One of the advantages of the new menu system is that we can build information into the server, useful lookup information with $command shortcuts.

This means leaders can tell backmarkers to check the rules on $blueflag, and likewise, backmarkers can tell leaders to check the rules on $blueflag.

Quote from james12s :

if i had 464 or 345 i would buy one straight away, what you could do is have a donate thing through paypal, so if people want the replays to be stored they should donate plus also i think we should all contribute to the cost of running every aspect of the ctra servers

ewww, don't buy them sucky drives, we want 1 tb of RAID0'd Raptors please

Quote from AndroidXP :

Wha.. oh nevermind. Come on guys, this was just a "IF we would save the replays, we'd need that much space". The point is, they DON'T. It would be a huge waste of space for a stupid feature. If you want a replay then save it yourself, and if you forgot to save a replay then simply get it fast enough before it's deleted.

you'd think that once your parked backwards on the track after being wrecked, it wouldn't take much to press "2" and type the insult there, rather than pressing "t" and typing said insult, but they forget

lol Jak

Although on the drive front, if we where doing that, why not RAID10? RAID0 is pretty, um, well, volatile.

we like Volatile.

Can i overclock the HDD's? pick me! pick me!

Quote from Jakg :

we like Volatile.

Can i overclock the HDD's? pick me! pick me!

:doh:

Storing replays indefinately would be neat, but definately not neat enough to justify the disk usage. Automatically keeping them for a few days for reporting purposes is great though. I think it is kind of important to keep the replay and go back and review it to make sure something wasn't actually your own fault before reporting someone, though, and I'm sure the admins would appreciate that.

Are admins going to automatically look at replays where collisions are detected, or does that just help with referencing for when something is actually reported? I'd guess the latter since even though the racing is clean there is still a fair amount of minor bumping going on, and even some bump drafting every now and then.

Becky, any plans for a detailed race log? Kind of like the "previous race" info on LSFW, but for all CTRA races? That would be great, especially if the number of points awarded is logged.

10k RPM on a Raptor

20k when i've finished.

It will be faster, but it won't neccesarily work....

Ok, i'll just keep overclocking the ethernet port

Jakg (overclock whore)

Quote from qoncept :

Are admins going to automatically look at replays where collisions are detected

That'd be every race ... and you do realise there are more hours of racing in a day on the CTRA, than there are hours in a day ! .

Quote from qoncept :

Becky, any plans for a detailed race log? Kind of like the "previous race" info on LSFW, but for all CTRA races? That would be great, especially if the number of points awarded is logged.

I'm not sure I know what the previous race info on LFSW was, all I can think of is the progress system. I've only been in LFS just over a year so was this an S1 thing?

I can't see a problem with keeping some kind of textual log of the races, but I need to know what it's useful for so that I know what text to actually store.

We do plan to keep quite a big archive of results so that we can make statistics from them, and we plan to log a new level of scrutiny in terms of driver performance to create new and interesting stats. You'll be able to see these stats, but we're not going the whole big brother route. We already collect yellow flag incidents and compare that versus laps - that's enough information to get a fairly broad overview of a drivers general cleanliness - beyond that it's for humans to decide if there is fault and punishment warranted from an incident. You'd be surprised just how revealing those two stats are when we look at submitted replays.

Oh that. Yes, that's a given. The question is how much extra information we store and what information/graphs and stats we can generate from it.

Quote from Becky Rose :

That'd be every race ... and you do realise there are more hours of racing in a day on the CTRA, than there are hours in a day ! .

That's what I was thinking.. Hopefully the new system will make it easier for the admins so they can spend more time racing.

Quote :

I'm not sure I know what the previous race info on LFSW was, all I can think of is the progress system. I've only been in LFS just over a year so was this an S1 thing?

Nope, if you log in to lfsw.net and click on "Online racer stats", just the stuff directly under your name. Server, time, finishing position and best lap. And car and track. I think maybe that plus starting position and points awarded would be perfect.

One thing that would maybe be kind of difficult in producing a "race log" for a single racer would be eliminating races they didnt actually race in. ie, every time I quit, I usually hang out and talk with the people I was racing with and don't get out till the race is about to restart. So I end up with my last race on LFSW saying something like it does now: 5th out of 3 racers, finished in 20:20.800 because I didnt actually race it.

