World of Spectrum....

Y'know, other stuff, Sinclair related.
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Mike Davies
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Mike Davies »

EdwardCatflap wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:35 am Lee, I think it’s best for WOS and the Spectrum Community on a whole is if you give up WOS (or close it) and just leave the ‘scene’.
That's not correct. Lee can keep WoS as his own personal fiefdom. The problem is having such a person, who has lost/thrown away the respect and credibility of large chunks of the Spectrum community as the sole gatekeeper of Spectrum content archives, where he can keep using his control to cut out people in the community he dislikes. That's now a solved problem - he doesn't control ZXDB.

The Spectrum Computing site, and ZXDB underneath have succeeded in creating a means of contributing that isn't impaired or controlled by this one gatekeeper. I'd urge you, instead of demanding that Lee leave, double down and contribute to Spectrum Computing and ZXDB, support those avenues as best you can. There is nothing Lee can do to interfere with the ZXDB dataset. His main ambition seems to be to duplicate a large chunk of work that's already available for free in ZXDB -- that's his choice. As Napolean once said, "Never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake".
EdwardCatflap wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:35 am Do the decent thing, just give it (WOS) up to someone who cares deeply for the Community or close it and let this site take over and get the scene back to what it was, nice friendly community chat about the ZX Spectrum and all things Sinclair related.
This site -- and ZXDB -- doesn't need Lee's permission to be the community website for the ZX Spectrum. This site has to earn that level of respect from the Spectrum community, one person at a time. That's what Martijn had to do when he built the World of Spectrum.

If Lee (or his "team") was interested in collaboration, and avoiding duplicate effort, and taking advantage of titles that don't exist in WoS currently, he/they could collaborate as equals, and feed in corrections and updates back into ZXDB. Lee doesn't control ZXDB. ZXDB is open, and available for anyone to use, and so far I've not seen a single example of it's creator and curator saying to any site that they can't use ZXDB -- much the opposite, to Einar's credit.
Last edited by Mike Davies on Fri Dec 29, 2017 2:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Mike Davies
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Mike Davies »

R-Tape wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:17 pm That's my hope for the place too, and if in a few weeks our most active thread is still the World of Spectrum then we have a problem.
If the thread continues to surface concerns about what the community loses if WoS disappears (e.g. the decade old and useful content hidden away deep inside the forum), that gives us time to mitigate these concerns. Community-wise that is a good thing.

The community has achieved much since August last year in safeguarding the archive from a possible WoS demise, to the point that we are no longer beholden to whomever hold the reigns. That is progress.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

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Sokurah wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:47 am By all means - nuke the Chit Chat section - that's worthless anyway ... but there's a lot of useful information on that forum, that it would be a damn shame to not have access to anymore.
Oi..! There's a lot of valuable culinary information in that forum that needs preserving... In the future who knows when someone might want to make a study on the unhealthy diets of middle age Spectrum owners... :lol:
My Speccy site: thirdharmoniser.com
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Juan F. Ramirez »

Morkin wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:50 pm
Sokurah wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:47 am By all means - nuke the Chit Chat section - that's worthless anyway ... but there's a lot of useful information on that forum, that it would be a damn shame to not have access to anymore.
Oi..! There's a lot of valuable culinary information in that forum that needs preserving... In the future who knows when someone might want to make a study on the unhealthy diets of middle age Spectrum owners... :lol:
Absolutely agree man! :mrgreen:
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Nomad »

Morkin wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:50 pm
Sokurah wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:47 am By all means - nuke the Chit Chat section - that's worthless anyway ... but there's a lot of useful information on that forum, that it would be a damn shame to not have access to anymore.
Oi..! There's a lot of valuable culinary information in that forum that needs preserving... In the future who knows when someone might want to make a study on the unhealthy diets of middle age Spectrum owners... :lol:
That is the thing, people today can't know what the interests of the future fellows are in the past. With the preservation stuff I was always surprised things I didn't even think about at the time (tape inlays), promo stuff. Sure I think everyone knew to hang on to the games but the utilities? That is becoming a centre for study (in Atari personal computers, they have a whole podcast dedicated to productivity tools :) )

With storage space being cheap now (and getting cheaper) probably just best to gobble as much as possible and leave it to the future to decide what they want or don't want to look at lol.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by EdwardCatflap »

R-Tape wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:41 am What do you really expect to achieve with that post? You've probably already said this to him/about him all over social media. If you think Lee should be held to account then do it over at WoS.

