FIREBOLT IS BEING DESIGNED FOR HTML 5 AND CSS 3
If the site looks really, really odd, consider updating your browser (absolutely free, faster, and usually more secure). Google Chrome 12 | Firefox 4 | Internet Explorer 9 | Opera 11.11
What It Is
Enter some keywords, find some relevant Diablo class guides. Tools: Find item quality drop rates based on your total Magic Find. Discover your Chance to Block rates based on your block percentages, dexterity, and level. Calculate your FPS and casting frequency with the Cast Rate Calculator.
Why I Made It
In this day and age, Google is everything. But does Google know the semantics of a good Diablo strategy guide? Does it know the sites to look through? Even on our own Wiki, it's not always easy to find the guide you want. Even with the guides you find, how many of them are useful?
My aim with Firebolt was to address these issues with dynamic search keywords, a simple interface, and reviewed guides. You won't find everything on the web here. You won't find this. This approach hasn't changed since the site cleared version 1.0. Thousands of successful guide hits later, Firebolt can now be found at DiabloStrategy.com.
How to Use It
Like I said, Google doesn't know what sites to look through. But you do.
The guides on DiabloStrategy.com are user-submitted. Fill out some text fields, select the character, and check some keywords. Done. After that, the guide will pop up behind-the-scenes so it can be read to make sure it's a real guide. Like I said, you only want to search through guides, not every spam site on the web.
To search, type a word (a skill, phrase, or typical build archetype) that you're looking for. If it's in the database, within less than a second it will appear below the search bar. Hit enter. Keep adding as many keywords as you want. If you're familiar with Facebook's searching methods, it's basically the same thing. See here for a complete tutorial.
Where It's At
The Firebolt strategy guide search engine, now on DiabloStrategy.com, is well past its version 1.0 benchmark. This means that while new features are being added regularly, the site essentially functions as it's meant to. That said...
1. If you find strange design flaws...
2. If you encounter unexpected error messages...
3. If you have any workable ideas for site tools or functionality...
Please do not hesitate to post here with your ideas, to contact me on Windows Live Messenger (magistrate_east@hotmail.com), email (diablostrategy@gmail.com), with Skype (magistrate17), or through IRC (I'm usually loitering in DiabloFans' IRC as Magistrate.)
How You Can Help!
Use it, test it, add some guides. Tell me what you think, how it could be improved, etc. I really appreciate any and all positive/constructive feedback
This is actually really awesome, nice work Seth, :D. Should extend it to D1/D3 as well, ;).
Yeah, I definitely want to expand it for Diablo III. The main challenge I'm facign when expanding it to multiple games is keeping the search page clean while implementing more search options.
For multiple games what I'm considering is a tabbed interface with it defaulted on the most current game, so that whatever tab you're in will only search for guides for that game. It took me two weeks just to get it to where it is right now, though. My script for adding a guide is somewhere around 400 lines of validation and data insertion/retrieval.
Unless there's enough interest, I don't want to waste time adapting it for Diablo I.
Nice, my old guide shows up when I search for "werebear"
The cool thing is that if someone were, say, searching for Werebear Mauler builds, and there were Fire Claw-based ones and what-have-you builds, yours would poke up at the top because it matches more keywords (Werebear and Mauler). I'm trying to make it further index them (after number of keyword matches) by hits. A nice thing it does for build writers (and experimenters) is that it helps get their meaningful stuff out there. I'm working on ways of improving that, but it'll only really show if there's more builds.
Of course, your guide wouldn't have showed up at all if it wasn't entered, so if you find any you like (that you or someone else wrote), don't be shy about popping it in. It makes everyone happier: the writer's guide gets more views, my site gets more usage, and players become more educated.
+ Tooltips added to search (not exactly self-explanatory)
+ Pop-up kind of advert thing to direct viewers to a place to put their guides (our wiki)
+ Fixed a regex problem (preg_match()) for submitting titles. Should accept apostrophes now.
Working on:
- A submit form that doesn't look like a clusterfuck.
- A diabloy design.
- Star rating.
Pretty cool stuff actually, but the search only works if you wait for it to generate the keyword for you. So if I enter werebear and wait for the search field to pop up "werebear" it works, but not if I simply search for werebear.
Also, what happens if an url to a guide becomes outdated? There needs to be some sort of report function for that methinks. Mod support also sounds awesome, but I think you should wait with it until the vanilla d2 side is done so to speak
PlugY for Diablo II allows you to reset skills and stats, transfer items between characters in singleplayer, obtain all ladder runewords and do all Uberquests while offline. It is the only way to do all of the above. Please use it.
Supporting big shoulderpads and flashy armor since 2004.
Okay, I'm just puting the update log in the OP now. In total, Firebolt got guides across teh interwebz more than a hundred extra hits already, and it's only been like four days, lol. Thought that was cool.
True that When I was mire into these stats, gamefaqs was were it was at. Those focused guides usually have the more nuanced information that, say, wikis lacked . Things are a bit different now, though...
True that When I was mire into these stats, gamefaqs was were it was at. Those focused guides usually have the more nuanced information that, say, wikis lacked . Things are a bit different now, though...
Well that differs from game to game I'd say. Not all games have such a dedicated following as Diablo :whistling:
PlugY for Diablo II allows you to reset skills and stats, transfer items between characters in singleplayer, obtain all ladder runewords and do all Uberquests while offline. It is the only way to do all of the above. Please use it.
Supporting big shoulderpads and flashy armor since 2004.
Okay, to make results more relevant, I'm thinking of adding a little "like" or "heart" button or something, so the results will be organized like this:
1) Number of keyword matches (most will be at top)
-> 2) Number of hits
--> 3) Number of "likes" or "hearts" or w/e
Now, to do this in a way that wouldn't be abused *too* easily, and to be able to do it without requiring accounts of any kind, I'll need to log IP addresses. They're easy to get, anyway, so I don't think anyone should really care, but I am going to encrypt them, anyway.
