Handy Game History v0.5.1 [Discontinued]

[philh]

This script is discontinued. For the new version of the script please visit viewtopic.php?f=527&t=123669


http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/12027

Thanks to edbeard for the name, and to ian13 for the proxy debugging before I got greasemonkey myself.

Install the script and a 'visualise' link will show up under 'Game Log'. Click it, and you'll be able to go backwards and forwards through the game history. For example you'll be able to see who started with each territory, etc.

Opera users, to install, you need to locate your userjs directory. It can be found in Help->About as 'User JavaScript files' under Paths. Save the file at the end of the 'install' link to there, keeping it with a .user.js extension.

New in 0.5.1:
Works with the new map XML format (thanks to freakybeard).

New in 0.5:
Larger, and more centralised, indicators.
Support for 8-player games.
Counters telling you how far into the game you are.

New in 0.4:
Navigate by move, turn, round, or go straight to the beginning/end of the game. (Turns are still available in freestyle games, though I'm not sure how much use they'll be.)
Made the indicators larger.
(Small update, but it's been over a month. I'm back at school, so things are slow.)

0.4.1 makes it work with the new game URL (game.php instead of gamespace.php), and only adds one set of controls if you click 'visualise' more than once.

Fixable bugs:
I haven't designed it to play well with the 'refresh' and 'larger/smaller map' buttons.
Games with more than six^Weight players will probably break. (I didn't expect this to actually happen outside of battle royale...)
It will break if the map file (.xml) can't be fetched for whatever reason. (I need that to work out where to place the indicators.)
Going forwards through the history, deadbeats' territories don't become neutral. Going backwards, territories that used to belong to deadbeats don't switch back from neutral.
In opera, it only occasionally works in World 2.1. Firefox is fine. Age of Realms was also causing problems, which I haven't tested in Firefox. All other maps seem to be fine.
Still available in active fog games, despite being useless. Generates lots of (non-fatal) error messages if you do try to use it.

Unfixable bugs:
It won't show you how many armies were on a territory, just who owned it.
If somebody deadbeats, any of their territories which haven't seen play at that point (ie. which haven't been conquered or used to conquer from) will show up as neutral (or their teammate's) at the beginning instead of reflecting their true original owner.

Future development:
I'd like to integrate chat somehow, but my HUI-fu isn't up to the challenge of doing it non-suckily.
Make it less ugly.
It should be more obvious where changes occur.

[Iliad]

That was one of my suggestions. Let's see it!

[wbaccus]

Got it installed in Greasemonkey, but it doesn't seem to be working. (I'm using Firefox on an Intel based Mac.

Love the idea though, I've been wanting functionality like this.

[philh]

I got a new version uploaded, it's replaced the original at the link I posted. Now with pretty colours!

It does now work with AJAX disabled. Also fixed a bug that I hadn't noticed before.

With the help of a friend over MSN, I got some way towards firefox compatibility. The last attempt he tested didn't work for him, but it was generating two error messages and I think I've fixed one since then. With luck, fixing that also fixed the other and it works now. (If it doesn't, it's at least in a better state for more knowledgeable people to look at.)

[edbeard]

I'm going to wait till I see other people saying it's working. Sounds pretty cool though.

As for a name I'd call it 'Handy Game History'

HGH for short

[wbaccus]

It now shows the visualize link in Firefox, and when I click on it, I get the advance/rewind links, but all of the armies go blank, so it's not quite there yet.

[jako]

this seems like a great idea especially for mentors who want to show their mentorees what they did wrong and where or show them y a game was successful.

i think it should be called flashback.

[yeti_c]

Nice work pal - I've not installed it yet - but look forward to doing it...

Of course when the next level of logging comes out then some of the impossible things will become possible!!

C.

[philh]

I realised it would be a lot easier if I just got greasemonkey myself, and eventually got it working. It's now hosted on userscripts, and I've updated the original post with the new URL.

[eternal_sunshine]

This is neat. The little asterisks are hard to see however.

[philh]

Agreed. They're bigger now, but let me know if it's not enough.

[lackattack]

Nice work, philh!

You'll need to change the script to install for game.php* instead of gamespace.php*

Also, I found a bug. When you click visualize several times it makes several sets of VCR buttons

[remydog]

I just downloaded and installed this, but it does not show up in my list of GM scripts and the button is not showing under the game log.

I tried re-starting, and still not there.

Did this get screwed up when the recent AJAX fix was implemented over the weekend? Is it a BOB compatibility problem?

I'd love to see this thing work.

MSK

[philh]

Fixed both those issues, thanks for the heads-up.

Remy, it should work now. I don't know of any problems with BOB compatibility, but as I don't use BOB myself it's not likely that I would. If anybody knows of one, let me know.

Also I've started watching this topic, so I might actually notice replies in future.

[remydog]

Agreed. They're bigger now, but let me know if it's not enough.

Please make the asterisks much bigger. Using this feature, it is almost more important to see the asterisks than it is to see the armies that are located at the spot at the moment.

Nice, and I'm sure additional development will make it even better. I don't have a clue about this stuff, but somehow seeing two boards side by side (or above and below) showing a round to round change might be good.

MSK

[remydog]

The other thing that would be good is to move the asterisks much closer to the army numbers. Where they are now, they are often outside the borders of the country that they represent.

[philh]

0.5 uploaded.

The indicators were always pretty close to the centre of the army circles for me. I've tried to make them closer, but it may depend on the font. I've set that to courier, but they still look totally different in opera and firefox, so I'm not entirely sure how it's going to look to anyone other than me.

[philh]

0.5.1 uploaded. A change in the XML format means previous versions no longer work. Nothing else new, I'm afraid. I suck at getting things done.

Credit for this one goes to freakybeard, who developed the fix before I even noticed anything was broken.

[CrabNebula]

Nice. Good job!

[Agent Price]

It sounds great, but how do you install the javascript? When I hit the install button, firefox just downloads a .js file. What the heck am I supposed to do with it? I'm on a mac, by the way.

[homes32]

It sounds great, but how do you install the javascript? When I hit the install button, firefox just downloads a .js file. What the heck am I supposed to do with it? I'm on a mac, by the way.

you need to have firefox with the greasemonkey extension installed first.

[scottp]

Thanks for developing this, it was something I was wanting, and somehow had missed this thread until today!

Of course, now the Ingrate will offer suggestions:

1. On some maps I've looked at (Madness, in particular) the asterisks do not align with the territories. Changing from large to small map or vice-versa does not help.

2. Could the changing icons flash or something to indicate where territories changed hands? It's sometimes hard to notice where the change occurred.

3. In a team game I reviewed, pink was eliminated, and cyan (pink's teammate) went on to win the game. However, all of cyan's activity after pink was eliminated was represented by pink asterisks.

4. yeti_c (or someone) indicated "more complete game logging" or something like that earlier in this thread. It would be GREAT to see the army numbers somewhere down the road, if that becomes possible!

again, thanks - and great job!

scottp

[Sh4d0w]

Does this not work anymore?

Click on the < and > and nothing happens.

[ignatious]

Same here - does anyone know if there's a working version of this, or something like it?

[scottp]

I bet the changes to the site that came about in the "Copyright chaos" are responsible. It was a nice feature that I didn't use too much, so it was only recently that I noticed it wasn't working. Woudl love if someone would revise/revive it, though.

Aligning the colored * markers with the army count bubbles better on the map would be nice, too - hey, if you're asking for something for free, why not ask for the moon?!