BnetDocs improvements

[Stealth]

IMO, the bottom line is that Arta's BNetDocs are just that: Arta's BNetDocs. How he runs them is ultimately his decision.

[c0ol]

Peace from the have-nots clamoring for reasons why they should have without doing themselves.  Peace from incessant reasoning about how those who are creating things are really hurting others by not giving away their creations.  Peace from all the questions, the begging, the whining, and just annoying attitudes.

*yawn* this is obviously lost on the /bnet elite/, im sorry i pestered you with things so silly as the community.  Its obvious YOU dont care about US grok, but i imagine some members do atleast a little, because they release things like bnet docs in the first place. Im just looking out for the greater good of the community.  This forum is for the community is it not? Grok i think your opinions of the community prove my point in this debate, its all about seperating the bnet elite from the pesky newbs and their leeching ways right? thanks

P.S.  Moon informed me that this may get me banned from the forum, while i doubt that, it would prove my point would it not?  This is a community forum, but if the views of the community are squelched, id imagine the community can go elsewhere.

[Skywing]

Peace from the have-nots clamoring for reasons why they should have without doing themselves.  Peace from incessant reasoning about how those who are creating things are really hurting others by not giving away their creations.  Peace from all the questions, the begging, the whining, and just annoying attitudes.

*yawn* this is obviously lost on the /bnet elite/, im sorry i pestered you with things so silly as the community.  Its obvious YOU dont care about US grok, but i imagine some members do atleast a little, because they release things like bnet docs in the first place. Im just looking out for the greater good of the community.  This forum is for the community is it not? Grok i think your opinions of the community prove my point in this debate, its all about seperating the bnet elite from the pesky newbs and their leeching ways right? thanks

P.S.  Moon informed me that this may get me banned from the forum, while i doubt that, it would prove my point would it not?  This is a community forum, but if the views of the community are squelched, id imagine the community can go elsewhere.

If somebody banned you it'd probably because your responses are getting more and more flamelike and less and less real discussion of the issue.

The fun involves creating something in your own time for your own enjoyment, and maybe sharing a bit of it with somebody else because you feel like being nice.  If somebody offers to split the cost of something with you, do you complain that they aren't paying for the whole thing?  I certainly hope not!

You seem to be under the impression that anything anybody decides to share in part for any reason is automatically in full the property of "the community" (and I use this term loosely right now, since "the community" mostly seems to be you, judging from people's posts here), and the creator is doing something wrong (stealing? excluding? insulting people?) instantly because they aren't giving every single thing away.

This isn't how life works in general, and it's certainly not how "open source" and "communities" work -- these involve positive contributions, no matter how small being welcomed and appreciated.  This does not include attacking those who so freely give things of their own will, just because they don't share every single thing they have.

If you truly have the interests of the community at heart, then why do you insist on attacking contributors just because you might not agree with the way they do things?  There's a saying - beggers can't be choosers - if you're just expecting people to help "the community" out of the blue, you're hardly in a position to demand from them, especially after they graciously donate information/things/their time/whatever to "the public".

[Grok]

*yawn* this is obviously lost on the /bnet elite/, im sorry i pestered you with things so silly as the community.  Its obvious YOU dont care about US grok, but i imagine some members do atleast a little, because they release things like bnet docs in the first place. Im just looking out for the greater good of the community.  This forum is for the community is it not? Grok i think your opinions of the community prove my point in this debate, its all about seperating the bnet elite from the pesky newbs and their leeching ways right? thanks

P.S.  Moon informed me that this may get me banned from the forum, while i doubt that, it would prove my point would it not?  This is a community forum, but if the views of the community are squelched, id imagine the community can go elsewhere.

Who said anything about "caring" or "not caring"?  That has never been part of this discussion.  You're not an invalid requiring a nursemaid, are you?

Since you didn't even read my post in the context as a reply to yours, you missed the whole point.  I was saying that the reason vL was created was because of attitudes like the one you were displaying in your post.  I'll spell it out... "Hey you know stuff -- GIVE TO ME".  I heard that a lot and got tired of it.  Not tired of the people saying it, just the number of times it was expected, even demanded, that I use my knowledge for them, when all I wanted to do was relax, play some games with friends, and have a good time.

Your post about "not caring about us grok" is a classic example of the "woe is me" crying that caused many vL members to distance themselves from other bnetters.

When we game, its all good.

And btw, this forum, Battle.Net Bot Dev, is not a vL property.  It is primarily Spht and Kp's, iirc.  Looking at the list of admins, I don't see anyone who would ban you for having an unpopular opinion.  But it's theirs to do with as they wish.

[Camel]

Skywing, the issue isn't that he wants more than Arta will give. c0ol is frustrated because Arta is taking some information and sharing it with a very specific group of people and nobody else.

Every post so far that I have seen in defence of Arta has been aimed at showing that it's wrong to ask for more than is given. Might I suggest instead you attack c0ol's interperatation of c0ol's argument instead of your interperatation of c0ol's argument? It's been clearly established that Arta has the right to do whatever he wants; it's his work. That isn't what c0ol is arguing about. He has a problem with the ethics of Arta's descision, and I have to say I agree to some extent:
It seems rather boorish to me to allow a group of people access to information that others are excluded from simply because he can.

[iago]

At the beginning of last summer, I could have been considered a "newb".  I had no real knowledge of how battle.net works, I didn't know assembly language, I didn't really know what packets are, and I even seem to remember asking if the binary login sequence could just be copied and pasted into a bot or if it changed every time.

Over the course of the year, I taught myself assembly, mostly from writing programs in c++ and reversing them.  I wrote a plugin, and skywing helped me for maybe 1/2 hour, including giving me a barebones source for a wrapper function, and I've asked his help only a couple times since, and I always appreciate it.  

