Hi there,

I wrote a little package of PHP scripts allowing you to

• show the online status of mates and friends
  
• show the online status of servers
  
• show a list of HLs and PBs of your mates for whatever track/cars combo you like (I call it a "tracker").

Take a look at our web site to see what I mean. On the right hand side you can see a list of online mates and on which server they race. Just play around with the tracker and if you like it, you can download the 150kB package right here.

My main motivation was an independent server status script and the team tracker.

Although my scripts are able to query LFS World for host lists, WRs, PBs and HLs, they are not supposed to be in competition with dygears and filurs LFSWorldSDK, which I think is much more professional. In fact, I have to thank them for some helpful discussions!

To be honest, I didn't really care about nice code, effective programming or compatibility. I'm not the ultimate PHP expert and I mainly made this for my team.

However, it took a lot of work to get this done and so I thought maybe some others want to take a look at my stuff. It should run fine with PHP4, I guess.

I really spent some time writing 20 pages of documentation, explaining the installation process in some detail and also how I realised certain things. With this you should also be able to write your own stuff based on my work.

If you encounter any bugs, please post them here or PM me and I will try to fix them as soon as I can. Unfortunately I haven't the time to do big changes in the near future, even if there are already some things which I wish to have implemented ...

So have fun this.

Regards,

°HoT HorsePower

No problems mate, love it, I really do. I would not run it on principle, but still very nice job. Now I have to one up ya .

P.S I've got Dec 16th (My BDay) to Jan 2nd or 3rd off work. Expect me to start cranking out code REAL soon.

You frighten me!

Quote from HorsePower :

You frighten me!

I don't mean to say that I'd work on something of this caliber to compete with you, I'm just going to have to work more on the SDK to make sure that it could work as the back end for this. I think, and I had not looked at your source code and I have just glanced at it to check (while making sure that I would not remember any part of your code mind you), that your not using my SDK. That means that, my code needs more work and I'm failing to do the job I set out to do. I would like the SDK to become the back end for all of the applications that query LFSWorld. Not because it is easy to use, but because people can't get or do any better then that SDK. That is my goal for the SDK as of when your code came out and I read about it.

Ok. In fact, your SDK came out before I started to work on my project.

My initial intention was only to create an online status of servers and team mates. And because I always like to learn something I decided to figure that LFS World stuff out for my own instead of using your SDK.

Looking back this maybe was a mistake, but I at least understood some things concerning PHP and the LFS World pubstat access.

Anyway, it should be an easy task to implement your SDK and I will include that on top of my TODO list. So I will keep an eye on your progress and maybe I will find some time after X-mas to do something on the code.

Together, we'll rock.

Whats up, thats pretty cool
If i learn to work with php ill use it ehehe i tried and tried but i cant use php. LOL

Thanks! You don't need to be a freakin expert in PHP to use this. But knowing a little bit, clearly helps.

Just take a look at the examples, maybe you can learn from them.

---

A little side remark in general:

From the german LFS Forum I just learned that it is in this version of the tracker VERY IMPORTANT to have the LFSW Nickname in the Variable $TrackList in lowercase letters.

So in the file includes/tracker.php it should be something like

I never use this...

Quote from kodyro :

I never usi this...

Any need for this massive bump?

Hey,

I'm trying to set up the HoTTracker. After all i've done the update performs but no data is written into the mysql db :/

The log says:

Starting update at August 15, 2008, 7:31 pm.
Fetching all WRs.
Fetching all PBs from racer 'soucy'.
Fetching all HLs from racer 'soucy'.
Update finished at August 15, 2008, 7:32 pm.
Total time needed was 29 seconds.

But still no data written into my mysql db and no pb's visible on the tracker.

Any thoughts where the problem may be?

soucy

when i try to install it it just downloads the index.php. wtf?

For you out there wanting to use such a tracker: I'm currently working on version 2.0 of the HoT Tracker. It will be released at the beginning of the new year, maybe even earlier.

Let me just explain my motivations.

First of all the original HoT Tracker was developed by me "just for fun" and for exclusive use by my team (Hell on Tyres) only. Back then I wanted to try out this whole LFS-querying stuff and ended up with the tracker.

Since it was not designed to be "shipped", but was shipped anyway, the installation and configuration of the tracker was not as simple as it could have been ...

Due to a lack of spare time I also denied to do any support after it was released. I was happy to see the tracker was used by lot of teams anyway and the community (mostly german community) helped itself with all the issues.

Then there came out the LFS World SDK, which I didn't use in my old tracker.

So last weekend, I just tried the LFS World SDK out and again - I ended up coding all Sunday long and starting a new HoT Tracker.

So the difference now is that the HoT Tracker v2.0 will use the LFS World SDK for all LFS World queries. Furthermore, the new tracker will be designed to be "shipped", which means that I will do my very best to make it easy to install and to setup.

In fact, I will try to design the new tracker to be an SDK also. You will be able to use it as you want. For some feature (online status of racers and servers) you will not even need a MySQL DB, for other features (like the PB/HL team tracker) you will have to setup MySQL on your server.

