Unkle Nuke

Many, if not all, of the warnings I have from VC++ 9.0 (2008 Express SP1) regard functions not being fully POSIX compliant or deprecated. I take that with a grain of salt since when has MS really cared about complying with any standards that weren't developed by them? Even though you state that you've made fresh installs of your world database, I saw no mention if your characters database was also a new install. AHBot mainly conducts its transactions there and crashed tables there can lead to many problems with the bot. There was no mention, either, of whether you had tried running your server without Dual Spec or Vehicles. Also, make sure you do not have the total number of items with which the bot stocks the auction house set too high. Every time a player logs in, the bot will update the auctions for that players as well as any auctions the player has bid upon. With 10,000 items in each auction house, you're going to experience some significant lag that can cause the server's anti-freeze to trigger and force a shutdown. I eliminated such lag on my own server by using a more sensible limit for available items. How high or low that number can be depends on your own server's specs. It had been taking as long as 10 minutes for players to log in while the AHBot was updating the character's tables.

It may very well be an issue with Windows platforms. Visual C++ is fairly quirky as it is but there's also no reason to rule out database issues. I usually use SQLyog to run Analyze and Repair on all my tables at least once a week, then Optimize, and most certainly after a crash because MaNGOS fails to properly close any open tables, thanks to Windows' file system and threading. I'd recommend you take those steps first. If the crashes still keep occurring, backup your entire database and try a completely fresh, clean install for all databases, with new accounts and characters, as a test bed to determine if the database is at fault. If the crash still happens on a new database install, then it's time to rule out other patches by running MaNGOS with just the AHBot patch. Frankly, it very well could be Dual Spec or Vehicles. Both of those patches have demonstrated their instability and incompatibility with other core mods on many occasions.

For role-play purposes this would add a new wrinkle to telling a story. Let's say the King of Stormwind rewards a character with a dusty weapon of ancient lineage for extraordinary heroism to the crown. After all, the current definition of "unique" for an item merely means you can possess only one but there's nothing to stop someone else from also having one. Democracy and fairness might keep the majority of subscribers on retail happy but, it guts the potential to allow for those rare individuals that are a cut above the rest to set themselves apart by by earning rewards no other can have. Sure, it's not official-like. I learned a long time ago as a Dungeon Master that sometimes you have to bend or even break the rules for the sake of a good narrative. However, I've noticed that games like these may label themselves as RPGs but 99% of all PC and console RPG games are not really...not in the same sense as the ones where you rolled dice and had a poorly-drawn doodle of your alter-ego on your character sheet. I prefer to call them "immersive adventure" games, that only differ from FPS games in the fact that there's a whole world to explore. As for GMs... I've noticed that the .additem command is usually the first one that gets abused, which is why it's also the first command I set to level 3 when installing or upgrading my world database.

Based on that information and the earlier reports of crashes, it seems that AHBot once again is broken due to changes in the MaNGOS mail system. This seems to happen at least once for every client version for which MaNGOS is updated. Sooooo..... Anyone care to take a crack at updating AHBot's interface with the mail handlers?

Having an item to be "namebound", versus soulbound or bind to account, seems to have uses at first but, where does this feature really differ from an item being soulbound? I could see this perhaps being a unique way of binding one-of-a-kind custom items. Perhaps something like Elric's legendary, sentient sword choosing him alone to be its wielder.

Thanks for the very successful patch to limit the number of bots per account. I have another suggestion for you, blueboy. How about upgrading the patch to remove the limiting of bots based on the account's security level? This way, ordinary players would still have the limit imposed but, a GM or Moderator could summon the full nine bots for testing purposes. It may read something like this in the Playerbot section of mangosd.conf: # # PlayerbotAI.GMNumBots # Allows accounts at or above the security level specified to bypass the MaxNumBots limit. #Default: 3 - GM/Administrator can always summon up to 9 bots. # Just a thought.

Automatic merge does not work with the AHBot repository until it is updated for the most recent MaNGOS core. You can either edit the entire patch into your source tree by hand or do a merge and then resolve conflicts using git mergetool. At this time, there seems to be segmentation faults between AHBot and MaNGOS. Let's wait and see what xeross155 finds...if people reporting the crashes will provide proper dumps. I'm sticking with a MaNGOS revision for which AHBot works without those troubles. It's far more important to have the auction houses working on my low-pop server than to have fixes and updates for the server core at this point. My players can live with missing spells and broken buffs but they'd scream bloody murder if they lost their beloved AHBot, without which they would have little to nothing to bid upon and be forced to sell valuable loot to vendors for chump change!