Any more attacks and you make SC look bad. Please stop it.
Attacks? Ok, apart from LOL, I’m just saying what a majority of the Spectrum scene think. Have you been following the Vega debacle? The personal attacks? The legal threats? The ‘Ive seen the Zx Vega in production claims’

Heck, the fact that 5 people have liked this compared to 2 that have liked your reply suggests that at least in this thread I’m not alone.

It does not make SC look bad at all, in fact it’s nice to hopefully have the ability to post an opinion rather than it being deleted and being banned (which would happen on WOS by Lee ‘I am always right’ Fogarty)

Anyone remember the Your Sinclair Rock and Roll years by the way?

Maybe the Zx Shed?

Have a look at the zxvega tag on twitter. It’s very interesting.

Oh, and this speaks volumes...


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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by R-Tape »

I am aware of the stuff you mention and I’m not necessarily saying that I disagree with you. Please consider this from our point of view, we're not saying WoS can't be discussed but we can’t have a thread with people falling over themselves to take pot shots at someone from another site (who is probably sat back laughing his cock off that SC is having to deal with it). The only thing it achieves is giving the mods here more reported posts to deal with.

You’ve got your bee sting in (did it make him stand down?), now I hope you’ll leave it at that.
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Einar Saukas
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

My apologies for the late replies. I'm currently on vacation without regular Internet access these days, so it will take me a while to answer all posts targeted at me in this thread...

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pm
Einar Saukas wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 2:41 pmThat's exactly what we are all working to prevent!
Funny, I thought your objective was simply to maintain a database.
Correct. ZXDB is "simply" a database created with the objective of preserving WoS archive data. It started at the time Lee decided to quit and there was no replacement plan.

Likewise, SC and ZXInfo are "simply" archive front-ends. Archive.org is "simply" a repository, that stores the WoS archive mirror. SC forum is "simply" a forum.

Those are separate initiatives by different people that independently work to achieve a common goal: to preserve the valuable information that WoS provided.

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pmFirst off, it's rare that Archive.org captures all publicity available data. Second, it's even less likely to capture non-publicly available data, or get pages/data if there are broken links. So when did Archive.org crawl WoS? When WoS was not being maintained by Martijn or more recently?
It doesn't really matter since WoS archive content hasn't changed in the last 5 years. I just know these files were certainly copied before December 2016 because they don't have this problem.

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pmPlease also note that Archive.org is just as venerable to server or hard drive failure as any other site. Earlier this year, I could not access a site archived on Archive.org due to a system failure. I don't know if this was a temporary failure or something else.
Earlier last month (Nov 9th) I could not access parts of WoS either, due to a system failure. Are you trying to argue that Archive.org is less reliable than WoS?

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pmSpectrumComputing only has a fraction of copyright holders permissions compared to WoS.
Obviously. All permissions for titles currently distributed by WoS were obtained on 2 decades of work under Martijn management.

However notice that, since Martijn left, WoS has been loosing permissions (such as System 3) and SC has been acquiring permissions (such as Zenobi).

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pmIf everyone really values the online archive and Sinclair computer internet presence, then you should support all web sites that are about the Sinclair computers (ZX80, ZX81, ZX Spectrum etc) including WoS.
I'm glad we agree on something!

For exactly this reason, ZXDB has maintained and updated all site integrations from the original WoS Infoseek (Tipshop, Spectrum 2.0, CrashOnline, Lemon64, etc) and added new ones (RZX Archive, ZX-Art, Speccy Screenshot Maps, ZX81Stuff, CASA, Mobygames, etc). Most of these sites now provide links to corresponding pages at SC/ZXInfo and vice-versa. Moreover every game webpage at SC gives a link to both ZXInfo and WoS, and every game webpage at ZXInfo gives a link to both SC and WoS.

