteroid compositions.
However, even with just the two types of information available, I believe the plugin to be quite useful, as it allows a user to gain access to more or less up-to-date information without traveling to the sectors of interest.
So, with that introduction out of the way, here's a download link of the .zip file hosted at box.net.
Once you download the file, extract it to your plugins folder, as per instructions.
The plugin's interface is a graphical one, and is accessed by the command "/showbib" from a chat box anywhere in the game.
The (ugly) dialog that comes up is split up into four tabs: "Connection", "Item Information", "Trade routing" and "Storms".
Connection
The workings of this tab are, I think, the coolest thing about the plugin, so please use it. In order to do so, you'll have to click the "Connect" button under the "Password" text field. If this is your first time using the connection thingy, I believe that whatever text you enter in the password field will become your password. If not, the password will default to a blank field.
When using the "Connect" button for the first time, you will have to click it twice before you're actually connected.
You might notice that none of the password fields protect your precious password from prying eyes. This is because the password is sent and stored in plain text, with no protection at all. I can, and probably will see whatever password you use here. Do not use a password you use anywhere else. In fact, using a password is rather silly in general, so I'd suggest not using it at all. But if you're worried about 1337 h4x0rs spoofing your character name and stealing all of your doubly-fake credits and spending them on fake information, feel free to protect your name with a password.
On the right of the useless password area, you should see three labels that tell you the connection status, the amount of fake-credits you have, and an unused standing line. Who knows, maybe some day you'll be able to have a faction standing with the BLAK guild, which will affect the price of information. Not yet though.
Below the useless password area are two slightly seperated lists with associated buttons. Those buttons will allow you to send data to the server, update the lists of available datasets, and buy a datasets selected in the lists. Now is probably a good time to mention that trade data is only available from the server in packages of stations's worth of data, and ion storm data is only available in packages of a system's worth of data.
In order to have the credit to buy any information, you should send in whatever data you have every so often. How much you get paid for depends on the cost of trade goods you're reporting, the age of the data relative to the oldest known entry, the minimum price the station will pay for the item, ect. It's hard to predict how much you'll get each time, but I expect somewhere around 10k fake-credits per station you visit with a small variety of trade goods.
Item Information
This tab is mainly for the purpose of viewing the trade data you either discover yourself or buy from the server. On the left is a large list of stations you know about. If it is empty, and you feel it shouldn't be, clicking the "Delete" button above the list should cause it to be updated.
The "Delete" button, and its buddy the "Add" button are actually more closely related to the small list above them. Clicking the "Add" button will bring up a dialog that will allow you to add a rule by which the station list will be filtered. At this time, you can filter out any stations of a certain faction or in a certain system. As you can probably guess, more options were planned, but aren't there yet.
This filtering will affect the station list on this tab, as well as the two lists in the next tab over, which can be quite useful.
To the right of these two lists is a list that should only fill up when you select a station from the list of stations. The list will then contain a list of the items for which some information is known at the selected location. Selecting an item will fill up the blank spaces below with the information collected about the item in question.
Trade routing
This is probably the second most useful tab of the plugin, as it allows you to predict the best profit per cu made trading between two stations, with consideration of the price dropoff for selling trade goods.
To find a best route, you really should enter a reasonable number into the text box in the sentance "Search for best two-station route with ___cu of cargo". No number or too low of a number will give you a route that could depreciate too quickly to be useful, and too high a number is liable to give you a route where the dropoff is not known, and so isn't considered. I generally enter the size of my cargo hold as the input here and re-calculate the route every time I stop at a station.
Storms
While not super-useful as of yet, this is also probably the most original part of the plugin. To my knowledge, there is no working storm tracking plugin, though it looks like someone took a stab at it at some point.
This tab features a list of systems on the left, and a 16x16 grid of buttons on the right. Most likely, the buttons will be a rather dark blue color. When you select a system for which you have recent data for, however, the buttons will change colors to reflect whether the sectors they line up with are known to be storm-free or full of storm. How faded the color of the button is is based on the age of the data on the sector, as well as the "data obsolete in" text box. The larger the value in the box, the longer it will take the button to fade completely.
I've worked hard on this plugin and the server to go with it, so please try it and let me know how it goes. I'd love to hear about how fair you think the pricing of the trade information is, as well as any bugs you find or features you might be interested in.
*Note that linked thread is full of lies about our glorious past.
To the devs:
I am sorry to dump this in General, seeing as how it is pretty clearly a community project, but I really need the exposure. This is because this project is in essense my senior capstone project in computer science. It is for this reason that I also ask that if you guys do find this sort of thing to be in violation of point 14 of the rules of conduct, you hold off on shutting me down for a week, so I can collect the data I need on how well the data pricing algorithm works.
