New Updates!!!

[Stardragon]

Hear yea! Hear yea!

New changes have been made to the team pages. Each team page will now feature the total number of structures produced by the team. The changes will come into effect starting next week :D

In order to place your team logo and/or a webpage link on the team's webpage, we require the following files from you:

1. A file named teamlogoXYZ.jpg, where XYZ is the number of your team (the number, NOT the rank). The image can be a maximum of 450 pixels in width. Please note that any larger images will be reduced, and any smaller images will be stretched.

2. A file named teamXYZ.url, where XYZ is the number of your team. This file must be in plain text, and must contain the full URL address of the webpage you desire to link to.
For example, a file might contain the following line: http://www.distributedfolding.org

NOTE I: If you do not know the number of your team, go to the Teams page from the main page of www.distributedfolding.org Then select your team and go to your team's webpage. The URL displayed at the top of your browser will say http://www.distributedfolding.org/teampages/teamXYZ.html
XYZ is the team number of your team.

NOTE II: Any logos and links submitted are subject to our approval, and will only be posted upon such approval.

For now, we will accept the files only from the team leader, which we have arbitrarily decided to be the person ranking first in the team.

Please send the required files as attachments to trades@mshri.on.ca

[jkeating]

1. A file named teamlogoXYZ.jpg, where XYZ is the number of your team (the number, NOT the rank). The image can be a maximum of 450 pixels in width. Please note that any larger images will be reduced, and any smaller images will be stretched.

Is 450 pixels the maximum size ("The image can be a maximum of 450 pixels in width"), or the only size ("any smaller images will be stretched") ??

[Stardragon]

The width can ONLY be 450 (i.e. width = "450" HTML tag).
If you want a smaller picture, just fill up the remaining width with whitespace.

[jkeating]

okie, dokie... thanks

[Dyyryath]

Hey Elena,

Just curious, what are the odds of getting a plain text dump page generated with the rest of the stats of the team names, numbers, and total structures?

It would be just like the txt page for each team, only instead of a team's users it would be the list of all teams as a whole.

It sure would make tracking the stats for all the teams a lot easier. ;)

[Scotttheking]

Um, the team leader selection just sucks, no offense.
For instance, on team macnn, reader50 or I (Scott) are the team heads. I'd rather not have to play around with hunting down members or anything like that.

If you can add some more stats, that'd be cool.
Whatever Dyy asks for is probably what we need for stats, too.

[reader50]

A suggestion, track the founder of a team. I founded ours' (Team MacNN) and presently went to set a logo, but could not find an access method. My account password would only access my account.

While an expanded ranking listing of top (or all) teams would make stats tracking MUCH easier, I have not asked for one. Reason: with interteam stats very difficult to track, it means we have competitive stats while most other teams do not. ;)

[Dyyryath]

LOL! :D

You're right, my friend. I'm certainly not interested in the extra hassle required to track every team with the format we get now. I track only those teams that I find interesting, or that I consider a threat to Free-DC.

The current setup definately keeps only the hardcore stats gurus in the 'all teams' stats game. :D

I'll settle for just being an entry-level stats guy unless they decide to offer an 'all teams' dump. ;)

[Scotttheking]

Originally posted by Dyyryath
LOL! :D

You're right, my friend. I'm certainly not interested in the extra hassle required to track every team with the format we get now. I track only those teams that I find interesting, or that I consider a threat to Free-DC.

The current setup definately keeps only the hardcore stats gurus in the 'all teams' stats game. :D

I'll settle for just being an entry-level stats guy unless they decide to offer an 'all teams' dump. ;)

:bs: WIMP
You know you can do better ;)
Come on, you and reader50 in a stats war!
That would be cool, and there'd be a ton of stats.

[reader50]

Stardragon, I very strongly suggest a different method of selecting the "team leader" After further thought, it came to me that anyone with a large number of units could join most teams and instantly become the leader. They could change the logo file and url, then move on to the next vulnerable team. "You are now Owned by XXX team. Follow the link to your new masters!"

Certian nuisance teams would no doubt find this quite entertaining, and we would have to keep scrambling to get our highest-ranked member to change it back after each departure.

Dyy, thanks. :)

[MAD-ness]

I have to admit this would be a funny prank the first time or two.