We are all following Martijn's philosophy on supporting all other sites. It's unfortunate that WoS doesn't believe on this idea anymore.

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pmThe infighting that has happened in recent times helps no one. So let's see some community spirit and goodwill for the New Year ;-)
Within the spirit of New Year goodwill, I would like to reiterate my offer to help new WoS on converting, fixing and organizing the entire content of old WoS archive. Although that's work already done in ZXDB, I volunteer to import all this content into new WoS, into whatever format or database schema is needed.

1024MAK wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:05 pmAnd there are a number of other Sinclair computers web sites that would love more support ;)
If you can suggest any other Sinclair computers web site that ZXDB doesn't support yet, please let me know. I would like to support them all!
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Einar Saukas
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

fogartylee wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 4:56 pmThere's videos, loads of additional files for publishers, people, etc., the denied titles, books, denied magazines, hi-res inlays & numerous other documents.
These are files that Martijn decided to keep out of WoS archive. Either to save bandwidth (like hi-res inlays) or because distribution was denied.

The non-denied part of this material could be added to ZXDB now.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by EdwardCatflap »

R-Tape wrote: Sun Dec 31, 2017 11:36 am I am aware of the stuff you mention and I’m not necessarily saying that I disagree with you. Please consider this from our point of view, we're not saying WoS can't be discussed but we can’t have a thread with people falling over themselves to take pot shots at someone from another site (who is probably sat back laughing his cock off that SC is having to deal with it). The only thing it achieves is giving the mods here more reported posts to deal with.

You’ve got your bee sting in (did it make him stand down?), now I hope you’ll leave it at that.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to give him any more attention than he always appears to seek. I’ve said what I wanted to say and feel it needed to be said. I personally feel there is too much ‘walking on eggshells’ when it comes to him and WOS, hence my post.

I also fully appreciate the fact I can post such a comment here.

Of course he won’t stand down, mores the pity.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

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Mike Davies wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 2:21 pm
EdwardCatflap wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:35 am Lee, I think it’s best for WOS and the Spectrum Community on a whole is if you give up WOS (or close it) and just leave the ‘scene’.
That's not correct. Lee can keep WoS as his own personal fiefdom. The problem is having such a person, who has lost/thrown away the respect and credibility of large chunks of the Spectrum community as the sole gatekeeper of Spectrum content archives, where he can keep using his control to cut out people in the community he dislikes. That's now a solved problem - he doesn't control ZXDB.

The Spectrum Computing site, and ZXDB underneath have succeeded in creating a means of contributing that isn't impaired or controlled by this one gatekeeper. I'd urge you, instead of demanding that Lee leave, double down and contribute to Spectrum Computing and ZXDB, support those avenues as best you can. There is nothing Lee can do to interfere with the ZXDB dataset. His main ambition seems to be to duplicate a large chunk of work that's already available for free in ZXDB -- that's his choice. As Napolean once said, "Never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake".
EdwardCatflap wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 11:35 am Do the decent thing, just give it (WOS) up to someone who cares deeply for the Community or close it and let this site take over and get the scene back to what it was, nice friendly community chat about the ZX Spectrum and all things Sinclair related.
This site -- and ZXDB -- doesn't need Lee's permission to be the community website for the ZX Spectrum. This site has to earn that level of respect from the Spectrum community, one person at a time. That's what Martijn had to do when he built the World of Spectrum.