PlugY for Diablo II allows you to reset skills and stats, transfer items between characters in singleplayer, obtain all ladder runewords and do all Uberquests while offline. It is the only way to do all of the above. Please use it.
Supporting big shoulderpads and flashy armor since 2004.
Did you follow the instructions? (Viewable by hovering over the question mark next to "Search Guides".)
Start typing a word
-> Wait about a split second
-> If the keyword is attached to any guides, it will show up below
--> Select keyword (and continue to add keywords like this, if you want)
---> Hit search
----> Profit
If the site looks really, really odd, consider updating your browser (absolutely free, faster, and usually more secure).
Google Chrome 12 | Firefox 4 | Internet Explorer 9 | Opera 11.11
LINK
What It Is
Enter some keywords, find some relevant Diablo class guides. Tools: Find item quality drop rates based on your total Magic Find. Discover your Chance to Block rates based on your block percentages, dexterity, and level. Calculate your FPS and casting frequency with the Cast Rate Calculator.
Why I Made It
In this day and age, Google is everything. But does Google know the semantics of a good Diablo strategy guide? Does it know the sites to look through? Even on our own Wiki, it's not always easy to find the guide you want. Even with the guides you find, how many of them are useful?
My aim with Firebolt was to address these issues with dynamic search keywords, a simple interface, and reviewed guides. You won't find everything on the web here. You won't find this. This approach hasn't changed since the site cleared version 1.0. Thousands of successful guide hits later, Firebolt can now be found at DiabloStrategy.com.
How to Use It
Like I said, Google doesn't know what sites to look through. But you do.
The guides on DiabloStrategy.com are user-submitted. Fill out some text fields, select the character, and check some keywords. Done. After that, the guide will pop up behind-the-scenes so it can be read to make sure it's a real guide. Like I said, you only want to search through guides, not every spam site on the web.
To search, type a word (a skill, phrase, or typical build archetype) that you're looking for. If it's in the database, within less than a second it will appear below the search bar. Hit enter. Keep adding as many keywords as you want. If you're familiar with Facebook's searching methods, it's basically the same thing. See here for a complete tutorial.
Where It's At
The Firebolt strategy guide search engine, now on DiabloStrategy.com, is well past its version 1.0 benchmark. This means that while new features are being added regularly, the site essentially functions as it's meant to. That said...
1. If you find strange design flaws...
2. If you encounter unexpected error messages...
3. If you have any workable ideas for site tools or functionality...
Please do not hesitate to post here with your ideas, to contact me on Windows Live Messenger (magistrate_east@hotmail.com), email (diablostrategy@gmail.com), with Skype (magistrate17), or through IRC (I'm usually loitering in DiabloFans' IRC as Magistrate.)
How You Can Help!
Use it, test it, add some guides. Tell me what you think, how it could be improved, etc. I really appreciate any and all positive/constructive feedback
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Yeah, I definitely want to expand it for Diablo III. The main challenge I'm facign when expanding it to multiple games is keeping the search page clean while implementing more search options.
For multiple games what I'm considering is a tabbed interface with it defaulted on the most current game, so that whatever tab you're in will only search for guides for that game. It took me two weeks just to get it to where it is right now, though. My script for adding a guide is somewhere around 400 lines of validation and data insertion/retrieval.
Unless there's enough interest, I don't want to waste time adapting it for Diablo I.
The cool thing is that if someone were, say, searching for Werebear Mauler builds, and there were Fire Claw-based ones and what-have-you builds, yours would poke up at the top because it matches more keywords (Werebear and Mauler). I'm trying to make it further index them (after number of keyword matches) by hits. A nice thing it does for build writers (and experimenters) is that it helps get their meaningful stuff out there. I'm working on ways of improving that, but it'll only really show if there's more builds.
Of course, your guide wouldn't have showed up at all if it wasn't entered, so if you find any you like (that you or someone else wrote), don't be shy about popping it in. It makes everyone happier: the writer's guide gets more views, my site gets more usage, and players become more educated.
+ Tooltips added to search (not exactly self-explanatory)
+ Pop-up kind of advert thing to direct viewers to a place to put their guides (our wiki)
+ Fixed a regex problem (preg_match()) for submitting titles. Should accept apostrophes now.
Working on:
- A submit form that doesn't look like a clusterfuck.
- A diabloy design.
- Star rating.
If there's interest...
- Diablo I support
- Mod char build support
Also, what happens if an url to a guide becomes outdated? There needs to be some sort of report function for that methinks. Mod support also sounds awesome, but I think you should wait with it until the vanilla d2 side is done so to speak
And I appreciate the wiki link
/done double-posting now.
I'm looking in to adding one for FCR and screen rate correlation.
Added Frost Zealot.
Titles should accept periods and commas.
I'll get to work on that.
1) Number of keyword matches (most will be at top)
-> 2) Number of hits
--> 3) Number of "likes" or "hearts" or w/e
Now, to do this in a way that wouldn't be abused *too* easily, and to be able to do it without requiring accounts of any kind, I'll need to log IP addresses. They're easy to get, anyway, so I don't think anyone should really care, but I am going to encrypt them, anyway.
Eh?
Having an issue with CSS when I'm making that transparent background, but ff there's any problems besides that, lmk.
"to the worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish."
1) What doesn't work?
2) What's your browser and browser version?
searcher smiter, nothing happened.
"to the worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish."
Start typing a word
-> Wait about a split second
-> If the keyword is attached to any guides, it will show up below
--> Select keyword (and continue to add keywords like this, if you want)
---> Hit search
----> Profit