Announcement: Pond

[AireTamStorm]

I'll consider allowing PONClient connect to other communication protocols- since I'm planniing on using libpurple, anything supported in pidgin (AIM, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, etc) will fairly easily work. Do NOT ask for skype, though. Some features will only be available on POND Jabber servers, like automatic TCP / UDP tunneling through remote servers.

As for stat tracking, that depends entirely on the game developer to implement, even if I wrote all the code for it. I will see about it, however that is an immense amount of work all by itself. There is alot of encryption and security to consider so that people do not cheat, for instance. As such, such functionality would likely require a separate team of developers, as it has nothing to do with connection negotiation. Volunteers? Some of these features you are casually requesting are no small feat. Doesn't mean it isn't doable... My priorities are just elsewhere at the moment, and that is making connections as smooth sailing as possible.

 

[lardman]

Would be good to add Bonjour (avahi) functionality to allow people to play/talk/etc. directly without needing to join a network.

 

[AireTamStorm]

Would be good to add Bonjour (avahi) functionality to allow people to play/talk/etc. directly without needing to join a network.

Going to add that functionality for bluetooth, and WiFi if the chip supports ad-hoc (I doubt it will not). I will not actually code anything to manage the hardware beyond perhaps a simplistic script, but once there is an open path for connections, I'll try to make it as easy and transport-irrelevant as possible.

 

[MrShleee]

I would love to see some kind of community style modules...

In-game chat, Friend lists and achievements

 

[AireTamStorm]

Status Update on this project:

Base Network Library
I've decided to go with HawkNL ( http://www.hawksoft.com/hawknl/ ) for the base network library. Why?
QUOTE
HawkNL has been tested on Windows® 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP/CE, Linux®, Solaris™, IRIX®, AIX®, BSDs, Mac OS®.
In other words, any platform that the Emulator or game can run on, PONC will too, and all clients will be able to communicate with each other regardless of platform. Are you ready for PC vs Pandora vs (modded) PSP gaming? I am, and I'm going to commit to cross platform compatibility. HawkNL is the fastest way to that goal.

Licensing and technical information
The entire client and server will be licensed under GPL. As said before, there will be a wrapper library that is public domain you compile into your application, or alternatively, be run completely separately of the application to create the tunnels. You don't even have to recompile your applications to work- if they can connect to 127.0.0.1 / localhost on the PONC port, they can connect via POND. Both methods aim to be full function.

On another note, I'd like to see where TINXL is, status-wise.

 

[slygamer]

Base Network Library
I've decided to go with HawkNL ( <a href="http://www.hawksoft.com/hawknl/" target="_blank">http://www.hawksoft.com/hawknl/ )</a> for the base network library. Why?

Be aware that HawkNL development has been stopped for a few years now and is no longer an active project.[/quote]

 

[gaspo]

My two cents...

What you need to create, problably, is not a XMPP server, it's a XMPP Component.

With a Component you will need just to extend the protocol to your needs, like google did to create jingle extension, not re-implementing all the XMPP protocol.

With a component you can use any XMPP server (that supports this feature).

Here..

http://www.igniterealtime.org/projects/whack/index.jsp

you can take a look at component library made in java. I know, java sucks, but I giving this as a reference implementation.

Jabber component protocol:
http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0114.html

Python Library with component implementaton:
http://pyxmpp.jajcus.net/

People at the project OLPC has proposed a component extension:

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/XMPP_Extensions

Besides that, I think they have created serverless xmpp communication too.


Sorry for my terrible english

 

[phrosty]

How about using asio for networking. It's got a nice modern c++ design, and supports async.

 

[Arialia]

Very good idea AireStorm, like it

 

[Wertigon]

Not a bad idea, however, I'd like to suggest one thing; instead of making it an XMPP *server*, make it an XMPP *client* with support for Jingle and PEP (Personal Event Publishing) and where one can simply "connect" the desired game.

