possibly simple smartphone optimization option (in General)

after some hijacking of this thread,

http://www.carnageblender.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0039VJ

i got to thinking about ways to make cb more smartphone friendly. touchscreens have made it easier but even with the ability to zoom cb as it stands had one major problem in my eyes. if you zoom in enough to make it easy to click the fight link, then you cannot see botchecks or even fight results.

i asked in the linked thread if we could do a simple app with a fight button that could show botchecks and simple fight results. after thinking about it though, that is even more than what is needed.

i think we could just do a separate web page with a big fight button at the top and a box below that which could show fight results or bot checks with a text entry box and an enter button.

make the fight button fight the favs list and make it large enough to click easily with your finger on a touchscreen. later we could add more simple pages but for now that would make burning ba, which is what most of us do with most of our time on cb much easier on the smartphones.

It would be cool to have a fighting widget on one page and a forums widget on another.

for now on my phone the fight button is located at the bottom left, i wish it was more aorund the Train button.

here is a very simple mockup of the page i have in mind for fighting.

It just needs a customizable list, up and down arrows, an area for botchecks, a fight button, a link back to the home page, and a non java chat and it would be all we phone users need

the fight button would be replaced by the bot check image when needed with a text entry field underneath and an enter button.

omega, when you become a supporter you get a customizable fight list that automatically progresses to the next, non-comatose opponent. for simplicity's sake i was going to make the fight button work off of that at least at first.

Ah I see. Well I think one thing that really needs to be stressed is a flash chat system specifically for smartphone users. Just sayin. The only contact I have with the community is the forum

i am not sure of how that all works but wanted to start with something very simple as it is more likely to be taken on if it can be done quickly with our limited dev time. it wouldn't have to be the end of development but rather a good beginning.

It takes a few good eggs to make an omelette

I've been asking for this for a while as well. I agree that a simple page with this setup would make fighting on a phone much, much easier and more worthwhile.

Chat would be nice, but I would hate it because I really, REALLY hate the autocorrect on my phone and at least in forums I have a chance to preview and correct a bit when I'm using it.

It would be nice to be able to have a radio button for clan fighting too, so it highlighted next clan fight if you selected it.
Might save me swerving all over the road when I'm trying to scroll down :-)

I'm with OB on the autocorrect! My phone has a very strange sense of humour when it comes to autocorrect. Even something as simple as Happy Birthday can be autocorrected to something..odd.

Meanwhile a smartphone option would be lovely. Whilst fighting on mine isn't bad thanks to a reasonably large screen it's still akin to cooking a meal in the kitchen through a cat-flap in the kitchen door.

keeping the page very simple would also mean that anyone playing with a browser phone that isn't touch screen would be able to use their directional controls to easily choose what is on the page.

Awesome analogy, JW :)

As for the idea... It'd be nice to do this in an actual smart phone app. But it would be quicker to build it as a normal web page. Maybe I can work out a prototype.

True nice one JW!

Maybe create the page and have it as a Setting for Smartphones once clicked it auto detects and redirects them to said page.

woohoo!

Ok, so the only people allowed to respond are those who know the definition of "prototype"....

That said..

Append "&mobile_stream_p=1" to your fight.tcl call and see what happens.

I'd explain further, but the people who can figure that out are the ones who should be testing.

I tried it on my laptop. It seems to work very well, but I ran out of BA without catching a botcheck to get an idea of how that'll work. Even in this early stage, it seems like it'll be quite useful.

Since no one else is commenting, I'll go ahead and note two things:

1. A botcheck kicks back to the standard screen to answer the check and returns to the mobile version after it's successfully answered.

2. This early build doesn't have a notice for all members of the fightlist being unconscious. Instead, it shows this that you successfully defeated the target after zero rounds of combat.

Does anyone who plays on a phone care to comment?

works good for me on my android but if i zoom in to make the link large enough to easily click on, it goes back to the default size after each fight. haven't gotten a bot check as of yet though.

it did seem to make for some extremely fast fighting though! ; )

I tried it on my iPhone and when my list is comatose instead of it saying "Fight <character's name>" it simply says "Fight".

