Webtiles

[mageykun]

We need an idiots guide on how to get this to work. You know, for us idiots. :p

Wasn't hard to get firefox to enable websockets (which apparently default to off), but now I'm stuck at a login screen. The existing "How do I play online" page describes how one obtains and sets up the client, and then connects to a sever, but doesn't say how one creates unique login credentials. Do I have to go in at least once in putty before I can try the online tiles?

[absolutego]

Wasn't hard to get firefox to enable websockets (which apparently default to off), but now I'm stuck at a login screen. The existing "How do I play online" page describes how one obtains and sets up the client, and then connects to a sever, but doesn't say how one creates unique login credentials. Do I have to go in at least once in putty before I can try the online tiles?

yes, you need an existing account. it's simple, just telnet to the server and create an account (give it a username and password), and then you can forget about it. there are very clear instructions here: http://crawl.develz.org/wordpress/howto

(i'd say use CAO instead of CDO so you don't have to mess with the ssh-key.)

i'm sure you'll be able to do this via browser in the future.

[tcjsavannah]

(i'd say use CAO instead of CDO so you don't have to mess with the ssh-key.)

I had to specifically create one on CDO to work - my CAO account did not work when I tried it first.

[jejorda2]

I tried it out and got it to work in Firefox 4 on Mac OS X. Sometimes there were display oddities when I used x to look at items, especially items on spaces next to lava. After passing over the items, the space would show solid black instead of the tile for the item.

And X seemed less useful for finding unexplored stairs than it is in console. I couldn't see any more of the map than I see when playing, because the stat display doesn't go away to show more map. Maybe it's always like that in tiles and X is only useful in console. I didn't see the symbols to indicate how many stairs and escape hatches have been located and followed.

I expected to be able to ssh into CDO and play the same character there, but I couldn't find a way to do it.

Ctrl-D didn't let me edit macros in webtiles as I am accustomed to, and I couldn't find a way to edit the options file.

[galehar]

In local tiles, there's the minmap which helps a lot. Other than that, the map mode is the same as the online one. I'll make it fullscreen and zoomable someday. And add some buttons for discovered hatches, stairs, portals, etc...
You can edit macros with ~ and I think you can edit options by ssh. It's still very beta as you can see.

[jejorda2]

I think you can edit options by ssh. It's still very beta as you can see.

Am I supposed to be able to log into ssh://crawl@crawl.develz.org, select option 1 to play 0.8, and then see the same character that I've created at tiles.develz.org? That isn't working for me.

[galehar]

I think you can edit options by ssh. It's still very beta as you can see.

Am I supposed to be able to log into ssh://crawl@crawl.develz.org, select option 1 to play 0.8, and then see the same character that I've created at tiles.develz.org? That isn't working for me.

Options are shared between CDO and webtiles, but not characters (yet).

[fnwc]

Here's quick and dirty tutorial:

• Download a telnet client such as PuTTY.
• Create an account using PuTTY to telnet to "crawl.develz.org" port "345", and selecting "R) egister as a new user". Don't use a password used anywhere else, as this password is insecure (it's even stored in the browser querystring when you play).
• Get a browser that supports WebSockets (Firefox or Chrome). My advice is to use Chrome, as it's disabled by default in Firefox (you should be using Chrome anyway ).
• Connect via browser to https://tiles.crawl.develz.org, and use the username/password created in step 2.
• Profit.

Big, big props to the developers for this!

Edit: skip steps 1 and 2 if you already have a CDO account, obviously.

[galehar]

Big, big props to the developers for this!

Actually, the author of the port is edlothiol who isn't a member of the devteam, so many thanks to him. And also to Napkin!

[mageykun]

Pfff, I'm not going to listen to that chrome propaganda. :p Enabling websockets in firefox is easy.

Webtiles as it is now is interesting, I'll give it that. The lag, combined with the lack of a minimap and what seems to be impaired X functionality, are probably the bigggest impediments to play. The missing menu tiles, mouse support, etc not so much.

[galehar]

Pfff, I'm not going to listen to that chrome propaganda. :p Enabling websockets in firefox is easy.

It does work better and more smoothly in chrome.

[savageorange]

Ah, it's nice to be able to play with tiles at a merely slow, instead of glacial, speed

(glacial being the speed that offline tiles plays at: about 1 turn per 3 seconds, while eating up all spare cpu, and with extremely spasmodic responsiveness to keyboard. Online is more like 4-6 turns per 1 second in firefox, with working keyboard)

Thanks for the chrome tip: it does seem to speed it up noticably.

[edlothiol]

Webtiles were updated this weekend with the following features:

Spectating!
The dungeon view size automatically adapts to the browser window
You can register via the web interface
... and many small improvements.

If you find any bugs, please report them on Mantis.

