Hiya gang… I got a lot of stuff to share with you this time around. Without further adieu, let’s get right to what a lot of you have been discussing lately on the message forums…
Game statistics – yes, I am aware of the inconsistencies with the way halfStats is recording stats. Part of this is due to the way ½ life records game logs in the first place (no getting around that one)… and the other may very well be the way I personally am retrieving stats from the game server. Before, with Intelistats, it would go directly to the game server and parse the log files from the CS ports log directory. When I switched to halfStats, I pointed it to the logs that CSCop would generate from remotely monitoring TK’s. The reason why I did that was because halfStats could just parse the stats directly from the web-server’s hard drive, instead of having to get them first from the game server. Since, over the course of a month of constant playing time, the logs can grow to over 200MB (not kidding on that one :-P), that would save halfStats about… oh, 5-10 extra minutes on every parse cycle. It’s very possible that the logs CSCop generates are not entirely complete… I dunno for certain. I do think getting the logs directly from the game server will be more accurate. Also, as a checks and balance/quality assurance test, I’m going to try and run 2-3 different stats programs on the same logs at the same time and compare each programs output. HalfStats will still be the only one visible to the public starting out. I’ll keep you guys and gals posted on how that goes… check the msg forums for updates on that.
Still speaking of game stats… I am now posting game stats of the Hardfought CTF/DM/TDM Match Quake3 port, using GeigerCounter 2, release candidate 5. You can see these stats by following the ‘Game Statistics’ link to the left. The layout is *sharp* and has full support for the OSP mod. The initial layout is a bit confusing at first but there is quite a bit of info to be had there… it’s currently displaying stats as far back as the end of February. There’s still some more tweaking I wanna do to the Quake3 stats but I’ll have to find some time with the creator of GeigerCounter to do that. Those stats are updated once an hour… but it wont show when they were updated until there’s new activity on the port.
Nexus defended our #1 spot on the OGL Quake3 CCTF ladder again last week, defeating delusional Reality by a score of 15-0. Demo’s and screenshots of the match are posted in the usual places… good game to dR. The OGL CCTF ladder has been pretty quiet since then with no new challenges since… although Immortal COIL and MaD have signed back up as of the past 24 hours… things are about to get a bit more interesting there I imagine :-)
The newly formed Nexus CounterStrike squad is due to have it’s first practice tomorrow night… w0oP!! HaDeS has been playing quite a bit and for having only started playing CS about a week ago… she’s doing damn good in my opinion… a lot better than I did starting out. Between watching how well she is progressing and also how well the rest of my teammates do on the public server makes me think we’re going to do pretty well overall as a team. If your clan is interested in having some scrimmages with us, just let us know, we’ll be ready soon.
Server updates – sprays have been re-enabled on the public CS port. They were disabled temporarily due to the amount of the offensive X rated content of the custom sprays file. I cant (at the moment) police exactly what gets uploaded and what doesn’t… but I am gonna ask everyone not to use any overly-offensive sprays on the server. If you’re caught using one, don’t be surprised if you’re kicked/banned from the server… fair warning, folks. I’m no prude, but I have had several complaints from people who play on the server that do not enjoy having to view some of these sprays, and after seeing some of them myself, I don’t blame them. Since some of these spray *will* make it onto the server eventually… if you do not want to view them, disable downloads in your config.cfg file and remove your existing custom.hpk file from your \cstrike directory. This is the best solution I can think of for now until I can find a .hpk editor that works.
More server updates… heh :-) I’ve added a couple new adminmod scripts to both the CS ports. One allows everyone to use /admin_playerinfo as a substitute for /admin_userlist… the layout is much more ordered and is easier to read. The second allows users to use the IRC-style /me switch in chat mode… so by starting your chat with /me will make what you say appear in third-person instead of first-person. Try it out, you’ll see what I mean :-P Also… and this has been up for awhile… users can use /admin_who to see who has admin privileges on the server and who has a reserved slot.
Personal stuff – I finally found a fuckin’ job!! After almost four weeks of phone calls, resume submittals and interviews, I start a new job with IBM on May 8th as a Level 3 field technician. Hands on work this time around… answering phones day in and day out with Nortel for a year was getting *old*, plus the pay is better :-) Special thank to Ronin for hooking me up with the in-house job posting :-)
Oh yeah, almost forgot… new and improved voting poll to the bottom right, go vote if ya haven’t already. Have a good weekend gang, see ya online.
K2