Sim City

Does anyone else play or has played Sim City?

This is my current region in Sim City 4.

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Aaron's Stuff

Show me ... where the bank heist shoot outs with Val Kilmer take place.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Dang! That's awesome. I just got it as a gift in the Steam sale. I've played it now about 6 hours, and it's what I was hoping for. I've played Sim City back since Sim City 2000. I still have the original box for it and it's expansions.

But yea, my city can't seem to get out of this rut with the water pipes leaking every minute. It's wonderfully detailed though, and I can't believe the amount of content packed in this game. I've got a long ways before reaching that level you have there.

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

Have you tried CitiesXL? I have both SIM city 4 and CitiesXK, and love them both. Now if they can get "7 cities of gold" on steam and for it to work with the latest Windows I will be happy!

Your city looks amazing Aaron.. good job man. Hows your pollution map?

Riven said:
my city can't seem to get out of this rut with the water pipes leaking every minute

What, literally? Hmm this has never happened to me before, did you lower the funding for utilities?

Also, I suggest you download the Network Addon Mod. It contains a bunch of really cool stuff that should have been included in the game, most importantly railway and road bridges and tunnels so you can do things like this.

Note also the custom railway station at the top left, overhead lines for the railway, and the turning lanes at the avenue intersection.

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Aaron's Stuff

Thanks Muhnay! Pollution isn't a big issue for me. I have water treatment plants in problem areas so water pollution is fine (except for the industrial area in the western part of the screenshot :< ) and in the city area I have high tax for dirty industries and low tax for high tech industries to encourage clean industry. Plus I have the technology to build solar and hydrogen power plants XD

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Aaron's Stuff

Dang, what WTF gives. It loaded the entire 976k size for that tiny pic?

Anywho's, the damage is done now..

That city looks a hell of a lot like the one on the Colorado river between Arizona and California. Can't recall the name off the top of my head, but its straight up from the London bridge area. I reckon that any river city is gonna look like a river city. Nice job with this one.

As for Sim City, I played the first version. Hated Sim city 2000 and haven't touched it since. All I ever saw on the shelves were those stupid Sims that seemed to have no relation to the original so I just looked past them.

Its nice to know there is a version that still makes cities.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Updated and higher-res panorama of my region!

"Orpheus" said:
Dang, what WTF gives. It loaded the entire 976k size for that tiny pic?

Anywho's, the damage is done now..

Hmm it appears as if the image has been rescaled, I thought it would have created an actual thumbnail.

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Aaron's Stuff

Loaded quick and just fine for me Aaron, no wait or anything. Didn't seem to hinder my loading of the forums or page or anything, so I am not sure what the problem is with leaving it like it is. I can see the whole image on the screen and when I click it it gets huge, and thats great allowed me to see all the detail of your city.

aaron_da_killa said:
Hmm it appears as if the image has been rescaled, I thought it would have created an actual thumbnail.

I know it was unintentional on your part but I for one would like the option of clicking to the larger file size or not.

The fact that it loaded in a timely fashion for our resident slow member isn't the point. Snarkpit s supposed to auto-resize images to avoid such massive pics being loaded onto the main pages.

I was curious how your screen slpped through the cracks so Riven could address it when next he is in contact with Larchy. It might be something indicative of a larger issue.

Images that are 2 inches by 3 inches should NEVER load at 976k. Ever.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Could it be perhaps that the current code base is entirely separate? <~ Sarcasm, because it's obvious that's the reason.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

I think I know what you're saying but up till this thread the pages have been loading thumbs properly.. At least I hadn't noticed anything strange.

Being an image nazi doesn't mean I invent things after all. Up till this thread I hadn't noticed anything worth reporting as an error. If you are saying that Larchy failed to install the resizing protocol, then I am confused as that was one of the fundamental things about Snarkpit. Having broadband or not was never the issue. Having a well constructed and optimized site was.

An oddity in itself considering that the old Snarkpit was very code heavy.

Seriously though, I don't think he left that out. Everything seemed fine till now.