Paradox, the original author of AHBot, has been banned over at the TC forums so I have no way of contacting him to ask what changes are necessary to update our AHBot here. I sure hope everything is okay with Naicisum. I think I'll say a prayer for him and keep my fingers crossed, just in case he needs more help than I can give with just text on a computer screen.

The steps are really quite simple. Assuming you have correctly merged and compiled your server source with AHBot, plus installed the required SQL files into your database... If you have already completed steps 1, 2, 3, skip to 4. If you have not completed any of the first three steps you must first disable your AHBot in your mangosd.conf file! * Using the MaNGOS server console, create a player account for your Auction House Bot. * Log onto your server with your game client, using the account you just created. * Create a character. This will be your AHBot. Enter the world to generate the character's data for the database. You do not need to play this character, just log in with it once. You can now log out. * Close your client and shut down your server. * Activate the AHBot in the mangosd.conf file, add the account ID number and character's GUID number. These values can be found in your 'characters' database under the table labeled 'characters'. The first two columns contain the GUID and Account ID. The fourth column will contain the character name. * Apply the settings you choose for your AHBot in mangosd.conf. * Apply the needed settings for MinPrice, MaxPrice, and so forth... into your auctionhousebot table, which is located in your 'characters' database. * Restart your server. Allow a few minutes for the AHBot to initialize and execute its database operations to stock the Auction House and create auctions. * Log in with your game client and enjoy the benefits of a fully working Auction House for your low-population server. Keep in mind that you will need to exercise some restraint when choosing how many items the AHBot will auction at each of the Auction Houses. Depending upon the hardware specs and OS used for your MaNGOS server, assigning very large numbers of items may cause severe lag when the AHBot is updating its auctions. This is most noticeable when players report getting "stuck" at the character selection screen, or just after the login screen, for several minutes. A sensible number is 5,000 items or less. A very powerful computer may be able to handle 10,000 items or more. Mostly you just need to take your time, carefully read all documentation provided, and follow the instructions precisely. Trying to rush through it or skip steps is going to cause nothing but trouble. Naicisum's AHBot has very well written instructions that should be more than adequate for anyone if they pay attention.

Open the patch file in a plain-text editor, like Notepad++, or use TortoiseMerge to make your changes. Find the section in the patch file for mangosd.conf.dist.in. Cut that portion out and save it into a temporary text document. Save your AHBot patch file. Now, go into your mangos repo, find the file mangos.conf.dist.in, open it in your editor, then paste the code you saved in your temporary document into the mangos.conf.dist.in file. You should get something that looks like the last few lines in my file.... Network.Threads = 1 Network.OutKBuff = -1 Network.OutUBuff = 65536 Network.TcpNodelay = 1 ################################################################################################################### # AUCTION HOUSE BOT SETTINGS # # AuctionHouseBot.EnableSeller # Enable/Disable the part of AHBot that puts items up for auction # Default 0 (disabled) # # AuctionHouseBot.EnableBuyer # Enable/Disable the part of AHBot that buys items from players # Default 0 (disabled) # # Auction House Bot character data # AuctionHouseBot.Account is the account number (in realmd->account table) of the player you want to run as the auction bot. # AuctionHouseBot.GUID is the GUID (in characters->characters table) of the player you want to run as the auction bot. # Default: 0 (Auction House Bot disabled) # # AuctionHouseBot.VendorItems # Include items that can be bought from vendors. # Default 0 # # AuctionHouseBot.LootItems # Include items that can be looted or fished for. # Default 1 # # AuctionHouseBot.OtherItems # Include misc. items. # Default 0 # # AuctionHouseBot.Bonding_types # Indicates which bonding types to allow seller to put up for auction # No_Bind # Default 1 # Bind_When_Picked_Up # Default 0 # Bind_When_Equipped # Default 1 # Bind_When_Use # Default 1 # Bind_Quest_Item # Default 0 # # AuctionHouseBot.ItemsPerCycle # Number of Items to Add/Remove from the AH during mass operations # Default 200 # # AuctionHouseBot.UseBuyPriceForSeller # Should the Seller use BuyPrice or SellPrice to determine Bid Prices # Default 0 (use SellPrice) # # AuctionHouseBot.UseBuyPriceForBuyer # Should the Buyer use BuyPrice or SellPrice to determine Bid Prices # Default 0 (use SellPrice) # # All other settings have been moved to sql # ################################################################################################################### AuctionHouseBot.EnableSeller = 0 AuctionHouseBot.EnableBuyer = 0 AuctionHouseBot.Account = 0 AuctionHouseBot.GUID = 0 AuctionHouseBot.VendorItems = 0 AuctionHouseBot.LootItems = 1 AuctionHouseBot.OtherItems = 0 AuctionHouseBot.No_Bind = 1 AuctionHouseBot.Bind_When_Picked_Up = 0 AuctionHouseBot.Bind_When_Equipped = 1 AuctionHouseBot.Bind_When_Use = 1 AuctionHouseBot.Bind_Quest_Item = 0 AuctionHouseBot.ItemsPerCycle = 200 AuctionHouseBot.UseBuyPriceForSeller = 0 AuctionHouseBot.UseBuyPriceForBuyer = 0 ################################################################################################################### # CONSOLE AND REMOTE ACCESS # # Console.Enable # Enable console # Default: 1 - on # 0 - off This is really basic, no-brain stuff, guys. Use that gray matter for more than just skull-filler! :rolleyes:

