Time for a new KoLmafia thread over on GD?

People would be weaned off of major builds if none of them actually worked any more due to a KoL change, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's a good idea to force people away from them.

Like StDoodle, I have no problem being one of the minions that answers questions in the G-D thread. I think it's better for everyone if people adding code to mafia can spend their mafia-improvement time on writing code instead of answering the same question for the tenth time or so.
 
I, as a rather recent user, think a new thread is probably a good idea. Monster threads like the old one generally make it so that people post things like "I looked through the last page but this wasn't there so..." even though it might've been answered already but further back. The smaller the thread the more likely that someone actually read it before posting.

I almost never go to the KoL forums at all because there is just too much going on there, and far too often, a lot of drama llamas wanting something or other off of the developers, but for those who do I think a restarted thread (with the excellent wording posted above) would be a good idea.
 
StDoodle said:
I don't know how the forum adminship is set up, but it might be nice if a couple more people could have at least limited power to change thread prefixes. At the very least, it isn't unheard of for a feature request to be taken back by the original submitter upon learning that there's already a fairly decent way to do what they're looking for. While I don't think non-devs should be marking any bugs as "Fixed," I think the "Rejected" for feature requests and sometimes even "Not a Bug" could be done by a few of the forum regulars. With any luck, this would cut down at least a little on the time devs spend doing "paperwork."
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Right now Developers and any moderators should have access to change prefixes if there are any suggestions on who else should have access I'm all ears.
 
My search-fu is far from perfect, and there are lots of registered users to look through, but I only saw two moderators who weren't devs or you; asturia and dangerpin. I've seen dangerpin post once in a while, but I don't think asturia is active here anymore.

I would suggest both Bale and slyz, as they're both active in the GD thread and here. There's one other person* I could add, but he's not the most -- politically correct, I guess -- poster at all times. ;)

* Yes, I'm talking about myself in the third person.

Edit to add: yeah, add ".*?lost.*?" to the list.
 
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Are you looking for a new rank that can change prefixes? Like, say, "Minion"? >:-)

Regarding helpful & active people both here and at GD, I also direct your attention to lostcalpolydude, who is "i'm lost" over on GD.
 
I like the idea of a Mafia Minion group.

There are currently ten people with commit access at SourceForge. If the definition of "Dev" means "has (and sometimes uses) commit access" then grotfang and I (jaadams5 there) probably should be added to Dev.
 
You guys do? Honestly I don't look at SVN commits often enough :(\

Edit: Bale and slyz are now Minions aka Super Mods
 
StDoodle breaks out the red pen

Welcome to the KoLmafia thread. This thread is supposed to be where you post any questions, comments, or concerns you have related to the KoLmafia project so as to keep this forum uncluttered with general KoLmafia questions. However, while questions are welcomed, attitude is not, so make sure you think twice about what you're writing before posting. Think at least a third time before using words like "annoying" to describe the behavior of a freely provided program that has lots of hard, free work behind it that was most certainly not created to "annoy" you.
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I'm thinking the last two sentences should be changed to something like:

However, please keep in mind that this project is run completely by volunteers, from the developers writing code to the minions on the front line answering more basic questions. While we strive to make sure the experience of using KoLmafia is as pleasant as possible for everyone, no one is getting paid to put up with attitude, and we certainly won't do it for free. We will do our best to respond to all polite correspondence as soon as we are able. Attitude, however, may lead to mass /baleet, which could make it difficult to obtain further help

I'm still not 100% happy with the above, and would love to hear suggestions.

If you've got more advanced questions which you think require a thread or two to explain, consider taking your question to the KoLmafia User Script Repository forums, which can be found here. Or, if you think it might already be answered, check out either the FAQ or SinginSally's KoLmafia Guide (inspired by Aprocalypse's earlier guide).
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I think we should shorten it to the "KoLmafia Forums"; while it's still the main script repository, it's so much more today. I don't want to give the impression that the forums are for script-related issues only. I also think we need to change color / bold the links; as I've mentioned before, the inline links can be very difficult to pick out in body text on many forums (including GD).

Can I have some quick links?
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I generally dislike doing so, but given the nature of GD it may be worth listing the main page of the wiki and forums up there too (despite listing them above).

Will KoLmafia run on my system?
...
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I don't see the need for any changes there.

What features does KoLmafia provide?