I've been thinking about something similar for quite a while for PC gaming but I've never gotten around to implementing it. My basic idea was to establish a duplexed Jingle stream for the data and let XMPP handle the communication stuff (voice, video, text). That way, all you sent over the data channel would be things related to your game world. If your app were XMPP aware, it could also use PubSub to display, oh I dunno, scores perhaps? Or that it's installed on your PC? And you could get challenges to your XMPP client natively...

Anyhow, it's a solid idea, and I think XMPP is the right technology for it. You just need to make it happen, and like others have said, make it a client/component instead of a server.

 

[VRAndy]

Basic functionality I plan to integrate:
Chat: Text, and later Voice
Automatic connection negotiation
Application / Firmware update notification options
File transfers
Bug Reports
Global configuration UI

This sounds excellent. I enjoy the idea of a Pandora-only chat feature for gaming.

Questions :

- You're talking about a dedicated server for this, right? Not just any random Jabber server?
-- Who would run this server? I'd be happy to throw in a couple bucks for server maintenance and whatnot.

- Will there be a default "lobby" chatroom for Pandora users? With the small size of the community this seems like it could be important.

- I'm not a huge fan of them myself, but I'm surprised that no one has mentioned "achievements". Is there a way to graft them onto this? I'm not even sure how Live/PSN/Steam implement this. Are they stored locally or centrally? (I suppose anti-cheating measures would not be trivial, but I bring it up anyway.)

- How far along is the project?

 

[Kaya tetsu]

I kind of skim read the second page,but this seems awesome and though I'm new here on the forums, I'm more than willing to help in any way I can. I'm kind of busy,but I think I could fit this awesome project into my shedule.

Dedicated servers?
http://www.apiservers.com/?section=shop-main

That was a favorite on the mmorpgmaker forums, so I thought I'd post it.

Anyway, like I said I'll help in anyway I can.

 

[slygamer]

- I'm not a huge fan of them myself, but I'm surprised that no one has mentioned "achievements". Is there a way to graft them onto this? I'm not even sure how Live/PSN/Steam implement this. Are they stored locally or centrally? (I suppose anti-cheating measures would not be trivial, but I bring it up anyway.)

On Xbox LIVE (achievements), Steam (achievements) and PlayStation Network (trophies), they are stored on the server. Each game uses a small data file that exists on the server that contains the list of achievements the game provides. When the player has done something to receive an achievement, the code calls a function that awards the achievement.

In an open system such as Pandora, achievements would be almost impossible to make secure since it would be mostly trivial for someone to write their own little application that awards themselves every achievement.

 

[VRAndy]

In an open system such as Pandora, achievements would be almost impossible to make secure since it would be mostly trivial for someone to write their own little application that awards themselves every achievement.

Yea, that's what I figured.

Netrek used to use a system of blessed binaries and RSA keys to determine whether or not players were using the official binaries of the client.

I don't recall how successful this was.

 

[AireTamStorm]

This sounds excellent. I enjoy the idea of a Pandora-only chat feature for gaming.
The goal is to allow any chat protocol (AIM , Jabber , MSN , Yahoo , etc) so that you can communicate with your PC friends, but use an extension to the Jabber server API to allow for seamless connection negotiation.

- You're talking about a dedicated server for this, right? Not just any random Jabber server?
A jabber server with an extension to parse connection negotiation information formatted in XML. Some have suggested using a plugin for standard Jabber servers as to not taint the server code and make development easier. I think I'll go that route.

-- Who would run this server? I'd be happy to throw in a couple bucks for server maintenance and whatnot.
Where ever it is hosted, rest assured. There will be a paypal "donate" button. You can also run your own servers. Ultimately, I'd like the OpenPandora team to consider running a server of their own for Firmware / Driver update alerts and for something like that of a help channel. There are many forum members around that would be willing to give advice and help. I'd hope that using a nice, "instant" chat room on the Pandora itself would improve the ease of use over that of browsing a forum on a small screen.

- Will there be a default "lobby" chatroom for Pandora users? With the small size of the community this seems like it could be important.
As said above, there may or may not be. Translation: I hope so.