As some of you may have noticed, I have recently taken over the lack of management of the guild BLAK, with the intention of turning it back into the glorious trading guild* it once was. While this is indeed something I would like to do, the real reason for gaining control of BLAK was to provide a backdrop for intorducing my plugin project.
Over the course of the last way-too-many weeks I have been working on a plugin that uses the game's TCP connecting ability to link up to a server in order to let players trade information about the game between each other. This trade works in a way similar to some retail-store return policies. A player sends information to the server, in exchange for credit that can be used to access other informations stored on the server. This credit is not the same as in-game credits and can only be used to purhcase information from the server.
I believe this sort of information trade provides an incentive to send information to the server, which means more information will be available, creating an incentive to use the service in the first place.
Although this sort of trade could be applied to a great deal of information within the Vendetta Universe, I've only had the time and energy to implement two types of data available to trade: ion storm information for sectors and detailed trade good information. Perhaps with some time I'll get around to adding the originally planned but scrapped records for player sightings and asteroid compositions.
However, even with just the two types of information available, I believe the plugin to be quite useful, as it allows a user to gain access to more or less up-to-date information without traveling to the sectors of interest.
So, with that introduction out of the way, here's a download link of the .zip file hosted at box.net.
Once you download the file, extract it to your plugins folder, as per instructions.
The plugin's interface is a graphical one, and is accessed by the command "/showbib" from a chat box anywhere in the game.
The (ugly) dialog that comes up is split up into four tabs: "Connection", "Item Information", "Trade routing" and "Storms".
Connection
The workings of this tab are, I think, the coolest thing about the plugin, so please use it. In order to do so, you'll have to click the "Connect" button under the "Password" text field. If this is your first time using the connection thingy, I believe that whatever text you enter in the password field will become your password. If not, the password will default to a blank field.
When using the "Connect" button for the first time, you will have to click it twice before you're actually connected.
You might notice that none of the password fields protect your precious password from prying eyes. This is because the password is sent and stored in plain text, with no protection at all. I can, and probably will see whatever password you use here. Do not use a password you use anywhere else. In fact, using a password is rather silly in general, so I'd suggest not using it at all. But if you're worried about 1337 h4x0rs spoofing your character name and stealing all of your doubly-fake credits and spending them on fake information, feel free to protect your name with a password.
On the right of the useless password area, you should see three labels that tell you the connection status, the amount of fake-credits you have, and an unused standing line. Who knows, maybe some day you'll be able to have a faction standing with the BLAK guild, which will affect the price of information. Not yet though.
Below the useless password area are two slightly seperated lists with associated buttons. Those buttons will allow you to send data to the server, update the lists of available datasets, and buy a datasets selected in the lists. Now is probably a good time to mention that trade data is only available from the server in packages of stations's worth of data, and ion storm data is only available in packages of a system's worth of data.
In order to have the credit to buy any information, you should send in whatever data you have every so often. How much you get paid for depends on the cost of trade goods you're reporting, the age of the data relative to the oldest known entry, the minimum price the station will pay for the item, ect. It's hard to predict how much you'll get each time, but I expect somewhere around 10k fake-credits per station you visit with a small variety of trade goods.
Item Information
This tab is mainly for the purpose of viewing the trade data you either discover yourself or buy from the server. On the left is a large list of stations you know about. If it is empty, and you feel it shouldn't be, clicking the "Delete" button above the list should cause it to be updated.
The "Delete" button, and its buddy the "Add" button are actually more closely related to the small list above them. Clicking the "Add" button will bring up a dialog that will allow you to add a rule by which the station list will be filtered. At this time, you can filter out any stations of a certain faction or in a certain system. As you can probably guess, more options were planned, but aren't there yet.
This filtering will affect the station list on this tab, as well as the two lists in the next tab over, which can be quite useful.
To the right of these two lists is a list that should only fill up when you select a station from the list of stations. The list will then contain a list of the items for which some information is known at the selected location. Selecting an item will fill up the blank spaces below with the information collected about the item in question.
Trade routing
This is probably the second most useful tab of the plugin, as it allows you to predict the best profit per cu made trading between two stations, with consideration of the price dropoff for selling trade goods.
To find a best route, you really should enter a reasonable number into the text box in the sentance "Search for best two-station route with ___cu of cargo". No number or too low of a number will give you a route that could depreciate too quickly to be useful, and too high a number is liable to give you a route where the dropoff is not known, and so isn't considered. I generally enter the size of my cargo hold as the input here and re-calculate the route every time I stop at a station.
Storms
While not super-useful as of yet, this is also probably the most original part of the plugin. To my knowledge, there is no working storm tracking plugin, though it looks like someone took a stab at it at some point.
