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Messages - Epicmaster [ switch to compact view ]

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1
When I said a beautiful and simple desktop RSS reader I really meant it.

Those application are ugly, cluttered and not intuitive in any way. Windows applications typically suck, I want to really craft something beautiful for windows.

If I were to use something as inspiration I would definitely take a look at the Mac leader in RSS news reader: http://reederapp.com/mac/screens

2
Hey guys,

So some of you may have heard of the recent news that Google Reader is being killed off.
Right now their are nice alternatives on the web that do their own thing, but none have the simple RSS reader features i'm looking for.

web apps like feedly, prismatic and pulse are great but Google reader was great because of its simplicity in offering nothing more then
the ability to add rss feeds easily and read news in a simple way.

I've long been looking for a simple, slick and beautiful desktop application that would act as a great RSS news reader.
Now that Google Reader is dead I think there may be more of a demand thanks to the void Google has left.

I want to participate in designing such an app with a programmer as a partner. I can design beautiful interfaces, develop nice interaction models etc. but
I don't have the time nor the skill to do the coding and back-end. I have experience in designing applications, exept I code in Java, which I doubt many of you
know desktop Java development. Anyhow if you need proof i've been posting my progress on this thread: https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=26652.0
and on the site that features the open source application i'm working on: auroragamehub.com

Anyways, I obsess over great design, but I don't have time to work on the backend, which is why I need help your help
I need someone who knows how to make a great application but needs a designers help. If anyone becomes interested I can work on some mock ups and ideas and post them here.

I want a partner who is passionate at making something cool, something beautiful, something simple and useful.

If you are a Creative Developer, want to learn or, out of need, would like to make such an RSS reader please let me know!
I for one am super willing and committed :)

3
Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: PC game launcher/organizer/frontend
« on: December 15, 2012, 03:01 PM »
We have been hard at work on Aurora and we are about to push a pretty big release.
Some of the new stuff in this release:
 - A new Name
 - A Completely revised and refreshed new skin call Onix 2
 - Lots of small and big features!

take a look:

promo_comp.png

promo2_comp.png

promo3_comp.png


We should be ready to release early January!

I'm super excited by how far we've come, we've had to make a lot of architectural changes and code cleaning/refactoring to achieve this.

The new name is because we saw it miss-represented what we wanted out of Aurora. Its more then just a manager of games, but a better experience that surrounds your games.

Hope you guys are just as excited as we are :)

4
I know its a bit late to reply to this, but maybe this low priced paid application might provide inspiration :)

Exteme Games Manager

I have not used this personally, but have used the Book/Movie/Music versions, and was very pleased with the results


If I remember correctly you can enter 50 items in the trial version

From that video, it looks terribly complicated to learn to use, and it has horrendous UI issues. But thats just my opinion, I consider my self a hardcore PC gamer, but not THAT hardcore  :D

5
Well Here it is guys, The Alpha release is Done!
Check it out, its still has lots of missing features and bugs but it can potentially do something useful, so let me know what you think!
https://sourceforge....t/projects/auroragm/  :D


6

Alpha release soon, with only the Core Library functionality implemented.


Per OP's question, how many hours has it taken you so far to get to your Pre-Alpha? And would you call this a "Coding Lunch or Coding Dinner"? (Imagine this on a scale of say 1-5, those are levels 2-3, level 4 would be a full strength big app, and 5 would be an enterprise package module.

Currently This project is an accumulation of over a year worth of work on this with my free time on and off (so I don't really know exactly how many hours)
I would say right now the scope would be a level 3, but I really want to take it to level 4 in the next iteration
alot of time was spent making the foundation of this project strong and developing an application engine that powers this application in a modular fashion.

Plus have you ever seen a Java app that looks this good?  :P

7
Get Excited...




Alpha release soon, with only the Core Library functionality implemented.

8
Developer's Corner / Re: Need Partner, Help Me Make PC Gaming Better!
« on: November 01, 2011, 05:04 PM »
It would be awesome come to think of it.  ;D

but then again, lots of things would be awesome.
If I could do all these things It would be very awesome, the only awesome all in one gaming app.
The only problem is that I am one guy, and one of the reasons I posted here was to get help.
If I do it all my self could take a year at the very least with university chasing me all around ;)

So again if anyone is interested passionate to work this awesome project, I am willing to work triple hard to make this frickin thing happen with them.  :Thmbsup:



9
I have been working on a similar project for a few months now called the Aurora Game Manager. unfortunately the core components are still in heavy development and are not activated, but Maybe someone might find the current Idea enough to give you an idea of how it will look in the end.

I am almost done the core features
-Add Game to Library (with beautiful box art)
-Remove Games from library
-Launch Games in library
-Search for games in library
-Select Favourite Game

This will be completed and seen in an alpha release

after that the following will be released in a beta release:
-Tracking (Hours Played per game, Overall Favourite Games, Last Played)
-Badges (Based on Time played, time of day, day of month ect)
-Skins (Supporting Custom Skins)



GET
Pre-Alpha : HERE

READ
Dev Diary Blog : HERE

10
Developer's Corner / Re: Need Partner, Help Me Make PC Gaming Better!
« on: October 07, 2011, 02:47 PM »
Interesting idea(s), promising that you've already got some code put down. Unfortunately I have no spare time to contribute, but I'll be watching the progress with great interest.

- Oshyan

Thanks!

I actually have a blog where I track my progress if anyone is interested, mostly to help me write down and track what I accomplish

http://auroramanager.wordpress.com/

11
Developer's Corner / Re: Need Partner, Help Me Make PC Gaming Better!
« on: October 05, 2011, 03:43 PM »
Seems like you want to just "Click and Play" without limitation of hardware...Which is already available, and ive been using the service since it launched.

www.onlive.com :)

unfortunately Onlive is not what I was talking about, Onlive is a very limited service with few supported games, however I will say the interface provided has been a slight influence to what I am thinking of.