If Lee (or his "team") was interested in collaboration, and avoiding duplicate effort, and taking advantage of titles that don't exist in WoS currently, he/they could collaborate as equals, and feed in corrections and updates back into ZXDB. Lee doesn't control ZXDB. ZXDB is open, and available for anyone to use, and so far I've not seen a single example of it's creator and curator saying to any site that they can't use ZXDB -- much the opposite, to Einar's credit.
This is spot on. Well said Mark. Support this forum, this site and ZXDB. I hope Einar will continue to update ZXDB for a long time to come and i hope this site can become all it wants to be.
I don't have anything cool to put here, so i'll just be off now to see a priest with yeast stuck between his teeth and his friend called Keith who's a hairpiece thief...
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Mike Davies
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Mike Davies »

I think Einar, again, has nailed it perfectly when it comes to genuine inclusivity. ZXDB contains links to ZX Spectrum Reviews (currently offline, hopefully temporary), the TipShop, CASA (for adventure solutions). That's bringing together various community resources. I hope this is just the low-hanging-fruit, and it goes further, that ZXDB references any useful/informative online resource that relates to a particular entry: catalogue title, publisher, developer, label.

Like the entry for Avalon linking to Steve Turner's blog post talking about how he developed it as an event tree (http://graftgold.blogspot.co.uk/2017/07 ... ntrol.html), and Steve Wetherill on how he achieved the fast scrolling on Sidewize (http://stevewetherill.com/2015/02/24/th ... enanigans/); Graeme Mason's interview with Giovanni Zanetti about the making of Pippo (http://www.wizwords.net/the-making-ofpippo/).

Or, more technical things, like notes by people who have disassembled/reverse engineered games, like this one about The Great Escape (http://dpt.github.io/The-Great-Escape/) -- that was mentioned in another thread here.

Why should the only references for titles be 30-year old magazine articles? We're at the point where journalists, writers and fans are doing wonderful work in finding out about the games we grew up with. We are in a time where there's a growing interest and fascination about Spectrum games, developers and publishers. And ZXDB is in a great place to bring this knowledge together around the catalogue of titles (new and old). This will be a boon to people using ZXDB-powered sites to find out more about a game they are interested in.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by PeterJ »

Hi [mention]Mike Davies[/mention] I see no reasons why these hyperlinks can't be added. We already have hyperlinks for authors and publishers. I suggest you send a PM to [mention]Einar Saukas[/mention] . We could extend the project you are working on to accept these as people find useful hyperlinks.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

A number of inappropriate allegations involving myself were posted in this thread, about the time I was leaving on vacation, so I couldn't address them properly. Now that I have somewhat sorted out most accumulated work during my absence, it's finally time for me to address these points.

My apologies for resurrecting this discussion, but I couldn't leave false claims unanswered...
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

fogartylee wrote: Thu Dec 28, 2017 7:26 pmBut for further clarity, I also offered to write the javascript needed to access the WoS magazines API and display the thumbnails correctly, and ultimately by default have access to the hi-res pages without needing any additional work. Strangely that offer was ignored by the team here with no explanation.
Interesting.

You never really supported Spectrum Computing. Although you stated that Spectrum Computing and ZXDB were both censored at WoS forum without your knowledge (November 2017), 3 months later you are still keeping the Spectrum Computing thread blocked without an explanation.

The only time you really "offered support" to Spectrum Computing, it was actually an attempt to undermine and replace ZXDB. A week before Christmas, you contacted Spectrum Computing administrators without my knowledge, trying to convince them to adopt your new WoS API instead of ZXDB for magazines (initially), and expressing your desire for them to also do the same in other areas later.

Curiously, if Spectrum Computing had accepted your "offer", it would have less information about magazines, instead of more. At the time you made your offer, Spectrum Computing already provided MAGAZINE REFERENCES from pages about games and companies, for example. Just clicking on any of those links will open the magazine page. Or check all games referenced by a specific magazine issue, for instance. All this information is obtained from ZXDB database. In comparison, even nowadays your new WoS API can only provide magazines without any information about games, authors, and publishers related to them.

is it really surprising that Spectrum Computing wasn't interested in your "offer"?
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Einar Saukas
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amThe admins at the time had also spent (along with Martijn) some considerable time helping Einar create ZXDB.
Correct. The WoS admins (including yourself) helped me a lot in the first few months, when I started ZXDB, right after you decided to quit.

This is nothing new. I already mentioned it several times since ZXDB started, such as here (July 2016), here (December 2016), here (June 2017), and many other posts.

