Seeking a partner to develop mod for use with Civstats.com

Greetings wonderful modding community!

I have been working on a project for Civ4 for quite a while. You can check it out at CivStats.com.

It's a webpage that allows players in Pitboss games to access their game stats at any time, right from their web browser. You can check out an example game here. Players can see who has and hasn't finished their turn, when new turns begin, when people log in, and get a nifty score graph to boot. It also has a whole diplomacy messager built in to aid communication in Pitboss games for those that don't want to use email.

This weekend I officially completed phase 1 (or version 1) of the project, and I would like to begin on the next major phase.

What I would like to do next is offer ALL of the stats that are available in game, on the website. Meaning you'll be able to access the domestic advisor, the military advisor, the foreign advisor, etc. The game log will also have the same information that you can see in the in-game game log, like war declaration and wonders being built.

To accomplish this, I planned on developing a mod for Civ4 that outputs all of this information to a log file - every time something changes, another line will output to the log file. My uploader application will read this log file and upload the information to the webpage, and the php script will handle the parsing and database stuff.

However, there is one issue: I am already actively developing in two languages (1 for the uploader, and 1 for the web scripts) and I cringe at the thought of having to learn an entire new one (Python) that has its own set of things to learn. So I am looking for someone that would like to either A) develop the mod for me or B) develop the framework of the mod, and let me worry about the details. I would be perfectly happy with option B - I wouldn't mind coding in Python, I just really don't want to try to figure out how to create a Civ4 mod from scratch. At least, not at this time

I also have some questions for your mod gurus about what is and isn't possible when modding for Civ4:

• Is it possible to develop a "server-side-only" mod. That is to say, a mod that runs on the server, but the clients do not need to have the mod in order to connect to the server. Would this simply mean people would get the "Modified Assets" warning when joining? I'm okay with that if there's no other way.
• Is it possible for the mod to ONLY output the log files on the server's machine? Obviously we would not want all of the stats for every nation to output to a file on each of the client machines!

That's all I can think of right now, actually.

Only 30 views in 48 hours huh?

I wonder what it is about my title that's causing people to not read this. Perhaps people don't like to read threads with 0 replies! Yes, that must be it. So by replying to this, people will think it's more interesting, so they'll read it! Yes, I do believe my plan is perfect...

Please don't tell me I have to learn a third language for this project.

You might want to check out these:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141164
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141769

It should be very easy to pull the info that is currently being used via python. In fact a mod could push the data straight to the webserver with no worries. Extra data may be a little trickier, but the hardest bit would be making the mod without requiring all players to have it. I suppose the savegame scanners c/o DaveMcW might be useful, but an integrated system would be better.

Well, if I can't find someone that wants to develop the core of the mod for/with me, I will probably use AutoLog as a good learning tool. It has the foundations of what I want to do.

As MooMan said, figuring out how to make it server-side is going to be the biggest challenge.

Implementing save game scanning to get the info is certainly an intriguing idea. It obviously would get over the server-side-only issue, but my concerns are 1) If the save game format changes at all, the scanner needs to be updated and 2) I don't know how to go about even starting to write a save game scanner. Therefore I think I'll stick with the mod method.

I'll give it another couple days to see if anyone is interested, then I'll start figuring out how modding in Civ4 works so I can do it myself.

I've already said I'll help. I can do the mod side and the website side equally well, and I don't have to learn any new languages.

Ah, great then! I didn't read your post as an actual offer.

Well, feel free to get started on the framework. The details like the actual output format can be decided upon later - as long as the code is nice and modular that should be no problem.

Tell me if there's anything you need from me!

Well I've actually started working on this myself, using AutoLog as a learning tool.

Turns out it's a lot easier than I thought. I am going to experiment tonight with the client/server stuff to see how it behaves when only the server has the modified files.

Ok. I'll look into the exact changes that should be made. Also, might I suggest a backup website for when CivStats has problems... Actually I know of a couple of methods of alternating between sites without the end user ever realising.

It's something I had never considered because this is the first downtime my server has experienced in the 3 years it has been running

I think having redundant servers for a site this small is a little overkill, but I'd be open to the possibility.

It's small now, but wait until it gets more than a mention in Soren's blog. What'll happen when Firaxis decide to officially endorse the site like they do with Apolyton and CivFanatics (one can dream)?

The next logical step beyond this would be the ability to play the game remotely without using the graphical interface or with a seriously slimmed down one, or on a game console, or on a web page. If that capability were available, it would be possible to sell subscriptions to a game server and catch all the prospective players who don't have computers which meet the specs.

I suggest contacting someone from Firaxis and trying to get a cut of the market while it's just an idea.

Humm... we already have Soren's attention. We could see what happens from there .