Before 2014 ends - a Skye: Endless Realm development update
We hope you and yours have had a wonderful and safe Christmas during this holiday season. There’s less than a week to go until we welcome in 2015, and yet Skye: Endless Realm still remains unlaunched. Furthermore, it has been a very long time since my teammates and I last updated you (in August!) or answered your questions*; a progress report is definitely due for you. Thank you for still being there when we went quiet on you.
Alain Leon spent a good amount of time diligently trying to get PSQL, Ruby on Rails (“RoR,”) and Discourse (our forum framework of choice for Skye) to “talk” with each other. Linking databases and inter-database interactions posed some challenges because Discourse’s install uses Docker, which had Alain working within layers and layers of permissions and security. George Jin Zhao aided in logic checking and testing (for the infinite layering of particular Skye item types) and reviewing. Because of Discourse's [relatively] new way of setting up on servers (through Docker,) everything is within the Docker bubble of permissions while our databases are outside of that bubble. What we were trying to accomplish was writing and reading info within the Docker PSQL database from outside of it - since the way we currently planned to set up the databases (3 tables within two databases) must be able to communicate with each other to sync info. We had to work within a combo of RoR, Redis, and Docker tech and figure out how Discourse sets up its permissions; we found that the way Discourse prefers things set up is that everything else is a plugin for it instead of vice versa, so Alain toyed with different ways of bringing this project node to fruition - such as producing all other elements into plugins for Discourse.
Alain also created three (!) basic builds [two on Ember.js and one on Meteor.JS] of Skye: Endless Realm’s avatar customization screen and inventory - within the efficacious Meteor framework. Included in the builds: in-game currency per user, the basic site layout, customizable male and female avatar bodies & working layering of multi-layer items & interactive item thumbnails.
Here is an Easter egg for you for reading up till here. Here is a non-publicized temporary test forum on Skye’s network that was created earlier in 2014 for server load testing:
This screenshot is an excerpt from a message that was sent to a randomized group of your peers (and possibly you who are reading this!) that was asked to test-load our servers, or “spam the forum with numerous posts/pictures/videos/forum icebreakers/replies,” and thereby get to meet their wonderful compatriots who are also waiting for Skye while doing so. There are wonderful people who are still using this temporary forum!
In addition to our current documentation and logging on Asana, Trello, Hipchat (a handy Github-integrated team chatting tool replete with timely emojis,) Sagar Biddanda and I established a custom set of internal tools that will help fuel independent training and faster catching up across our growing team. (Should you have any ideas or suggestions, I would love to hear more about good documentation habits to further expedite our progress. The following is a memorable excerpt I read lately from this fascinating "novella" that Sagar sent me on being an entrepreneur in Japan.)
I designed the components and features of the "item_PNGs_submitter," the main tool for submitting and defining item PNGs and their layering behavior (Skye items can be made of only one or several PNGs that exhibit various creative interactions with other PNGs.) Here are my wireframing materials. Your critiques are very welcomed. A. Here is the list of all item PNG categories in the order that I thought may be easiest on teammates using the item_PNGs_submitter. (Categories determine the behaviors of a PNG - and its layering attributes, such as whether you may wear "infinite" items or only one item from that category at a time.)
B. Here's the same list from a different perspective. I ordered categories by "default layering" this time.
C. A mockup of the item_PNGs_submitter (made with Jotform!)
D. And I designed other features related to the item_PNGs_submitter, such as the submitted_items_archive (see this link for edits and corrections.)
*One major question has been, “When will Skye: Endless Realm launch?”
We are intently looking forward to hitting Skye: Endless Realm milestones as early as possible in 2015. Therefore...
... We are expanding our small team with dedicated full stack developers who can work full time to build Skye faster.
Our job listings are still open! You can apply on Odesk, Elance, or Guru.
One of the first project nodes we're tackling is the item_PNGs_submitter because once this submitter and its related admin features goes live, the art team can be mobilized at the same time because artists' PNG deliverables can be appropriately processed right away by the submitter. Here's some of our discussion so far (thank you so much, George, Sagar, and Daniel Tong for your heady analyses!!)
To the wonderfully talented and patient artists who are awaiting decisions on their applications to Skye…
Here are the screenshots for Skye's belated design manual! I would like to finally finish and publicly release the design manual for everyone's consideration as soon as possible!
To the skillful and generously kind members of #SkyeWorldChangers…
For your review, I wrote a peer-reviewed† contract earlier this year to ensure idea-submitters retain ownership of their sketches and designs, and receive copies of the items based on their designs after Skye launches. The terms of this release form will still remain in place after Skye launches.
†(Thank you so much for your time and thoughts in reviewing this contract, Boua Vahn Thor, Mallory Velten, Stephanie Lee, Justyna Echo Kwiatkowska, Aurelia Wang, Jessica Wang, and George Jin Zhao!)
- A grateful Melissa