That would probably all end up being web based stuff, let me know if you need a hand.

Quote from Jakg :

Enjoy Becky.

Oh wow, I forgot that was even there. Doh!

James asked how much work has gone in to the new system so far. Well actually not much. The SRA2 system was well underway when everything went awry and was handed over, the UKCT programmers struggled to get to grips with it and I offered to develop a new system. I've been taking a break, what with one thing and another and am only just settling down into it.

The death of Freddie, my beloved cat, and best friend, removed any creativity left in me and you can't program when you are not feeling creatively inclined.

I've recovered from that now and last week started brainstorming for what I wanted to do with the new system. I've got a fairly comprehensive list of features I want to include, not all detailed here so far (I have plenty more to tease you with yet), and last night I started work again.

I looked at the source code for SRA2 and decided that for the new ideas I had I wanted to do some things a different way, I also wanted to move it to a new development platform so that I could do the SQL access natively rather than through an API.

So last night I started coding it afresh, i've got as far as the server configuration file, some global preferences, establishing and maintaining the insim connection, reestablishing the connection after a service outage, support for remote servers and servers with a different insim password etc, and I am tracking players who join and leave a server.

Tonight I am hoping to get a substantial part of the core functionality in, except for track recycling because I find that hugely annoying when developing! So that will come later on.

This probably isn't want everyone wants to hear, but i've had a bad time of late and i'm only just coming to terms with everything and getting myself together.

We have planned for approximately 1 month of down time. I have an operation later this month though and that could impede development process. With software you never know how long things will take, it could be a week, it could be 18 years... You'll just have to wait and see .

Sounding more like Scawen & Co every day

Good luck with the op though, and I'm looking forward to seeing what's on the CTRA cards soon.

Any chance the servers will be staying up even though the points system isn't? Because these ones are still about the only places you can find decent low-power close racing right now.

sorry to hear bout your cate becky and hope the op goes well, do it at the pase you are happy with as the longer we wait the more we will aprecciate it

Please no appreciation. I demand nothing less than worship.

I want to get as much of the core functionality out of the way tonight as possible so that I can get to work on this new event system. It's going to turn you all into believers!

Idols of Becky, holy symbols, and other CTRA religious paraphenalia are available from the stand at the other end of the hall...

Quote from Becky Rose :

Please no appreciation. I demand nothing less than worship.

I want to get as much of the core functionality out of the way tonight as possible so that I can get to work on this new event system. It's going to turn you all into believers!

Idols of Becky, holy symbols, and other CTRA religious paraphenalia are available from the stand at the other end of the hall...

your jokes are good
how you think um up i dont know

****goes to wordhip the stuate of becky******lol

Quote from james12s :

your jokes are good
how you think um up i dont know

****goes to wordhip the stuate of becky******lol

Jokes? Where?

***shakes head at disbelief because of the real bad jokes***

rofl

I made some progress tonight, $commands are now processed which makes debugging handy. The next major step is working out how to access SQL without the old API and this is a new area for me: I've not done SQL before; and at the same time as mastering queery strings i've got to master a new dll - which unfortunately I cant compile which seems to be a problem with my compiler, that i'm now having to download all the updates for again....

So whilst my PC is busy downloading tonight i'm going to watch my nice shiny new Lost DVD...

Becky, if you have any specific questions about SQL don't hesitate to give me a whistle. I've got years of experience with some complex work. My AIM name is qoncept if you've got it.

Just finished basic SQL connecting, disconnecting and put some messaging and $command processing in (for purposes of debugging but will be used later). NOW i'm going to watch Lost...

I'm going to miss all my old regular racing chums when the plug is finally pulled. Still, it will give me a chance to catch up on some much overdue work. Good job I'm the boss so can't sack myself

Still, out of the ashes will arise the Phoenix. Seems like you've got some of that old motivation and enthusiasm back Becky, I'm pleased. Or have you just realised, there is no escape from the cult they call LFS. Oops, said too much, I'll have to hop on one leg and bark like a dog for half an hour now. Wait, that was last weeks punishment

Quote :

With software you never know how long things will take, it could be a week, it could be 18 years... You'll just have to wait and see .

God damn, i REALLY hope it doesn't take 18 years, but then it may handiliy coincide with the official full release of S3