Forums » General
After quite a few months of school unexpectedly snatched me away from this project, I am finally releasing version 1.0 of the Vendetta Online Unofficial Plugin Repository (VOUPR) into the wild. For those of you who have kept up-to-date with the Community Projects forum thread, the only new change is the domain name: www.voupr.com (2022 Edit by Inc: this domain was since allowed to expire, now use http://voupr.spenced.com ) . For everyone else, here is a quick description of my goals:
Simplified Plugin Hosting
Right now, there is no established way for users to share the plugins they've written. The Wiki links to a motly array of different download and hosting services, including a fair number of dead links. This lack of organization raises the barriers to entry for both plugin maintainers and users, and wastes valuable time on both sides. VOUPR provides an easy method for maintainers to host their current downloads as well storing all previous versions of each plugin.
Plugin Discovery
The current system also leaves much to be desired for the new user confronted by the myriad of different plugins. Simple search and rating systems can go a long way in this respect, by bringing the most popular plugins to new users' attention. VOUPR can sort plugin lists by name, rating or popularity and can perform simple searchs on the name and descriptions of all plugins.
Update Notification
Even once a user has installed a number of plugins, there is no simple way of keeping everything updated. Plugin maintainers have no good method of alerting their users that they have released a new version, and people are left to check the respective plugin threads or Wiki page for each plugin every so often. VOUPR allows you to add plugins to a "My Plugins" list that will display your installed version against the current version to quickly judge if you need a newer version. If there is demand for it, I was also considering adding an optional email notification system for these plugins.
Auto-Updater Backend
This is the final and potentially most important function of VOUPR. The main list, My Plugins list, search results, and versions list all have XML equivalents to provide the framework for anyone to write a true auto-updater. This won't necessarily happen today, or tomorrow, but Soon(TM) it would be a very nice feature.
On a final note, apologies for the ad at the bottom. ;-) This is CrazySpence's only payment for generously allowing me the use of his server space and clock time. Thanks Spence!
-Calder
Edit: If anyone's interested, the code is all open-source and available here.
Simplified Plugin Hosting
Right now, there is no established way for users to share the plugins they've written. The Wiki links to a motly array of different download and hosting services, including a fair number of dead links. This lack of organization raises the barriers to entry for both plugin maintainers and users, and wastes valuable time on both sides. VOUPR provides an easy method for maintainers to host their current downloads as well storing all previous versions of each plugin.
Plugin Discovery
The current system also leaves much to be desired for the new user confronted by the myriad of different plugins. Simple search and rating systems can go a long way in this respect, by bringing the most popular plugins to new users' attention. VOUPR can sort plugin lists by name, rating or popularity and can perform simple searchs on the name and descriptions of all plugins.
Update Notification
Even once a user has installed a number of plugins, there is no simple way of keeping everything updated. Plugin maintainers have no good method of alerting their users that they have released a new version, and people are left to check the respective plugin threads or Wiki page for each plugin every so often. VOUPR allows you to add plugins to a "My Plugins" list that will display your installed version against the current version to quickly judge if you need a newer version. If there is demand for it, I was also considering adding an optional email notification system for these plugins.
Auto-Updater Backend
This is the final and potentially most important function of VOUPR. The main list, My Plugins list, search results, and versions list all have XML equivalents to provide the framework for anyone to write a true auto-updater. This won't necessarily happen today, or tomorrow, but Soon(TM) it would be a very nice feature.
On a final note, apologies for the ad at the bottom. ;-) This is CrazySpence's only payment for generously allowing me the use of his server space and clock time. Thanks Spence!
-Calder
Edit: If anyone's interested, the code is all open-source and available here.
Ads are OK. I hope there'll be many plugins soon.
I'll upload everything from the Wiki that people haven't taken the initiative to upload after a few weeks, but I want to give maintainers the chance to link the plugin to their account without the hassle of transferring ownership etc...
Congratulations! Great stuff!
I like the idea :)
ignore turrets does not exist and it is the only one I want at the moment.
Woah, that was weird. It's fixed now, but I'll look into why that happened.
Edit: I think Spence needs to make the 'downloads' directory writable by the Apache server, once he gets my email it should work. ;-)
Edit: I think Spence needs to make the 'downloads' directory writable by the Apache server, once he gets my email it should work. ;-)
it's your website you do it
edit: I caved and fixed it
edit: I caved and fixed it
Lol, thanks Spence. I actually did search through all the control panels for it, but I couldn't find anything remotely reminiscent of what I wanted...
Anyway, it should be working as desired now.
Anyway, it should be working as desired now.
Hey look its Calder.
Anyways, cool shit, man.
Anyways, cool shit, man.
Is someone adding this to the "Community Sites" list, yet?
Thanks guys! And yes, Chaosis, I haven't really found the time to stick my scrawny neck in-game at all this year. :D Hopefully that'll change over the summer...
