ideas Site Suggestion Box

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

On 24/09/2024 at 10:32 PM, simmering said:

With all the changes to STEX files done by ST staff in relation to the submenu DLL and building styles DLL, how about adding "Updated by" to the File Information box?

Done!

I've coded it for both description edits and new file versions. (You'll be able to see who made the update when you are signed in.)

Here's a preview:

(As shown from this file.)

Important Note

For new version uploads, it will only apply from this point onwards. The reason it's not retrospective is because there previously wasn't any logging when a new version was uploaded. It was only when a file description was edited, and so I had to implement new code logic for this internally.

This also raises the potential prospect for a files feed to display all newly updated file entries on the STEX.

One thing at a time however...

[simmering 2,743]

That was fast. I very much appreciate the privacy measure of only showing this to logged-in users.

[nos.17 5,256]

IMPLEMENTED - 

---

On a related note, would it be possible to not change the updated datetime when a file's description is changed? If someone is not adding a new file version and just editing the details of the STEX description to update dependency links, for example, IMO it makes sense to show that the file has not been updated.

[JulioC 2,581]

6 hours ago, nos.17 said:

On a related note, would it be possible to not change the updated datetime when a file's description is changed? If someone is not adding a new file version and just editing the details of the STEX description to update dependency links, for example, IMO it makes sense to show that the file has not been updated.

Thats a feature that would be nice on the City Journals section too.

If I want to edit something in an old entry, there's only the option of "publish" after finishing the edition, which makes that entry go to the top of the list of your entries as it was the publishing of a new entry and subsequent your latest entry, and not only an edit - which make a mess on the order and also it evens appear on the "new entries" list box in the city journals page

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

2 hours ago, nos.17 said:

On a related note, would it be possible to not change the updated datetime when a file's description is changed? If someone is not adding a new file version and just editing the details of the STEX description to update dependency links, for example, IMO it makes sense to show that the file has not been updated.

Sounds a good idea. Silent editing will be very useful for description edits, so then a file is only updated if a new version is uploaded. I believe this will be possible to adjust somewhere in the internal code for the board software. There must be something which triggers the date to be modified when a description is saved.

 

2 hours ago, JulioC said:

If I want to edit something in an old entry, there's only the option of "publish" after finishing the edition, which makes that entry go to the top of the list of your entries as it was the publishing of a new entry and subsequent your latest entry, and not only an edit - which make a mess on the order and also it evens appear on the "new entries" list box in the city journals page

I like this too. I'll need to do a bit of investigating with this, as a key consideration is Publish still sets the time initially (on first publishing of a CJ entry). The logic would need to differentiate between unpublishing and re-publishing an entry which has previously been published.

[JulioC 2,581]

1 hour ago, Cyclone Boom said:

I like this too. I'll need to do a bit of investigating with this, as a key consideration is Publish still sets the time initially (on first publishing of a CJ entry). The logic would need to differentiate between unpublishing and re-publishing an entry which has previously been published.

On a new note... I guess that now that you said it... I just checked back and yes, I'm a bit dumb

I just need to set the publish date to some older date and then the orders and etc wont be messed up. For some reason I never noticed that, and just went straight to the "immediately" box

Sorry, kinda embarrassing but yeah lol

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

5 hours ago, Cyclone Boom said:

Silent editing will be very useful for description edits, so then a file is only updated if a new version is uploaded.

@nos.17

Done!

It was a nice and easy edit, and I'm pleased to confirm this is implemented and working. Upon editing a description and saving, the time is no longer updated. If an updated time has been set previously (from a new version), this will still be maintained along with the "Updated By" info.

I can imagine for file updating projects this'll be very beneficial, as it'll mean no concerns about the updated list being out of order.

Previously it was confusing how the Changelog release time got updated too, even for simple description edits.

 

3 hours ago, JulioC said:

I just need to set the publish date to some older date and then the orders and etc wont be messed up.

Ah, I see! So that'll work fine to set the date back as it was. I wasn't very familiar with the CJ updates, so that's a good thing to be aware of.

No worries, at least we both know this trick now.