So I will try to make it as modular as I can, easy to maintain for you, easy to support for me, easy to extend it's functionality in future times.

The first release of the new HoT Tracker will basically only cover the features of the old Tracker:

• Online Racers (friend, team mates)
  
• Server Status
  
• HL/PB Tracker (MySQL needed)
  

But I can already imagine that future releases will have a User-Authorization concept, a MySQL-based racer management (to add tracked racers via online form) and some other things ...

Being a professional software developer (well, not in the area of PHP/MySQL, but who cares) should help to create something good.

So, do not nail me down on any features or release dates, since this is still a spare-time-project for me. But I will try to finish it.

Kind regards,

HorsePower

Quote from HorsePower :

Then there came out the LFS World SDK, which I didn't use in my old tracker.

So last weekend, I just tried the LFS World SDK out and again - I ended up coding all Sunday long and starting a new HoT Tracker.

So the difference now is that the HoT Tracker v2.0 will use the LFS World SDK for all LFS World queries. Furthermore, the new tracker will be designed to be "shipped", which means that I will do my very best to make it easy to install and to setup.

When is your planned ship date? I'll update the SDK before hand so that you can have the most up to date version. (Next version will be LFSW-SDK will be 1.9, with a final major stable release in that branch.)

I guess I will be finished somewhere between christmas and new year.

To be honest, I have some suggestions for you SDK, too. I'll post them in the other thread, soon.

Quote from HorsePower :

I guess I will be finished somewhere between christmas and new year.

Great! I was thinking about setting up Your Hottracker for my team in these days, do You suggest me to wait for the new release/version?

Yes. In one or two weeks from now there's a good chance you be able to get the new stuff.

I will also get in touch with haelje (well I should better say he already contacted me). He is the guy who took over my first HoT Tracker (and improved). Maybe he should also contribute ... but it's to early now, as I first want to see a clear picture of what this is going to become ...

As of now I can already say that the new tracker should be more easy to setup. For online mates and server information you still won't need MySQL but for all other features you will.

This project is going to be far more than a simple tracker I hope. My vision is to have an admin panel where registered users are able to maintain the tracker.

Things that will be maintainable:

• Users: There will at least always be a super user with full rights. On top of that there can also be admins (being able to maintain the database of known racers), event admins (to be able to maintain event-trackers) and ordinary users (which will be able to only see data if you choose to keep the data private)
  
• Known racers: A database of racers that the HoT Tracker know (along with ingame names, team assignment, group assignment (e.g. for events ...) and so on).
  
• Events: At a later point in time (maybe not in the first release) I can think of a event database where you might create events (by specifying a combo, assigned group of racers, grid size, ....). Anyway, I'm not exactly sure at the moment how this shall work in detail.
  

The "look" of the tracker still will have to be configured by changing values of constants in the PHP files ... maybe we can change that in a future release also so that these things might also be changed online.

But this clearly would mean a whole lot of work which I do not know if it is worth the benefit ...

We'll see. Be patient. I have some ideas, but I cannot promise anything (unless you guys start paying me :nod.

Hi there,

I just want to give a brief update on the current status of development of the new HoT Tracker.

It took me longer than expected to come this far and I'm still not finished. Nevertheless I managed to get a whole lot done in the last few days but now my vacation ends and I will have less time to develop.

However, I still think that the tracker will be out before the end of this month. When I release the Tracker I want it to be as good as possible.

So what can you expect?

• HoT Tracker Control Center - This will be the central page to maintain the features of you installation of the HoT Tracker. You will be able to LFS color replacements for your web site, ingame names of racers, groups of racers, ingame team tags and more.
  
• User Management - Only registered users will be able to use the control center. There has to be at least one user which is called "super user" and has all authorizations. There can also be administrator users, event manager and ordinary users, all having different authorization profiles.
  
• LFS World Data:
  • Local copy of LFS World team information.
    
  • Local copy of world records.
    
  • Personal bests, Hotlaps, Personal statistics and fuel consumption of selected racers can be stored locally.
    
  • Update script for LFS World data
    
• Colors, LFS Colors, Style
  • Specify your own colors.
    
  • Assign these colors to LFS color codes.
    
  • Create styles to change the look of displayed tables
    
• Server Status Configuration
  
  • Create configurations of server status (which fields you want to show and in which order)
    
• Online Racer Configuration
  • Create configurations of online racer table
    
• Tracker Configuration
  • Specify configurations of tracker lists (which fields you will show and in which order, sort criteria).
    

• Racer and Team Database / Ingame Names
  • For every existing LFS World Team you can maintain a ingame team tag that will be used on you web site.
    
  • Maintain a list of racers that are "known" to the HoT Tracker. Specify the ingame name of each racer (using the ingame team tag if relevant).
    
  • Assign these racers to self-defined groups, for example you might want to have a group "Team Mates" and a group "Friends". But also if you plan to organize an event you might want to create a group "Registered Racers for Event X".
    