  • Auto-adventure. Yes, just like KoLmelion, KoL CLI, bigfreak's toolbelt, and Ohayou's mad-speed repeat action scriptlet, this desktop client supports adventuring at many of the most popular areas accessible through the browser. If new content arrives that is not yet supported by KoLmafia, please do not post to this thread asking for it to be added. Instead, post a "New Content" request on the forums.
  • Coffee cup gameplay. Under the hood via the "relay browser" interface, KoLmafia aggregates some of the best browser script / helper ideas to present a slightly different click-reducing look to KoL that works in most major browsers, not just the one with the orange icon. Some general features include quick auto-restore links, quick use links, simplified combat handling, and tracking of most of KoL's "hidden" counters and timers.
  • Inventory management. Wanted to keep an inventory window open while you're buying from the mall or adventuring to see your totals? Want to speed up multi-step recipes? Want to buy from lots of stores at once? KoLmafia presents a way to streamline that to let you focus on the cooler, less repetitive aspects of KoL.
  • Not-So-Instant Messenger (NSIM) not to be confused with NetScape Instant Messenger (NSIM/AIM). Ever find yourself in far too many channels with some burning desire to have it all tabbed or in separate windows? Maybe your PMs, too? KoLmafia presents its own interface to KoL chat to help you manage all that, and it even logs all your chat sessions behind the scenes for later out of context quoting.
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The first item is pretty outdated; which of those are still around? Also, these days information is as big of a use-case as auto-adventure; for public-relations reasons, I think it might be better to move that up one (and change it a bit, see below). Should we also mention that including any relevant info should be done with "New Content" requests, or are these mostly just serving as "TODO" lists anyway?

The second item should either be expanded on or split into two parts. Information is one of the big things KoLmafia helps with. I've know people who have downloaded KoLmafia just to track fortune cookies. I've know people who have done so just to get access to logging abilities. While this isn't my call, in my opinion, I think it would be a good idea to emphasize this aspect of KoLmafia.

While I can appreciate that a great deal of effort probably went into the chat features built into mafia, I'm not sure it ranks up there as the #3 most important aspect of KoLmafia, currently. If we want to replace this with something new, I think a nod to the extensibility of KoLmafia through ash scripting may be in order. Hell, ash is pretty damn powerful these days, and probably on par with "professional" programming languages from when a lot of people here started programming. (Not me though; I'm not a programmer. :p)

How can I help with the KoLmafia project?

I would love to be able to simplify KoLmafia a bit (following this philosophy whenever possible). If you've got any suggestions on how to make KoLmafia easier to use, even if it involves removing an existing feature, I'm open to hearing them. If you have ideas about improvements or enhancements, I'm open to those as well, but I abide by this philosophy in addition to the previous one (just a fair warning).

As a side note, there may be occasions where we miss your bug report amidst all the other thread posts. If the bug persists after a release, and you haven't seen any explanation of why the bug might not be fixed, feel free to bump the thread.
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This is probably the most difficult place for me to make suggestions. I would say that encouraging anyone who wants to help with simple questions in the GD thread might be a good priority in this section. Some suggestion, as per dev preferences, as to how to help with the code may be in order. Beyond that... I'll leave that to you guys. ;)

Edit to add:

The fact that -- assuming the user performs the same actions in KoLmafia that they would in plain KoL -- a good deal of server hits can be saved by KoLmafia's elimination of extraneous page loads may be worthy of mention, as well.
 
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Take two, incorporating many of St.Doodle's suggestions,, with additional editing and ideas from me:

----
Welcome to the new KoLmafia thread. KoLmafia was holatuwol's creation and his original thread, chock full of interesting historical info, is still available for your viewing pleasure. Unfortunately, due to its age, the original post of that thread can be edited only by forum mods and so, at the request of the the forum admins, we've rebooted. You made it!

This thread is supposed to be where you post any questions, comments, or concerns you have related to the KoLmafia project so as to keep this forum uncluttered with general KoLmafia questions. However, please keep in mind that this project is run completely by volunteers, from the developers writing code to the minions on the front line answering more basic questions. We strive to make sure the experience of using KoLmafia is as pleasant as possible for everyone and will do our best to respond to all polite correspondence as soon as we are able. None of us is getting paid to put up with attitude, and we certainly won't do it for free. Attitude may lead to mass /baleet, which could make it difficult to obtain further help.

If you've got more advanced questions which you think require a thread or two to explain, consider taking your question to the KoLmafia forums. Or, if you think it might already be answered, check out either the FAQ or SinginSally's KoLmafia Guide (inspired by Aprocalypse's earlier guide). Both of these are hosted on the KoLmafia Wiki, which also contains a great deal of additional information that you may find useful.

Can I have some quick links?

Will KoLmafia run on my system?

