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robiwan
Moderator
1035 Posts |
 Posted - 31/03/2008 : 20:20:59
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Dev Diary - Improved Community Searching
Hi everyone, Lee "Torsion" Nagar here. For this dev diary I am going to discuss my work on the search improvements planned for Chapter 10. The entire system will be discussed in greater detail in the future.
This was a very exciting task to undertake; most of the work done on a live product involves working in existing systems. Since this was going to be a brand new system, a lot had to be established before any work began.
A server programmer and a designer have been involved in the process as well. The basics are very simple: help players to find other players on their server. This could have been approached in several ways, so it was decided that we would create a very dynamic system that would give the players the flexibility to search for whomever (as long as they weren't /anon) they wanted to find.
With a dynamic system like this, it would be really easy to overwhelm players with too much "stuff." This is where I came in. I was responsible for exposing the players to this very intricate system in a clean-cut and direct manner.
My work began in the UI tool mocking up the basics that were established through a design document. Screenshots of the mock-up were sent around for feedback. In order to present the large amounts of options to the players, a "Tree-View" seemed like the most logical approach. This allowed categories to be expanded and collapsed with ease, exposing or hiding sub-categories with the click of a mouse.
Below is an in-game picture of the new Community window still in development. This is not the finished product.
If you notice in the search criteria (left side) there are a few different colors. We want players to quickly recognize what they have selected, even if they collapse a branch. Some of the profession branch's options are selected. All of the faction branch's options are selected. By default the Character Data branch is colored as "Some Selected" because a few of its sub-branches have options the player selected.
Here's a picture of the same window, just with the Character Data branch collapsed.
You may also notice the save and load buttons. We want players to easily save and load search criteria that can be shared with different characters on different accounts. You can even share them with other people.
Thank you for taking the time to read a bit about what the team does behind the scenes. More information about the entire group searching system will be available soon.
Lee "Torsion" Nagar
Programmer, Star Wars Galaxies
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I have waited and planned and built my strength for fifteen thousand years. I have evolved. It is time.
(Omnius Evermind)
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Feyd'Rautha Saresh (Medic, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera), Robe Saresh (Force Sensitive, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera)
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Dev Diary - Improved Community Searching (31.03.20
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