2012 has started, and I'm pleased to see such enthusiasm with regards to our resolutions. I especially enjoyed reading about how much of /prog/ wants to come together to collaborate on a bigger project. Without an epic idea to start with, one can only achieve mediocrity (at best). So let us dream big.
But also, let's make sure we do not repeat the mistakes of the past. The last time we tried something like that it was called Anonix, and this project died a slow death. As /prog/'s official community manager, it is my job to ensure we do not go down that route again. Since some of you are new here, I will attempt to briefly summarize what went wrong with Anonix:
* unrealistic objectives
* limited usefulness
* no fun factor
* last but certainly not least: no repository
As you can see none of these problems are fundamentally unsolvable. And in fact, most have already been solved since we're not writing an OS. ITT we try to tackle the last one.
What /prog/ needs first, IMO, is a communal repository. A place where we can share all of our /prog/ scrapers, userscripts, games, challenges etc... I'm sure there are people here who have server space to make this a possibility, and I'm sure there are other people here who have the technical know-how to make this a reality. I am calling on those people to step forward and get in contact with each other.
Found it. I think anyone can push to the mob branch... if it still works, and I remember there were some problems back in the day as well.
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Anonymous2012-01-02 18:57
>>5
Holy shit, the only remaining fragments of Anonix?
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Anonymous2012-01-02 19:00
Someone take the lead and make a repo, and let's start discussing what kind of game to make, if /a/ can make a joint project then so can we
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Anonymous2012-01-02 19:02
>>7
What is /a/ making? ... not that shitty eroge, right?
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Anonymous2012-01-02 19:14
>>8
I don't know what the genre is called, graphic novel? interactive something? but yeah...
what about instead of a game a project of mine: a P2P IM, i've got all protocols down and apart from adding people that may be a hassle it is actually a pretty nice project, it also supports trackers and delegaters to become a more robust network, even if it takes away part of it's free as in freedom image, it's optional ofc
i've got a preliminary working copy done on java, now I want to implemente a serious version in C
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Anonymous2012-01-02 19:18
>>9
Needs more Usenet-rewriting in ad-hoc embedded Lisp.
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Anonymous2012-01-02 19:21
Hey no boot loader? On Anonix
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Anonymous2012-01-02 23:46
An idea: what about a roguelike RPG game (possibly multiplayer)?
Some sort of NetHack, but with more people on the field.
That would be interesting. A group of /prog/riders seeking Satori, they must travel in the World of Languages and deal with monsters disguised as bad practices in all the languages we make fun of.
Guido as the Final Boss
Sussman and Abelson as our mentors.
for the combat system, should they throw spagetti code at you in their language, which you'd have to elegantly rewrite in scheme? And if you can't do it within a certain time limit, then helpless google searching coders will find the monster's code and adopt the bad practices, and then suffer. But if you perform an appropriate rewrite in time, then they'll find your code instead, and enjoy success. Every time a person on the internet adopts the monster's coding practice, the monster's code appears in giant solid block letter, stacking up around you, until you are eventually buried. The more difficult monsters will present code that is increasingly complicated and obfuscated. The Guido will present something from the obfuscated python contest in a moment of desperation.
We should make it! We'll need to develop a code analyzer though to make sure the player is using /prog/ approved coding conventions.
Since we are at it, a dedicate server for our telnet chat would be nice, i think the last one was rather unreliable.
And the name should be optional.
It should also include some sort of anti spam system.
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Anonymous2012-01-03 8:24
>>20
What are you talking about? The last one in the previous thread is still up on my not-very-dedicated server: `nc 50.56.35.147 9099`
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Anonymous2012-01-03 8:26
>>20
Also, the name does not have to be unique, so just leave it empty.
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Anonymous2012-01-03 9:30
>>19 rechan has been down since ages... don't toy with our emotions cudder.
Was up yesterday, but very slow.
Attack plan:
* Make a simple but flexible chess engine.(No AI for the moment)
* Adapt it to new attack modes (with the use of Scala traits).
* ???
* Profit!!
If there are people interested, i am willing to pay for a VPS for like 6 US$ a month for the development machine. http://www.dmehosting.com/openvz-linux-vps.php (OVZ 2). Access only to ssh. No ftp or IRC or other services.
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Anonymous2012-01-03 16:16
>>27
Pasted something in the middle of the push path, fixed:
Excellent! Well done! This thread turned out far better than I could have ever anticipated. I could have never imagined the old repository still existed. Big thanks to you and the people at repo.or.cz and whoever set up the account back in the day :-)
I will throw my hub.hs on there: it is an anonymous IRCd I once wrote (somewhere in 2008 probably)... I'm not sure if it's the lastest version of the code (moved HDs a lot since) but it should work. I'll polish my prog.user.js one of these days and share that too.
IMO it'd be a good idea to give the repo a gentle scrubbing, but I'll leave that to someone else.
I'm not sure how I feel about that idea. I like the thought of one day having a /prog/ battle station online somewhere where we all have accounts (somewhat breaking anonymity, i guess) and run all kind of crazy software on the internet / tornet. If someone pays for it with dollars it's probably going to bite us in the ass (isn't there hosting out there that accepts bitcoins?).
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Anonymous2012-01-03 19:25
if you want to make a roguelike, why not build on tprf?
>>28 I propose Scala or Perl6 for the server side stuff. As long as the language supports traits/roles,
No! Bad! You don't need roles so badly to make it your one language requirement, especially since you can gain the equivalent (though perhaps not as nicely) with any prototype-OO language: nodejs, Lua, Io.
I'm not saying these languages are bad in general, but your criterion is scary. Based on my experience, if you put Perl 6 into production you'll probably have a better time of it with Niecza than Rakudo for performance reasons. (Also stability, Rakudo development is more willing to regress—which is why there hasn't been a distribution release in ages.)
Disclosure: I've no intention of contributing to this project.