This information was also added to the ZXDB documentation a long time ago.

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amThey had all expressed disappointment with his actions following our help
Wrong. Instead of expressing disappointment with my actions, they simply expressed disappointment that new WoS still didn't use ZXDB. Even after you kicked me out of your WoS admin group at Facebook, they still hoped there would be a way to work this out. For instance here (July 2017).

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amwhich - as we were told - was to help WoS, whereas it seemed afterwards the intentions were very different.
Wrong. The intentions behind ZXDB were never any different. These intentions were clearly explained since the very beginning, in my original post in the original ZXDB thread (July 2016):

"Just to make it clear, I'm not planning to implement any WoS replacement myself! I'm merely providing a database model that others can use. Based on previous forum posts about new WoS development, it seems the old WoS "legacy" database is quite messy. By providing a new "clean" database, I'm hoping to reduce the burden on whoever assumes responsibility over WoS development afterwards."

At the time, you even offered me to take over new WoS development and provided suggestions, but I declined your offer, explaining again that this was not my intention (July 2016).

However your own intentions changed multiple times within about a year:

Moreover, I will take this opportunity to repeat, one more time, my offer to help WoS. I volunteer to import all this content into new WoS, into whatever format or database schema is needed, as mentioned for instance here (June 2017). Keep in mind that ZXDB already contains the entire WoS archive, with thousands of fixes and improvements resulting from 18 months of hard work. It also contains almost 4,000 new entries, and integration with several more sites. Finally notice that, if you prefer to import data yourself into new WoS, then we have already provided a script to convert ZXDB content into old WoS format, presented in the original post of this thread (July 2017). Therefore exactly the same method you would be using to import data from old WoS files, could be used to import data from ZXDB converted to work like old WoS files, without absolutely no extra work from you.

Notice it's absurd that you keep refusing all my offers to help WoS, and at the same time claim I have no intention to help WoS! With your actions, you are giving the impression of exactly the opposite of your words, as if my actions had always been to help WoS, whereas it seemed afterwards your intentions were very different...

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amAnd as said on WoS - those actions weren't agreed by me, and the end result was that they have all left the role to concentrate on helping WoS with the database info instead.
Now you are not making any sense.

Your posts here (November 2017) and here (November 2017) suggested that you fired WoS admins because they started censorships without reason and without your knowledge. Are you now saying something different?

Also this information doesn't seem related to anything we were discussing in this thread. So what's your point exactly?

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amAs an aside, I have since also gone against the admins votes by offering to assist ZXDB further which has been rejected.
Again you are not making any sense.

Do you mean you wanted to support ZXDB but WoS admins voted against it? Or do you mean WoS admins voted to support ZXDB but you opposed them?

Also are you referring to the time WoS admins (including yourself) supported ZXDB in the first few months? Or your lack of support ever since?

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amSo sometimes they are right and sometimes they were wrong. It happens - there is a new team of admins now.
Once again, you are not making any sense.

Are you trying to imply that you firing your own WoS admins was my fault somehow? What's your point exactly?
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Rorthron »

Einar Saukas wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 4:31 am My apologies for resurrecting this discussion, but I couldn't leave false claims unanswered...
There is no need to apologise. You are quite entitled to respond to the allegations Lee has made.

I would, however, like to remind everyone to keep the discussion in this this thread calm. This is clearly a subject that has caused frustration among many here. Let's not let things get out of hand.

(For the avoidance of any doubt, I am not at all suggesting that there is anything wrong with your posts, Einar. They clearly pass the calm-and-considered test. My comment is a general one. I am just trying to pre-empt any possible future problems more generally.)
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

Rorthron wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 4:51 amI would, however, like to remind everyone to keep the discussion in this this thread calm. This is clearly a subject that has caused frustration among many here. Let's not let things get out of hand.
And I would like to reiterate your works!

