NAB622

https://youtu.be/PyXWiBkj33Y

Cagelight fixed the gametype bug. Apparently I miscounted the gametype array and left a blank spot out. Custom, external skin files are now accepted, and all the skin files are easily downloadable from the dynamic setup page. The changes are only available on the testbed - I still want to make one more attempt to fix the Safari levelshot bug before releasing this. After the release, I'll help you get a custom CSS file set up. Testbed link: http://testbed.dogi.us/ParaTracker/ParaTrackerDynamic.php By the way.....does Safari give any JavaScript errors in the console?....

Most of what you're asking for can be done with a custom CSS file, like adjusting the colorizer's colors, adding a custom message and forcing a single transition to be used for all levelshots. I'm working on allowing external CSS skin files, and if they work, you can change whatever you like, whenever you like, by hosting just the CSS file on your own website. Right now I've hit a snag with levelshot transitions and with the width and height of the external skin files. More to come later.

Okay, I'm looking everything over. ParaTracker has not been updated yet; I am simply going over a list of what is done already. First off, some of your suggested changes would be easier with a new skin file; what do you say to a new skin called "Bigflat Huge" or "Hugeflat"? Specifically, you said the player list was a bit small. If I make the player fields a bit smaller and increase the list size, would that work? The scroll bar is difficult to remove because it will misalign the Score and Ping headers. However, the list can be freely resized. The flag alignment can be changed in a new skin. Also, flags can now be disabled. Game name can be disabled. Server ping can be removed in a new skin with ease. (Yes, it is the tracker's ping to your game server - I needed something to fill some space) The logo can be changed to text in a new skin. The orange, black and gray colors can be adjusted in a new skin as well. Can you give me exactly what hex values you would like for them? Fonts can freely be changed. Users can type in several fonts, and they are applied directly into a "font-family" CSS property. Levelshot transitions can now be disabled. Choosing transitions is a tricky issue and is unlikely to work well, but I'll be toying with the idea in my head for a while. Auto refresh can now be disabled. However, it cannot be enabled if the config file has it disabled. EDIT: Server name filtering has also been updated, and can also be disabled or enabled at will. The missing space in the server name has been fixed. Levelshots not working in Safari.....this is a mixed bag. The JavaScript SHOULD work now; however, I do not have a Mac, so I cannot test to see if they do. They still don't work on the latest version of Safari for Windows, but it's 5 years old, so it's irrelevant. The JavaScript definitely works, and that was probably the holdup. This is the new customization list, by the way: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wh10dicvuxmm2lg/2017-04-14.png?dl=0

I don't hate you for the image. Actually, that's exactly the kind of feedback I need. I am at work right now, but I will tackle this when i get home. Most of your suggestions should be very easy to implement, actually, especially since they involve disabling things rather than adding them. I already implemented font changes, although I'll probably have it limited to basic font families.... Is there a specific font you are looking for? We tracked down the issue with Safari - Apple decided they're too good to comply with web standards, just like Microsoft does. We'll get a workaround for it in place, but yeah, we couldn't have foreseen that issue. Thanks for catching it. But, for the record, if it's broken in Internet Exploder, I do not care. It's a nightmare to work with. XD Safari should work in the next update, though. Text only logo is also a possibility, actually, although I'll have to update the skin files a bit. The only reason I want the tracker name visible is so other people know how to find it. It is intended to forever be a free service, just like JediTracker was. The game name is visible on all skins because ParaTracker can track several other games. However, it would be very easy to allow users to disable it, so I'll add that as well.

Oh yeah, almost forgot - if ParaTracker still isn't working on your web server, it's probably the same issue I ran into with Bravenet, unfortunately. Is it giving you any error messages, or simply telling you that it could not connect? Also, at the very beginning of the HTML code, is it giving any debug information next to the version number (aside from the array to string conversions)? The ability to choose a font will be very easy to implement, although only as a global thing. I'll see about adding that as well. I'll post back when an update is pushed with some of these features, and if I forget any, remind me. There is an advantage to you using our tracker service for now - when updates are pushed, you will automatically get the most updated tracker. And seriously, the bandwidth on our end is negligible anyway. Edit: By the way, if you ever want screenshot(s) added for some maps, just give a shout.

Hmm. Levelshots not working on iOS is very interesting. I'll add that to the bug list. To stop the auto refresh, click on the refresh message, and it will stop until the next reload. I'll add an option to turn it off completely in the next update. Yeah, if you can get a screenshot, I can get a skin much more to your liking. Cagelight told me to allow third party CSS files, and I didn't listen, but technically it should be possible. I can probably also add that in the next update. Right now, I'm focusing on game support - I have COD1 and COD2, SOF2, RTCW and W:ET in line. But those will take a back seat to whatever options you're asking for.

Another update has been released. http://paratracker.dogi.us/ This update added a new skin. Also, Cagelight made a killer bit value calculator that will work on any supported game that uses bit flags. A bug that was causing a delay reading from new servers has been fixed. Quake III Arena is now fully supported. Any feedback or concerns are welcome. If someone is still looking for a skin they like, please give feedback on the skins as I will be happy to change them where possible.

Initially, I believe Cagelight had it multi-threaded, but it caused issues with something and had to be put back to one thread. He knows a lot more about that than I do.

IIRC Bullet has cloth simulation. If I understand correctly, though, the problem is Ghoul2. It is a nightmare and it is built directly into the renderer. It would need either a complete rewrite or some very careful (And hacky) crafting to get something like cloth. Not that it won't or can't happen, but it'll definitely be a hard cookie to make.