[Narretz]

Wow, I never thought this would be available so fast!
I just had a quick look and am very impressed already.

[absolutego]

very welcome improvements. good work, edlothiol!

[Narretz]

I just posted the first issue on Mantis.

Should there be a Wiki page for discussions about Webcrawl or should this happen here?

First, we could find out which features are most desired to be ported, so that you don't waste your time on something that could come later. I am also interested if you think it's possible to port really everything from Tiles or just the basic things. As it looks at the moment, this is basically what I want, everything else is just bonus. It looks already better than Nettiles, just the lag is sometimes a little frustrating since I don't know if it crashed or if it's just slow.

[galehar]

We can do as usual. Let's start discussion here, and if some ideas reach some kind of consensus, let's bring it to the wiki. Or whatever edlothiol prefers, since he's doing the coding
About the lag, I have a weird bug in ff4. Sometimes it seems to hang and I need to press a key to refresh. This doesn't happen in chrome.

[fnwc]

Hey, is it possible to get a CAO version of this? Or one in North America? I'm wondering if the lag is a websockets thing or the fact that tiles.crawl.develz.org is in Germany.

[Pumpking]

Where are you guys discussing about what should be implemented in webtiles?
I think it's cool the way it is... just make less laggy the movement with arrow keys and something like a "force screen" to adjust the resolution for who is watching your game (keep moving the side-scrooling bars is pretty annoying), etc...

[Narretz]

Hey, is it possible to get a CAO version of this? Or one in North America? I'm wondering if the lag is a websockets thing or the fact that tiles.crawl.develz.org is in Germany.

I use it in Gemany, and I get lag, too. But it's not a uniform lag, sometimes it runs very smoothly, until I have a lag of epic proportions or the game freezes completely.

[edlothiol]

I use it in Gemany, and I get lag, too. But it's not a uniform lag, sometimes it runs very smoothly, until I have a lag of epic proportions or the game freezes completely.

Did you get this recently (i.e., since last wednesday)? We fixed a bug which caused these lags.

Let's start discussion here, and if some ideas reach some kind of consensus, let's bring it to the wiki. Or whatever edlothiol prefers, since he's doing the coding

Yes, that's probably best.

I added a chat function and fixed some display bugs; you can now look at the changelog with the link at the bottom of the game list.

[Jeremiah]

Huh - I seem to be able to play in webtiles even with a browser that does not support WebSockets - I'm using Safari 4.1 and I'm pretty sure support wasn't introduced until 5.0.

I just clicked on the link to watch someone else's game on CDO, and it opened in webtiles and then I could create an account myself (I forgot the password for my old account) and it seems to be playable with a bit of lag.

So now I have to decide whether to finish my current offline game first or keep playing online.

[ClawlessVictory]

The missing menu tiles, mouse support, etc not so much.

For me this is exactly what WebTiles is missing. I've been spoiled by these conveniences and I'm sure I'm not alone. I think it should ultimately have the same features as local Tiles.

[ibanix]

There is a basic page on the Crawl wiki for webtiles: http://crawl.chaosforge.org/index.php?title=Web_Tiles

Please feel free to improve it.

[Pumpking]

It's only me or everyone experience some lag while moving with arrow keys?
When I move with the auto-explore key "O" the character moves fast but when i go for the arrow keys it lags a lot...

[Narretz]

I use it in Gemany, and I get lag, too. But it's not a uniform lag, sometimes it runs very smoothly, until I have a lag of epic proportions or the game freezes completely.

Did you get this recently (i.e., since last wednesday)? We fixed a bug which caused these lags.

I checked and the huge lags were gone. Some of the "lags" were probably due to the fact, that I couldn't see the -- More -- message and didn't hit space.

Ah yes, I can see the log area now completely (in Chrome). Have to check with Firefox + Tabbar at the bottom.

Are webtiles characters already integrated with the general scoring? If not, then this is my n1 feature before the tournament starts in summer.

[Robsoie]

I'm currently using Webtiles to play the tournament and i find it fine (though i miss a lot the Tiles interface functionality) on the portable version of the Iron browser (that's basically Chrome but without the google data mining) i'm using specifically for this to not mess up with my actual browser security settings.

Though, i'm facing a few problems :
- i don't see the bottom of the messages if i don't go full screen (F11)
- i can't seem to access the character status with @ ( @ on my azerty keyboard is made with AltGr + 0, maybe it's a keyboard language problem in Webtiles as in normal tile version it works fine)
- same as with the character dump, # does not seem to work (# on my azerty is AltGr + 3 )
- i remember when playing NetTiles in the last tournament, i was able to access a ASCII "mini map" (mini map though it was bigger than the screen so i had to scroll around) , but with WebTiles i can't find that function, the only way to move to location i want is to press X (caps, not lower case) and move the cursor through the whole map, making it difficult to find again where i wanted to go.