Another thing that would be nice to add is a buy BA link. Overall though it is very nice for a "prototype".

Newlin, you're right that the text drops to just "Fight", but if you click it again, it'll pull up showing that you won a fight in zero rounds. It's benign, though.

Yeah, I didn't do anything special to handle anything but the most basic fighting. Then I added the thing that generates a link with your highest scored opponent that's not comatose. That's about it.

I really just wanted a proof of concept. There's tons of stuff that will go wrong with it. But it's still possible to use it.

i just went through a couple 100 ba using this on my phone and it is already a vast improvement on the standard layout as is.

if the font could be doubled in size it would be awesome!

an added benefit of this is an alternate in case we ever have sidebar issues again. ; )

That or your internet at home is just slow. This is far better fighting on my dial-up connection the only problem being I can't just hit enter. I have to actually point and click :)

this actually works fine since it is full screen, it is impossible to miss it.

really i think all that is needed functionally is a larger fight link or a button that is large enough to click easily.

after using most of my ba from my phone this weekend while traveling, i was wondering if we could at least make the font larger? two to three times as big would be nice!

It's hard to do fonts on phones. The text size should be what your phone's UA has as "normal".

Kinda off topic and probably worthy of its own thread but in my humble opinion if everyone who can work on CB programming, isn't working on sexing up a truly functional tutorial, they should be.

We've got a great game but we've got to welcome our visitors with something outstanding. In the world of Internet Customer Service, it's important to remember the exit is only one mouse click away.

so could we make it a button and does the phone interface determine image size or will it be easier to control it if it was a button?

the text is tiny on my phone. much smaller than text on any other web page even.

1. So, how do I get to try this, or is it still in alpha?
2. I agree with G_Beee

ok, i did find where i could change the default text size for the built in android browser. that makes it much easier!

i would now say that from my testing this is a solid mobile fighting page that is very fast and i have had no issues so far.

OK - Problem (cheers Dude btw for your help).
It's actually easier for me to view the normal page and zoom right in than to click on the link on the fight page (even with hugeified text).
That said, it is a *heck* of a lot faster fighting from there, and if I turn my phone sideways it gets about twice as big, making it viable in my car.
Still be good to have a Clan fight option :-)

Please don't play while your driving! :P

If I zoom in I can play without taking my eyes off the road. No more dangerous than talking to a passenger (or looking in the mirror for that matter)
My CPs take a hit tho...

if you chose someone from your favs list it should be auto progressing to your other favs.

OK - here's my experience:

Text too small, unless you enlarge the default text (not good for other pages). Is this a prototype thing?

Seems to go quicker than normal - is this a function of just showing the result, or am I seeing things that aren't there?

Once I had some kind of network error mid-fight (not uncommon). Thereafter my fights ping-ponged between two screens, neither BA decreasing nor results differing. I had to come out of my browser and relaunch to get out of this. Never happened again.

Most of my Clan fights are well below my level, meaning I have to scroll down to them on my phone if I want to take them out of turn - A tad more dangerous whilst driving and not possible at all with this new system.

Overall, there's not really a lot of point using this at the moment - but hopefully the functionality will improve. I'm quite looking forward to the Beta!!

i guess your mileage may vary. i love it and it works great for me. i only have people i want to fight in my favs though so all i have to do is keep clicking the link until ba is gone unless i get some bot checks along the way.

so vc, how exactly do you use your favs list then?

The purpose of the prototype was to see if I could deliver a different page if the user was on a phone. I did so in a rudimentary way. I then expanded that to be a separate template page that gets parsed instead of the usual fight page.

None of this has anything to do with the actual content of the mobile version itself. It's just to see whether or not it's even feasible to HAVE a mobile version.

NS: Yes, I realise - that's why I said
But feedback is good, surely?

More or less the same, but as most of my clan fighting is done waaaayyyy below my level, every few BA (depending on how many CPs I have) I hit 'C' which takes me down to the highest non-comatose clan opponent. Then I hit Enter, which fights and returns me to the top of my fight list again. I can't believe I'm the only one who does this???

Not always :) But in this case, yes, I'll consider the things you say if we can have a better mobile version.

As for fighting styles... everyone fights differently.