[edit] You must be right, although I still cannot fathom why anyone would even bother resizing a screenshot, without resizing the file size. That would be like having sex without the orgasm, or eating an entire supper but throwing it up afterward. Its just stupid to do something half way. I honestly thought the screenshot issue was resolved but now I have to worry all over again.

damn,damn... damnit all.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Install? As far as I'm aware he wrote everything from scratch.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Maybe large images are resized to prevent the page from breaking or looking weird but no code was implemented to create thumbnails?

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Aaron's Stuff

Well considering the image is smaller than its actual size, I think that qualifies as a thumbnail. But if it is causing such a problem, post a link to the image instead of the image as it is now. FIXED

This may be an ignorant question, (I Googled for answers, but it wasn't immediately clear to me) but to write a code that creates a thumbnail (reduced file sized) version of the image, wouldn't you have to store that reduced version of the image somewhere? Snark Pit isn't going to save a copy of every image linked here.

Larchy did implement a code that does indeed reduce the file size as well as the image dimensions, but that's for pictures that are intended to get uploaded here in the first place. So, every image gets a thumbnail copy of itself stored on the server too, but again, that's for maps, articles and downloads, nothing more.

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

Only if it needs to be cached and honestly, that's the most efficient way to do it. Otherwise, every time anyone looks at the thumbnail image the server will be resizing the thing ... which I don't think your host will be very happy about.

You could implement a smart caching system that will put various thumbs around the site into a cache and keep a list of which are cached and which aren't, then you just use a least recently used replacement technique. Therefore you only have X number of thumbnails on the server ... and any time the list of thumbs gets full, the least recently seen (this would have to be managed through PHP and SQL) would get deleted from the server, and the new thumb gets cached in its place.

The table for the database would be very simple and the actual code to do the replacement is not complicated either. You just need to take the resize image code and stick it in a PHP file to be remotely called.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Sounds easy to implement, but let me ask this: Is it a common thing for forums to implement? Do phpBB forums have this built-in? -Or is this something only custom sites pull off? In other words, is this a standard people expect, or a luxury we can afford because of our low bandwidth usage and/or because we are a custom coded site?

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

Crono are you saying that the PIT could have a standard THUMB image that replaces the actual image that links to the image in its full size once clicked?

Look guys, I'll deal.

I will never fathom the need to post such large pics. Its like boys comparing prick sizes when you're little. I swear it is.

Anywho's Snarkpit had two systems. One resized images that exceeded a certain size. (both actual dimensions and file size). This prevented the forums being stretched out with over sized screens distorting them.

The second was MUCH BETTER and caused no hassles to either the user or the forums AND you could post any screen size you wished. That was the use of thumbnails. Thumbnails were not restricted to those tiny 1 inch things either. You could easily link an 800x600 screen to a massive one and get what you wanted. Even someone with as little knowledge in html could use them. I posted a shitload of critiques using just that method.

As I said, I'll just deal.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

No, most sites do not have any image resizing at all. They either yell at you for it being over a certain size or resolution. Most sites if you "attach" an image to a post, it will upload the image to the web server, but will not be displayed in the thread, it'll be a link only logged in members can click.

What I'm talking about isn't common at all. But, it's something that wouldn't be terribly difficult to do and it's not really anything anyone would notice. It's just a balance between storing thumbnail versions of ALL linked images and just the ones people are looking at. (Thus the least recently used list)

Let me be clear, the standard user will notice nearly no difference besides the fact that when they look at an embedded image it MAY have a smaller file size. Otherwise, it'd act just like it does now.

Muhnay, it wouldn't be standard to all images and it wouldn't require it to be clicked at all, just viewed. This is how it would work:

Someone has embedded an image in their post, it is too large for comfort. The database will likely need a new table linking posts and pictures and a flag saying to resize or not, and to what. Someone else views the page in the thread with the pictures. This triggers a function in the PHP script (the page you're looking at) to run a check on images, because there are images being displayed. It cross references the image id numbers (which are uniquely generated upon creating the post) with the "resize" table ... if the flag for resizing is NOT set to resize ... then it just shows the normal URL image, possibly with a custom resolution. If it is set then it has to use a thumbnail. It then goes to the currently cached thumbnails table and sees if the image is listed ... if so, it displays that cached thumbnail image and modifies the table to show that the entry is now the most recently used (Could update time indexes or something), if not, it creates a new one. This is based on the URL of the image, it is not some standard image shown if something is too large. It then resizes and saves the image in its cache directory and adds the entry to the cached table replacing the least recently used entry and then using THAT thumbnail.

