Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

An area to facilitate free-form feedback on systems (in-game or out) related to Arelith.

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DM Apollo
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Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by DM Apollo » Tue Mar 20, 2018 12:05 pm

Our player portal is getting some updates soon, so I'm looking for some feedback on the two we have right now. The two existing portals are:

- The arelith version at http://portal.arelith.com/
- Cih's version at https://vps.cih.fi/donut/2hfn4-e2-4/arelith/#

So my questions for everyone are:
1) What do you like about the two portals?
2) What do you dislike about the two portals?
3) What are one to two features that you wish that the Arelith version had, that it doesn't currently? This can include functionality in Cih's version that isn't in the Arelith version or entirely new functionality.

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Teshil
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Teshil » Tue Mar 20, 2018 1:19 pm

1. Like the extra Character stats on the top of areliths page, and the extra player information on cih. LOVED the old, full information on cih, but I understand there were privacy concerns.

2. Dislike the huge image and all the wasted space at the top of arelith’s. (On my tablet in landscape there is no useful information until I scroll down after each refresh). Dislike that the link at the top of the forum to the FL Portal is broken.

3. Want: sort by username or character name option, and as much statistical information as is easy to display.

Why not just bring in Cih as the official Portal?

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Tathkar Eisgrim
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Tathkar Eisgrim » Tue Mar 20, 2018 1:33 pm

I prefer the formatting and information of Arelith's own Portal:

+ The larger text and black text on pale blue is more readable.
+ The display of a player log-in is beneficial for aiding OOC discussions / contact.
+ The server status (Up / Down / Restarting / Stabilizing) very useful.

- The underlining between individual character names / log-ins is a little dominant. Maybe half the size of the line, yet remaining centred or some other formatting could squeeze down the element size per person a tiny amount and allow more name entries vertically without scrolling?

- Do the green / blue buttons besides each name really say anything extra?

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Miaou
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Miaou » Tue Mar 20, 2018 1:44 pm

With Cih's portal, it has been used to be more of a tracker than a portal. It has changed a bit, but there are many concerns to be had by displaying too much information. I do not like the idea of having my play time and activity open to the public without me wanting it so.

I prefer the simplicity of the official portal. Shows who is online. Perhaps update it so formatting issues don't happen for mobile.

Xerah
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Xerah » Tue Mar 20, 2018 2:19 pm

The Arelith one has issues with lining up on mobile, which is annoying.

I like that you can sort on Cih’s plus it shows online time for that session. I also really like the favourites feature. Searching is also very useful.

I really liked the old version of Cih’s portal and wish it would come back.
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JediMindTrix
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by JediMindTrix » Tue Mar 20, 2018 3:02 pm

Cih's "tracking feature" has allowed me to get online the same time as players who only sometimes wander accidentally into my timezone that my characters have meetings/business deals with. Never understood the aversion towards the information it collects as it cannot out your secret alts.

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Teshil
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Teshil » Tue Mar 20, 2018 4:10 pm

The historical data seems to be the problem for most people. Maybe the new Portal should only show live stats then.

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BegoneThoth
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by BegoneThoth » Tue Mar 20, 2018 4:19 pm

For a while it showed far less information, and now it's back to just verbose regurgitating alts.

So I guess the whole act of culling how much info was available via scry really just hid the info, it was never purged, and now it's all back.
\

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Twily
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Twily » Tue Mar 20, 2018 5:09 pm

BegoneThoth wrote:For a while it showed far less information, and now it's back to just verbose regurgitating alts.

So I guess the whole act of culling how much info was available via scry really just hid the info, it was never purged, and now it's all back.
None of that has been undone as far as I can see, It still doesn't show full player lists, playtimes, etc associated with the account name entered, only characters that logged in within a recent amount of time, or containing the name that was searched.

EDIT: Edited this part of my post in response to BegoneThoth editing(and later deleting) his first reply
As an on topic note:

2) I wish Arelith's Portal Page was mobile friendly.
Some mobile browsers have a difficult time figuring out how the page is supposed to be laid out, and offset the playerlist from the server name.
Either way it's also a huge page that has to be zoomed in and scrolled around on to actually be read.

