im_thinking_of_making_something_like_blather User24 It's going to be a hybrid between blather, the blatheworld, blathermaze and other things. Firstly, I'd like to assure everyone that I'm not trying to replace blather, it's not going to be a dumping ground for thoughts, it's going to be a lot more structured and co-operative. Secondly, to save time explaining when the inevitable questions come up, yes, I know how much it would cost, yes I have the programming skills, no, I won't be able to design graphics, yes, I can put the time in to maintain it (not that it'll need much) I'm now going to explain in detail what it's going to be, and I'd like everyone to tell me what they think, so - Technical Data: LAMP structure server (linux,apache,mysql,php) free to use anyone can read, you must register to create (so blather_impersonation cannot happen) General Idea: The idea of the cubeworld is to create a kind of democratic, and philosophical game, where everyone gets to choose how it progresess. you create a cube, with details of it's location / purpose you link the cube to other cubes (a cube can have an unlimited number of links you specify the requirements (if any) needed to exit the cube (answering a question, telling a joke, provoking thought, etc). when someone enters your cube (and you can create as many as you like), their handle appears on a "who's in" list, when someone first writes on your cube, you get to choose if they are allowed to use the links you've created (you can, of course let everyone exit at will, or link your cube to nowhere) you can also set your cube to be a "votecube", where everyone who's 'in' the cube votes on whether the new person gets to leave, based on their posts The general idea being that you'll want to progress though the cubes, and so will not create blather_pollution, or any other blather nasties. You can post up to X times in a cube (defined by the cube creator), if you're deemed unsucessful, the cube is closed to you until the originator, or, in the case of a votecube, an existing member, decides you can try again. Once you're allowed into a cube, you can post as much as you like. You can password protect your own cubes, only allowing those you want to access them, or you can leave them free for all. the cubeworld will be displayed on the screen graphically, in 3d. Everyone will, at logon, be presented with a "who's in my cubes" list, a list of previously accessed cubes, and a list of cubes they've 'passed' You'll be able to engage in realtime chat with the people in the current cube, these chat sessions will not be saved anywhere. When creating a cube, you can change the 'theme' of the cube, a list of, say, 4 themes will be shown, giving a choice of "alien", "city", "airborn" and "underwater", thus, each cube will have a distinct 'feel'. Well, that's about the size of it, any opinions? (by the way, all the above is changeable, but I think what I've said would work, and be technially feasble) (also, if I think it's going to be worth it, it'll take a good few months to complete, so this isn't going to pop up tomorrow) 030403 ... cube Oh Gawd! Now you've really jinxed it :-) ³ 030403 ... User24 how so? 030403 ... cube 1) Change "cube" to "node" or "neuron", as in "nodeworld". 2) Discrepency: "you can post X times" and "you can post as many times as you want". 3) Love the 3D graphical display idea. I'm currently working on a 3D graphics project in C. 4) Realtime chat is good. Engines available for that. 5) How about letting creators decorate their own cubes with a palette of colours? Simple way to start (programming wise) - could be enhanced if successful. I'd be glad to help coding if it came to that. I always need a goal in order to pick up a new language. Might want Daffy to get involved... ³ 030403 ... User24 1. I like the "node" idea. v cool. 2.You can post X times when trying to access the node, once in, as many times as you want. 3. yeah, it'll kick ass, methinks 4. yeah, that should be pretty easy 5. I want to keep it themed so people know where they are, otherwise there'd be no continuity between nodes, I'll probally have 10 or so themes 6. I started coding it last night, and actually got quite far, over the next few weeks I'll put something somewhere for people to see (I'm excepting an alpha release to be ready by the end of the month) 030404 ... User24 but yes, once I've got the framework, I might start some form of open development forum, so people can be assigned tasks, d/l the relevent files and modify them as required. 030404 ... ever dumbening ..... get outta my cube beeotch sounds very cool. a woman in my welding class jokingly accused me of being elitist as i told her about the hidden aspects of the next piece i'm planning on (26 steel flowers arranged alphabetically, no labeling, so you'd have to be paying attention to catch that it's an alphabet), and i thought, yeah, i'm a bit of an elitist. so the idea of people passing various levels of tests and challenges is pretty cool. you suckahs better brush up on your borges if you want to get out of my box. TREBECK!!!!!!! i'm guessing that graphical stuff greatly increases the storage needs, but will there be any room for visual creation? or will it be like blather in that it's just verbal? will there be de facto squatters rights for our current blathernames? i'm thinking i might want to become kingsuperspecial or maybe yummychuckle. (insert evil laugh track--ooh, which reminds me, what about sound?). looking forward to seeing what you come up with. 030404 ... User24 heh, yeah, the space requirement is the biggest obstacle, it's all going to be running from a database, so that will keep the size down. image /sound uploads are possible, but that'll whack the size up hugely (unless you just point to an image / sound already on the net) When I'm ready to allow people to register, I'm going to get a page up on blather where I'll arrange some sort of password thing so blatherskites here can keep their handles. 030404 ... User24 essentially though, the interface will be a graphically enhanced blather - mainly words, possibly a sort of 'doodlepad' where you can draw pictures on the screen to be saved into the db.. 030404 ... User24 coming on nicely, graphics and db structure are done, I've got to do sitebuild and php integration. 030416 ... mon cool user24 030416 ... cube As you know, I've been considering renting web space for an eLearning site. How much space do you think you'll need and maybe I can host it. E-mail me... ³ 030416 ... User24 will do. initial construction is almost done (and my god does it look cool) most of the features discussed above won't be there for a while (good programmer? yes. superhuman? no.) so all I've got to do now is get the really hard stuff done. 030420 ... User24 the website address, for now, will be http://nodes.curvedspaces.com/ 030426 ... niska user24: I love you. when this is working, i will 'switch'. 030426 ... User24 updated just now, the links and the text you can see are coming from the database, so all I've gotta do now is prettyfy the middle page and get a few forms on there so you guys can play 030426 ... a long lost blatherskite I'll show up for sure. 030426 ... jane it looks awesome so far 030427 ... User24 muhahaha, it's alive!!! sorry about that, me is very excitified about it, it's very close to being in beta; which means all you lot can be my beta testers in about a week or so. 030427 ... User24 I made it using notepad and msPaint. nothing else. 030427 ... DannyH Blather is having a baby...can't wait to fill its head full of dangerous ideas 030427 ... User24 nodeworld_is_in_alpha so please take a peek and let me know! 030505 ... User24 project2501.plus.com only online when I am for the moment 030622 ... anne-girl this sounds so insanely cool... does it still exist, somewhere, in an obscure corner of harddrive? wants to see 050605 ... u24 I think it's still hanging around somewhere in a backup dir of a long forgotten HDD. I'll pull it out and see if I can massage it into working order. It never really got off the ground; as I remember, the best I got to had less features than blather does, but ya, t'was a good idea. project2501 was designed to replace it but all 2501 was was a weak free website host with WYSIWYG. meh. :-) 050613 ... u24 remind me to think about this again sometime... 051108 ... u24 and mention the word 'clans' to me when you do. 051108 ... anne-girl *reminds u24 to think about this again sometime* 051108 ... oren Don't_forget to think_about_it. This_is the_first I've heard of it and it sounds great. 051108 ... u24 mm.. 3d... mmm... 060203 ... u24 i should learn to make things before telling people about them. 060203 ... anne-girl is guilty of that all too often 080331 ... u24 There's a BIG project I've been working on for ages that I've told virtually no-one about. You'll love it when it gets done. 080331 ... oren think_about_it 080910 what's it to you? who go blather from