FOG needs a little, external "ready!" application

[grumblefish]

What Field of Glory needs right now is a little application that can sit in the taskbar and go "Ready!" whenever your opponent ends his turn. That way you don't need to constantly open/close the game to check, or alt tab back and forth and click on the different tabs to make it refresh. This would be very helpful in my opinion, but I'm not a programmer so I don't know how complicated it would be to make. Presumably it would just require you to log into the server, and then it would check every minute or two to see if your turn has come up in any of your ongoing games.

Does Slitherine have any plans to do anything like this? Is it simple enough that a talented fan could make it (I am not talented when it comes to PCs, sorry).

[batesmotel]

What Field of Glory needs right now is a little application that can sit in the taskbar and go "Ready!" whenever your opponent ends his turn. That way you don't need to constantly open/close the game to check, or alt tab back and forth and click on the different tabs to make it refresh. This would be very helpful in my opinion, but I'm not a programmer so I don't know how complicated it would be to make. Presumably it would just require you to log into the server, and then it would check every minute or two to see if your turn has come up in any of your ongoing games.

Does Slitherine have any plans to do anything like this? Is it simple enough that a talented fan could make it (I am not talented when it comes to PCs, sorry).

Have you tried using the email notifications? They can do an equivalent thing if your mail program indicates when you've received new mail.

Chris

[grumblefish]

Does Slitherine have any plans to do anything like this? Is it simple enough that a talented fan could make it (I am not talented when it comes to PCs, sorry).

Have you tried using the email notifications? They can do an equivalent thing if your mail program indicates when you've received new mail.

Chris[/quote]

I wasn't aware that there was an e-mail notification option, but no, my mail programme doesn't indicate such. A little application that sits in the taskbar would be fantastic, though; much better than having my e-mail inbox filled up with notifications.

[pipfromslitherine]

It is something I have been considering. But we weren't sure that people would have a use for it!

I will look into it - we'd want to make it pretty customisable and as small as possible - I hate bloated stuff that sits in the task bar!

Cheers

Pip

[keyth]

It would be a very cool thing to have.

[Morbio]

I have a practical solution to this that others may be able to utilise too (I suspect many are).

When at home I connect my smartphone to my WLAN. I open my Googlemail mailbox and sit watching TV. When the PBEM e-mail is received my phone 'dings'. I pause TV (gotta love Sky+), go make my move, delete the e-mail, and then go back to TV and un-pause

Now. not everyone may have a phone capable of WLAN connection and e-mail, so maybe an alternative solution is to have a have a text message generated as well, or instead, as the PBEM notification.

I hope this helps.

[pipfromslitherine]

OK guys - I have got a beta version of something to do the task ready. This is an early beta version, and can be downloaded from:

http://www.slitherine.com/files/SysTray ... eta001.zip

You only need the EXE. Currently it requires you to login each time, but that will be fixed going forwards. Once you start up the app it will sit in the system tray and should tell you when you have new games ready.

If you try it out please let me know how it runs, whether you have any issues, etc, and ideally what OS you are running on. Obviously any suggestions are also welcome.

Cheers

Pip

[Morbio]

I just installed it (Windows Media Centre) and it told me I had 3 turns to play (I thought I had 1 - a broken game) and when I looked I had 2 turns..... it then told me who had just completed a turn (the 2nd game), which was nice.

Not sure where the 3rd game is

[Amaz_Ed]

Windows 7.

Installed it and it sdays I have 7 turns waiting. I have none. I wonder whether it could be seeing games that are over, but where my opponent had the last turn, something like that?

Also, I clicked on the icon in my system tray and it vanished. Tried again and the same happened, but the process is still running according to the task manager.

[pipfromslitherine]

Good catches. I'd forgotten about completed games .

Clicking on it tries to bring up the diagnostic window, which isn't there any more - doh!

I'll get it fixed and let you know once I have it sorted out.

Cheers

Pip

[pipfromslitherine]

OK, new version available:

http://www.slitherine.com/files/SysTray ... eta002.zip

+ no longer counts completed games
+ won't vanish when clicked on

I am especially interested in whether it correctly pops up when a new turn becomes available while it is running. Note it has a 2 min or so timer for when it checks.

Thanks to all who are trying it out.

Cheers

Pip

[Morbio]

I couldn't install version 2, probably because v1 was running (even though not is systray). So I blew v1 away using taskmanager and then installed v2 and it seems to be running OK now.

It seems to give the right count now.... just 1 (broken) game. Come on guys, make a move!

What would be nice, is that if you double clicked the systray icon that it showed a window of all the games that are your turn... that way you could tell if a particular game you are waiting for is there.

It's nice that it even works if you don't have FoG running (although the list will never change).

[pipfromslitherine]

Yes - if the old version was running it would prevent the new one starting, but glad you got it running.

When you get a new turn, if only one updates it tells you the name of the enemy. But I appreciate the point that you might want to track a specific game.

Not sure what you mean by "The list will never change"? The app checks for updated turns every 2 mins, so if you get a new turn to answer it should tell you.

Or is that not what you mean?

Cheers

Pip

[Morbio]

Not sure what you mean by "The list will never change"? The app checks for updated turns every 2 mins, so if you get a new turn to answer it should tell you.

Or is that not what you mean?

Cheers

Pip

If you don't have FoG running it will not be connecting to the server and so the file(s) stored on the PC won't be changing (or whatever the app is looking at) will be static..... unless this little app is connecting to the server?...... ah, I guess it is! I like it even more now!

Update: It detected a new turn and made me aware.

[pipfromslitherine]

Yes - it pings the server so it should be up to date. If it told you when a new turn arrived then looks like it does everything it's supposed to . I will have a think about a clean way to show which turns are waiting - I don't want it to get too intrusive.

Hopefully enough people give it a try that I can do a first release with a more official announcement .

Cheers

Pip

[petergarnett]

I put the wrong password it (you said to test it!) - how do I enter it again please?

[pipfromslitherine]

Just right-click the icon, choose Exit and then run it again .

Cheers

Pip

[Morbio]

It seems to be working well, but I just got one oddie....

I got notified of a move, went to FoG and made my reply. Came out of FoG and then got notified of my move for the same game. I guess that either it keeps posting the same open games, or there may be a slight lag because it hadn't realised that I had completed my turn.

Not a major problem though

[pipfromslitherine]

Did you close the app between times? It shouldn't flag a new move to you unless it's your turn.

I'll check it out

Thanks

Pip

[Amaz_Ed]

Logged in, was told of the turns waiting for me. Completed those turns, received another while I was doing so, played that and then when i alt+tab'd out of the game i was told that there was another turn waiting. There wasn't, it was the one that arrived while I was in game. Not a big issue.