It would have to do if to every image being looked at. You just split up the checks and such.

The alternative would be to cache every image that gets posted, and obviously, that'll get large very fast. This keeps it to a minimum and hopefully, makes it so people never have to see super large images. It would do the resizing during the fetch stage of displaying the post, so it would never show you an enormous image, but sometimes it could take a few seconds for a page to display everything properly, based on how long it takes to properly reencode the image.

You could also cache the images when the post is made and add them to the cache list. (Also, I forgot to mention, when something is removed from the cache list ... the thumbnail needs to be deleted ... sort of the whole point)

You could also just ban images over a certain size and demand people supply their own thumbnails.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

I personally am in favor of the user being responsible as its their picture in the first place. Its like they say, you cannot legislate stupid. But you can make it very very uncomfortable for them to be stupid.

Anywho's I cannot seem to find the code for the thumbnail process. It used to be something like"[ thumb=url]original image url[/ thumb] I see no reason why Snarkpit should be troubled other than furnishing the necessary tools (in this case the code string necessary to post properly) to members for posting of their images. This is a forum, not a daycare facility. stashes bottle from prying eyes

I understand its not 10 years ago. I still see no reason for anything over 100k, excepting in the photographic thread for members posting photo quality stuff. In that thread everyone knows in advance that they enter at their own risk. I myself posted 100's of photos of the grand canyon and hoover dam. I can vouche that there is a shitload of oversized pics in that thread. Still as I said its not 10 years ago so upping the image size is an option but seriously can anyone tell me truthfully that a perfectly crystal clear image needs to be over 200k? Its been proven 100's of times that screens can be optimized and retain ALL of their original quality with regards to forum usage.

You know that there would be a shitstorm from hell if someone released a map that was obviously compiled wrong. Even if the person doing so said it played perfectly well on his monster machine. We'd all tell this person how foolish t would be not to recompile it and releasing a properly optimized map. How is this particular subject any different? Just because there is 12mbps dsl doesn't mean everyone is using it.

Still the bottom line is this.. Is it the responsibility of the website, or the user to police the problem? Or with the case of some, is it a problem in the first place?

I've always believed that it takes the same amount of time to do something wrong as it would have to do it correctly in the first place. I reckon its time to test that theory on the net.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Some random BB code is useless currently if there's no implementation to go with it.

If it were up to me, I'd support the option to supply your own thumb as well as the ability to post pictures that get resized and cached.

If you wanted to impose more regulations on the matter, you could always give a monthly limit on thumbnails.

I don't really see the reason NOT to do something like that, even if your site has the most responsible group ever. It's about quality user interface and experience not responsibility. It's much more likely the person doesn't know how or have the means to resize their images rather than they're just being a dick to you personally.

There's not really anything to discuss anyway since it's not any user's concern, really. I mean if you implemented something chances are everyone here wouldn't remotely notice. Which is actually what you want. You want people to enjoy coming here, not feel like they're getting scolded every time they try to share something.

Saying that small file sizes have just as much quality is not true at all. They do not, and if you're on larger resolutions, it's blatantly obvious. At around 1920x1080 and above, web images, even the really large ones, show compression artifacts and it's hideous.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

True but whom needs a screenshot of anything that big to begin with. I mean I have my screen size set to 1440x900 at home, but it would never ever enter my mind to post a screenshot of a map I am working on in that resolution. Even if this website supported such size without distorting, it would not give anyone a clearer picture of my map than the normal 800x600 (or some similar res.)

Now, I can understand the Sim City shot in the beginning of this thread. It needs to be large in size (not necessarily in file size though) simply because of the complexity of the details involved. I would have rather it was posted in the Art thread.. But that's really not important because its not like there are a shitload or SimCity screens being posted every day.