[hugues aroux 3,867]

Thanks to @nos.17  for suggesting the idea here, and @Cyclone Boom for making it happen; only taking into account a real file modification is a real plus, for those who like me like/need (!) to rewrite the text of their articles, without disturbing visitors.
Along the same lines, CB, do you think we could bring the info - this file update (STEX) - back to the "All Activity" page (../discover/) ??
We see that [NewMember] has arrived, that has changed his profile icon, the public messages between members! Why not file/article updates!? A simple line with url.
Yes yes .. I'm a big lazybones, and I like this page as an entry point for all my browsing on ST, like many other Members, it seems to me, it's a bit like our "supervision console"

[CorinaMarie 29,894]

On 3/17/2024 at 1:21 AM, EastChapel said:

Personally I'd rather the SimCity 4 ones be at the top as I feel they're the most used.

Agreed. I've promoted SimCity 4 vertically.

While at it, the Challenges forum has been moved down just above the Trixies Forum. If ever there's activity in those, they can be moved back to the top as needed.

 

On 3/17/2024 at 1:21 AM, EastChapel said:

That being said I could be wrong and there may be other legitimate reasons to keep the Skylines subs at the top...

Long ago, there were more posts per day in CSL and it made sense for it to have top billing. As it happens now there hasn't been a post in the past week in there so CB and I decided it was time to do this.

( Hang tight in this topic for an activity graph by CB. )

[The Mayor of Hiversbridge 341]

3 hours ago, CorinaMarie said:

Agreed. I've promoted SimCity 4 vertically.

While at it, the Challenges forum has been moved down just above the Trixies Forum. If ever there's activity in those, they can be moved back to the top as needed.

Long ago, there were more posts per day in CSL and it made sense for it to have top billing. As it happens now there hasn't been a post in the past week in there so CB and I decided it was time to do this.

( Hang tight in this topic for an activity graph by CB. )

Back in its rightful spot

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

On 05/10/2024 at 10:06 PM, CorinaMarie said:

( Hang tight in this topic for an activity graph by CB. )

And here is said graph...
 

As we can see, this clearly justifies SC4 being back on top now. CSL had its period in the limelight, before activity dwindled from 2018 onwards. SC4 on the other hand continues steadily, boosted recently by the amazing developments in the custom content scene.

Analysis

• CSL posts have decreased by approximately 98.8% from its peak year in 2015, to current levels in 2024.
• Even with the 3 years it had higher totals, the average CSL GD & modding posts per year is only 2,685 (compared with 3,540 for SC4).
• SC4 has seen an increase of approximately 12% over the past 10 years, with a gradual growth trajectory.
• With a grand total of 120 posts this year, CSL has had its highest total since 2020 (mainly thanks to the release of CS2).
• For SC4 at the current rate, 2024 looks like accumulating over 3,000 posts for the year, close to double that of last year.
• Last year at this stage, there were 1,314 GD & Modding posts for SC4. Now there are 2,359 (an 80% increase).

Ok, that's enough now. Otherwise this will turn into a PhD thesis...

[Kel9509 1,483]

I think, with the recent changes to the Recently Updated files, there is an inadvertent error happening.  

The front Downloads page, in the "Recently Updated" section, shows all new files posted to the STEX.  The exclusive list of recent updates there appears to be replaced by the new files.  Of course, new files are also shown under "What's New" as well.  

I would occasionally browse the Recently Updated list there but it's been completely subsumed by new files now... 

[CaptCity 4,915]

3 hours ago, Kel9509 said:

I think, with the recent changes to the Recently Updated files, there is an inadvertent error happening.  

The front Downloads page, in the "Recently Updated" section, shows all new files posted to the STEX.  The exclusive list of recent updates there appears to be replaced by the new files.  Of course, new files are also shown under "What's New" as well. 

Yes, I thought I had noticed the same, but hadn't gotten around to giving it a closer look. It seems the lists on the homepage are more clearly represented, but the lists under the ST STEX tab may have been affected somehow. At least this is what I see on my end...

[CaptCity 4,915]

15 hours ago, CaptCity said:

It seems the lists on the homepage are more clearly represented, but the lists under the ST STEX tab may have been affected somehow.

If I may quote myself... It seems I spoke to soon (or I'm not undeerstanding the new settings clearly, or the settings are being modified as I speak...), but the 'Updated list on the homepage is now showing things that don't seem to have been updated. There doesn't seem to be any update indicated for the newest two on the list (Julio's and WannGLondon's), but they're on the list. Again, I may be misinterpreting things...