That's an issue for Playerbot. You really should pull that core mod from blueboy's repo. He's the dev for that project and is usually quite diligent about keeping it updated. You can post in that thread for more assistance.

Good job, Skirnir! I second marcelomax's response. I'm hoping that Naicisum's absence is due to improving AHBot, such as fixing the Buyer so it once again works for all factions, not just the Neutral auction houses in places like Gadgetzan. @vladex: I did take an introductory C++ class during my brief flirtation with college back in 2001. It covered all the basics up to SWITCH/CASE, three-dimensional arrays, sorting, strings, and simple file I/O. It was the most fun I've ever had in school and it did seem to come naturally to me. I've missed that experience. Real life got me sidetracked and I've only just begun to have the luxury of picking it back up again. Still have all my books, class notes, source code hard copies, and even my assignment diskettes but, I've also picked up several other books, since I'm sure C++ has changed a lot over the years. Having read over the MaNGOS source code, I'd say making sense of how it all fits together so you can develop coherent code would be the hard part. I'm sure there's open source projects out there which are far larger but, MaNGOS's source tree is a real monster compared to its humble beginnings.

By this do you mean being able to configure your utility to post news from Twitter, MySpace, etc., or your own News And Updates http server, if one has such a feature for their server's community? A suggestion would be to have it "skinnable" so people could create their own look for the utility, such as using TBC graphics if they're running a 2.43 server.

Even simply providing current merges of AHBot is one way to contribute and help out, Skirnir. Don't sell yourself short. Being able to provide people with an AHBot that can merge without errors takes some of burden from Naicisum, who would otherwise be under great pressure to stop whatever he's doing to create an updated merge. As for you, X-Savior, it's an immutable law that MaNGOS without ACID reduces game play to nothing more exciting than shooting tin ducks. I also wish there were more people to help you in your efforts. It seems everyone is running short-handed. It's one of the deeper-cutting consequences of the split that led to Trinity's founding, I fear. I wish it were possible to learn C++ and SQL with a simple download, Matrix-style. I'd jump into the deep end and be as happy as a pig in a mud wallow! I'll see what I can do with my spare time to try and learn some coding. Perhaps one of these years I'll be able to help out more than just being a cheerleader.

Doubt it, unless there's a dev branch like there was for 3.3.0a, 330a-willcrashforsure. As always, you're free to experiment and try current revisions with PTR clients but it's really pointless to ask when there will be support for client version X.X.X. As it has been said by a very wise man here at the MaNGOS Foundation, "It will be supported when it's supported.", or something to that effect. So please be patient. If you can't wait, then feel free to start cranking out some C++ code to build compatibility with any client you wish!

A simple "pull" does not always work when there's significant conflicts in the code layout between two revisions. Git Pull does a fetch + merge but will abort if the merge fails. You'll have to separately do "fetch", then try "merge". If the merge fails, you can use 'git mergetool' to resolve conflicts or just hand edit the patch into your source.

Way to go, Mighty Blue One! Looking forward to testing this one when it's ready.

jolan's MoveMaps repo is very outdated. Last commit was November 13, last year. Better to do some work and manually merge Neo's updated code with your local repo, then generate a diff, if you must.

You know, now that you pointed it out, it does seem so obvious that it makes you feel like smacking your forehead and saying, "Doh!". I guess my brain was on vacation, too! lol.