3) I quite liked being able to view my own statistics that Cih's page previously showed.
To alleviate the privacy concerns people had, would it be possible to tie the PublicCD Key with the forum account(seeing as you have to create your forum account from in the game), and allow expanded statistics to be shown when people are looking up themselves logged in from said account?
Things such as other usernames used by that Public Key(I know I've forgotten a few of mine), a full character list, playtimes, and so on.
(Not sure how much of this is actually possible, but it'd all be nice to have, imo)
Last edited by Twily on Wed Mar 21, 2018 9:49 pm, edited 15 times in total.

PinataPlethora
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by PinataPlethora » Tue Mar 20, 2018 5:17 pm

1. The Arelith version loads super quick, and Cihparg's version has lots of useful information.

2. I agree with Teshil that the Arelith portal could use some judicious visual streamlining, and the Prehistory column doesn't need to be there. Cihparg's version sometimes loads kinda slowly, and the color scheme could do with a little more contrast.

3. I'd happily see Cihparg's version made official with some visual and performance enhancements, and I'd even be glad to see its old, more detailed scry functionality returned. The majority of information that it outputs can be gathered in game and through the Arelith portal, although it's much easier when automated and logged. Masking your identity with a new login is quicker and easier than changing your socks, so there's very little risk of being tracked if you don't want to be.
The worst thing I see Cihparg's portal doing is making it glaringly obvious when players only log in once a week to touch their quarters and shops, but I guess some players don't like that?

I really miss being able to look up my character creation dates, because I constantly forget how old they are.

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Cortex
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Cortex » Tue Mar 20, 2018 6:01 pm

Twily wrote:
BegoneThoth wrote:For a while it showed far less information, and now it's back to just verbose regurgitating alts.

So I guess the whole act of culling how much info was available via scry really just hid the info, it was never purged, and now it's all back.
Please do not derail this thread into complaining about Cih's page again. You already did plenty of that back on the old thread, and got them to make quite a few changes to show far less info. (None of which have been undone as far as I can see, It still doesn't show full player lists, playtimes, etc associated with the account name entered, only characters that logged in within a recent amount of time, or containing the name that was searched).
If you want to continue to voice privacy concerns over the page, make a new thread or send a PM to cih, this isn't the place for it.
stop diminishing opinions because you dont like them, the OP asked what people like and DISLIKE about them

I prefer Arelith's appearance design.
I dislike Cih's colors
I dislike Cih's lack of alphabetic organization on names.
I like Cih's 'live' functionality.
:)

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Twily
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Twily » Tue Mar 20, 2018 6:08 pm

stop diminishing opinions because you dont like them, the OP asked what people like and DISLIKE about them
I'm not diminishing opinions I dislike.
Had he simply said he disliked A, B and C like Miaou did, I'd have no issue with it.

Making false claims(nothing has been changed back) and disrespectfully sharing information of someone who specifically said doesn't like their information being public, I do have an issue with.

Regardless, This is for the forum moderators to handle and not me. (I'm done replying to anything not on topic, as to not derail this thread)

EDIT: Just to ensure clarity, As his reply has been edited and now doesn't pertain to any of what I've said here, I have no manner of issues with his post.
Last edited by Twily on Wed Mar 21, 2018 9:51 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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Thanatosis
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Thanatosis » Tue Mar 20, 2018 6:37 pm

Best part of Cih's page was that it was "active," or whatever word's better suited in a technical sense. Not having to refresh was pretty handy.
BegoneThoth wrote:Hardcore player here

JediMindTrix
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by JediMindTrix » Tue Mar 20, 2018 6:44 pm

TimeAdept wrote: Burn cih's page, the official one is fine. Why should we 1: continue to allow it to exist, and 2: look to it as a model for the Official Thing?
I'm just going to point out that the portal in itself is totally unnecessary. Cihpargh's has a solid # of uses and functionality missing from the main portal page that I really would like to keep around.

Something about both portals I dislike is that they can be used to pretty easily ID a disguised character.

