Custom 404

I just added a very easy thing, that I just haven't added before because of lazyness.

A custom 404 error message! Actually it was just a 100% blank site before today.

To have a custom 404 you only need to create a file named .htaccess in the root folder on the FTP server and then add

ErrorDocument 404 /404.html

In fact I did that many weeks ago, but today I created that 404 file that gets displayed.

Try to go here: http://the-gamevault.com/thispagedoesnotexist.html! As you can see I have a button that simply takes you one step back in history....

< input type="button" name="back" value="Take me back" onclick="window.history.go(-1);" >

easy! =)

EDIT: I just discovered that you can actually use JS directly on the page:

EDIT: Try to click on this: Edit everything on this page! this enables you of editing the whole blog! try it out, you can click on any text on the page and then edit it.


Gives some possiblities!

Code box for the blog

I just added a small css change that draws a nice codebox when needed!

.code {
background-color:#3E3E3E;
background-image:url(http://the-gamevault.com/images/code.jpg);
border:1px solid #585959;
color:black;
margin-left:5px;
overflow: auto;
padding-left: 5px;
white-space:pre;
width: 99%;
}

Actually I made this box for a friend some months ago, but it's nice than I can use it too now :)

Quick start launched!

Today I finished the quick start mode!

You can access it from the main page in the sidebar on the right side.

I think it works pretty nice now, and I am rather happy with this "Go!" button drawn in inkscape!


Technically this works by adding up a list of all possible games in a list, and then it randomly chooses a game and checks weather the rating is above 3. When a game with a decent rating is found, you will get redirected with some Javascript :)

I also thought of adding a parameter where you could choose that you only want games with a better rating than 4, but as it is now, not many games are rated... So help me rate!

Adding Quick start

I'd like to have something on the Gamevault that gives the user a different opportunity for browsing games than using a list. Therefore I introduce the quick start button!

currently you can find the test page here: http://the-gamevault.com/quick.php
So, how does it work? It's pretty simple as it is now. The script takes every checked box and find a match in the file databases. Then it adds all the "good" games up in a string and takes a random game, which I'll redirect to with some Javascript.

But I have bigger plans! Currently the game database runs on a couple of simple text files, because my old host was without mySQL databases. When I get that database converted to SQL, I'll implent the quick start system as it really should be!

It should work like a clickable matrixsystem, where you can click everywhere in this square to get a game. Also, I plan to add a rating parameter which means you should could specify that you only want games with a rating better than 4 etc. This combined with the current system with game genres should provide a nice quick start where users quickly can get what they want.

Now I just need to convert to whole database to mySQL, and I don't really know the SQL language yet...

Setting the blog up

Hey there and welcome to this blog about the-gamevault.com!

The main purpose of this blog is to write about the development and progress of the site. Therefore the activity of this blog might depend on the coding activity on the main page. Lets hope it stays high :)!