Comments from everybody are (always) very much welcome, but let's keep a civil conversation based on facts, without personal attacks on anybody. Please?
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

ADJB wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 1:09 am
fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 12:33 amThe admins at the time had also spent (along with Martijn) some considerable time helping Einar create ZXDB.
When was "the time" that time was spent by the admins and Martijn helping Einar?
When I started working on ZXDB, WoS admins helped me to figure out certain undocumented internal details of the old WoS archive, to ensure no information was lost when imported into ZXDB. Most of this support was provided by Gerard, but others also helped, including Lee that forwarded a few of my questions to Martijn.

This happened at the beginning of work on ZXDB, for a couple months in 2016. I already mentioned it in my last post above.

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 1:28 amThere's been a FB group chat around for a year. It was started when the core admin scripts were completed and we were ready to start working on individual sections. Einar joined around February or March - at which point we had already started uploading tables & CSV files of the output to be checked.
Lee, your answer has nothing to do with the question. I didn't join the WoS admin group at Facebook to get help. It was exactly the opposite, I joined it in order to help new WoS!

I joined the WoS admin group much later in February 2017, per your invitation, supposedly to discuss the best way to import data from ZXDB into new WoS. At this time, ZXDB already contained fully imported and validated information from old WoS archive, and also several months of work on thousands of bugfixes and improvements. In comparison, you had just started to work on importing data from old WoS and uploading this information into new WoS, with the intention to start bugfixes and improvements afterwards. The idea was to help new WoS avoid repeating all this work, and import data from ZXDB instead. It would save months of unnecessary work on new WoS development.

Instead, you kept me busy for 3 months discussing your excuses for not doing it -- such as claiming that auto-increments in a database were an obstacle to export data from it. In the meantime, you continued to work on trying to import data from old WoS, instead of ZXDB. It was getting really hard to avoid the conclusion that you just wanted to keep me waiting for an answer several more months, until you finished importing everything from old WoS, so you could claim "sorry it's too late to use ZXDB because I have already imported everything from old WoS"...

If you were talking seriously about the idea of importing data from ZXDB, why did you continue to focus your work on importing data from somewhere else instead of ZXDB, all the time during those 3 months, while discussing ZXDB with me?

After wasting 3 months presenting technical arguments against each one of your excuses, I finally decided to bring this discussion back to the WoS forum again. When I did it, you blocked my access to the WoS admin group. Even so, I never commented about it (because I consider all private conversation as confidential) until you decided yourself to make it public. More details were already described here (November 2017).
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 2:48 amUnless you have access to the FB admins group then you have no idea of what discussions happened or didn't happen.
Exactly!

The problem is, we have completely different "recollections" of these WoS admin group discussions. My description is here, yours is here. They are so different, it's obvious they cannot be both true. One of us is clearly "misremembering" absolutely everything, intentionally or not.

There's only one way for people to find out. Let's release publicly our discussions! Obviously I'm not referring to any confidential or sensitive information about the WoS admin group. I only mean publishing the content of our relevant discussion threads from there.

As I mentioned before, I consider it's unethical to quote a private discussion without the other party's consent. Therefore I won't publish my discussions with you without your approval. However you have my consent to publish any discussions we had at the FB group, at your convenience. Feel free to choose yourself the thread(s) you want to publish, it's your choice! My only condition is publishing entire discussion thread(s) to avoid anything taken out of context.

We both have nothing to hide, right?

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 2:48 amI was warned by several people in advance that it would be a mistake to aid Einar but chose to ignore the warnings.
Really? Can you name one non-fictional person that warned you about myself? So what did this non-fictional person say?
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Einar Saukas
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:33 amIt was also known to people working on the data and testing the scripts that the database would be rapidly increasing with a lot more information. It's not practical to use ZXDB with that amount of data - or any site via SQL statements.
Are you trying to convince us that Spectrum Computing (and other SQL based sites) shouldn't be feasible?

Interesting.

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:33 amEinar also knew this, so when he was publicly asking for the database schema, he knew full well those modules hadn't been completed yet, and therefore there was no schema.
I initially asked to see your database model here (October 2016), here (November 2016), here (December 2016), etc. You ignored my requests for a few months, then finally claimed you still didn't have a database schema. Curiously, it didn't stop you from trying to import data from old WoS.