[Simizen 1,100]

Can we have access to our own files under the Profile Icon?

basically, right here with an option for "Files", we could select that and then jump straight to any files that we've uploaded. Otherwise, we have to click a few times till we find the spot for it. Maybe I'm an anomaly, but I've been finding myself trying to see what I've uploaded regularly enough for this to be an issue for me. And I figured it'd probably be best to have that, so people can do a quick check before uploading something, to see if they've already uploaded the mod they wish to add.

Otherwise, if there's a quicker way than what I've been doing, feel free to let me know, lol

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

On 15/10/2024 at 9:07 PM, Kel9509 said:

I think, with the recent changes to the Recently Updated files, there is an inadvertent error happening.

Good catch there. This was the default sorting in those feed blocks.

I've now custom coded this logic, so it only displays STEX files which have been updated. Previously it was seeing submitted files the same as as newly updated. This is because when a STEX file is uploaded, the submitted and updated times are identical within the database. The fix involved adding logic which filters these out, meaning the "Recently Updated" feeds on the STEX and homepage now only show these updated ones (of any submission age).

 

11 hours ago, Ryuu Tenno said:

Can we have access to our own files under the Profile Icon?

We can...
 

While editing this, I spruced up the menu with icons and hover over titles for each. The icons also appear on mobile view too (just slightly smaller).

Thanks for the idea as well.

[Simizen 1,100]

9 minutes ago, Cyclone Boom said:

While editing this, I spruced up the menu with icons and hover over titles for each. The icons also appear on mobile view too (just slightly smaller).

Absolutely didn't realize that there were no icons for these options, lol. I thought something seemed different about them, but I do love the icons being added. This is wonderful!!

[CaptCity 4,915]

12 minutes ago, Cyclone Boom said:

"Recently Updated" feeds on the STEX and homepage now only show these updated ones (of any submission age).

As I view them now, things do seem to be being displayed in the appropriate positions on both. Great that it was possible to make those modifications. Thanks for the taking the time to do so... 

16 minutes ago, Cyclone Boom said:

I spruced up the menu with icons and hover over titles for each.

Very neat and tidy looking... 

[CorinaMarie 29,894]

Excellent work, @Cyclone Boom!

Each of these features you've added makes our home more and more pleasant to roam around in.

[Delyo00 3]

I personally think it's quite difficult to find files on Simtropolis, because there are so many of them. I think there are two things that can be done to help find things much easier.

1. Choose a time range for files in the category view.

As of today if you go into the "most downloaded" or "most viewed" view for a category most of the assets will be from 2004 - 2006. There's a lot of nice assets on there obviously. But, I hope we can all agree that more recent assets are higher quality. This is simply because asset creators have become better at making assets, they spend more time on a single asset and have access to better tools. It's more difficult to find those assets, because the new assets don't manage to collect as many views or downloads. The older assets have had years of head start on that front.

This is why I think we should be allowed to set a time range for the submitted date for files  in the category view. Then we could set the "sorty by" to eg. most downloaded or most viewed. This way it'd be easy to see the best files for a given year or a range of years. I think it should be rudamentary and you just select one year as a whole instead of selecting specific dates. To make this less computationally complex and to save the money spent on the servers, the list for each year could be regenarated every month or so. The most recent year could be regenarated once a day or once a week. It wouldn't be perfect but definitely be accurate enough.

I'm aware that as of right now you can go into my streams page and you can set the time range to whatever you like, however, that page doesn't sort the assets according to the downloads or views so you're looking at all assets from a time range chronologically.

2. More subcategories

I've talked about this on the S4 Evermore Discord with a couple of people and I think it'd be a great feature to add subcategories for SimCity 4 files.

For example, it's rather difficult to find train stations, because they reside in the vague Transport category. I think the whole category could be split into train stations, bus stations, metro stations, parking stations, and "other" category.

