A Nexuiz development blog

[Dokujisan]

5) Crap... too many options... can't find the info that I want.

Choose one option, read through that, choose another, read through that and so on.

Or....just go to one place.

I always thought that the more places you can get info the better, as then you can verify some information with other places and find the info a lot faster.

That sounds like a whole lot of unnecessary work. You're telling me that if you had a choice between

a) one place with the information that you neeed


or

b) 6 places that collectively offer the information that you need


you would choose b)?

I don't believe you.

You have to be the first one that I've run into who has problem with too many options

I guess you haven't met enough people. Many sources is not the same thing as many "options". There is a difference. There is only one way to keep track of Nexuiz development. That means that there is one "option", and that is to scour all of the sources available. You cannot only track one source and expect to stay updated on Nexuiz development. You have to run through all of the sources (irc, wiki, svn, forum, etc) Something like a blog could fulfill the need to have one location where everyone goes to stay updated, providing regular updates (aka summaries) of development information.

[Dokujisan]

...and so on.

[C.Brutail]

I was thinking about a more complex and complete newsletter/blog solution. The blog should be maintained by a few people, and it could have different sections:
A.: official development

B.: Community buzz:
1.: News around home cooked levels, mods, models etc.
2.: What shadowy secrets are the Ninjaz up to at their dojo?
3.: Epic PB leave-your-brain-somewhere-else funfests
4.: Ladder matches, tourney reports
5.: Maybe interviews (?) with developers (developers developers developers) and regular players
6.: +18 section ("community prjocet" states )

I'd take part in this, but I won't do it alone (too big project for only one person)

[Fisume!]

haha, let's start with "nex.TV" again

btw: I am already working on a new project for nexuiz, most of your points are in a feature of the side.

->
1.: News around home cooked levels, mods, models etc.
2.: What shadowy secrets are the Ninjaz up to at their dojo?
4.: Ladder matches, tourney reports
5.: Maybe interviews (?) with developers (developers developers developers) and regular players
6.: +18 section ("community prjocet" states )

[GreEn`mArine]

@C.Brutail: VERY good points, really !

[tZork]

Id like to visit this universal library of all knowledge and wisdom. who is s going to compile and maintain it?

If we are talking Alientrap's Nexuiz development progress its covered fairly well by the svn commit logs IMO. Maps and have their own sub forum here for everyone to browse. A blog where the devs would need to repeat their commit logs just sounds like a pile of unnecessary, tedious work IMO. If we go back to the example of the Cryliink, do you think toy would have realized that it would become a the issue that many think it is today? I hardly think this blog entry would contain "Made Crylink a over powered spam cannon". More likely it would be:

redesigned crylink primary, may need additional balancing
crylink primary now bounces once, and has a splash radius of 80 on each
bounce, it does not bounce if it hits a soft target, this means that
bouncing shots off the floor directly infront of a player can do about
50% more damage, and if you hit the floor to the side of a player you
can still do a little (about 50%) damage

And that "incidentally" what lordhavoc wrote when he committed this change.

That there are fifty eleven other forums where ppl post things related to nexuiz rather then whatever the forum was intended for is hardly something fixable by adding yet another information stream.

[ai]

That there are fifty eleven other forums where ppl post things related to nexuiz rather then whatever the forum was intended for is hardly something fixable by adding yet another information stream.

Exactly what I was about to write.
So to Doku: If you have tons of options, and have a problem with that, why would you want to add another one which would require more work from the devs, and basically have the same function as these forums?

[Dokujisan]

That there are fifty eleven other forums where ppl post things related to nexuiz rather then whatever the forum was intended for is hardly something fixable by adding yet another information stream.

Fail.

This is unlike the current streams of information. This would be something that filters and funnels information from the other information streams. It's not "yet another" anything because there's nothing currently like it. The closest thing is the Development wiki, but that still isn't the same.

Exactly what I was about to write.
So to Doku: If you have tons of options, and have a problem with that, why would you want to add another one which would require more work from the devs, and basically have the same function as these forums?

ai, I'm not the only one that has a problem with too many sources of development information.

Imagine if I were to tell you a story, but instead of telling you the story in one book, I decided to cut up the story into a dozen pieces and spread it around in different places around the city. In order to get the full story, you have to go to every location in the city to collect all of the pieces to assemble them into a full book. This is the problem with having too many sources, because they are each limited.

Then imagine this story gets updated nearly everyday. So everyday, you have to go through each of the areas of the city to get the complete updates to the story.

I mentioned the concept of a funnel. Did you read that part? To my knowledge, there isn't any current communication tool that is acting as a funnel for Nexuiz development information. It's all split up all over the place.

The forum is like a garbage bin that things get throw into and hardly ever seen again. To gleen development information from the forum, you have to sort through all of the unrelated topics and hope that the sticky threads cover what you are looking for. That is not even close to ideal. It's not very functional.

Wow.... I feel like I'm doing a big song and dance here just to prove to you that the sky is blue. Really, guys....the sky is blue. Trust me on that. Just look upward.

[morfar]

I certainly think a blog is a good idea. As I already wrote.
SVN logs is not really good either. Most stuff div0 writes needs an interpreter anyways ;P

I'm also willing to contribute to such a blog. Together we are strong.

[ai]

I mentioned the concept of a funnel.

Oh, now I understand those funnel pictures. Before now I had no idea why you posted those so I just ignored them.

But nevertheless, even you you want to admit it or not, adding a blog will still be 'yet another source of information', you cannot deny that. Possibly a good one, or even the 'best' one depending on how well maintained that is.
However, I still stand by my idea that if you will go fourth with this blog idea, you still need the devs to coop with you, and div didn't like that so that's one down. However, I also have another proposal to make that will kinda resemble a blog and that is to use the resources we already have without creating more work. That is to use these forums.
Why not just create a section on these forums where the devs (or moderators i.e. the 'reporters' I mentioned earlier) can fill out info about the development. There's already a 'Nexuiz - Development' section, why not fully use that? Though I think a whole new section would be more feasible, for the simple reason that there is a sticky thread which is locked. It brings up all the info that the devs/reporters type in, then if someone wants to comment on that they create a new thread and a discussion is on the way.

I don't think there's a worry that there will be tons of threads by every single person cause those thread will just end up (even less) than what the comments would have been on the blog.

OR, yet another idea. Why not just create a blog at blogspot.com and be done with it without any work whatsoever?

There's really no need in creating more work before all the resources that are available to you have been fully taken advantage off.