Therefore I offered instead that "I can easily export ZXDB content into whatever format you want for new WoS" (June 2017). You claimed it still couldn't be done, and I had to wait. In the meantime, you continued to try importing data from old WoS.

Afterwards I wrote a script that converted ZXDB to the same old WoS format (July 2017). Therefore whatever method you were using to import from old WoS, would also work for converted ZXDB. However you pretended it never happened, and you are continuing to use the same excuse that you don't have a database schema.

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:33 amWhat you have now is exactly where Martijn was - one person performing updates, and to update the website you need to run the SQL statements. That's fine. But Einar always stated that once WoS is finished he has no intention of keeping ZXDB going. Has that changed?
Not exactly.

It was never my intention to maintain a database. I simply created ZXDB to help other people build a new WoS, at the time you decided to quit. I assumed whoever took over new WoS, would also want to adopt and maintain ZXDB. After all, nobody in their right mind would want to throw away over a year of work (cleaning WoS archive, fixing inconsistencies, adding information, etc), then waste a long time redoing exactly the same effort from scratch, right?

My opinion hasn't changed. I still prefer to spend my time creating games, instead of maintaining ZXDB.

Fortunately so many people have been helping with ZXDB content lately, that I don't need to dedicate much time to ZXDB myself anymore. As a matter of fact, I'm working on a new game right now!

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:33 amWho is taking over? And again you have one person maintaining the data - and in this case several sites.
Wrong.

Nowadays we have different people producing game screenshots (Peter, Pavero, ...), providing game information (R-Tape, hikoki, ...), integrating with other sites (Thomas, Daren, ...), registering everything into a collaborative spreadsheet (mostly R-Tape) and reviewing it (myself). Nowadays almost all SQL statements in ZXDB are generated automatically from the spreadsheet. It may not be a pretty solution, but it's better to improve everything gradually instead of putting an entire site on hold for years while working on a fancy solution.

In latest ZXDB releases, my involvement has been limited to validate information, make adjusts in a few cases not covered by the spreadsheet yet, then pack and upload everything. Although I don't spend much time with ZXDB anymore, it has never been more complete and up-to-date!

Moreover, we are currently working on submission forms and further automation of the entire process. Soon ZXDB won't even need me anymore :)

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:33 amWhat happens if archive.org receive copyright complaints? Will they argue their case, or disable the WoS files? Files which they are happy to advertise as WoS backup without actually having permission to host them.
Should I remind you that WoS also hosts thousands of files without actually having permission to host them?

fogartylee wrote: Fri Dec 29, 2017 3:33 amAre they going to spend hours on the phone speaking to copyright holders, or visiting them personally, as I have done? I doubt it.
Since you took over, the number of distribution permissions for WoS has been diminishing (for instance System 3 games).

Perhaps it's a good thing that other sites are not behaving like you!
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Sokurah
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Sokurah »

Einar Saukas wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 6:01 am It may not be a pretty solution, but it's better to improve everything gradually instead of putting an entire site on hold for years while working on a fancy solution.
This!
Website: Tardis Remakes / Mostly remakes of Arcade and ZX Spectrum games.
My games for the Spectrum: Dingo, The Speccies, The Speccies 2, Vallation & Sqij.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Ralf »

Einar, I remember everything that you talk about. Lee was very contrary in his actions, once saying that he'll use ZXDB and then denying it.

And meanwhile he was building his own solution, you can see the results here:
http://live.worldofspectrum.org/

At these moment you can browse 2 tables - publishers and magazines. For a long time there were only publishers. But I suppose if he were to use ZXDB he would have to scrap or rework this "big" stuff and he didn't want to as he loved it with strong father's love ;)

I believe it was also a problem of having full control of everything. When you work in a team, other people make their decisions and solutions too and sometimes you have to adjust to them, not only expect everyone to adjust to you all the time.

