Server-wide data communication

[ybe]

My question is about server-wide channels, basically. I am trying to figure out why no-one (that I know of at least) has made addons that communicate like that (to any great extent, at least). For example it would be brilliant for setting up a "web" shop on your server, or any other similar service. Or, if you take it quite a bit further, "web" pages and other similar stuff.

The reason why I am saying this is that someone must have thought of this before. So what have made people not make this sort of functionality?

I ask because I can't see the problem, and it would be nice to know why this would not work.

[nightcracker]

As far as I know this kind of huge datatransfer is blocked by the spam block filter from blizzard. I don't know how this is for addon channels because I never used them. But I'm interested, if data transfer of 2kB+ is possible then I will write a library that allows people to give other people their addon config over the server channels.

Nice idea!

[Yhor]

iirc, Open RDX has this functionality (sharing layouts (game desktops) in game via a channel). I'm not very familiar with it, but I'm 'fairly' certain it exists in OpenRDX.

If you are asking about more than just sharing layouts, I dunno. I don't know what extent you mean by "web shop / web pages", unless you mean for selling your crafted goods?

[ybe]

Originally Posted by Yhor iirc, Open RDX has this functionality (sharing layouts (game desktops) in game via a channel). I'm not very familiar with it, but I'm 'fairly' certain it exists in OpenRDX. If you are asking about more than just sharing layouts, I dunno. I don't know what extent you mean by "web shop / web pages", unless you mean for selling your crafted goods?

It could be anything. A webpage promoting your guild - including a signup page. Or a full-featured shop with a list of items you have/make and prices. Could be anything. No restrictions.

EDIT: Well... restrictions would be within the WoW restrictions with no disk access and no Internet access. So all would have to be within the game, of course. But within those boundaries, no restrictions.
In the extreme case, even update of addons would be possible. I haven't tested that particularly yet, but it should definitely be possible.

[ybe]

Originally Posted by nightcracker As far as I know this kind of huge datatransfer is blocked by the spam block filter from blizzard. I don't know how this is for addon channels because I never used them. But I'm interested, if data transfer of 2kB+ is possible then I will write a library that allows people to give other people their addon config over the server channels. Nice idea!

The spam-filter is not too difficult to handle, so that's not really a problem.

[nightcracker]

Originally Posted by ybe The spam-filter is not too difficult to handle, so that's not really a problem.

"not really a problem" doesn't solve it for me
Please get into details, I'm interested!

[ybe]

Originally Posted by nightcracker "not really a problem" doesn't solve it for me Please get into details, I'm interested!

Well - It depends on what you want to do. To broadcast huge amounts of data on a common channel is probably not a very good idea. If you want to share "huge" amounts of data with the guild or a few friends, that is totally possible. There is a library called chatthrottlelib if all you want to do is to get around the spam-limit.

For my own part, I have made a library that sends more complex data over (for now) the guild channel including throtteling, so the spam-limit is not a problem.
The library has been modified for some more cool support, but this is still a work in progress.

As I said, it's all down to what you want to do.

[Akryn]

There are addons that do this to some extent. The main problem is that there is no "addon" channel that is server-wide, so you have to use a real channel and hide it -- or whispers.

As far as updating addons that way: it would be technically possible, but extremely inefficient because the updated code would need to be stored in savedvars and executed via runscript.

[ybe]

Originally Posted by nightcracker As far as I know this kind of huge datatransfer is blocked by the spam block filter from blizzard. I don't know how this is for addon channels because I never used them. But I'm interested, if data transfer of 2kB+ is possible then I will write a library that allows people to give other people their addon config over the server channels. Nice idea!

Okay. I should say something about that config you mentioned.
To do what you say is at best risky. If it is possible to send data for several users, you must consider data collision events, and how to automatically resolve them. I have myself during betatest of my old addon DuckieBank had problems with that, simply because people modified the code to make it (they thought) faster. This resulted in huge collisions and problems that can be very difficult to resolve automatically.
Especially when you are talking about that kind of datasizes, the problems will get quite big.
But if you are interrested in automating that stuff, send me a PM, and I'll get you started on that with minimal coding in a few minutes