Brian Moseley, Chief Suspect

From: Brian Moseley
To: Warhorn.net announce list
Date: Jan 21, 2006 11:12 AM
Subject: Warhorn.net updated to version 1.5.0

it has been many moons since the last changes to warhorn.net, but i'm
happy to announce that i've just updated the site to version 1.5.0,
which includes several new features and some critical bug fixes.

WTF, MY SITE BROKE THIS MORNING!
===============================

now that we have so many event sites (over 400), updating the site
takes a lot longer. a few of you may have seen some errors when
accessing your event site between 10-11am PST; those should all be
resolved now. if you're still getting errors, please let me know asap.
the next time i upgrade i hope to have a smoother process in place.

THANKS FOR YOUR DONATIONS!
============================

i have to admit that the majority of these updates have been finished
for several months and have just been sitting on my computer. i went
through a period of burnout, with gaming in general and with my
hobbyist hacking on warhorn. however, you guys and the folks who come
to your events made an unprecedented display of generosity in december
and january, and the donations you sent me were a swift kick in the
butt, jolting me back into action. so thank you, and i hope you like
the new stuff. there's more to come in the future.

NEW FEATURES
============

* the gaming schedule interface has changed quite a bit. when you
click the "gaming schedule" button, you'll only see a single day's
slots. click the links at the top left of the schedule table to
navigate between days. click the name of a scenario to view the
details for that particular game, including scenario title, author and
blurb, and the number of tables and signed up players. this definitely
increases the number of clicks a person needs to sign up for games,
but it's the first step towards adding table mustering features. for
that and other reasons (future performance optimizations), i think the
tradeoff is worth it.

* for privacy reasons, we'll only show player and judge names in the
gaming schedule if you're logged in - this keeps search engines from
making a person's game participation known to the world.

* you can now subscribe to an Atom 1.0 feed listing all the games
scheduled for an event. the link for this feed is found just below the
event details at the top middle of every page. open that link in your
favorite news reader (bloglines, google reader, feeddemon, etc) and
stay updated as the event's schedule changes. if you use a browser to
read news feeds (eg firefox's live bookmarks) and are logged into the
warhorn site, the feed will even include judge and player info.

* similarly, there are now feeds available for the warhorn upcoming
events and recurring game days listings. subscribing to these feeds
will let you stay up to date as new event sites are added to warhorn.

* the scenario selection menus on the signup form now tell you how
many open seats are available (for the player menu) or how many judges
are needed (for the judge menu). if a game is full and waitlisted
signups are enabled, the menu indicates that the player will be added
to the waitlist.

* when a game is full and waitlisted signups are not enabled, the
signup link for that game on its schedule page is replaced with the
text "FULL" so that players will know they can no longer sign up for
it.

* you can now associate scenarios with an RPGA campaign or game
system. the campaign or game system is typically indicated where the
name of a scenario is found, most noticeably on the game schedule and
the signup form.

* you can now configure the payment subsystem with all optional
packages if you so choose. previously at least one mandatory (base)
package was required.

* when requesting an event site, you can now choose "online" for the
event location.

* the new combat role "psionic manifester" was added.

* the game schedule is now highlighted by slot rather than by game,
making it easier to visually group games by slot.

SKINS
=====

* the nyrond skin was updated with the shield and colors of the
nyrond imperium. hopefully not too little too late :)

BUG FIXES
=========

the following bugs have been resolved in the new version. please let
us know if you spot one of them (or any other)!

* removing a slot without first "zeroing out" all of its games no
longer leaves the database in an inconsistent state. nuke slots at
will!

* non-empty first and last names are now required when registering
for an event site. previously a user could register with a last name
of " ".

* previously on the single game signup form (the popup one), if you
had signed up to judge one game and then tried to switch to judging
another game, the system would not remember the change. this should no
longer be a problem.

* scenario titles are now unique. you can't have two scenarios with
the same title in the same event site.

* better validation that the number of tables and number of players
per table for a game are input as numbers, not mixed strings like
"6+".

* remove weird slashes from system-generated emails

* on the gaming schedule, the slots for a day are now ordered by slot
start time, not slot number (slot numbers will be revamped in a future
update so that they are arbitrary labels on a slot rather than the
weird not-quite-used position indicator that they are now).

THAT'S ALL
==========

as always, please let us know if you have any concerns or encounter any bugs.

good gaming!

- the Warhorn.net team