Defenses in vCore are changing. I've already noted the primary blocker will be URL based rather than domain-based, but domain-based won't be going away, either ( Read more... )

So today on Varus Online, I changed a few things so items now have colored names. This is an idea I've been toying with since July 2008, and today I decided to just fucking do it. I got the idea from playing World of Warcraft, where all item names are colored to indicate their significance, and it certainly does help ( Read more... )

I've been pondering this idea since I started drafting the design of the new spam defenses in vCore. Varus already offers its spam-defense data through an open and simple XML-based API. But, the transition to vCore also represents a huge upgrade in our defensive capabilities. The new defensive capabilities are more fine-grained, they operate on ( Read more... )

For quite a while now, Varus Online has had text-based logos. That is, whenever someone typed in a name like Google or GMail or even Yahoo!, it would automatically format the text to look like that particular logo, and it respected text sizes, too ( Read more... )

In one week, I plan to release vCore in a private beta. That means I have to work on it all day every day for one week. Many components have to be tweaked, but thankfully, they're all there. What's coming first? Forums and the wiki ( Read more... )

I have found a way to confuse bots so badly they can not register. Not to throw a GEICO like line or anything, but "It's so easy a web developer can do it." Seriously, it's easy ( Read more... )

One of my cohorts in the #php IRC channel has discovered a new web server. We've been using lighttpd for years, and its great and all, but ..... its not the best ( Read more... )

So, I have been asked to open source the code for my random number seed generator. So, here it is, enjoy. This code is BSD licensed, so you have the most freedom possible with it, and not have to worry about compliance requirements of the overly-restrictive GNU GPL. The license is included in the file.

/* ?pc=varus&fc=fc-all&rc=ondemand&cfs=vc ( Read more... )

Seems the damn spambots are at it again! There's been a rash of new spambots on Varus Online in the past couple weeks, seems they're abusing Google to get their free email addresses, and have advanced onto actually using the URLs from the messages Varus sends out. Oh, shit. Looks like Google needs to do something about their CAPTCHA ( Read more... )

There are changes brewing at Varus Online. We have all agreed to semi-regular staff meetings, primarily around events, but I suspect we will also have regular non-event related meetings. For the last two events (Winter 2008 and New Year's 2009) we all collaborated on them ( Read more... )