[galehar]

- i remember when playing NetTiles in the last tournament, i was able to access a ASCII "mini map" (mini map though it was bigger than the screen so i had to scroll around) , but with WebTiles i can't find that function, the only way to move to location i want is to press X (caps, not lower case) and move the cursor through the whole map, making it difficult to find again where i wanted to go.

Nettiles was emulating the tile interface on top of the console. What you describe is just the console map. There's no alternative currently for webtiles. I don't know if edlothiol is planning to add support for the minimap, but if he doesn't, a full screen map would be a big help already. I had this planned for the local tiles version, but if it can help with webtiles, I may move it at the top of my todo. edlothiol, what do you think?

[edlothiol]

I do plan to implement a minimap, but it will probably take me some time.
If you do implement the full screen map, I could probably port it to webtiles (although I think large parts of the work to implement it for local tiles wouldn't directly benefit webtiles). It would certainly be a helpful addition, but I don't think it is immediately necessary.

[Narretz]

Minimap + scrolling the map with x should be enough, since you can see where you are scrolling, and what else there is, on the minimap. Thanks again for all the work, Edlothiol!

Would it be technically possible to watch console games on webtiles? If yes, this goes straight to my "nice to have" list.

Some minor issues:
When spectating, I see that the character information is sometimes moved out of screen range. Could that have something to do with the difference in player's and my screen resolution?

Some other poster mentioned keys not working: I can't use \ for item knowledge and ` for repeating an action. Also, 5 on Num Block is resting 100 turns, when I thought it was 1 turn previously.

@Pumpking: How much is your "lag"? There is a certain lag for me, but it's definitely less than a second. I can't run like I did in Nettiles, but for me that's actually good since it prevents killing myself by running into danger.

[Pumpking]

Sorry for asking again but...
It's only me or everyone experience some lag while moving with arrow keys?
When I move with the auto-explore key "O" the character moves fast but when i go for the arrow keys it lags a lot...
I play ascii mode in both servers (CAO and CDO) and don`t have this...

[galehar]

Sorry for asking again but...
It's only me or everyone experience some lag while moving with arrow keys?
When I move with the auto-explore key "O" the character moves fast but when i go for the arrow keys it lags a lot...
I play ascii mode in both servers (CAO and CDO) and don`t have this...

Have you tried chrome? It's faster than firefox.

[Pumpking]

Sorry for asking again but...
It's only me or everyone experience some lag while moving with arrow keys?
When I move with the auto-explore key "O" the character moves fast but when i go for the arrow keys it lags a lot...
I play ascii mode in both servers (CAO and CDO) and don`t have this...

Have you tried chrome? It's faster than firefox.

Yeah, I use chrome just to play webtiles.

[Regnix]

Just wanted to let you know, Webtiles works in Opera Mobile on the Android. Websockets support is disabled as default, but if you put "opera:config" in the URL then you can enable websockets. I may have to purchase a bluetooth keyboard now...

Regnix

[Kautzman]

It's my understanding the webtiles is based in Europe. While I think I've become accustomed enough to the lag from the US to Europe to make it my main way to play, is there a chance we'll see it on CAO as well or some other venue in North America?

[hxy]

Feature request:

On the home screen showing the list of on-going games, can we have the row highlighted when you mouse over it?
When the "User" and "Where" columns are far apart, it's sometimes difficult to see which game I'm clicking on... or maybe I'm getting old

[edlothiol]

is there a chance we'll see it on CAO as well or some other venue in North America?

I don't know -- the operators of CAO will have to decide that. But remember that Webtiles is still very much in development (we tried to keep it stable for the tournament, but when that is over, there will be more changes), so even if they want to install it, they may wait until it is more stable.

On the home screen showing the list of on-going games, can we have the row highlighted when you mouse over it?

Good idea. It's implemented and will probably be online in a few days.

[evilmike]

I just have two small comments.

First: a day or two ago I spectated someone, and noticed someone deliberately scrolling the spectator chat. It seems all you need to do is hold down enter and it will send dozens of blank lines to the chat box.

Second: Is there any plan on adding a monster list to webtiles? For me, this is the main feature that keeps me playing ascii instead of tiles. It's incredibly useful to have a list of all the monsters on screen, with their names displayed. Even offline tiles doesn't really have this. It seems this would be a lot easier to add than a minimap, too.

[galehar]

Second: Is there any plan on adding a monster list to webtiles? For me, this is the main feature that keeps me playing ascii instead of tiles. It's incredibly useful to have a list of all the monsters on screen, with their names displayed. Even offline tiles doesn't really have this. It seems this would be a lot easier to add than a minimap, too.

