Emblem Discussions

Tural · Post by **Tural** » Thu Dec 27, 2007 9:14 pm

Out of curiosity, how does it manage to scan the database without direct access and without forcing unauthorized access?

GametagAeonFlux · Post by **GametagAeonFlux** » Thu Dec 27, 2007 9:19 pm

Tural wrote:Out of curiosity, how does it manage to scan the database without direct access and without forcing unauthorized access?

I'm assuming it just goes to this URL and increases the number by 1 each time, all while checking for files/images with whatever filename.

EDIT: Nevermind, emblems don't show up there.

StalkingGrunt911 · Post by **StalkingGrunt911** » Thu Dec 27, 2007 9:20 pm

Does this go through each and every persons profile and then outputs their username and chevrons for the specific emblem in the list according to the memberlist which is their member number like Gren being #1 and being number one in the listview? I guess this also means we can lol at whoever is in the readers club, like mods that RC themselves? ;P

Anyways, nice app you got their and I wouldn't blame you for it being slow blame HaloMods for being so damn popular and having all these members.

Edit: Nvm.

Iron_Forge · Post by **Iron_Forge** » Thu Dec 27, 2007 10:21 pm

Prey wrote:Here designed an application to make it easier to find whos got what emblem..

I called it Pepper.. Couldn't think of anything at the time, so I just took that from your name Sgt.Peppers. Sure you won't mind..

It searches a bit slow, but that's the trade-off when not having direct access to the forum database.. this instead goes through a bit of a "hacky" job =x

If you think the app could do with any updates then post and I'll look into it when I'm not busy.

Download. Enjoy.

Interesting app...I'm not overly fond of the idea of you and everyone else hammering the site, so I recommend no one run it!..Lots of improvements could be done in theory though...The average emblem user probably has a higher number of posts, so when pulling the member list, sort by posts descending...After about 20 pages or so, you get into members with <150 posts, which isn't that much in the grand scheme of things...There's also little point in scanning for a single emblem...You might aswell pull who has what emblems from that list of the first 1000 people with the most posts, then after you've pulled that info, you can filter it based on which emblem you're trying to figure out (saving the list, so it doesn't need to be pulled again)...Also, since you're loading thread pages anyways, you might aswell pull the emblems of all people on any thread page, that way if you encounter a user on memberlist page 2, that happened to have posted in the same thread as someone from memberlist page 1, you can just skip them, saving 2 page loads...There's also no point in loading the users profile page, since you can jump right to the search page given a users name...

-Legendary- · Post by **-Legendary-** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 12:09 am

Sweet

.

Patrickssj6 · Post by **Patrickssj6** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 3:34 am

Somehow the app works really slow...but who cares! Server Hammering FTW

Prey · Post by **Prey** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 6:10 am

Well this is how the application currently works for those interested..

It first requests the memberlist, and from there plucks out each profile url on the list and advances forward to their profile page.
It then takes the users name from the page, before advancing down the "Find Posts By User" link.
It then finds the link to the first post, and it's post ID, by the user on this page.
And then, using the Post ID, finds the users emblem table on the page and searches it for the specified filename. If it's there the username taken from above is output along with the chevrons, if any, the user is found to have.
On reaching the end of the memberlist page, the next page link is formed and if it exists; the process is started again.

Now before anyone jumps down my throat!.. Quick FYI on why I did what I did..

GametagAeonFlux the reason I didn't do that instead of searching the memberlist was because, due mostly to the forum merge, there is a lot of "ghost users" - like this one. Using the memberlist be quicker.
Erm...Yea, that's it..

Iron_Forge wrote:Interesting app...I'm not overly fond of the idea of you and everyone else hammering the site, so I recommend no one run it!..Lots of improvements could be done in theory though...The average emblem user probably has a higher number of posts, so when pulling the member list, sort by posts descending...After about 20 pages or so, you get into members with <150 posts, which isn't that much in the grand scheme of things...There's also little point in scanning for a single emblem...You might aswell pull who has what emblems from that list of the first 1000 people with the most posts, then after you've pulled that info, you can filter it based on which emblem you're trying to figure out (saving the list, so it doesn't need to be pulled again)...Also, since you're loading thread pages anyways, you might aswell pull the emblems of all people on any thread page, that way if you encounter a user on memberlist page 2, that happened to have posted in the same thread as someone from memberlist page 1, you can just skip them, saving 2 page loads...There's also no point in loading the users profile page, since you can jump right to the search page given a users name...

I won't ask how you know the inner workings of my application so well =x ..but yes, they are all good points and I'll look into updating the app.

I use the "only human" argument damnit!..

DarkShallFall · Post by **DarkShallFall** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 6:43 am

bant mbmbmb

Patrickssj6 · Post by **Patrickssj6** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 7:10 am

Yay I'm on page....250 or something member number around 15000....xD

DarkShallFall · Post by **DarkShallFall** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 7:52 am

Patrickssj6 wrote:Yay I'm on page....250 or something member number around 15000....xD

http://forums.halomods.com/profile.php? ... profile&u=12018

Patrickssj6 · Post by **Patrickssj6** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 7:54 am

Educated guess

shadowkhas · Post by **shadowkhas** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 9:49 am

It's called Pepper because it peppers the server with hits.

...kill me now.

Prey · Post by **Prey** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 10:37 am

lawl

Well I've updated the application.. new method:

It first requests the memberlist(mode "Total Posts", order "Descending"), and from there plucks out each user name on the list and searches for posts by the user with the "/search.php?search_author=USERNAME" url.
It then finds the link to the first post by the user on this page.
And then, searches through all the users emblem tables on the thread page and searches it for the specified filename. If it's there their username is output along with the chevrons, if any, the user is found to have.
On reaching the end of the memberlist page, the next page link is formed and if it exists; the process is started again.

And no user is read twice as names are kept track of. Apart from that.. you can also double-click a member to access their profile =x

Download!..

-Legendary- · Post by **-Legendary-** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 10:38 am

New version looks good

.

Patrickssj6 · Post by **Patrickssj6** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 11:15 am

I approve of this app

neodos · Post by **neodos** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 11:28 am

Haha great job Prey!

DrXThirst · Post by **DrXThirst** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 11:33 am

Whenever I check "Uses Chevrons", the app won't find anything.

Prey · Post by **Prey** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 11:41 am

If pictures of the emblems didn't appear then it doesn't exist, and so it won't bother searching.. else your just not waiting long enough (you can see the progress at the bottom).

Make sure to read the readme to make sure your doing everything correctly. Or perhaps your firewall is blocking the application access to the interwebs..

T1xAnton · Post by **T1xAnton** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 12:28 pm

It looks good Prey.

StalkingGrunt911 · Post by **StalkingGrunt911** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 1:43 pm

I like the app a lot better now. :X
Only happened once but still. :p

Guess it got confused because Tural and CabooseJr have 3. o:

I also never knew that there was only six people with the 3rd chevron for the helping emblem, and I'm one of them. :O Tural was first, if I remember right.