ExtendingMultiplayerServer

Me

Hi, my name is Gaurav Mitra . I am 21 years old and a 3rd year Software Engineering/Science student at the Australian National University , Canberra. I have been playing wesnoth for about 2 years now , and its about time i contributed to its development !

Coding Experience

I am proficient in the following programming languages :

C
C++
Java
Haskell
ADA

I am familiar with Linux environments which is where most of my coding is done . However, one of my home pc's has windows on it where i use cygwin to compile programs. But i prefer Eclipse for Java and C++ projects. My favourite code editors other than eclipse are Kate on linux and Notepad++ on windows. I have used SVN extensively for coursework and use the Tortoise SVN shell extension in windows for version control. I am also familiar with basic Networking concepts

My teamwork experience is as follows :

In my 1st year I had worked on a Java game called blockOut in a team of 4 people
Am currently working in a team of 6 to develop a Linux Robotic Framework written in C as a year long university project
I have worked in groups of 2-4 for numerous presentations on topics such as AJAX etc

My preferred method of development is Agile and i like working in groups of 2-3 people.

As far as GSoC participation goes , this is my first time ! My motivation for participating is mainly to gain experience in developing a professional project and i get to develop wesnoth which is great ! But i intend on going through with wesnoth development even after its over.

Gaming Experience

I started playing games about 10 years back when i got my first pc . I prefer strategy war games rather than first person ones, hence my interest in wesnoth . My personal favourite game though is Age Of Empires II Conquerors , of which i have a fair bit of multiplayer gaming experience . As an opponent i do not favour AI because invariably its moves can be predicted . Human opponents are unpredictable and hence exciting to fight !

Communication Skills

I speak fluent English , Bengali and Hindi !

Contact Info

> IRC nick: dudegaurav

> Wesnoth Forum : dudegaurav

> Gna : dudegaurav

> Email: dude.gaurav@gmail.com

The times that i am awake are generally very flexible , usually i sleep from 15:00 to 21:00 UTC and am available the rest of the time . I will be logged into IRC most of the time but may not be checking it frequently so feel free to email me as i check mail every 30 mins !

My Ideas for Extending the Multiplayer Server

As mentioned by wesnoth developers in their suggestions for this topic , the basic idea is to study the current multiplayer lobby , come up with tweaks , get them approved and code them ! At the moment , the tweaks that are evident to me are :

Support for different versions of wesnoth i.e. different versions would have separate rooms and they could compete there rather than having to download the latest version again
Support for different game types eg. Epic games ( maybe 100x100 maps ) , Large games and so on . Grouping of a certain type of game would enable players to choose games they are interested in , easily
Providing proper login authentication similar to IRC
Player profiles , having info about player details , number of games played , won , lost , best match etc
Database for storing player profiles and ranking players based on their game statistics
Grouping similar games , maybe making a grid layout rather than the scroll up/down (current) one
Improved communication system between players i.e. private chat etc
Simple room system similar to IRC , and separate rooms for different wesnoth versions , maybe more rooms for match making purposes
Filtering mechanism for games interested in i.e. game search system by specifying different criteria such as number of free slots , playing against whom ( i.e. Northeners/Elves.. ) , number of players , map size , map terrain , etc.
Having a multiplayer section on the website detailing player stats , game stats etc.

Overview

Page under construction at the moment , rest will be up shortly !