Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Broken link? Feature request? Anything related to the Spectrum Computing website here.
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PeterJ
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Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by PeterJ »

We have been asked a number of times how people can contribute to the development of the Spectrum Computing website.

We can't have everybody working at once on technical stuff. It may take some time until we can give green light to any specific task.

The sticky post will be regularly updated with ways you can help.

Technical
  • On-line Emulator intergration
Note: The server uses Ubuntu 16.04 LTS along with Apache, PHP & MySQL. We use LetsEncrypt for SSL. The site also uses Bootstrap and JavaScript.

Linux
  • Setting up Postfix mail
  • Cron jobs
Non Technical
  • Testing the website and reporting bugs
  • Creating screenshots (Dave is taking care of the more recent titles but if you can help with the older stuff that would be great.
  • Promote Spectrum Computing to other Spectrum users (Be careful you don't appear to be spamming though!)
  • Contacting developers of previously commercial software to obtain permissions. Please be careful - certain ones might be best approached at the right time by the right person, for example we don't want another Electric Dreams style denial! If you think there is a good chance it wil be a "yes" then go for it, especially if you have an 'in' with the person already. Also - if you're reading this and you happen to be an author/publisher and haven't already let us know your permission status for Spectrum Computing, and also the "All Free Sites" that use ZXDB please get in touch!
  • Designing graphics
  • Increasing social media exposure
  • Maintaining a 'Useful Links' page

Projects already in progress
  • Simple A-Z Games Listings [mention]PeterJ[/mention]
  • FIle and information upload system for authors [mention]Mike Davies[/mention]
  • Predictive searching [mention]RMartins[/mention]
Non urgent future technical developments
  • Screenshot browser
  • Magazine Search Engine
  • Most popular game pages visited
  • Voting system
Donations
  • If you are a game publisher or hardware producer and want to donate items that we could give away in competitions that would be great
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R-Tape
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by R-Tape »

Cheers Peter, just a few thoughts:
Creating screenshots
A large part of this is in hand, so we would have to be careful to avoid duplicating each other's work. I'm currently okay taking care of the newest game releases, but if you spot them further back in the archive please do send them in. Details here.
Promote Spectrum Computing to other Spectrum users
Yep, but be careful not to look like a spammer!
Contacting developers of previously commercial software to obtain permissions
Yes please but be careful - certain ones might be best approached at the right time by the right person, for example we don't want another Electric Dreams style denial! If you think there is a good chance it wil be a "yes" then go for it, especially if you have an 'in' with the person already.

Also - if you're reading this and you happen to be an author/publisher and haven't already let us know your permission status for Spectrum Computing, and also the "All Free Sites" that use ZXDB please get in touch!
Shaun_B
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by Shaun_B »

Hi,

How is the site built? And are you using GIT for versioning (or something equivalent)? If so, you can have multiple people working on technical stuff at the same time :-)

Regards,

Shaun.
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PeterJ
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by PeterJ »

Hi [mention]Shaun_B[/mention] We are not using versioning at the moment. We have a copy of the site in a 'Dev' folder that we test stuff on (apart from when I forget, and test stuff in live and break it!). Seriously though, Git is a good idea if developers increase.
Shaun_B
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by Shaun_B »

PeterJ wrote: Sun Feb 11, 2018 4:34 pm Hi @Shaun_B We are not using versioning at the moment. We have a copy of the site in a 'Dev' folder that we test stuff on (apart from when I forget, and test stuff in live and break it!). Seriously though, Git is a good idea if developers increase.
Indeed. If I find some time (and you need a PHP person) then I'll let you know. And I use GIT even on solo projects because if I break something, I roll back until I find the last 'working' version.

Regards,

Shaun.
hikoki
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by hikoki »

One tip for taking good screenshots and save time? Go to the rzx site, pause a .rzx anytime and save file as .scr :geek:

Another question is collecting new utilities, hardware, music, demos, Spectrum links..
Too many things to care for. Perhaps it is good idea to wait for the new WoS and import from their archive.
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PeterJ
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by PeterJ »

Hi [mention]hikoki[/mention]

We wont be importing from the new WoS. We will only be using ZXDB. I'm sure [mention]Einar Saukas[/mention] will be more that happy to add new hardware or anything else that is missing to ZXDB. You just need to contact him and provide the information for him to add.

If you fancy being responsible for maintaining the links page we can set you up with access.

Peter
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Juan F. Ramirez
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by Juan F. Ramirez »

PeterJ wrote: Sun Feb 11, 2018 2:59 pm

Non urgent future technical developments

  • Most popular game pages visited
  • Voting system
Two promising features! Great!
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R-Tape
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by R-Tape »

hikoki wrote: Sun Feb 11, 2018 6:46 pm One tip for taking good screenshots and save time? Go to the rzx site, pause a .rzx anytime and save file as .scr :geek:
I've noticed some of your screenshots are more than just the first screen! Depending how tired/busy I am I play as many screens as I feel like until I reach a more interesting bit to snap.
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R-Tape
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by R-Tape »

I'd like to add one to the 'non technical' requests.

Somebody do a regular Monday Speccy quiz to cheer us all up, it's as dreich as hell today! :D
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Juan F. Ramirez
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by Juan F. Ramirez »

R-Tape wrote: Mon Feb 19, 2018 9:25 am I'd like to add one to the 'non technical' requests.

Somebody do a regular Monday Speccy quiz to cheer us all up, it's as dreich as hell today! :D
Seconded!
hikoki
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by hikoki »

PeterJ wrote: Sun Feb 11, 2018 6:53 pm Hi @hikoki

We wont be importing from the new WoS. We will only be using ZXDB. I'm sure @Einar Saukas will be more that happy to add new hardware or anything else that is missing to ZXDB. You just need to contact him and provide the information for him to add.

If you fancy being responsible for maintaining the links page we can set you up with access.

Peter
Interesting offer.. I would suggest a collaborative effort using a software like https://sourceforge.net/projects/semanticscuttle/
One site using this software is https://arthur.lutz.im/bookmarks/
See? several admins, multiple users, approvals, etc
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PeterJ
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by PeterJ »

Hi, it looks good but if we use an external tool I would rather something that was being actively updated. This looks like the last update was in May 2016. I think for our needs a simple HTML page would be fine as a starting point. We don't want to over complicate things. Let us know if you want to help.

This could be as simple as collating a list of useful links in a text file with an explanation of each.
hikoki
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by hikoki »

^^^
Hi Peter. I've seen the author answered a question on the help page last year. Also there is a java port from last year. I don't think the program is difficult to maintain for a PHP coder.
You have a good point about simplicity though this kind of software is useful even if only to show a button to encourage people to collaborate.
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PeterJ
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Re: Ways you can help with the development of Spectrum Computing Website

Post by PeterJ »

[mention]hikoki[/mention] I looked at it again but it appears not to support PHP7 so unfortunately we can't use it. Good suggestion though.
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