I'm a bit confused, what?

ParaTracker 1.3.1 is released. http://paratracker.dogi.us/ Two new skins have been added, each with a light and a dark variant: Banner ad, and Skyscraper ad. There is also a major change this release; you can specify a background color (with opacity), text color, and two player list colors (with opacity). Several bugs have been fixed as well. Feedback is welcome.

Right now my time is consumed with personal things and ParaTracker. We have no intention of letting this project go, and I'm still active, but with JediTracker's demise, ParaTracker is far more important.

In case anyone was wondering why there was a brief outage earlier, PHP updated earlier today, which caused the player list to always show up as empty. Cagelight tracked the issue down to stricter type casting in the new php library, and corrected it. All is well.

Edit: Instead of editing the post repeatedly I'll just delete and summarize. I am watching as servers show up on our ParaTracker host and adding levelshots to things here and there. I added levelshots for your guys' servers a few days ago. It looks like someone changed the BSP name of the map you guys are using to read "Temple" instead of "TEMPLE" - and case matters. Cagelight fixed it already, so you should be fine now.

Can you elaborate a bit on that? Are you saying they were showing at one point and now they aren't, or that you are trying to add some custom ones?

ParaTracker 1.3 is released. It is currently hosted on our website at http://paratracker.dogi.us/. Please check it out and let me know what you think. Feel free to use it if you like. There were some HUGE changes this release. It took a long time to finish because vast portions of the back end have been updated. According to the changelog: In addition to all this, the Dynamic setup page will now generate HTML for a sandboxed iframe, although a lot of things had to be re-enabled for it to work, so isn't really a whole lot more secure than it was. But at least it's there. I do expect some backlash for the new levelshot transitions, but here's the good news: you can either choose a single transition that you like, or turn them off entirely. Or, if you really want to get extreme, you can make your own, even crazier ones. Caelum - I have not yet completed GeoIP support. There are two options in the config file for it, but currently, it does not work. I'll get there at a later date, as unfortunately, life has thrown me yet another painful curveball at a most inopportune time. Circa - There's now a skin called "Bigflat - Light" that might appeal more to your tastes. There's also a variant called "Bigflat - Dark" that I like better. For anyone that would like to make a skin of their own, there's a file called "Template.css" in the skins folder you can use, or you can use the JSON response to make your own from the ground up. Feedback is always welcome.

All right, everything is in order; skins A B and C are redone in the new CSS method. The skins are completely redone now with CSS. The text labels on each item are now generated from within the CSS skin files, and can be modified at the user's discretion. Cagelight vastly improved the network response time - in my tests, getting and parsing info took less than one second on average. Many servers responded in less than 1/10th of a second. Server ping was added as a feature on the param list as well as optionally on the tracker page. Completing the JSON support is next on the list, as it is primitive right now (It needs access to the levelshot files and a few other things), and once it is done I will be updating the GitHub repository and the website. Hopefully in the next day or two.

Not to mention, that brings up a lot of security concerns. Web pages should *never* *ever* be able to launch a program on the client computer.

I forgot you posted that one above, sorry. Way too much stuff going on, I'm completely scatterbrained. Okay, I'll see what I can do. It probably won't look exactly like that one, but I can get something pretty similar.

There are a few things, like the dynamic tracker setup page, that have styles of their own. ParaStyle.css is intended for those styles. There's a few other oddball ones in there too but I can't remember them at the moment. Regardless - I have already moved the RCon, Param, and colorizer styles out of ParaStyle.css and into the individual skin files, and separated the skin files into a skins/ folder. The next time I have an update, they will be available. I'm going to get back to work on my own skins very soon, now that the back end is more stable and more flexible. Also - if you are having trouble with the css skins, just make an image mock-up of what you want and I should be able to do it for you. More skins is better.

Another update! I am working on having the tracker auto-detecting games, and parsing them uniquely. So far, it is working well, but I still need some more time to make it completely flexible between multiple games, as it was not my initial intent. For now, I have some great news; I have a test HTML page for ParaTracker and a CSS file ready to go. So for those of you who want to play with the skins, you can do that now instead of waiting. Here's the download link: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/19603700/ParaTracker/ParaTracker%20TEST%20PAGE%20FOR%20CSS.zip To modify the skin, unzip the folder somewhere, go into the CSS folder, and modify the two CSS files however you see fit. Particularly, ParaSkinA.css is the one you'll probably be looking for. Now, all this being said, I have a question: should the styles for the param list be different for each skin, or the same? Now is a good time to make that choice, before I go any further, because it will change the file I put the styles into. Circa and Caelum, I look forward to your input, good or bad.

Just an update, since I imagine some people are following this project with interest now. Cagelight saw a request for JSON on Discord, so he implemented it. Caelum and I spoke a few days ago, and his requests should be possible. Most of them, most notably XSS safeguards and flood protection, were already implemented. I have finished remaking skin A with all CSS, and will begin working on skins B and C shortly. The new CSS method is completely flexible and the end users can change literally anything they like about it. A few items, like the levelshots and player list, are grouped together to make them more useful, but other than that everything can be manually colored and placed anywhere. Circa, you'll have to let me know what you think when you get your hands on it, but I think you'll love it. Edit: None of these changes have been uploaded yet; I want to finish skins B and C first, merge the two code bases we are working from, and look into Caelum's requests.

In the interim, though, ParaTracker is functional and can be used. Paratracker.dogi.us

Unfortunately that is exactly what I am trying to avoid doing. I don't want to use a portal, because the wall will be large and round. But thanks anyway. I'll probably just have to leave it visible from both sides.