This tab features a list of systems on the left, and a 16x16 grid of buttons on the right. Most likely, the buttons will be a rather dark blue color. When you select a system for which you have recent data for, however, the buttons will change colors to reflect whether the sectors they line up with are known to be storm-free or full of storm. How faded the color of the button is is based on the age of the data on the sector, as well as the "data obsolete in" text box. The larger the value in the box, the longer it will take the button to fade completely.
I've worked hard on this plugin and the server to go with it, so please try it and let me know how it goes. I'd love to hear about how fair you think the pricing of the trade information is, as well as any bugs you find or features you might be interested in.
*Note that linked thread is full of lies about our glorious past.
To the devs:
I am sorry to dump this in General, seeing as how it is pretty clearly a community project, but I really need the exposure. This is because this project is in essense my senior capstone project in computer science. It is for this reason that I also ask that if you guys do find this sort of thing to be in violation of point 14 of the rules of conduct, you hold off on shutting me down for a week, so I can collect the data I need on how well the data pricing algorithm works.
Having a plugin that accesses a server+database and stores information related to VO is against the rules of conduct? I would hardly consider such a thing a server emulator.
Anyways, good luck with your senior capstone project... whatever that is. How will you be graded?
Anyways, good luck with your senior capstone project... whatever that is. How will you be graded?
This looks pretty neat. As far as I know, TCP connectivity is not against the rules, as long as we don't try to break the game. Ill check this out Genka.
Well, the rule says "...you will not post or distribute any utilities, emulators or other software tools related to Vendetta Online without the express written permission of Guild Software Inc."
As far as a capstone goes, it's supposed to be an independent study project in my final year of college, showcasing my mad skillz in the field of study. As you can see, I don't have very many, but I'm trying my best to showcase them.
The grade will be based on, I think, a presentation of the work I've done as well as a written report. Whether or not the work is actually useful or functional is somewhat secondary, but it certainly helps to be able to brag a little.
Plus, since the focus of my work is technically the algorithm I use to price the data, it would be neat to know how much use people are getting out of it.
As far as a capstone goes, it's supposed to be an independent study project in my final year of college, showcasing my mad skillz in the field of study. As you can see, I don't have very many, but I'm trying my best to showcase them.
The grade will be based on, I think, a presentation of the work I've done as well as a written report. Whether or not the work is actually useful or functional is somewhat secondary, but it certainly helps to be able to brag a little.
Plus, since the focus of my work is technically the algorithm I use to price the data, it would be neat to know how much use people are getting out of it.
Sounds interesting, genka. I have no issues at this time, if that changes I'll let you know. Good luck with your final project.
when i downloaded this my computer deleted system 32 and turned into a zombie wtf
Hmm... for some reason, the connect button won't click. Has anyone else tried it yet?
Changing price based on standing with BLAK is a REALLY neat idea. I hope you get far enough to implement that. Rest of it still looks cool though :P
Incarnate: Thanks! :D
peytros: That's normal and expected, because zombies are cool
smittens: I think that's a neat idea too!
skelbley: judging by the number of downloads, one other person may have tried it, but if my logs are right, they had as much luck as you. It seems that I've pretty much shot myself in the foot here by not checking to see if my University accepts any incoming connections (which it doesn't seem like it does.)
I'm currently looking for some working place to host the server, but until I find one, I'm shit out of luck. Sorry guys.
On the bright side, I think the rest of the plugin is pretty useful on its own, so maybe the time spent downloading it isn't entirely wasted, eh?
peytros: That's normal and expected, because zombies are cool
smittens: I think that's a neat idea too!
skelbley: judging by the number of downloads, one other person may have tried it, but if my logs are right, they had as much luck as you. It seems that I've pretty much shot myself in the foot here by not checking to see if my University accepts any incoming connections (which it doesn't seem like it does.)
I'm currently looking for some working place to host the server, but until I find one, I'm shit out of luck. Sorry guys.
On the bright side, I think the rest of the plugin is pretty useful on its own, so maybe the time spent downloading it isn't entirely wasted, eh?
what part of this plugin makes genka less of a [DELETED BY WHISTLER]
Impavid: That feature didn't quite make the cut this time, but maybe in a few weeks...
Anyway, I've got the server up and running on CrazySpence's awesome computer (thanks spenced.com!) and it seems to work just fine. I was able to connect from my computer, at least. I've updated the old download link to have the new file, the only difference in which is the address the plugin connects to. If you would like to skip re-downloading the whole plugin, you can search for "143.44.67.109" in main.lua and replace it with "blak.spenced.com".
If the connection still doesn't work, make sure port 3564 is open.
Anyway, I've got the server up and running on CrazySpence's awesome computer (thanks spenced.com!) and it seems to work just fine. I was able to connect from my computer, at least. I've updated the old download link to have the new file, the only difference in which is the address the plugin connects to. If you would like to skip re-downloading the whole plugin, you can search for "143.44.67.109" in main.lua and replace it with "blak.spenced.com".