The system I am proposing allows PC Gamers to Manage and Interact with Practically ANY game in existence, the user needs only the name of the game and should be able to access a huge amount of content available online and offline.

A game manager would be the first step towards this system, the simple ability to organize and provide a simple, vivid interface to accessing and tracking PC Games would be a great stride forward.

I know that many people will start naming alternative, but I have seen them all, and they are all
narrowly focused on a specific feature (Steam)
Very Unintuitive (Gamespy Comrade)
and ugly (Raptr, xfire)

In an effort of making things simple we need The Dashboard Interface found in Xbox 360 and PS3 combined with the power and flexibility of PC to design the Next generation PC Gaming Focused App, leverage all that content and power into one thing, one experience, just imagine how epic this could be!


12
Developer's Corner / Re: Need Partner, Help Me Make PC Gaming Better!
« on: October 05, 2011, 02:02 PM »
Just out of curiosity, would this project you're talking about be the "Aurora" thing found here and here?


Yup, I knew someone would find out eventually, I was going to mention it as people got interested, but I guess It was not too hard to find anyways  :D

13
Developer's Corner / Need Partner, Help Me Make PC Gaming Better!
« on: October 05, 2011, 12:17 AM »
So for the past year now I have been obsessed with the idea of improving PC Gaming, making it better.
I already knew in my head what needed to be done, I've just never had the time to actually write this down, so here goes:

PC gaming is awesome
its better
its faster
and stronger
than any other form of gaming out there.  :D
Yet people still get drawn to what I would consider the crappy quality of the actual in game experience of the Console.

It lead me to think, what's wrong with gaming on the PC?
Why would people compromise for
-lower graphical fidelity,
-slower frame rates
-barley any flexibility (mods, ect)
-and overall limiting hardware which essentially limits developers from making super cool games.


Well PC Gaming does have its faults, those of which are mostly non-existent on the consoles
The primary fault PC Gaming has is cost of hardware, which is a legitimate issue. The fact that PC Gamers must upgrade their PCs every year or so can be daunting.
HOWEVER, this a problem outside the reach of a university student who can only deal with software, so lets move on.

The next problem is the complexity involved in actually playing a game.
The console only requires you Insert a Disc, and voila! you can play the game instantly
no installing (unless your using the ps3)
no looking through  blogs and websites for the correct day one game patch
no looking in the AMD or Nvidia website for updated drivers
and finally no having to navigate around your messy desktop or start up menu or wherever you put your game short cuts
              ^
Most of THESE  problems can be solved through software which I will discuss later,
but we are not done because we don't want to just Solve the PC gaming (software) problems but we also want to make it BETTER

The final problem I seem to have with PC gaming which even consoles don't seem to get the hang of is the "Gamer Experience"

The Gamer Experience is just a term I made up to explain the idea that we as gamers have certain things we use and need outside of the actual game to
help us in games
allow us to socialize with other gamers
know more about different games
and finally to actually Get Games!

Each and Every Single one of these Things, these Services we use OUTSIDE of the actual game is typically a separate service
To Help Us in Games we look for -> Youtube Videos of Walkthroughs, or Websites for Cheats and such
For socializing -> We go to for example Steam Forums, Facebook, Twitter, Game Websites!  
To know about games we go to -> Read reviews at Gamespot, IGN, Metacritic, ect.
and To get the games we go to -> Steam, D2D,Impulse, (The retail store <-why would you do that?)

Each and Every single one of these services work together to make up the "Gamer Experience" of course this is a simplification but does admittedly speak for a large percentage of PC gamers.
The simple fact is, Why has this not been put together yet?
Why can't it all be ONE Experience?

Well this is what im planning on doing.
Very ambitious, I know
But, I am Willing and Passionate, and from what I have seen and experienced that's all I need.

First, lets talk about the solving of PC gaming complexity.
Complexity originates from having too may steps in too many confusing ways of performing said steps

Bringing the whole PC Gaming Experience into One App that takes care of it all would literally be a revolution
The Computer could have a PC Gaming mode and a PC working/browsing mode, the possibilities are endless!

 So, how would we go about to make this One App that does it all, well we start with the basics

PC Game Library -> a simple library allows you to add and remove games manually, but also has capability to automatically detect games.
Gamer Profile - > Gamers love to see stats: playcount, hours played, last played, genre, favourite ect.
Online Portal-> a portal to the online world, which would feature the "Gamer Experience"

These are the basic and HIGHLY simplified features of an app I am currently working on.
Its Part of a Much Much bigger Project dedicated solely to IMPROVING THE PC GAMING EXPERIENCE.

I Realize this is a fairly long post
I also realize I need to sleep

So, as much as I would Love to keep on going I will stop here for now


The point of this post is quite simply that I might need some help to get this done  :D

I need One Person, Who would do this for Passion and Pleasure, no gain (yet)
This person must Love Technology, Love PC Gaming and Love To Learn!
This is something ive been working on for the better part of a year now and know that It will some time to get things done

Im currently nearing an Alpha release of the preview App i'm working on for this project.

If you read through this whole thing than thank you very much, I sincerely appreciate you reading this, as you can't believe how much I want to make this a possibility

if you want to contact me personally, my e-mail is [email protected]

Thanks again for your time and consideration, I hope to hear from you! :)

 
EDIT:

For those interested, here are a couple links to project pages:

Behance Page for code name Project Aurora description: http://www.behance.n...roragm/frame/1258589
Sourceforge Page for Aurora Game Manager: https://sourceforge....t/projects/auroragm/
Dev Diary for Game Manager: http://auroramanager.wordpress.com/

that's it for now!


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