• Event/League Database (not yet designed, so the following are just preliminary thoughts)
  • Set up leagues.
    • Assign a group of racers to a league
      
  • Set up events (independent or assigned to a league)
    • Assign a group of racers to an event
      
    • Set a date for the event
      
    • Set a list of race information for the event, including a combo and so on (we'll see ...)
      
• Tracker
  • There will be a tracker script which can be called directly or included anywhere.
    
  • Specify a style, configuration, event, combo and a group of racers in order to determine the resulting tracker list.
    
• Server Status
  • There will be a server status script
    
  • Specify a server name, a style and a config.
    
• Online racers
  • There will be a online racer script
    
  • Specify a configuration, and a style and a group of racers.
    

As you can see there will be a whole lot of features in the new tracker. Thus I will have to write some documentation also.

Installation of the tool should not be too complicated. There will be a ZIP file containing all files. All you'll have to do is to create a folder on your webspace and copy all the files in there.

However, the HoT Tracker will need a MySQL database to run.

So you will have to make some small adjustment in a configuration file (MySQL login information, pubstat ID key, premium access ...)

So let's see how long it takes me to finish this. I will do my very best to make it easy to install and to use. I will also try to write a good documentation since I will not be able to give a lot of support. My hope is that the community will help itself.

Kind regards,

Timo

why don't you release an alpha version?

I don't like the idea of releasing an alpha version. At the moment there's a lot of code for the backend and the control center, but not much for the "end user".

On top of that I'm re-implementing already some stuff which I have implemenented at the end of last year.

This project is a bit "dirty". Normally a developer has to sit down and start thinking for a long time about what he will do and how. That is, it all starts with a specification which will result in a design which will result in an implementation. After that comes testing.

Unfortunately, that's not how I work (well, at least for my spare time projects). I think only for a rather short time, start implementing and see what comes out. The price I pay is recoding some old stuff from time to time.

When I'm finished, I will release it for testing. Give me two more weeks.

I just want to give a proof of life.

Nearly all features are implemented by now, some sort of "closed beta testing" is done at the moment.

There are just a few feature that I still have to implement: Event/League Management, some general options and last, but clearly not least: The documentation.

In fact, the HoT Tracker v2.0 has grown so big that it will be hard to see all the features without any documentation. Installation is not the problem, I guess, but you can maintain nearly everything via web (From LFS-Color replacement to the list of supported cars/tracks, know racers, ingame tags and names, table styles, configurations for online mates, server status and tracker lists ...)

So I really need to write something about the supported features.

The basic idea still is:

• One super user can exclusively set up styles and configurations and maintain the user database.
  
• Administrators can maintain groups and racers and events.
  
• Event Managers can maintain events.
  
• User can maintain their own ingame namem their own personal information and password.
  
• Everyone is allowed to use the tracker features, i.e. everyone can inlcude the scripts generating the output (online mates, server status, tracker list).
  

So the registered users can maintain the content and the look of the features covered by HoT Tracker, the output can be included everywhere (even remote) by using the generic scripts.

The PHP function to use in order to include the generated output on one's web site is file_get_contents (just similar to the method used for retrieving LFSW data).

Give me another two weeks for testing, implementing the final features and writing some documentation. Then I will release all my stuff right here.

(Well, I hope it will be used at all out there ...)

Quote from HorsePower :

So I really need to write something about the supported features.

The basic idea still is:

• One super user can exclusively set up styles and configurations and maintain the user database.
  
• Administrators can maintain groups and racers and events.
  
• Event Managers can maintain events.
  
• User can maintain their own ingame namem their own personal information and password.
  
• Everyone is allowed to use the tracker features, i.e. everyone can inlcude the scripts generating the output (online mates, server status, tracker list).
  

Sounds good!


I can't wait...

Hi there,

I though it is time to give a status report on the project.

Unfortunately it still takes me longer than I expected (since I have had not much time for developing the last two weeks). Some testing is going on but a few features are still missing. I will make no predictions anymore since they always are wrong.

So let's keep it as the LFS developers: When it's done, it's done.

But it's a matter of a few weeks, not a few months ...

I append some screen shots that show the current look of the main menu and the tracker list test page.

If you do not understand the meaning of some of the menu items, feel free to ask.

Kind regards,

Timo

Hi, any progress?

Not recently, unfortunately. As I said in another thread in this forum, there is only very little to do (besides the documentation).

I will abandon the event-stuff that I had in mind for the first release.

At the moment I have to deal with real life issues (normal things such as much work, taking care of wife and daughter ... it's winter time and we get a lot of bad colds).

So I'm sorry that I cannot say anything else than I will finish it soon ...

This is just to inform you that I'm currently writing the documentation. The tracker is finished so far ... so expect it to be released on the weekend or during next week.

This weekend it is planned to run some final installation tests which I expect to run fine.

It will be released as BETA since I think there will some minor bug fixing to be done.