If the connection still doesn't work, make sure port 3564 is open.
We can't say [DELETED BY WHISTLER] anymore?
No, it's just a matter of genka lacking a [DELETED BY WHISTLER] - truth in VO forums, you see.
dick
Wow.
Damnit, peytros, you fell into our own trap lol.
How about privacy? The information this plugin can provide will reveal alts, location of the player in real time, habits, etc. I'm sure a lot of players are not willing to share those with you.
heh some people coughTGFTcough already have alt finders.
Except the results are usually less than helpful, and as far as it's concerned, I could be an alt of anyone in the game.
The only data players share with me is the data they have access to in game and are willing to share with me. There is no data that is sent to the server automatically or without a user's express knowledge. If no-one sends me your location, I won't even know you're online. This is sort of a moot point anyway, since that capability's not even there yet.
I guess there's potential for players giving away their favorite mining spots by sharing storm data on those obscure sectors, but that can be avoided by either not sharing storm data or jumping around the system to confuse people.
Besides that, if the player location tracking thingy ever comes to fruition, I don't think I will bother storing anything other than a player's last known location. That should make it pretty difficult to pick out a pattern of a player's movements without spending a whole lot of fake-bucks. This sort of knocks away the "habits" worry, and I don't really see how knowing a player's current or recent location will reveal that player's alts.
If you disagree, please post. I am very interested in hearing people's opinions on the future of this plugin, especially when it comes to the somewhat debatable morality of sharing other character's private information with the world. (Though I figure, if most people are willing to tag their friends in embarrassing pictures on facebook, most people are going to be willing to let me know where in the universe their buddies are.)
Also keep in mind that the potential damage such information can do could be somewhat mitigated by making the information hard to access, i.e. making it cost a whole lot on this market doodad.
PS: A quick server update:
It should be up and running right this minute, and should no longer explode into a memory black hole any time someone connects to it. It might still inexplicably die from time to time, but I'll try and restart it every time it does until I can come up with a better solution.
Unfortunately, due to my being an idiot, the server also thinks that the older the data you want to buy is, the more you want to pay for it, so if you are looking for stations with fresh information, look for reasonably cheap datasets. I'll fix it this weekend. I'm not sure if this is the case for storm data as well, but in either case, watch out when buying the Odia dataset. Back in the day, a dropped connection managed to label all of the sectors in Odia as being storm free, and I doubt that's been corrected for yet.
As far as odia stations go, I did a pretty thorough survey of the trade goods in the system earlier today, so if you're looking for a decent in-system trade route, why not check thems stations out?
I seem to remember there being a route that pays around 180k per cycle in a behemoth, just jumping between two stations. I'm not an expert trader yet, but that sounds pretty good to me!
I guess there's potential for players giving away their favorite mining spots by sharing storm data on those obscure sectors, but that can be avoided by either not sharing storm data or jumping around the system to confuse people.
Besides that, if the player location tracking thingy ever comes to fruition, I don't think I will bother storing anything other than a player's last known location. That should make it pretty difficult to pick out a pattern of a player's movements without spending a whole lot of fake-bucks. This sort of knocks away the "habits" worry, and I don't really see how knowing a player's current or recent location will reveal that player's alts.
If you disagree, please post. I am very interested in hearing people's opinions on the future of this plugin, especially when it comes to the somewhat debatable morality of sharing other character's private information with the world. (Though I figure, if most people are willing to tag their friends in embarrassing pictures on facebook, most people are going to be willing to let me know where in the universe their buddies are.)
Also keep in mind that the potential damage such information can do could be somewhat mitigated by making the information hard to access, i.e. making it cost a whole lot on this market doodad.
PS: A quick server update:
It should be up and running right this minute, and should no longer explode into a memory black hole any time someone connects to it. It might still inexplicably die from time to time, but I'll try and restart it every time it does until I can come up with a better solution.
Unfortunately, due to my being an idiot, the server also thinks that the older the data you want to buy is, the more you want to pay for it, so if you are looking for stations with fresh information, look for reasonably cheap datasets. I'll fix it this weekend. I'm not sure if this is the case for storm data as well, but in either case, watch out when buying the Odia dataset. Back in the day, a dropped connection managed to label all of the sectors in Odia as being storm free, and I doubt that's been corrected for yet.
As far as odia stations go, I did a pretty thorough survey of the trade goods in the system earlier today, so if you're looking for a decent in-system trade route, why not check thems stations out?
I seem to remember there being a route that pays around 180k per cycle in a behemoth, just jumping between two stations. I'm not an expert trader yet, but that sounds pretty good to me!