I'm in no position to make empty threats of "Or we'll make a competing product!", but this recent round has helped highlight some problems. Because it is closed-source, we as consumers don't get the opportunity to examine the source code and compile it ourselves. Because we can't see the source code, the decal dev team can't take new developers, because they'd have to place a huge amount of trust in a new developer. Because of all of this, the memlocs XML is encrypted for security reasons. Because memlocs are encrypted, we have ONE PERSON we we trusted to perpetuate the franchise of a commercial entity by doing the updates himself. Because this person has a real life outside of AC, the playerbase had to wait and whine, and eventually we had another dev put up some memlocs that he acknowledges are incomplete and might be buggy.


Decal as open source is going to get a LOT more help. You'll get people like me who know some coding but have greater strengths in keeping the website up to date and providing documentation to users and plugin developers. You'll get people who can handle tech support. You'll get new features by fresh talent with different perspectives. Your core developers can continue to participate as much or as little as they desire, and the product will perpetuate. Because everything the contributors add will be open, there will be little chance of people installing trojans. There will be forking to deal with, but that should be tolerable.


Get on it.

 

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great case of hoof n mouth disease.


wow took almost 36 hours to get memlocs up wha wha wha


from what was finally posted the usual memloc expert is in the process of moving and another had to do it. I suggest right now you start turing off decal and learning HOW to play the game.


cause as we get closer and closer to the 10th anniv, I expect some changes to the 'messages' and other turbine stuff that last time took days to decrypt and then make changes and finally locate all the memlocs. so i predict you will be soon pulling massive amounts of hair out your head since you can't play without decal.

 

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i never acknowledged they were incomplete or buggy. i simply stated that they were untested, as is stated every month. and when did we become a commercial franchise? that actually made me laugh! for the record, the patch process is almost completely automated, this one just caught a LOT of us AFK (1 moving, 1 on vacation, 1 started a new job, etc). besides, making decal open source wouldn't help the patch process at all, since we'd never make the signatures generally available.

Sweet LORD...


The vast MAJORITY of Decal updates over the years took up to a WEEK... It is only relatively recently that memlocs have been released so quickly. So recently in fact that many of us still talk about being surprised and unused to it.


And people STILL quested and explored on patch day, without Decal. If you want an opensource plugin handler, make one. Feel free to try to compete with Decal. Good gawd.

 

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I am overall quite PLEASED with how fast they were able to compensate for the 'normal' dev's on Memloc duty being unavailable. I personally was expecting monday evening or tuesday before they would be available.

Decal Dev's, you beat expectations (well mine once it was apparent there was an issue). GOOD JOB guys, thanks for getting the job done once again.

As I said in one of my other recent posts, Decal Dev's thanks for taking on this NON-paying job and providing MANY people with tedium relief so we can play the game not get carpal tunnel syndrome. Also thanks for putting up with cranky and sometime whiney folks who think they are entitled to have instant or near instant service all the time, life and ESPECIALLY decal is not that way :^)

Edit:
Oh, hey Arc, why does decal *NEED* to be open source for you to help with the website? From what I've read/seen of time is they bring people in gradually after building some trust, they don't just dump people into working on the New View system, or memloc's they ahve to see that people can handle the work and are not just trying to plunder the code for secrets. Yes, Secret's , the memloc's were changed to encoded status after people found ways of abusing the servers with Decal, if they hadn't I doubt we'd have Decal or even AC at this point. Mostly because I, like many I know wouldn't play AC without a prospect of decal reducing tedium unless Turbine fixed many of the things we currently use Decal for. Decal compensates for many of the things newer games have built in stock.

 

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Decal is a delicate balancing act. If it weren't for the fact that the source is closed and some data encrypted, Turbine would've shite-canned it long ago, with obvious good reasons.


The trust developed between each Decal dev team and Turbine is critical to the survival, period. Demanding that Decal become open source, or even demanding they take on more developers is absurd at best. It's ok to think out loud. It's ok to even type into a posting dialogue box. The failure is in hitting the Post Reply button.

To be honest i couldn't play the game (nor be bothered) if Decal wasn't there. Decal makes the whole experience so much better and I sincerely thank those who keep it going.


I dont know how much co-operation there is with Turbine Dev team and Decal dev but there should be a whole lot.


I am sure there are so many of us who have it (Decal) intergrated with there play style and would leave the game if Decal became extinct. And I am sure there are those who would say good ridance as the door closes on our backside. But be careful what you wish for, the player base is fragile as it stands right now.


I have been in this game since 2000 and used various plugins in that time, always hitting the donate button as a thank you. Where's the donate button for Decal, I am sure enough people would, that could at least get you guys a deserved cold beer. Thank you

GBTDT!

As soon as your paying them well to work exclusively on Decal, then you can make these stupid demands. Until such time, shut up.

Get your panties out of the bunch that the pucker seems to have pulled up into your body.
By all means if your unhappy with how Decal is being run, uninstall it and never use it again.
You have all the answers, write your own. Maybe then you can be on the otherside of the equation and see how mindlessly stupid the demands and whining from the masses are.
Its obvious from your attitude you believe your entitled to something special. Big shocker for you, YOUR NOT.
When you get older, they will drop and then you can be a real boy.


wubbie - seriously are you out of your fing mind?

 

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What a jackass! Just like paradoxlost, I too damn near fell out of my chair laughing about the "commercial entity" line. ROFLMAO


I've been using Decal since 2002. Due to some physical limitations, there are plug-ins that really help me a lot but I can, and do, in instances such as this, play the game without Decal. In all the time I've been using Decal, without fail, every month, the Devs always say something to the effect that the Memlocs "Are mostly untested", etc... I recall a few times when the wait for an update was longer than this month (what was it that one time? when Decal pretty much had to be re-written? 2 months?). Never during that time have I seen the bitching and whining like this month. I guess there's a whole new breed of youngsters joining that game who believe that they are owed something. Which is really retarded when applied to this situation. Decal is provided and maintained for free. This month and every month, for many years past, and hopefully for many years to come. Yet, this particular 'consumer' feels the need to disrespect the developers and show no appreciation at all. Unreal... I really wish there was a way to ban certain people from using Decal (I wonder who would be at the top of the list)...


I really hope this attitude can be attributed to age and that it will be out-grown in a few years. Otherwise, this guy/girl is going to have some serious issues in his/her life.

And... Paradoxlost did not need to come here and justify the delay to this moron, or any else for that matter. Those of us who have been around for a while know and understand about delays such as this.

Thank you to all of the Decal developers for your continued support. I, like many, really do appreciate it.

 

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Like many of the posters on this thread have mentioned, AC is playable WITHOUT Decal. I too am one of them. I was on DI like always and did pretty good without it.


Does this mean I want to play without Decal at all? Heck no!!! Like others have stated, it does take out the tedium that is built into AC.


It is nice that we have Decal and are able to start our buffs, get up from the chair, take a bio break, get another diet coke and have our toons ready for another 2-3 hours


Decal Devs, thank you


DtB

 

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