I got a packetlogger and logged Starcraft's packets.  I figured out 0x0F, profile requests, and parts of the login sequence from packetlogging, and I reversed Starcraft's code to the point where I now have a bot that could login.  Although I used bnetdocs for reference, I wouldn't want to have any more information, like how to generate the CheckRevision, or the Hashes, or anything like that.  I'm happier figuring that out myself.

Currently, I consider myself pretty good at assembly/reversing, and I'm proud of the work I've done.  


I think my point is basically this:
yes, vL is prejudiced against newbs, but anybody can teach themselves how to do these things.  And if they can't, they shouldn't.

[Arta]

Jesus, the forum exploded while I was asleep...

Firstly, Grok: Your earlier post explaing the reasons for vL's creation is one of those rare occasions when someone else perfectly and succinctly describes exactly what one thinks. A joy to read.

Getting back to the topic:

I have not restricted information on BnetDocs 'because I can'. Given that I value self-discovery and real, practical, thorough understanding, as I explained earlier, I feel it is beneficial to make some information - a small amount - publicly accessible. This gives people a taste for the field. Lets them get an idea of how Battle.net, operates, and what they're getting into. Making everything publicly available would be self-defeating - given my objective - since it would entirely destroy the process of self-discovery in this field.

Sky is quite right when he says BnetDocs started as a personal project. It started out as my method for keeping notes about discoveries and soforth - i was sick of maintaining several different textfiles full of scribblings. I'd also like to note that he was skeptical when I first raised the idea of making it public and this thread perfectly illustrates why. I agreed this would probably happen, but you know what? I don't care. Far more people find it useful than find it annoying. BnetDocs has ~820 registered users and more register every day. I can live with 5 whiners.

[Skywing]

Skywing, the issue isn't that he wants more than Arta will give. c0ol is frustrated because Arta is taking some information and sharing it with a very specific group of people and nobody else.

Every post so far that I have seen in defence of Arta has been aimed at showing that it's wrong to ask for more than is given. Might I suggest instead you attack c0ol's interperatation of c0ol's argument instead of your interperatation of c0ol's argument? It's been clearly established that Arta has the right to do whatever he wants; it's his work. That isn't what c0ol is arguing about. He has a problem with the ethics of Arta's descision, and I have to say I agree to some extent:
It seems rather boorish to me to allow a group of people access to information that others are excluded from simply because he can.

So, then, you would prefer to remain blissfully ignorant of its existance and any information you may have gained through it, just because he's not sharing every last thing?

[Adron]

What an interesting choice of words in your post Skywing. Blissfully ignorant. Yes, that's the way they should've been kept I suppose.

[Grok]

So, then, you would prefer to remain blissfully ignorant of its existance and any information you may have gained through it, just because he's not sharing every last thing?

* Grok makes note to c0oL that grok is not on the bnetdocs 'elite'.  Grok does not even have a registered name on bnetdocs.

[Adron]

Oh, Grok hasn't been put on elite? What a disaster! Someone has to list him as elite right away, I can't believe that such a serious mistake could've been made. Hurry Arta, and include Grok in our secret society of elite people!

[DarkMinion]

c0oL: If you don't give everyone the administrative access password to your computer, so we can get any info we require, you're a complete asshole.  Fuck you.  

[CrAz3D]

c0ol's computer is not a palce open to the public to gather information, while on the other hand BNET Docs is just that.

[c0ol]

The fun involves creating something in your own time for your own enjoyment, and maybe sharing a bit of it with somebody else because you feel like being nice.  If somebody offers to split the cost of something with you, do you complain that they aren't paying for the whole thing?  I certainly hope not!

Have you read any of my posts, this isn't the point at all.  If you go to BnetDocs, you see a different and more privledged set of information than i do. That is NOT the same as arta having all the information, and sharing only some of it. That is arta having all the information, and seperating who sees it and who doesnt by their bnet social status.

You seem to be under the impression that anything anybody decides to share in part for any reason is automatically in full the property of "the community" (and I use this term loosely right now, since "the community" mostly seems to be you, judging from people's posts here), and the creator is doing something wrong (stealing? excluding? insulting people?) instantly because they aren't giving every single thing away.

Let me iterate, i am NOT saying that arta doesn't have the right to do whatever he wants. I am NOT saying that the community has a right to everything. I AM saying that were arta's goal to help people, then not seperating and restricting the information would be the best thing for everyone.

This isn't how life works in general, and it's certainly not how "open source" and "communities" work -- these involve positive contributions, no matter how small being welcomed and appreciated.  This does not include attacking those who so freely give things of their own will, just because they don't share every single thing they have.

This isn't about sharing everything you have.  This also isn't about closed source.  This is about sharing by social association.

If you truly have the interests of the community at heart, then why do you insist on attacking contributors just because you might not agree with the way they do things?  There's a saying - beggers can't be choosers - if you're just expecting people to help "the community" out of the blue, you're hardly in a position to demand from them, especially after they graciously donate information/things/their time/whatever to "the public".

*tires of repeating this over and over* I am not demanding anything at all from the contributors. I am talking to the users, i don't expect you to understand things like community. Some contributions can hender the community. If a project that is restricted comes out and fills a gap in functionality, than the motivation for developers to come out with an unrestricted solution would lessen.  Not to say that the restricted project is being forced on anyone, or people are forced not to make something new because of it, but people use what works.

[c0ol]

Firstly, Grok: Your earlier post explaing the reasons for vL's creation is one of those rare occasions when someone else perfectly and succinctly describes exactly what one thinks. A joy to read.

Yes Arta, im glad you said this. This discution was about me stating that the restrictions in BnetDocs are not the best thing for the community. Grok clearly stated that he doesn't care for the community at all.  If you agree with him, than you assume that position, and that basicly ends this debate.