It would get old very quickly, but it WOULD be sort of funny once (assuming it wasn't your team getting jerked around). ;)

[Jodie]

Sounds like incentive to produce! ;)

Seems kinda funny though. Although - let's face it - you're calling Elena and the DF team's intelligence into question. From what I see of the requested format, it's not a particularly automated procedure. Don't think they'd notice after a time or two of switching it back - and the subsequent uproar?

[Stardragon]

Ok, I can see a big uproar about this, so I will go into the slightly more detailed version...

The reason we cannot request the team founders to send in the logos is because we have no way of tracking them down. This feature will be implemented in our new database, which is now in its testing phase.

The decision for the person with the most structures was made mainly to prevent repetitive submissions for the same team.

Here is the verdict - if you have a team member who is treated as team leader, then by all means have this individual submit the logo and url to us. In the case of conflicting submissions, we will simply pick the one we feel is more appropriate, or simply looks better :D

Since each team's logo/url needs to be manually uploaded, we just want to minimize confusion and avoid tedious clarification processes.

Also, if your team number is only one or two digits, please do not add zeroes in front. The XYZ was merely an example, it doesn't mean each number must be comprised of exactly 3 digits.

I hope this puts your minds at peace. :p

[Jodie]

<<I hope this puts your minds at peace>>

Naw.. But then, an entire team of psychologists couldn't do that - so don't feel disappointed. :p

[statsman]

Originally posted by Stardragon

...

Since each team's logo/url needs to be manually uploaded, we just want to minimize confusion and avoid tedious clarification processes.

...

Why all this uploading and manual intervention? Just use URL's to what the team wants as it's logo and team home page. Why fool with all the logo files? Just look at any of the other DC projects. They just allow the team leader to set the logo and team URL's, i.e. the team must have a host site for the logo picture file.

[Angus]

I just know we'll all end up with pictures of shrubs on our team pages...
:haddock:

[MAD-ness]

Thanks for the additional info Elena.

I know Howard is pretty tight lipped about stuff (not to mention probably too busy to come reporting every little detail to us) but when possible, more info = better in the eyes of most of us.

Helps prevent the questions/complaints/suggestions which are gauranteed to follow. ;)

Thanks again for the info.

On a related note, I have been curious lately as have others, I think, as to just what kind of firepower you guys are hoping to get in the future (i.e. this calender year in the "midrange future") and in the long term. Also, what kind of additional volume can you handle now?

Once we start doing CASP5 predictions, can you guys handle a /. type event? Even if someone can't get it submitted and posted on /., I know that the teams based upon tech sites will have news posts up (probably soon) on the main pages when possible and other publicity will be easier to create now that DF is involved in CASP5. :)

[Brian the Fist]

No one has asked yet, but Im sure you're thinking it - why the low-tech logo handling? Well, as those of you who have been with us for a while already know, it is of utmost importance to us to maintain the integrity of our site. If we let users start putting up arbitary images and web links, there's bound to be some clown who puts links to some pRon site, or photos of his posterior :moon: , or so on.. (heck, I'd do it just for a laugh :rotfl: ). So before you get any bright ideas (and I know no one on THIS forum would :D ) all images and links will be manually inspected.
If we deem them to be rude, offensive, politically incorrect, racist, sexist, feminist, proteinist or just plain ugly, we reserve the right to not post it.

To address Mad-ness, getting on /. would be cool. It is hard to estimate right now, but it appears we could easily handle 15-20000 active users with the current server (presently about 3000 of the 9000 registered users are active - not sure how good that is in terms of user retention). When we upgrade the back end in a few weeks, if all goes well, we should be able to manage 100K+ users. A local press release is most likely being released this week as well, so hopefully this will start bringing in more users quickly.

[MAD-ness]

I meant to ask this before, as it is almost certainly more relevant, but I forgot. :(

In terms of returned results, what relative volume can you handle? Easier to gauge it this way because there are going to be guys like Data and Marc and Jodie who are evil, evil human beings and totally screw up the averages. ;)

ScottJensen: you are the PR guy, wanna help us out? ;)

[IronBits]

Feature request...
I would like to assign a 'nickname' to each computer so I can track each ones progress. This would provide a useful tool where we could be alerted to a possible trouble spot, or even which ones are most productive, where I may have done everything right ;) :D

Maybe it could be the 2nd line in your handle.txt file.
You already have our 'name' in handle.txt.
If there is nothing on the 2nd line, then just ignore it...
I see this as beneficial to both the project and the individual parties, read: US :jester:

Something along those lines anyways... :notworthy