I've done some digging and it would be possible to not only create new subcategories to the website, but also to automatically sort all the existing files. All that would be required to do so is to get the exemplars from .lot, .bat, and .dat files for each updloaded file. The DBFP would have to be decrypted. The methods for doing so can be found in many existing open source projects such as:

https://github.com/Killeroo/SC4Parser

https://sourceforge.net/projects/ilive-reader/

Then you can read in the necessary values such as the Occupant Group from the exemplar. The occupant group then allow you to figure out what kind of a transport asset it is and sort it into an appropriate subcategory.

The subcategorization of the website could be taken a step further. Buildings could be split up based on density or the wealth levels. When submitting a new file the user could be asked to choose a relevant subcategory. There would be no necessity to run the scripts again.

 

I think the website is pretty good as it is, but it could definitely be made better. This is just my 0.02$.

[matias93 7,535]

23 hours ago, Delyo00 said:

2. More subcategories

I've talked about this on the S4 Evermore Discord with a couple of people and I think it'd be a great feature to add subcategories for SimCity 4 files.

For example, it's rather difficult to find train stations, because they reside in the vague Transport category. I think the whole category could be split into train stations, bus stations, metro stations, parking stations, and "other" category.

About the automatic sorting, what @Null 45 and @memo have done to implement the submenu DLL would be a proof of concept, but I tend to feel that developing a tool to do that outside of the game might be a bit too much for something that could be easier to implement by simply adding the corresponding tags to the STEX files. Admittedly, we (mods) could do that right now and haven't, mostly because of lack of time. I guess the more important step to do it right would be to determine a clear categorisation, coherent with what is found inside the game, to tag those files. We could start with the categories used for the submenu DLL, certainly...

[Propfam 2,305]

NAM shouldn't be a hinted acronym since we use that term a lot, similar to SC4.

[CorinaMarie 29,894]

14 minutes ago, Jidan said:

NAM shouldn't be a hinted acronym since we use that term a lot, similar to SC4.

I disagree and feel it should stay, but if the NAM team presents the request to remove the hover over text for the acronym, we could ditch it if they feel strongly about it.

Also, I've moved this to the Site Suggestion Box since the coding is deliberate and not a bug at all.

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

I concur with Cori. I think a key point is new players to the game might want to know what NAM means.

Sure they'll soon find out, but it wouldn't be obvious immediately.

[Propfam 2,305]

6 hours ago, Cyclone Boom said:

Sure they'll soon find out, but it wouldn't be obvious immediately.

Not to be that guy lol and seriously, there are a lot of first time player who know nothing, but is NAM literally the gate to SC4? I mean, no one is going to install SC4 without installing NAM or at least know NAM really is, even for people who are completely new to the game. There's a reason why NAM is so popular at ModDB, STEX, and LEX (or Evermore these days) in the first place. Also, there are many tutorials on YouTube what NAM is or what's the function of it, all thanks to creators and the NAM team. And I don't think NAM stands for something else other than the mod for network additions. Finally, as a testament to how popular the NAM really is, the NAM documentation has been cited and translated to different communities, from Polska to SFBT to even SimCityChina and SimCity Kaskus.

And also, in any exchange (sanctioned by the NAM team), the listings for NAM always include the full name. It's not just NAM, it also includes CAM too. The only time NAM is just referred as an acronym is for the park and ride plugin and obsolete mods. There's no time when the NAM listing is only titled as 'NAM.' It's always been 'Network Addon Mod' or 'Network Addon Mod (NAM)' or variations of it. So, it's clearly obvious what NAM stands for when you're downloading NAM in the first place, except if you download it directly, which is pretty rare, or unofficially (you know, that stuff that breaks the site rules). Even unofficial sources almost always list NAM with its full name. And again, it's true for all communities since the mod is so popular. It's unlike SFBT or WRC where you have to dig up thru the manuals or worse, figure out on your own to only find more acronyms.

 

I also hate why CAM is also an abbreviation. Well, I don't really hate it's a hinted acronym. But, thanks to its word to be hinted, everything that has a word 'CAM' (note that I spell it lowercase when making this reply) is capitalized as an acronym, even if it means otherwise. For instance, some may call the 3D camera mod as the 3D CAM, which afaik will be uppercased by ST right after posting a content, even including one instance in the homepage's Features.

Ironically, I probably contributed to all of this mess thanks to my own posts on SC4's acronyms, borrowed from SimCity Kaskus. It's still up on the forum iirc.