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BegoneThoth
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by BegoneThoth » Tue Mar 20, 2018 7:18 pm

Apologies I literally randomly clicked names on the list and posted the text didn't mean to offend/anger/privacy breach anyone.

Post edited, sorry Miaou (spelling and typing from phone, fixed the post as soon as it was brought to my attention)
\

Seven Sons of Sin
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Seven Sons of Sin » Tue Mar 20, 2018 7:22 pm

If people are getting offended about a public display of information, to the point where they want that freely available information redacted in forum posts, that should be enough rationale to not use Cih's portal.
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rookie
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by rookie » Tue Mar 20, 2018 7:28 pm

JediMindTrix wrote: Something about both portals I dislike is that they can be used to pretty easily ID a disguised character.
That's actually been my issue with the portals and the in-game ability to gather someone's login_name while disguised. In a perfect world players would be able to keep player and character knowledge separate, but it is a... mistake I see being made quite often.

I don't think it would be worth the time changing the portal part though unless the in-game portion was also changed. That might be way more work than it is worth taken you would still need to provide a way for people to report disguised individuals for rule violations.

My general thought process on stalking is I figure anyone that I've made a good or bad enough impression of to remember my login_name is probably going to learn of any new characters I make on the same account in a fairly short amount of time anyway. Easier to just have one character per account to prevent both automated and manual ways of tracking if one is worried.

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Teshil
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Teshil » Tue Mar 20, 2018 7:32 pm

I’d love to see number of DMs on, too.

Freyason
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Freyason » Tue Mar 20, 2018 7:42 pm

I'd like option to opt out.

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Iceborn
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Iceborn » Tue Mar 20, 2018 8:06 pm

Teshil wrote:I’d love to see number of DMs on, too.
Extremely exploitable.
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Xanos950
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Xanos950 » Tue Mar 20, 2018 10:00 pm

cihs list seems outright creepy and unnecessary tbh.

Cihparg
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Cihparg » Tue Mar 20, 2018 11:33 pm

A Complete redesign following in the steps of what Rin managed to create for the main page;
Active feed rather than static feed, so that the user doesn't need to manually refresh the page;
More (or rather, less) information provided about in game characters, meaning that when a character enters a disguise in game, that change should be reflected on the portal as well;
Potentially more controls for the player when it comes to displaying the characters on the page (Including but not limited to sorting, displaying the portal as a feed vs. a list);
Potentially more controls as to what players can use the portal for.

Expand post
Expose the player node rendering scope so that any tech savvy user can implement support for third-party portraits via userscripts, with browser extensions like Tampermonkey and Greasemonkey.

Beep boop.


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BegoneThoth
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by BegoneThoth » Tue Mar 20, 2018 11:57 pm

meaning that when a character enters a disguise in game, that change should be reflected on the portal as well
does that mean there will be an offsite record for what character disguises as who
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PinataPlethora
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by PinataPlethora » Wed Mar 21, 2018 1:02 am

BegoneThoth wrote:does that mean there will be an offsite record for what character disguises as who
I assume, as part of going official, the new portal would be run from the same cloud location as the servers and website.

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Miaou
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Re: Arelith Player Portal feedback thread

Post by Miaou » Wed Mar 21, 2018 7:07 am

BegoneThoth wrote:Post edited, sorry Miaou (spelling and typing from phone, fixed the post as soon as it was brought to my attention)
You're fine, thanks for apologizing and taking the time to edit it. You were trying to make a point.


More on the portals. I feel like the massive banner with the woman can be made smaller. Simply have "Arelith" displayed for simplicity. I also feel like we should have two separate portals, one for FL and one for regular Arelith. I enjoy the colours used but would like to request a "dark" version that could be toggled, just to make it easier on the eyes for those who struggle with bright websites.

The only feature I would like of Cih's portal to be moved over is the live update aspect of it, so you do not need to refresh. Also seeing a live count of the server's uptime and it stabilizing would be nice as well. Perhaps a general graph to see server traffic during the past day/week/month. Though I would still like to request any way to search characters/logins not be added.

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