VERY IMPORTANT NOTE: As I don't have 'net access at home, I cannot fix major errors until the next time I am at work (maybe tomorrow, most likely Monday). I am sending this now in the hopes that it will work -- all of my tests indicate it will -- but PLEASE, PLEASE keep a backup of all of your existing installation in case it doesn't and you need to fall back to it! Thanks for listening :-) and with that said, read on and I hope you'll enjoy the following...
I've been testing the new release and it seems to work to connect to both non-MAUTH and MAUTH-enabled servers. Therefore, I've decided that, as I need MAUTH-enabled data to test the new stats system before 0.3.0 is released, it is a good idea to make this release available to you sooner rather than later. Server admins: don't remove your existing installation just yet; test the new release separately (remember that you can change the listen port) before committing to it. Everyone else: keep a backup of your current installation in case you need to fall back to it if there are unforseen big problems with this release! I will explain 4 things in in this post: what's new; how to use what's new; what improvements are planned before the impending 0.3.0 release and where to get the new version from. ** What's New? The main feature of this release is that your player name should be protected from spoofing by others. That is to say that you can be pretty sure that nobody else can take your name. The stats system will be a lot more accurate because of this. When 0.3.0 is released and all of the bugs have (hopefully!) been squished, I will reset the stats data so that you can see your new, much more accurate and fair, stats being logged. We need you to please use MAUTH servers so that we can test the new system. ** How to use What's New First of all you'll need to go to http://stats.agrip.org.uk/reg/new and register your chosen player name. Then you can run the game as normal. Before you can connect to a server, you need to set two important pieces of information in your client: your player name and your password. You need to set your name and password in the game to the same as those you just registered on the Stats and Servers site. Assuming you chose ``dalek'' and ``ronbugrandy'' as your name and password, you'd have to type: ``name dalek'' and ``password ronburgandy'' into the console when you start the game. Then you can move on to connecting... The connect command now needs two bits of information instead of one: the master server you wish to authenticate against and the game server on which you wish to play. To use the only currently-available MAUTH server, you would type: connect agrip.org.uk oblique.agrip.org.uk. In this case, agrip.org.uk is the master server and the game server is running on oblique. During the process of connecting, your name and password will be checked against those on the master server at agrip.org.uk. Assuming you typed them in correctly and all is well, you'll be connected as normal! We may make a shortcut for you so that you don't need to always type agrip.org.uk. The reason that it's there is so other master servers may be set up (using our Stats and Servers infrastructure) to record stats for things like LAN parties and other games that people make based on AudioQuake. We would rather that mods for AQ (such as JQ) use the existing stats and servers infrastructure, so that people don't have to register player names in too many places. When we say that other stats and servers sites may be set up, we mean for really totally different games, that an entirely different team of people may make up, based on the technologies in AQ. You should still be able to connect to non-MAUTH servers for now... just specify agrip.org.uk as the master and all should be well (I have tested this and it worked for me). Over time, we hope that everyone will begin to run MAUTH-enabled servers, to ensure that the stats collected are accurate and people are not copying others' player names. ** Planned Improvements We desperately need good constructive criticism! Read on for our plans for improvement and please give comments and suggestions. I want to iron out any bugs with MAUTH (in the engine and web site) so that the stats system can be made much more fair. With the help of Guitar Babe I will be working on fixing the sound precache issue. Please make suggestions about how the game can be made easier to use -- if they are too big to fit in 0.3.0, we will strongly consider working on 0.3.1 soon after 0.3.0 is out. We will release the code for the stats and servers infrastructure after making improvements to cater for the 0.3.0 and possible 0.3.1 releases. The map description system is still in progress and we'll release more information on it after 0.3.0 is out. I was thinking that a utility that lists available games and allows you to connect to one of your choosing would be good... let me know if you agree and I'll see if I can whip one up. Please let us know how we may improve the launcher, too! ** How to Get it Go to http://www.agrip.org.uk/DownloadPage ** Summary I hope that this has explained enough about the new release to make you able to use it happily. Please write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] (which gets copied to both myself and sebby) or this list with any queries. i will try to answer them ASAP, but remember that my 'net access is limited at the moment, so please be patient. Thanks again for your continued support. I hope you enjoy this release. I am sorry it has been so long coming, but hopefully, together, we can make 0.3.0 come out soon after, and be well polished. bye just now, take care, Matthew and Sebby -- M. Tylee Atkinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> _______________________________________________ AGRIP-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.agrip.org.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/agrip-discuss