Anyway I see good points of everything too. Did you people notice that in last two months Lee made more posts on WOS about site development then he did in 2 years previously? That something is actually happening since a long time of hiatus? I suppose he has an ambition to do it his way and now is actually doing something, especially as he quitted this unlucky Vega+ project which drained a lot of his energy.

I fully understand you Einer that you don't want to compete with WOS but help and be part of WOS instead. But sometimes you have to accept the reality. Better to have 2 quality sites than none. And personally I'll be trying to help ZXB and Spectrum Computing as long as... well, I care for Spectrum ;)
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by KenD »

Einar, I commend your patience in dealing with Lee, but I fear you're wasting your time. Everything you have done has been technically exemplary, proposed politely and communicated respectfully. Instead, you get rudeness, contradictions and misdirection; selectively responding to choice allegations and conveniently ignoring the more pertinent questions. He's the real-life equivalent of Viz's Aldridge Prior.

Trying to get him to back to reality with facts is a bit like kicking a dead whale up a beach: slow, messy, and ultimately pointless.
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Re: World of Spectrum....

Post by Einar Saukas »

Ralf wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:17 am Einar, I remember everything that you talk about. Lee was very contrary in his actions, once saying that he'll use ZXDB and then denying it.
He did it more than once.

I wish he admitted from the beginning that he intended to discard any contribution he didn't create himself. It would have been equally frustrating for all involved, but at least it would have saved us countless hours of discussions.

On the other hand, perhaps we should be thankful to him instead. If he had revealed earlier that he didn't want ZXDB, there would be no reason to continue working on it at the time. Instead, he kept making new promises about it for about a year, thus giving us reason to keep improving it. By the time he finally revealed ZXDB wouldn't be used (not even the same IDs), ZXDB was already integrated with almost everybody else's sites thus abandoning it wasn't an option anymore.

Ralf wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:17 am And meanwhile he was building his own solution, you can see the results here:
http://live.worldofspectrum.org/

At these moment you can browse 2 tables - publishers and magazines. For a long time there were only publishers. But I suppose if he were to use ZXDB he would have to scrap or rework this "big" stuff and he didn't want to as he loved it with strong father's love ;)
Not really.

I offered several times to convert data from ZXDB into whatever new WoS system he had.

I also provided a script that converted ZXDB content into old WoS format, so he could import all information himself using exactly the same method he was planning to import from old WoS.

Either of these options would allow him to benefit from the original old WoS archive content, plus thousands of bugfixes and updates, without scrapping or modifying any of his work.

Ralf wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:17 amI believe it was also a problem of having full control of everything. When you work in a team, other people make their decisions and solutions too and sometimes you have to adjust to them, not only expect everyone to adjust to you all the time.
Not really.

The initial plan was, whoever took over development of new WoS (after Lee quit) would also take over ZXDB.

When Lee refused to adopt ZXDB at WoS, I proposed exporting all content from ZXDB and importing it into new WoS system.

None of these options would give me any control over new WoS decisions. I would be simply giving away stuff.

Ralf wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:17 amAnyway I see good points of everything too. Did you people notice that in last two months Lee made more posts on WOS about site development then he did in 2 years previously? That something is actually happening since a long time of hiatus? I suppose he has an ambition to do it his way and now is actually doing something, especially as he quitted this unlucky Vega+ project which drained a lot of his energy.
Agreed. I'm also glad to see WoS finally moving ahead. I'm just not sure it's moving in the right direction...

Ralf wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:17 amI fully understand you Einer that you don't want to compete with WOS but help and be part of WOS instead. But sometimes you have to accept the reality.
Done. I was finally 100% convinced there was no chance to make things work, when he stopped posting excuses and started posting "misremembered events" that never happened. More precisely this post. That's the day I finally subscribed and moved to this forum.

Since them, I'm keeping my comments about WoS to a minimum (there's no point wasting time on it anymore), except in cases where he tries to blame me on anything.

Ralf wrote: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:17 amBetter to have 2 quality sites than none. And personally I'll be trying to help ZXB and Spectrum Computing as long as... well, I care for Spectrum ;)
Thank you! Also thanks to anybody else who still cares :)
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