In which James talks about recent changes to the site, copy/pastes a change-log, and talks about upcoming coding-related things on the horizon.

Hi all, It's that time again! About time for another report from your friendly neighbourhood Seneschal with the latest ins and outs related to the site.

Deployed Code Changes

Below is a list of most of the code check-ins done to the site since my last report. This isn't an exhaustive list, and does not contain code changes that have not yet been deployed to the main website. To summarise, here's the TLDR:

1. New Themes, and related changes
2. Possessions-related things
3. Several items from the CoJ and ACC wish lists
4. An update to the Promotion Assessment tool that adds a toggle to select the cutoff date from last promotion, last merit, last sacramental or the latest of the three
5. Miscellaneous fixes and tweaks

James Entar (22):
      Possessions performance fixes; Sellback/Buyback window; Misc stuff
      Fix error 500 when not specifying a platform on PvP submission form
      Cosmetic dossier fixes; show rank name on hover over order-based rank name on dossier
      Add PIN columns to SA exam metrics page; cosmetic fix to canned promotion reccs
      Library updates
      Fix CS preview
      Item Aspects; Lib updates; News performance improvements
      Deprecate rank abbreviations
      Spambot blacklist update
      Layout update prep
      Fix wrong theme being shown in some cases
      Dynamic position of banner heading; ItemAspect bugfix
      More layout update prep
      Slotting; Item Management
      More theming prep
      Color tweaks
      Tweak colors a bit more
      Item/inventory management
      Some more theme tweaks
      Enable Splash layouts; switch default layout; disable custom Avatar form
      Various fixes/small updates
      Theme tweaks
      Various fixes and theme tweaks

Kalen Aquillarum (11):
      add CoJ probation report
      fix page name for Completed Probations
      allow Hands of Justice to see CoJ Probation reports
      [Fixes #27] Add Probation Info to the Login Info tab; Add probation reason/note to the new Probation report
      [Fixes #18] Renamed "Story" match style to "Singular Ending"
      [Fixes #25] Add Toggles to the Promotion Assessment Report, so that the report will display relevant activity from the last Promotion, Sacramental award, Merit award, or the most recent recognition (whichever of those 3 happened last).
      [Fixes #28] Add term duration column to the position administration screen
      [Fixes #24] Allow members to remove their Avatar from their dossier
      [Fixes #4] For SA Exam grading, turn off plagiarism detection for blank answers
      [Fixes #20] Issuing an ACC Open Challenge should not pair you with someone you have started a battle with in the past month
      [Fixes #23] Send email to ACC Battle participants when the battle times out

On the Horizon

This section provides some sneak previews of upcoming site changes and the larger things on my todo-list in various stages of completion.

1. Clan Alignments and Path Changes Most of the coding for this is done, and we're now waiting on the administrative stuff and go-ahead from Mav and Pravus.
2. Possessions The coding for phase 1 through phase 3 of Possessions has been completed and deployed to the site, and the focus has now shifted to creating items, item aspects, and balancing everything. Once that's done, and everything has been added to the site, we can move to beta-testing and implementation of the subsequent phases (load-outs/equip sets)
3. Test of Lore Revamp/Join Process Overhaul An ongoing project to replace the Test of Lore with something less... wall-of-texty, and less like an exam/test. Currently on hold until the Path/Order changes have been completed
4. Gaming Nights Bot This bot will facilitate matchmaking and match reporting in #DBGaming on Undernet. Since my last report, the focus of this has changed from just Gaming Nights to running 24/7, and the code has been adapted to allow for this. The bot is currently operational, so feel free to try it out!
5. Fiction Society Initial coding on this has been completed offline, after which data was gathered and sent off to Evant and his team to ensure the ranks, requirements and rewards are well balanced
6. Badges/Achievements Work towards achievements by doing things (or not doing things) on the site. This is low-priority project at the moment due to other projects having precedence, but I will expect to pick it up again in the future.
7. Random Bugfixes and Things That Come Up™ A wild Dark Council member appeared. It uses Feature Request! [FIGHT][ITEM][PKMN][RUN]

Ask the Seneschal

Q: Yacks asks: Jaaames. If you were to be asked one question for this new report, what question would you want to be asked, and what would the answer be?
A: It would be "If you were to be asked one question for this new report, what question would you want to be asked, and what would the answer be?", and the answer would be "It would be "If you were to be asked one question for this new report, what question would you want to be asked, and what would the answer be?"" :)

Q: Nero asks: If someone wanted to start to learn to how to become a computer god(dess?), where should they start?
A: From personal experience: Get some basic code knowledge, for example through online tutorials, such as the ones for the Programming Degrees, then dive straight in and get your hands dirty. Best way to learn is to try :)

Closing/TLDR

Again, lots of fixes and additions to the site, and even more interesting things to come. As always, if you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to either e-mail me or throw in a comment.

James L. Entar
Seneschal of the Brotherhood