- I'm not a huge fan of them myself, but I'm surprised that no one has mentioned "achievements". Is there a way to graft them onto this? I'm not even sure how Live/PSN/Steam implement this. Are they stored locally or centrally? (I suppose anti-cheating measures would not be trivial, but I bring it up anyway.)
As another poster stated, they are stored centrally. Since I'm using XML, someone should be able to extend that to include trophies and accomplishments. I'm actually working on a proposal to allow accomplishments for ROM based games. Yes, Chrono Trigger with trophies is in my opinion, very possible from a technical standpoint. More details on that at a later date.

- How far along is the project?
Planning stages, still. I want to get this right so I'm taking all of the feedback here very seriously. Accomplishments are a serious concern, but right now it is the connection code that I'm worried about. Messing around with HawkNL has showed me that using older libraries generally is not a good idea so that has been a bit of a setback. A target date for a beta would be the end of this year with just me, but if I get some friends in on this it should not be too hard to push forward.

Anyway, like I said I'll help in anyway I can.
Thanks, I'll keep the link you sent in mind. Anything in particular you think you can help out with?

As for the security of achievements, I think it is feasible to prevent that kind of crap. That goes hand-in-hand with my above ROM-accomplishment proposal that I'm writing. Probably not foolproof, but definitely alot harder to fool the system the way I'm thinking than simply saying "give them this". This, however is outside the scope of POND, because implementing accomplishments is up to the game developer, not me. Again, thats for another thread, another day.

EDIT:

Anyhow, it's a solid idea, and I think XMPP is the right technology for it. You just need to make it happen, and like others have said, make it a client/component instead of a server.

There will be a client part as well as a server part. POND acts as more than a scoreboard or chat, it is designed to open a data pipe for developers to use as a transport for game data. Throwing that data directly over XMPP in my opinion is not a good idea. It is better to use a generic TCP pipe for something like that. That being said, I will support data over XMPP to the best of my ability.

Hope I've answered questions reasonably and in a timely manner, I've been busybusybusy.

 

[Kaya tetsu]

Anyway, like I said I'll help in anyway I can.
Thanks, I'll keep the link you sent in mind. Anything in particular you think you can help out with?

I'm not really familiar with developing for ARM so on the pandora side I have a bit of learning to do, I think. But really whatever you need I can probably pick up quickly,if i don't know how to do it already, as long as I use it I'm a quick learner. It really just depends.

 

[dentrado]

Where ever it is hosted, rest assured. There will be a paypal "donate" button. You can also run your own servers. Ultimately, I'd like the OpenPandora team to consider running a server of their own for Firmware / Driver update alerts and for something like that of a help channel. There are many forum members around that would be willing to give advice and help. I'd hope that using a nice, "instant" chat room on the Pandora itself would improve the ease of use over that of browsing a forum on a small screen.

this is from the thread about a pandora APT repository:

Well, you can be sure I will offer free hosting to any Pandora projects, so if you like, you can setup an open repository there, sure

So it seems there is a good chance they will host a pond server.

As for the security of achievements, I think it is feasible to prevent that kind of crap. That goes hand-in-hand with my above ROM-accomplishment proposal that I'm writing. Probably not foolproof, but definitely alot harder to fool the system the way I'm thinking than simply saying "give them this". This, however is outside the scope of POND, because implementing accomplishments is up to the game developer, not me. Again, thats for another thread, another day.

yes, I'm not any expert at this at all, but I've heard it being mentioned before and I don't see why it shouldn't work to use signed binaries, so only the "official" certified binaries can be used to take achievments.

 

[timofonic]

Any news about this project?

What about making it serverless? This will save a lot of infraestructure, bandwidth and avoid problems like servers dying early. There's stuff you can use as a base for this, such as... Kademlia, Koorde, Tapestry, Nodezilla...

For VoIP functions, maybe SIP could be used for example. There's stuff like FreeSWITCH.

 

[dentrado]

EvilDragon said that they will host any pandora related project, so I don't think the server really is a problem, serveless would be really cool though.

 

[timofonic]

EvilDragon said that they will host any pandora related project, so I don't think the server really is a problem, serveless would be really cool though.

Indeed, serverless is still interesting for saving bandwidth and even could make things less laggy.

Any progress report about this project? Does it have some official site or blog?