New Feature: Beta Test - by Brad on 16:18 10 Aug 2003
Hi gang,
We have a new feature at Unified and Shadowdark.org. We have adapted a little script to our own sinister designs and have come up with a fifty little metasearch. It lets you search, in any combination, up to 4 specialized directories simultaniously out of a total of 16. (5 horror directories, 7 SF/Fantasy directories, 4 role playing directories (there is some overlap as some like Planet Doom have fairly extensive RPG categories in thier own right.))
Please give it a try at:
http://shadowdark.org/sfmeta/
I would appreciate if you would let me know what you think and any problems, as we are beta testing it to see if there are bugs.
I also put a link to it up in the "Announcement" category near the top of the forums.
Hi gang,
We have a new feature at Unified and Shadowdark.org. We have adapted a little script to our own sinister designs and have come up with a fifty little metasearch. It lets you search, in any combination, up to 4 specialized directories simultaniously out of a total of 16. (5 horror directories, 7 SF/Fantasy directories, 4 role playing directories (there is some overlap as some like Planet Doom have fairly extensive RPG categories in thier own right.))
Please give it a try at:
http://shadowdark.org/sfmeta/
I would appreciate if you would let me know what you think and any problems, as we are beta testing it to see if there are bugs.
I also put a link to it up in the "Announcement" category near the top of the forums.
New Feature: Beta Test - by MoonHunter on 01:51 11 Aug 2003
Two searches which should of come up with a few dozen responses (and I know the reponse that comes up for those searches on two of the sites), came up with one response from RPG gateway (planet doom, silver key, rpg gateway, wowee). The windows was four tiled then went straight to rpg gateway. So I got one answer and only one link.
Will try again another day.
Two searches which should of come up with a few dozen responses (and I know the reponse that comes up for those searches on two of the sites), came up with one response from RPG gateway (planet doom, silver key, rpg gateway, wowee). The windows was four tiled then went straight to rpg gateway. So I got one answer and only one link.
Will try again another day.
New Feature: Beta Test - by Brad on 07:01 11 Aug 2003
Good find. It looks like we will have to find a replacement for RPGGateway - they have a refresh thing going on.
Good find. It looks like we will have to find a replacement for RPGGateway - they have a refresh thing going on.
New Feature: Beta Test - by din on 07:56 11 Aug 2003
it looks like they have a frame buster script in there .. which is fine .. except for our nefarious plans .. I'd rather replace than remove, less typing involved, any suggestions ?
also another way to circumvent the problem is to have the search open in 4 seperate windows. I don't know how off hand, but it should not be difficult.
it looks like they have a frame buster script in there .. which is fine .. except for our nefarious plans .. I'd rather replace than remove, less typing involved, any suggestions ?
also another way to circumvent the problem is to have the search open in 4 seperate windows. I don't know how off hand, but it should not be difficult.
New Feature: Beta Test - by Emperor TAR-1 on 08:54 11 Aug 2003
Worked fine for me! I came up on three of the tiles, and was wondering why my site wasn't on the fourth.
It could be because I never listed there, do you think?
Great idea! Great job!
Worked fine for me! I came up on three of the tiles, and was wondering why my site wasn't on the fourth.
It could be because I never listed there, do you think?
Great idea! Great job!
New Feature: Beta Test - by Brad on 16:44 12 Aug 2003
Okay we changed RPGGateway, which was causing problems, to a online RPG gaming directory. It was quite a job finding one at all, I found 3 pen and paper RPG directories had gone belly up.
The two remaining are small and one of those has two popups per page view. So we moved to online rpg gaming directories and finally found a decent one.
We also replaced one of the scifi directories which was not working.
I also added some links so visitors fan find the directories used plus others, in case they find one they really like. I hope they do.
I suppose I should explain the basic theory:
If you go back to around 1997, people used meta-search engines to search a bunch of search engine data bases all at once. This was because the early search engines were so crude that you needed to search about 6 at once in order to come up with a few links that actually matched your query.
Now the search feature on all the SF directories is pretty crude too and the databases are not huge. So my thinking is to do two things:
1. Maybe give SF searchers something that will give them enough on-topic links every time! Even if it take 2 - 4 directories to do it. If we can do this we might make people's places to go use for searching first right from the start. More mainstream appeal.
2. Maybe it will get more of the general public to even know that SF directories exist and are useful to them. Maybe they will find one they really like.
So I hope you will take another look and give me your impressions.
Thanks.
Okay we changed RPGGateway, which was causing problems, to a online RPG gaming directory. It was quite a job finding one at all, I found 3 pen and paper RPG directories had gone belly up.
The two remaining are small and one of those has two popups per page view. So we moved to online rpg gaming directories and finally found a decent one.We also replaced one of the scifi directories which was not working.
I also added some links so visitors fan find the directories used plus others, in case they find one they really like. I hope they do.
I suppose I should explain the basic theory:
If you go back to around 1997, people used meta-search engines to search a bunch of search engine data bases all at once. This was because the early search engines were so crude that you needed to search about 6 at once in order to come up with a few links that actually matched your query.
Now the search feature on all the SF directories is pretty crude too and the databases are not huge. So my thinking is to do two things:
1. Maybe give SF searchers something that will give them enough on-topic links every time! Even if it take 2 - 4 directories to do it. If we can do this we might make people's places to go use for searching first right from the start. More mainstream appeal.
2. Maybe it will get more of the general public to even know that SF directories exist and are useful to them. Maybe they will find one they really like.
So I hope you will take another look and give me your impressions.
Thanks.