But by and large this is a HL based site with a larger portion of the screens being posted related to in game shots. So the reasoning that if someone posting a higher resolution MUST be permitted to use a larger file size is irrelevant for the simple fact that a higher resolution screenshot will deliver no more information than a screenshot of a smaller resolution....

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Well, truth is, regardless about what this site is about, or even what the thread is about, it's open to all to post whatever within reason, but having said that, you still can't expect anything, even a large image waiting for you when you load the next page of posts.

I mean...

Orpheus said:
In that thread everyone knows in advance that they enter at their own risk.

Which should always be the case. It's the internet after all. And this is The Snark Pit.

Crono said:
You want people to enjoy coming here, not feel like they're getting scolded every time they try to share something.

Basically Crono's proposal would be the most elegant and below the radar. But it's nice to know that Orpheus' complaint about: "[not being able to] fathom why anyone would even bother resizing a screenshot, without resizing the file size." as an automatic service is unprecedented outside of the Pit, and that this feature is indeed a luxury of a bandwidth conscious site. Something we could be proud of, if we implement properly.

If I imagine those with limited bandwidth, or extremely slow bandwidth were ready to disregard a site because of the freedom of usage on the forums for all users (regardless of bandwidth), then the most I would want to do is make it appeal to them without affecting others, even in the slightest. Here's what I propose:

A system, that treats the images exactly as it does now (e.g only re-sizes the dimensions so they fit in the thread properly). But a system that flags a thread or post with an image over a certain size for use of notifying those who'd like to know before visiting.

That is: An option included in the control panel, that would be off by default (normal forum behavior). That essentially posted a message or loaded a warning page to those who check it, when clicking the link to a thread containing any images on that page listing of posts that is flagged. Essentially, they could see an icon appear next to that thread, or when browsing that thread, and checking the next page, a warning message appears first, before they agree to download those pictures. That way, The site is acknowledging over-sized images, but not discouraging it, and not saving them, but all the while "protecting" those who don't want to see them. After all, it's their problem, not ours.

I don't want to hinder the rest of the internet for those who can't keep up for whatever reason.

Orpheus said:
This is a forum, not a daycare facility

I completely agree.

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

I don't see how a pre-warning system could work given that thread "A" might have one screen of huge size but thread "B" might have 10 perfectly acceptable sizes totaling more than thread "A".

How can any pre-warning work with the amount of fluctuations any website endures?

Times past a thread of a popular map might have 100 images from beginning to end. Of course, no single page would have all 100 but still the total image file size would be incredible if members were permitted to post any size they want.

I can understand that there is no easy remedy. I can see that the image issue is MORE my issue than anyone else's but what I cannot see is putting a bandage effort over the scab to hide it.

A pre-warning system would require more micro-managing than our current system.

[edit] Why ain't you back at school. This crap can wait till later.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Orpheus, these are computers, not people. You design the algorithm in such a way that it looks at the state of the database WHEN the person needs to look at the thread and depending on the page ... meaning the pre-warning is not really "pre" at all. The effectiveness isn't in how you implement it but rather the logic you use to make the decisions.

There's this neat function in SQL called "sum" you can make a list of images in a given query of posts and sum the total file size and the result larger than some threshold (can even be a threshold set by the user if you wanted, it's very trivial) could trigger the feature.

It's really a non-issue. All these techniques are rather straight forward.

You could eventually build this hybrid solution that creates a sort of nirvana of web surfing on the forums that I think would be something very welcoming and sophisticated compared to how its normally handled.

So, again, there's actually several easy remedies, they just sound complicated from a non-computer oriented standpoint. It's why I don't usually talk about implementation details, people get all worried HOW you do it and forget about what you're actually doing. It just makes things complicated and difficult for a non-complicated and easy problem.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Actually its only when you post weird that I get bothered with anything you post.

Whenever you post techy stuff I am all ears. I really cannot follow the bouncy ball but the fact that you're willing to discuss things with a lowbrow is cool.

I never get the feeling that you rub our noses in it I mean. My brains run in a different direction.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

I think a good option with the thumbnails is for the server to create them on the fly and store them temporarily as Crono suggested.