Why is it tripling the ad....
I only need one heh
I only need one heh
You should add a column for "vo version" which shows that latest version of vo that a given plugin has been verified to work with. This will allowed people to spot plugins that have lost their maintainer and are no longer operable.
I like that idea, but since there is only the current version of VO ever matters at a time, wouldn't a simple "defunct" stamp serve the same purpose?
there are some plugins that are not uploaded and I'm not sure if I am allowed to upload a plugin if I'm not the creator.
However, the plugins are FlashChange and targetless.
to the project: cool, nice to have someone who has the money to buy a (v)server and build such a cool website. Nice.
If you need/want, create a "donate" button...would be interesting for the plugin creators, too. I think.
However, the plugins are FlashChange and targetless.
to the project: cool, nice to have someone who has the money to buy a (v)server and build such a cool website. Nice.
If you need/want, create a "donate" button...would be interesting for the plugin creators, too. I think.
Cool.
Thanks. ;-)
A few updates. First, I've published all the code on Launchpad: https://launchpad.net/~voupr/voupr/trunk . Everything except the database itself (which contains sensitive passwords (or more accurately MD5 hashes of passwords), emails, etc...), and the code for connecting to the database is up there already. I think I'll just use the AppCore license, which I'm kind of fond of:
"You may use this material however the hell you please. We are not responsible."
Any suggestions about other licenses, etc...? Second, you'll notice that the home page got redesigned to actually be useful, and now shows a list of recent updates in reverse chronological order. Third, I've incorporated a number of small changes which Choco and others have helpfully suggested: listing plugins by a certain author, the news feed, editing version descriptions, and some more I'm sure I can't think of right now.
It's also been a week since I made this live, so I would encourage you to start uploading anything that's missing. If and when the original authors get around to it, you can easily make them managers on the "Managers" section of the edit page. Thanks for offering to help. The more complete VOUPR gets the more useful it is.
About the Donate button, it would mean implementing some sort of payment system, which would mean lots of code and encryption and signing and freaking out about security issues and... Not worth it for what I'm sure will amount to a minuscule amount of donations. What I could do on the other hand, if PayPal offers links to a particular user's account, is just to add another type of "Link" for donations and let them worry about all the security issues.
Keep the suggestions coming, they've been really helpful so far! I'm still considering the best way to manage "defunct" plugins, so if anyone wants to weigh in on that now's the time. I'm thinking they wouldn't show up on the main list, but instead have a separate list of their own. In search results they would also appear at the bottom and bear some sort of marking. Would that be too segregated, or is there any time you really need to see a now-useless plugin if you're not looking for it?
-Calder
A few updates. First, I've published all the code on Launchpad: https://launchpad.net/~voupr/voupr/trunk . Everything except the database itself (which contains sensitive passwords (or more accurately MD5 hashes of passwords), emails, etc...), and the code for connecting to the database is up there already. I think I'll just use the AppCore license, which I'm kind of fond of:
"You may use this material however the hell you please. We are not responsible."
Any suggestions about other licenses, etc...? Second, you'll notice that the home page got redesigned to actually be useful, and now shows a list of recent updates in reverse chronological order. Third, I've incorporated a number of small changes which Choco and others have helpfully suggested: listing plugins by a certain author, the news feed, editing version descriptions, and some more I'm sure I can't think of right now.
It's also been a week since I made this live, so I would encourage you to start uploading anything that's missing. If and when the original authors get around to it, you can easily make them managers on the "Managers" section of the edit page. Thanks for offering to help. The more complete VOUPR gets the more useful it is.
About the Donate button, it would mean implementing some sort of payment system, which would mean lots of code and encryption and signing and freaking out about security issues and... Not worth it for what I'm sure will amount to a minuscule amount of donations. What I could do on the other hand, if PayPal offers links to a particular user's account, is just to add another type of "Link" for donations and let them worry about all the security issues.
Keep the suggestions coming, they've been really helpful so far! I'm still considering the best way to manage "defunct" plugins, so if anyone wants to weigh in on that now's the time. I'm thinking they wouldn't show up on the main list, but instead have a separate list of their own. In search results they would also appear at the bottom and bear some sort of marking. Would that be too segregated, or is there any time you really need to see a now-useless plugin if you're not looking for it?
-Calder
Should add a how to install plugins link that either has the blurb from the wiki or goes to it because what if someone just goes there without reading the wiki then they won't know what to do with it.
Added.
A note for all those uploading plugins. If you are not the author, remember to edit the Authors section to reflect that and attribute credit to the proper owner. And remember to keep the description short and sweet.
A note for all those uploading plugins. If you are not the author, remember to edit the Authors section to reflect that and attribute credit to the proper owner. And remember to keep the description short and sweet.