It has been tested in Windows 98/2000/XP/Vista/7, and has been shown to work on several flavors of Linux and on Mac OS X 10.3+. Compatibility may exist for Mac OS X 10.2+, because KoLmafia's JAR releases are compiled using Java 1.4.1, but no confirmation has been provided for this. For some instructions on how to get started, check out Installation on the KoLmafia Wiki.

What features does KoLmafia provide?

  • Coffee cup gameplay. Under the hood via the "relay browser" interface, KoLmafia aggregates some of the best browser script / helper ideas to present a slightly different click-reducing look to KoL that works in most major browsers, not just the one with the orange icon. Some general features include quick auto-restore links, quick use links, simplified combat handling, and tracking of most of KoL's "hidden" counters and timers.
  • Session logging. Ever wanted to go back and see just what you did on this run? KoLmafia records every combat, every action, every familiar change or equipment swap, every skill usage. Other third-party tools recognize, parse, and analyze KoLmafia session logs for your easy perusal.
  • Inventory management. Want to keep an inventory window open while you're buying from the mall or adventuring to see your totals? Want to speed up multi-step recipes? Want to buy from lots of stores at once? KoLmafia presents a way to streamline that to let you focus on the cooler, less repetitive aspects of KoL.
  • Auto-adventure. Yes, this desktop client supports adventuring at all of the most popular areas accessible through the browser. If new content arrives that is not yet supported by KoLmafia, please do not post to this thread asking for it to be added. Instead, post a "New Content" request on the forums.
  • Scripting. Kolmafia includes not just one, but, count 'em, two scripting languages. It incorporates a basic CLI, or "shell", in which you type commands to adventure, eat food, autosell junk, craft items, or perform any of the other tasks you want to do within KoL. These commands can be saved in a script file and executed at your command whenever you wish. Additionally, KoLmafia includes the ASH (Advanced Script Handler) language, a C or Java-like language, sufficient to implement your wildest KoL programming dreams.
  • Not-So-Instant Messenger (NSIM) not to be confused with NetScape Instant Messenger (NSIM/AIM). Ever find yourself in far too many channels with some burning desire to have it all tabbed or in separate windows? Maybe your PMs, too? KoLmafia presents its own interface to KoL chat to help you manage all that, and it even logs all your chat sessions behind the scenes for later out of context quoting.

How can I help with the KoLmafia project?

I would love to be able to simplify KoLmafia a bit (following this philosophy whenever possible). If you've got any suggestions on how to make KoLmafia easier to use, even if it involves removing an existing feature, I'm open to hearing them. If you have ideas about improvements or enhancements, I'm open to those as well, but I abide by this philosophy in addition to the previous one (just a fair warning).

As a side note, there may be occasions where we miss your bug report amidst all the other thread posts. If the bug persists after a release, and you haven't seen any explanation of why the bug might not be fixed, feel free to bump the thread.
 
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At this point, the only thing I have left to suggest would be (maybe) bolding the rest of the inline links for consistency. But that's really minor and open to interpretation. ;)

IMO, it's all set and good to go. Also, you (will) have the advantage of being able to edit it now, if it turns out that you do want to tweak something later, without having to go through the forum mods. Yay!
 
Veracity said:
[*] Session logging. Ever wanted to go back and see just what you did on this run? KoLmafia records every combat, every action, every familiar change or equipment swap, every skill usage. Other third-party tools recognize, parse, and analyze KoLmafia session logs for your easy perusal.
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Might it be possible to change "KoLmafia records" to "KoLmafia can record"? The way it is currently worded, it sounds like the default action is full logging, while (at least when I last started on a new computer) it defaulted to not recording familiar actions and several such options. I'm just envisioning whining after someone finishes a run and tries to check on their stats, only to find that their data is moderately useless for (over)detailed analysis, though still useful in terms of what happened where. Just not quite as detailed as possible (and our teaser sales pitch might have led them to believe).
 
Personally, I think that mafia should default to full logging. I was somewhat upset the first time I cared about that and discovered that it didn't record as much information I thought it would have. I immediately turned it on. Actually I can imagine why someone would want less information in the CLI, but I think it should always record everything just in case you discover that you care about something later on -- that's what logs are for.

So please make "KoLmafia records every combat" the literal truth. If you don't do that, then yeah, add the word "can".
 
Turns out, the following are "off" by default - for no reason I can understand:

logFamiliarActions
logMonsterHealth
logStatusEffects

I'll enable them.
 
Thanks Veracity! Yeah, that confused me as well when I ran across it eventually. Actually split my log folders into oldsessions and sessions, so I would know which of my logs were fully accurate (as far as mafia can make it) and which varied by day/character/login.
 
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