[crossfire] Metaserver reporting and accuracy

[Mark Wedel]

Alex Schultz wrote:
> Robin Redeker wrote:
>> On Tue, Jul 11, 2006 at 11:15:18AM -0500, Rick Tanner wrote:
>>> Per the feedback from other people on IRC and other means, I've put
>>> together a list of requirements that people want to see with the
>>> metaserver reporting.
>>>
>>> So, with this post I am asking public server admins to cooperate on the
>>> following:
>>>
>>> * All information must be as accurate as can reasonably be (IP Address,
>>> hostname, number of players, server version, etc.)
>> I wondered: maybe wizards and afk people should be not listed as 'number of players'?
>>
>> Because the number that interestes the people who look at the 'number of players'
>> is the number of active players. A server with 10 afk users is as active
>> and interesting as a server with 0 users.
>>
>> Also wizards should not be reported, because a dungeon master that is administrating
>> the server is not an 'active' player in means of interacting with him.
> I would agree with that, however in my experience, very few players
> actually make use of the afk flag. This may have changed since I was
> actively playing though, back when I was actively playing, the default
> who command output would not include afk status, which it now does, so
> perhaps players are using it more now.

  One could take this a little further and say that these are provided to the 
metaserver, and the player can then decide if that other information is of 
interest (2 wiz's online, that's good, etc).  In fact, I could imagine some 
players would find that useful when they need a wiz because their character is 
stranded, etc.

> Either way, perhaps another thing that would be good on servers, would
> be automatically setting the afk flag if they are idle for more than a
> certain amount of time, and if they become active again, it will unset
> the afk flag, unless they turned it on manually. IMHO that behavior
> would make not including afk players in the count, much more useful.

  That would almost go into yet another category - 'idle'.

  I'm not sure how true it is, but I can certainly envision that there are 
players online who are idle - they are waiting for something interesting to 
happen, partake in chatting, etc.  So while idle, they are effectively around. 
    But that may be over thinking this problem here.