It may not be considered to be "retail" but it's certainly useful. In MaNGOS there are GM commands that allow you to modify arena points. What I like about this is it permits you to set these values globally. I'd love to see many more settings added to mangosd.conf because, blizz-like or not, it allows administrators greater flexibility in choosing how they wish to set the environment they wish to offer to players, giving each server it's own personality which allows you to be somewhat unique instead of just another server.

To the best of my knowledge, there's no set rule that any patch or core mod is the exclusive property of any single developer, right? I know Naicisum is the torch-bearer for the MaNGOS AHBot but, surely someone can step forward and help the guy out. Real life sometimes presents roadblocks to keep us from pursuing our hobbies and passions. Such may be the case here. We all would like for this code to be maintained and updated almost daily but, that's just not possible when the more mundane necessities of living demands time be devoted to paying the rent, keeping your significant other happy, appeasing the boss, making deadlines at work, and a hundred other things we endure between brief moments of doing what we really want. Aren't we supposed to be a community here? So let's pull together and lend a hand to the AHBot project! As it has been said, "When you can't run, you walk. When you can't walk, you crawl. And, when you can't crawl, you get someone to carry you." So, if any of you are handy with C++, jump right in and start updating. The rest of us can test and test some more until we once more have a stable and working patch. We all can contribute.

As I promised, I have tested your patches for setting bots per realm and limiting the number of allowed bots. Both appear to be working flawlessly, although testing the bots per realm patch was somewhat limited. I set up a second database and server, running on the same machine as my primary server, solely for testing the bots per realm patch at player login. Still need to check the fix intended to properly limit bots when summoned using macros. I also included your map-vmap "fix" for Playerbot and it has worked as advertised. So far, the bots have followed terrain as well as the active character that summoned them. This has only been over the course of two days of gameplay but, no major issues encountered at this time. Testing platform is MaNGOS-0.15 r9134, SD2 r1542, ACID 3.0.2, and UDB 0.11.6 r386 running on WinXP SP2 platform. Core patches used are AHBot, Playerbot, Nameannounce, Jail, Dual Spec, and PvP Ranks And Titles. You did good, blueboy! Who cares if you're still learning C++? You've done more with what you do know than a good number of expertly skilled coders and patchers. As my grandfather used to say, "It ain't what you know, it's what you do with it that makes you smart!". It appears the AI for Playerbot follows similar conventions as ScriptDev2 for C++ scripting behavior. Would that be a good place to start for those wanting to contribute to Playerbot or have you worked out your own type of "EventAI" that triggers and controls the bots' behaviors?

AHBot is THE most useful of all the core mods. It certainly would be a sad shame if circumstances have conspired against Naicisum to cause AHBot for MaNGOS to die. I doubt that's the case. Sometimes, real life has a way of getting even the most dedicated developer sidetracked for a time. It may also be that our friendly neighborhood AHBot dev has sequestered himself to work on major improvements to the code. Let's try to be patient and remain content to stick with a server revision that is compatible with AHBot until Naicisum manages to resurface here with an update. <crosses fingers>

What sort of project? If it's new models you wish to add to the existing client, you're asking at the wrong place. If your project is an attempt to create an original game client that uses MaNGOS as the server core, then you may want to talk to the guys that have been developing their own open-source client, named PseuWoW. You can find those good folks over at www.mangosclient.org. Best of luck to you in your endeavor!

This has been covered several times before. I'd recommend familiarizing yourself with the forum Search feature. But, since I'm here, I'll answer you this one anywways.... In the MaNGOS core file, Common.h, look under "enum AccountTypes" then modify the code like so: enum AccountTypes { SEC_PLAYER = 0, //Player SEC_VIP = 1, //VIP Player SEC_GAMEMASTER = 2, //GameMaster SEC_DEVS = 3, //Developer SEC_SENIORGM = 4, //Senior GM SEC_JRADMIN = 5, //Junior Administrator SEC_ADMINISTRATOR = 6, //Administrator SEC_CONSOLE = 7 // CLI in mangosd window, or Console // always last in the list, highest security level for use with console only! } ; You may wish to add more levels, have fewer, or different labels naming each rank but, this is just an example to illustrate the method. Don't forget to set the commands for each security level in the "mangos" database table "command". Otherwise, the default assignments in the database will leave many commands inaccessible to higher levels and allow low levels to use commands they shouldn't.