A New Support Approach

Howdy! Well, it's time to blow the dust off this blog with another new idea.

Ok, so, I've been getting a lot of support requests lately from people with problems with good ole Warn Logger. Now, I love helping people out and am in no way trying to tell people to back off with this concept, but the same problems keep reoccurring. So, heres what I plan to do.

I'm going to design a new chunk of code to allow the user to troubleshoot the code before they contact me. The troubleshooter will allow the user to fix the problem theirself or tell the person exactly what kinda information I need to get from them in order to fix the problem quickly and efficiently.

Here's a run-down of how I immagine it to work. The code starts by writing a try block on every line. If an error occurs, the try block will know of it and alert the user. The code will also be aware of the common errors encountered and common remedies the user should perform. The code will also check to make sure the code to test is installed properly. If all else fails, the user will be alerted with run-time reports from the code that need to be sent to me in order to fix the problems.

It's a bit low-tech, but I'm thinking up different ways of going about doing this without all the try blocks and such. If you see any codes pop up utilizing this concept, guess who the coder most likely stole it from! :p

Code Census

Wow, its been a while since Ive updated the blog. Ive been busy with a bunch of things.

Recently I launched a code counter with all of my public InvisionFree codes (as of this posts writing, three) to get an idea of just how many people use my codes. The counter was left on for a full 24 hours, give or take a few minutes. Im pretty happy with the results of the census; approximately 150 individual active boards have my codes installed and working. I say approximately because the results included about 2 google caches and 4 duplicates, and also did not count any of my codes which are self-hosted by the board owner. The next time I activate the counter, I hope to see even more boards in the results. The counter ate my bandwidth a bit, so I cant release a link to the results at this time. Sorry.

Also, I just updated to Beta Blogger and added an AdSense bar.

Two Code Updates for Reply-Blocker and dSig

Reply-Blocker has a few updates in store for it. Most of them are similar to the ones applied to dSig. They are listed below:

Make individualized (private per-user) cookies
Fix manager feature
Fix loadpoint
Confirm compatability with FF
MAYBE disallow Mod/admin blocking


dSig will also be receiving a small update to its cookie feature. The cookies use a character to distinguish different users and blocked names. The problem is if any user has that character in their name they cant be blocked and also cant use dSig! My solution is to change the character into something that IF boards dont allow to be in their user names. I havent figured out what yet, but when I do Ill let you know. This update will be included with the new version of Reply-Block as well.

Finished: dSig Update

I released dSig v3 about a week ago. It was going well until I got reports of an incompatibility with Firefox. Today I pushed out dSig 3.0.1, which features support for Firefox and a new runtime expansion that allows dSig to run faster than before.

The main reason behind the runtime expansion was not a concern of speed, but of conflicts with other codes. dSig uses a User CP addition called dSig Manager. In the method before 3.0.1 the code was run through the window.onload event, which can only hold one value per loaded page. Meaning if there is another code using the onload event, only one of the codes will run. In the new method, I check to see if the page is already loaded. If it is, dSig is run immediately. If it isnt, dSig is added to the onload event. I would like to make the immediate running mandatory, but that would mean becomming unavailable to boards with previous versions installed.

Reopening dSig

Well, Ive been working on the forum software for ThE NuBs. Its still not completely done, but its getting closer. I also finished Project Apex for now till the owner of it gets online again.

So, with those two monster projects done, Im ready to reopen an old code: dSig. I had said I would upgrade it back in the days when I wasnt so busy. I tried to open and edit the beta files of the work I had done towards the new version, but after reading through it a few times, I realized that the function and methods I had used in the old version wouldnt be able to work correctly with the ammount of data I would be passing it in the new version. As a result, Ive decided that it will be easier to completely recode the new version instead of just changing the structure of the function.

That means it will be a longer wait for the code, but will be definately worth it. As usual, Ill continue to post updates on the new versions progress as it unfolds.

Warn Logger Trouble

At first, the release of Warn Logger seemed like a big success. But then reports came in of a problem that was causing a board error. After cranking out the next version with the fix, I found out that for some reason one of the features, the one that allows you to post reports as new topics, wasnt working. I have no idea why that is as the code that deals with that feature was never even touched.

With this version came two more problems! The code now had some compatibility issues with Firefox and was causing "Aborted Action" errors in Internet Explorer. After talking with a friend, I figured out that the IE error was caused by dynamically knocking elements out of the DOM. I fixed the problem and it seems that the FF incompatibility was also being caused by the same problem.

So far, there have been no more bug reports. Hopefully it will stay that way and I can get some peace!

On a side-note, Ive started work on a "resource site" by a group called Project Apex. Its a pretty nasty little organization. The heads of the group are highly experienced web users, some including hackers, programmers, scripters, and other ranks from the "dark net". They all agree that there is no reason to fear them or not visit their site as their objective isnt to mess with innocent computers. Check it out at http://www.project-apex.com.

Finished:Warn Logger

Thats another code down! The long-awaited code Warn Logger is finally completed!

Check out this topic for details about how to install it. ^_^

Cookies Forever

I thought of something yesterday when I decided to clear out my cookies and temporary internet files. When you clear out your cookies, all the information saved by codes goes bye bye, including all the statistics saved by non-php RPG hacks and other codes you have to work for to get the information you do! So, I sat there thinking through all the alternatives to "temporary cookies". The most sensefull of them was to have a text file on your machine where a program can save important cookie information and restore it every time you delete your cookies. The hard part shouldnt be getting the actual program made, but getting IF users to actually download and set it up on their computers.

Also for those of you interested in progress of Warn Logger, its almost done. Now that all my side projects are done, I can get back to mainstream coding for IF. :)

New: JS++

While working on someones IF board, I realized how cool it would be if you could allow your advanced members to create their own JavaScript codes to run client-side everytime they visit the board!

I think it would be a pretty simple code structure. This project will become a reality after my other codes, such as Reply-Blocker update and Warn Logger, are completed. JS++ will exist in the User CP as a page containing a textbox for data entry. When the code in the textbox is submitted, a cookie will be created containing the data. Each page loaded past that point will have the cookie data appended to it. Since the inputted code will only affect the member who typed it up, there shouldnt be very many problems.

Thinking through the various functions and methods in JavaScript, I couldnt think of anything that would have to be restricted in this code. If you know of any variables, methods, functions, or other things that might cause a security or code flow problem please let me know by becoming a member of the UCO board and posting a reply to this topic. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Other Programs

Ive started work on a collection of Habbo-related programs called Stalk Utilities. Most of the tools are done and are working correctly. The tools will be downloadable from Myishi Chat Center when the project is totally completed.

Also, Im getting to work on a program that allows you to read through emails from Dodgeit.com without having to know how to read HTML or XML. More on this program will be posted later.

As for Warn Logger, the code is starting to finally take form. Expect to see it sometime in October.