Offline tiles does have a monster panel. There isn't the monsters' names, but when you play tiles, you get used to identify them with the picture.

[evilmike]

Yeah, it has the panel, but I prefer the list with names that you get in the console version. The tiles one only shows names if you mouse over them.

[sxoz]

I realize this is a bit off-topic for this thread but since we're talking about it anyway, I have to agree about the monster list.

The two biggest things that I miss when I play Tiles are the monster list (even though I have the config set up to always show the monster panel, it's not as useful as the ASCII list that gives you a quick glance at every monster nearby, their health and mental state), and the exits at the top of the overview map (Tiles doesn't have a quick and easy way to check which stairs you've found and used, and how many portals/shops you've found on the level, like the top of the overview map has in ASCII).

[Kautzman]

My two cents on the monster list:

I find myself being able to very easily identify the monsters as I see them, making it almost moot for me, but my history of playing crawl is Tiles for a year+ > Console for a few months > Webtiles, so perhaps it's because at this point it's second nature to do so. Either way, I always kind of liked that tiles didn't need a monster list because all the information was available on the playscreen. At the same time, I don't think it'd hurt anything.

Also, Webtiles is absolutely great. Huge thanks goes out to those who spent the time to develop it.

Edit: Is there a way to change the config file for webtiles?

[galehar]

The two biggest things that I miss when I play Tiles are the monster list (even though I have the config set up to always show the monster panel, it's not as useful as the ASCII list that gives you a quick glance at every monster nearby, their health and mental state)

The monster panel does show every monster, their health and attitude/behaviour. You even get more information than console because you also see terrain and wielded weapon. I think it's just a matter of getting used to it for console players moving to tiles.

and the exits at the top of the overview map (Tiles doesn't have a quick and easy way to check which stairs you've found and used, and how many portals/shops you've found on the level, like the top of the overview map has in ASCII).

Yes, the map mode could have many improvements. Buttons for stairs, portals and shop would be a big one.

[edlothiol]

Is there a way to change the config file for webtiles?

Not yet, but it uses your CDO 0.8 config, so you can edit it via the normal ssh/telnet interface.

Is there any plan on adding a monster list to webtiles?

Of course, although I'm currently concentrating more on the minimap and a few smaller things. The monster list comes after that, though.
In principle, in the long term, I'd like to reach feature parity with both local tiles and console online play. But there's still much to do for that

The monster panel does show every monster, their health and attitude/behaviour. You even get more information than console because you also see terrain and wielded weapon. I think it's just a matter of getting used to it for console players moving to tiles.

There is one thing the monster list shows which the monster panel doesn't: zombie/skeleton types (at least I think so, correct me if I'm wrong). This is rather helpful.
I was wondering if I should fashion the Webtiles monster list after console or tiles, though I do now tend to the tiles version -- galehar is right, almost all information is already contained in the tiles monster panel. Although having the names of the monsters instantly visible would also be helpful for console players moving to tiles, or console players watching Webtiles games. More input on this would be appreciated.

[evilmike]

I think the type you implement should depend on mouse support. If you plan on adding the monster list before you add mouse support, you should (at least for now) use the console style with names. This is because the tiles style requires you to use the mouse to see the names of monsters.

Obviously I prefer the console style anyway, but even putting aside personal opinion, I think it's the best choice as long as the interface remains keyboard driven.

[asdu]

Shift-movement doesn't work for me (it doesn't work on CAO either, for that matter). Is this normal?

There is one thing the monster list shows which the monster panel doesn't: zombie/skeleton types (at least I think so, correct me if I'm wrong). This is rather helpful.

This! I started wishing tiles had a console-style monster list the day a summoned elephant zombie whose type I didn't bother to check pushed me off the stairs of Tomb:2 while I was stair dancing

[sxoz]

The monster panel does show every monster, their health and attitude/behaviour. You even get more information than console because you also see terrain and wielded weapon. I think it's just a matter of getting used to it for console players moving to tiles.

Funny thing is I actually started out as a tiles player, then started playing online. I guess you're right that it's a matter of getting used to it for tiles, but the other side of that coin is that the ascii representation of the monster list is very quick to parse, whereas the tiles monster panel needs to be decoded in my mind.

[Galefury]

IMO the tiles monster list is really not what tiles needs. You already see all of the info there on your main screen. I would prefer something that gives me a quick overview of the most important info at a glance. Optimally in big enough letters so I don't even really have to look at it.

[ClawlessVictory]

Just hoping for mouse support and a minimap. I know the map has been discussed, but any word on mouse support?

Thanks!

[lordfrikk]

edlothiol, I was wondering if you can attemp to say at this moment how much faster webtiles will probably be down the road. I realize we can't probably expect to match the speed of native code but I'd still love to hear your opinion.

And thanks for doing this, it's already very playable.