Black darbars: bug or feature?

[hcrana]

Thursday night the Ferrets were squadding it up as usual, and we noticed the darbars on the clipboard map were black instead of the usual green and red.  I'd seen this before and thought it was maybe client-end; but I mentioned it this time, and everyone was seeing the same thing.

[Lusche]

It's a bug.

[CASHEW]

Very small bug. People make far to big of a deal out of it.

[hcrana]

Yeah it's not a big deal.  Just wondering if maybe it was done on purpose, since it seemed to be a server-side issue.

[Hetzer7]

Feature!

[ImADot]

Yeah it's not a big deal.  Just wondering if maybe it was done on purpose, since it seemed to be a server-side issue.

I think it has something to do with that particular map.
In either case, if the only darbar shown is next to the top of the grid, it's green; if there is a space between it and the top of the grid, it's red.

[ebfd11]

When the map was made it was rendered with the same color DAR bar as to make it just a little more difficult to distinguish between friendly an enemy. If you look friendly will be top ba and enemy is on bottom, just like a normal map.

Lawndart

[ImADot]

When the map was made it was rendered with the same color DAR bar as to make it just a little more difficult to distinguish between friendly an enemy.

If that is indeed the case, then it is a fail and should never have been allowed.

[Randy1]

I thought it was to be able to see the Radar red dots better through the dar bar.

[Swoop]

Rubbish.  It's not a feature, it's not a test, it's not by design. It's a bug.

It happens on one map and neither the map maker (Fester) nor HTC have figured out why, or if they have they haven't said.  However, since HTC is working solidly on the update I doubt there's been a huge in depth investigation to solve a bug that will be gone with the new version anyway.

It's not a massive deal, nowhere near as big a deal as having no dar bar at all and cons appearing at 20,000ft.....which is another bug that hasn't been fixed cos it'll probably be gone with the new version as well.  Fixing bugs that aren't game destroying is not a priority when there's a brand new version being developed.

[Aspen]

Its a bug.  To a layman like me, it seems like it should be an easy fix.  When something appears like an easy fix but doesn't get fixed, it cause folks to wonder if anyone gives a darn.  Sorta like coming to work with glasses taped together at the hinge.

"Bob, whats with the tape?  We have a big presentation this afternoon."

"Yeah, I'm missing a screw for the hinge."

"Ahh...yeah, we know.  You told us that 6 months ago when it first fell out?"

"Yep"

"Bob, a screw is like $1.49 and takes five minutes to fix?"

"MmmHmm.  Will there be doughnuts at the presentation?"


I don't know squat about coding so maybe its not a quick fix and would tie someone up a couple days.

[hgtonyvi]

The black dar bars only appears on FesterMA Map.

[pembquist]

I think its probably a consequence of being such a small organization but HiTech Creations would probably benefit from better communication with its users, at least all the complainers, (myself included,) on the BBS. When Hitech hiself spoke up about the HQ thing for me the subject evaporated. I don't know if it would make any material difference if there were official explanations for things like Black Darbar but it would dilute the feeling of carelessness which people get when they complain on a company BBS and hear nothing. So I just assume that Hitech is doing the best job they can with the resources they have.

[Swoop]

Its a bug.  To a layman like me, it seems like it should be an easy fix.  When something appears like an easy fix but doesn't get fixed, it cause folks to wonder if anyone gives a darn.  Sorta like coming to work with glasses taped together at the hinge.

<snip>

I don't know squat about coding so maybe its not a quick fix and would tie someone up a couple days.

Yeah see, bug fixing can either be a 5 minute thing when whatever is causing the bug is either pretty obvious or presents itself immediately under investigation......or it can be a hair tearing out procedure that drives programmers nuts and takes weeks of painstaking testing and going through 10,000 lines of code with a fine tooth comb, testing each section individually and triple checking variable outputs to ensure they're correct....and then you still don't find the cause so the only fix is delete the lot and rewrite it from scratch.  You don't know until you start.  And, as I say, HT is currently working on a brand new version of AH with completely new code written for everything......so he's kinda gone straight for the final silver bullet fix cos he was doing that anyway.

No other programmer on the planet would hold that against him.


P.S.  Of course if these bugs are present in the new version too then I'm sooooo gonna feel like a fool.

[Arlo]

Yeah see, bug fixing can either be a 5 minute thing when whatever is causing the bug is either pretty obvious or presents itself immediately under investigation......or it can be a hair tearing out procedure that drives programmers nuts and takes weeks of painstaking testing and going through 10,000 lines of code with a fine tooth comb, testing each section individually and triple checking variable outputs to ensure they're correct....and then you still don't find the cause so the only fix is delete the lot and rewrite it from scratch.  You don't know until you start.  And, as I say, HT is currently working on a brand new version of AH with completely new code written for everything......so he's kinda gone straight for the final silver bullet fix cos he was doing that anyway.

No other programmer on the planet would hold that against him.

Too large to quote, dammit. I'll opt for a request that Skuzzy sticky this on the Wishlist.