[Shadow Assassin 336]

lol no

If anything there's been far too much of a proliferation of TLAs (three letter acronyms) in the community in general.

It's a good thing that abbreviations like CAM, NAM, SPAM, etc have that feature on ST that explain what they mean.

[hugues aroux 3,867]

-- SPAM NAM SAM CAM SFBT BSC MTP BAT PIM RKT is our SC4 DNA ...free the TLAs and FTLs and ... and all the others !!

... Some are weird... depending on the language, or, more funny than others! THIS IS SC4 ! Super good idea, these info bubbles, for beginners.

 

[Ulisse Wolf 4,461]

1 hour ago, Jidan said:

Not to be that guy lol and seriously, there are a lot of first time player who know nothing, but is NAM literally the gate to SC4? I mean, no one is going to install SC4 without installing NAM or at least know NAM really is, even for people who are completely new to the game. There's a reason why NAM is so popular at ModDB, STEX, and LEX (or Evermore these days) in the first place. Also, there are many tutorials on YouTube what NAM is or what's the function of it, all thanks to creators and the NAM team. And I don't think NAM stands for something else other than the mod for network additions. Finally, as a testament to how popular the NAM really is, the NAM documentation has been cited and translated to different communities, from Polska to SFBT to even SimCityChina and SimCity Kaskus.

And also, in any exchange (sanctioned by the NAM team), the listings for NAM always include the full name. It's not just NAM, it also includes CAM too. The only time NAM is just referred as an acronym is for the park and ride plugin and obsolete mods. There's no time when the NAM listing is only titled as 'NAM.' It's always been 'Network Addon Mod' or 'Network Addon Mod (NAM)' or variations of it. So, it's clearly obvious what NAM stands for when you're downloading NAM in the first place, except if you download it directly, which is pretty rare, or unofficially (you know, that stuff that breaks the site rules). Even unofficial sources almost always list NAM with its full name. And again, it's true for all communities since the mod is so popular. It's unlike SFBT or WRC where you have to dig up thru the manuals or worse, figure out on your own to only find more acronyms.

 

I also hate why CAM is also an abbreviation. Well, I don't really hate it's a hinted acronym. But, thanks to its word to be hinted, everything that has a word 'CAM' (note that I spell it lowercase when making this reply) is capitalized as an acronym, even if it means otherwise. For instance, some may call the 3D camera mod as the 3D CAM, which afaik will be uppercased by ST right after posting a content, even including one instance in the homepage's Features.

Ironically, I probably contributed to all of this mess thanks to my own posts on SC4's acronyms, borrowed from SimCity Kaskus. It's still up on the forum iirc.

No thanks. Acronyms with information bubbles are useful for inexperienced players. If anything, we need to start removing obsolete acronyms from the list

[CorinaMarie 29,894]

6 hours ago, Jidan said:

I mean, no one is going to install SC4 without installing NAM or at least know NAM really is, even for people who are completely new to the game.

Well. That makes me no one back in 2015.

I got the original SC4 when it was new, installed it, and started playing. By the time I had a city tile about halfway filled it was stuttering and sputtering and was just unplayable scrolling around. My comp met the absolute minimum requirements and I was not willing to turn off all the good graphics. I re-boxed the CD and manual and put the game on a shelf for a wee bit over a decade.

Along the way RH came out and I bought that new too (plus the Prima Book) and put them on the same shelf as I knew someday I could run the game.

Then in mid or late 2015 I installed both on a much better comp and began playing vanilla and I loved it. Each time something would confuzzle me, I Googled and most times wound up reading replies here on ST. Even after joining this site in March of the next year, I became aware of NAM, but had no interest in some massive install.

I imagine many first time players could follow a similar path and they prolly also get completely overwhelmed for a while. Any help we can give them with hover over acronym descriptions will make their life easier. I know they were good for me while I was a neophyte and many of the more esoteric ones are still useful.

No one is required to mouse over them if they don't want to see the popup text.

[Propfam 2,305]

Yeah unfortunately, we can't remove NAM from hinted acronym and I agree with that. And I'm aware that some players wouldn't know NAM until later times, including myself and you. But that's a minority these days thanks to abundance of SC4 infos online.

But I do wish we can spell CAM (with lowercase) as such instead of CAM that we have today.