In the mean time, aren't we able to create a custom thumbnail if need be by doing:

(url=www.blahblah/bleh_full.jpg)(img)www.blahblah/bleh_thumbnail.jpg(/img)(/url)

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Aaron's Stuff

Yes.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

I've been thinking this whole situation through and it seem that we are overlooking the obvious. Anything we "implement" is going to inconvenience somebody.

1) If we put into place a system that pre-warns someone that a thread has oversized images its going to wave a flag saying either "someone stupid put big pics here" or worse "Whites only, move along"

2) If we try to put into effect new codes, someone has to take time out of their busy schedule to not only do it, but make sure it works properly. This could take forever considering all the image types and sizes available.

3) This could cost Riven dollars. Ironic when you think that its costing me them now. But why should it cost anyone? Least of all the site.

So here we are with what to do that harms no one. We remove the image tags. Their only useful purpose is one of convenience and would only increase someones time to view the image by a second or so. And its our only system currently in use that people are abusing. Even unintentional abuse is still harmful.

Removing the tag should be simple enough. It will cause no harm and most likely the only people who might complain would be the ones who are the problem.

I also don't think (and I am sure Adam will point out otherwise if I am) that it will effect the smileys or our avatars since they are used in another fashion either through our control panel or from a pre-set group of approved gifs.

Anyway, this seems the least harmful, and the most cost effective method. People can post links. It will cause no problems with band usage and the image tags we use now CONTAIN the links so the only thing we would be removing would be the auto-loading of the pics.

Anywho's this seems the best solution and helps or rather harms no one here.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Now this is what I don't get. Just for laughs I looked back onto page one of this thread. The picture loaded again. Costed me 976k again to do it but I was curious.

How come my browser didn't store it from the previous time? AND can I have it do so so if we cannot resolve this issue I can at least sleep well knowing we all did our best to reduce my online usage?

I really rather not be denied access to certain threads simply because there's a shitload of images. I'd rather have a look (by choice) but without the added hassle of it reloading every freakin time I do so.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Orpheus said:
1) If we put into place a system that pre-warns someone that a thread has oversized images its going to wave a flag saying either "someone stupid put big pics here" or worse "Whites only, move along"

You really have no idea how dynamic webpages work do you? Something could be done as simple as put a marker next to threads that have large images ONLY for people who have it set in their profile. Which is unobtrusive and set by the person who wants to use it!

Orpheus said:
2) If we try to put into effect new codes, someone has to take time out of their busy schedule to not only do it, but make sure it works properly. This could take forever considering all the image types and sizes available.

Again ... it's much more elegant than you're thinking ... like I said before, since you have NO idea how these algorithms work, you should probably stop thinking about them. The site needs to be rebuilt ANYWAY, so why don't you consider that.

Orpheus said:
3) This could cost Riven dollars. Ironic when you think that its costing me them now. But why should it cost anyone? Least of all the site.

If you want SnarkPit to actually become a community again ... something needs to happen. I'm not saying anybody needs to fork out (more) cash to make it happen, but it's just ridiculous. What you've just said basically sounds like, "I like my community empty and stagnant and I don't want anybody doing anything to improve it so new members can enjoy coming here and the site can be modern". That is not exactly an appropriate line of thinking.

Orpheus said:
We remove the image tags. Their only useful purpose is one of convenience and would only increase someones time to view the image by a second or so. And its our only system currently in use that people are abusing. Even unintentional abuse is still harmful.

I'm going to be frank: this is a stupid idea. It would inconvenience EVERYONE if you removed the ability to post images in threads. The entire idea is to evolve the site, not regress it.

You also simultaneously said that "if you post images you are a problem for the community", you need to knock this shit off. And if that's now what you're saying, you need to rephrase it properly, because that's what it sounds like.

In fact the majority of your posts in this thread sounds extremely anti-social and controlling. This is how it comes across, you should be aware of it.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Nevermind, Adam convinced me to wait and see.

I will wait and see.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Hey, I just realized something else this site is missing. A fucking report post button.

Yay for editing.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Be very glad we're not in the same room at times like these. I think I'd feel much better about being wrong after I knocked you on your ass a few times. Oh, I'd feel bad but I cannot think of a better reason to feel that way.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

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Aaron's Stuff