Updates!

I’m feeling particularly chatty tonight, so I figured I’d give some Zibings updates to those of you who still read this blog.

The Zibings Network
We are well into the rewrite now and are hoping to be testing a new version of the site towards the end of October.  Whether or not this happens will depend a lot on me, but we’re putting as much time into the project as we can afford.  It has become a very large part of the direction we’re looking to take Zibings in general, so the lot of us are doing different things to make the re-launch smooth and worthwhile.

N2 Framework
Ah yes, the framework we love to use so much we can barely spend enough time to do updates!  In a way, we’re really happy that we’ve gotten so busy using it that we haven’t been able to finish doing the v0.2 release, but in most ways we’re just annoyed.  The release is coming still, but I’m learning that setting dates for these isn’t going to be easy while we’re the only main contributors to the code.  Even so, I keep putting some hours into it each week and will hope to release Yverdon v0.2 before the end of the year.

Super Tech Help
The forums are back, and about as active as they ever were.  No real plans have been put forth JUST yet to figure out ways to draw new traffic to the boards, but a meeting is in the works for that exact thing.  I’ll be reviving my PHP tutorial, finishing it eventually, and moving on to another tutorial which I hope won’t take me 3-4 years to complete.

 

All in all, we’re busy-busy here and loving every minute of it, as usual.  I’ll be sure to let you know when things are getting closer to completion.

 

- Andy

100 Posts!

After getting back from a bike ride with my dad, I noticed that I’ve made 99 posts on my blog.  As I sit here and attempt to pretend that my legs don’t exist, I thought I’d just go over a few things that are happening in my life, with Zibings, family and anything else I can think to include.

Back In The Saddle
As I just mentioned, I’ve come back after a bike ride with my father.  All told I racked up about 18.4 extremely painful miles while Dad logged around 16.4.  The reason for the difference lies with how horribly out of shape I actually appear to be on a bike.  Within the first 2 miles of the trip, Dad lost me completely.  Oh well, it’s bound to happen when you haven’t really touched a bike in 9 years.

N2F Yverdon
After my busy day today I didn’t get to do this tonight, but tomorrow I am tentatively scheduling the debut of our RC (Release Candidate) for Yverdon v0.2.  We’re getting some new people to help with testing and are hoping to be out of RC with a new site before the end of next month.  Exciting for us!

The Zibings Network
We’ve been plugging away at a few milestones on the project as well as working on adding some new team members.  We have a designer coming on board, hopefully two new developers as well as some management switches.  All in all, we’re happy with the progress and will be even happier once we start having updates to show off to the world.

 

It’s been a pretty crazy month and it seems like months more crazy are coming up soon.  Thanks to everyone who’s been reading the blog, here’s to another 100 posts!

 

- Andy

Upcoming Zibings Activities

I’ve had a few people ask me recently what’s going on with Zibings.  The renewed interest comes at a very peculiar time, considering how much is going on behind the scenes that nobody knows about.  In order to give people a bit to go off of, I thought I’d share some things…

N2 Framework – Yverdon
Work has not stopped on Yverdon (though it’s been hindered by many other things).  At this rate, we’re hoping to have v0.2 into testing very shortly and released as soon as possible afterwards.  You can expect to see the next version sometime in March if everything stays on course from here on out.

The Zibings Network
The Zibings Network, which to most people has been dead for quite some time, is actually far from being dead.  Our initial Proof of Concept version (http://beta.zibings.net/) was a great endeavor for us as a development team, and we’re working hard to build the first legitimate version.  No specific dates in mind just yet, but we’re aiming for beginning a testing phase sometime in the next month.

Other
The reason for the delay on the previous two mentioned projects is going to be revealed within the next 3 months to early testers on ZibNet.  We’ve been putting tons of work into approaching this project in an organized manner and I know I speak for everyone at Zibings when I say that we’re excited as hell to reveal it to you.  Keep your eyes peeled here and on the main sites (www.zibings.com) as they begin to change and mature while we head towards the unveiling of our new pet project.

If you want more insight than this, you’d probably be best off joining us on IRC.  Otherwise, I’ll look forward to filling you in on more details as they come!

 

- Andy

More ZibNet Updates Coming!

We're quickly approaching our goal for initial release of ZibNet.  We'll be cutting it close depending on a few things and are intending on taking another week or two in order to do some solid security enhancements and testing...  But!  That does mean one good thing for all you beta testers.  We're going to be throwing out a few new features over the course of the next week and will be ready for major testing.  There are three big features slated to come out this week that are all comfortably on schedule.  Also, we'll be seeing our new design come out in short order as well.

Hope you all are looking forward to this as much as I am!

 

- Andy

Thanksgiving Week

I'll be spending the next week up with my family in New England.  As a result, most of the rest of the team will be taking off for the next week as well (I guess this just goes to show how much of a slave driver I really am).  We'll resume the following week and have a good solid stream of updates coming through from that point on.  Till then, Happy Thanksgiving!

 

- Andy

What A Week...End...

So what started as a small idea for a side project between z|Casey and myself has turned into one heck of a plethora of changes.  I'll go straight into the breakdown.

The Zibings Network
This was meant to be the side project.  We were going to create a new site for the Zibings Network, one that allowed us to provide a good centralized location for registering with the network, logging into the network as well as getting general information about the network.

What happened instead, was the birth of a whole slew of upgrades to the network infrastructure.  While doing the upgrades (which include things such as friends lists and private messaging), I was faced with the necessity of having to change the way ZSF worked.  And that is why, the second part of this is...

The Zibings Site Framework
Yep!  And as with the ZibNet updates, this one started out small as well.  I just needed to add one capability to one section of the framework.  In adding that functionality though, I realized that just throwing the feature in its place wouldn't do much good in the end to help the framework grow.

After a few hours, I'd completely rewritten the framework, and we now have a few bug fixes thrown in as well as a new event system (that was the feature I needed).

 

Either way, its been a lot of programming, and this forces us to do some major updates to ZTC soon as well, so keep an eye out for that.  We're flying around like little bees as usual, this time just a few more fun things are on the way for you the user.

 

- Andy

ZibNetBot: 2nd Generation

As we're working (slowly) on rebuilding ZibNetBot into it's second generation version, I thought it'd be fun to give everyone a chance to come up with a new name for the bot.  The quick and dirty is this:

The person who comes up with the name that we use for ZNB will receive $25 from me personally.

That's about it now that I think about it, so start emailing me those names or message me on IRC (irc.zibings.net #Zibings.com) at z|Andrew or z|Andy.  I'll do my best to keep track of things and announce a winner in 2-3 weeks.

Also, at this point, the best names currently are 'Bot', 'z|Bings' and 'Ace', but I think most of you can do better than that.  :p

 

- Andy

Quite A Few Updates

Alright, so its been -quite- a long time since we've last spoken.  I won't apologize for it as the reason I've been so flaky with this blog is due to my excessive amounts of work towards adding features for little old you.

ZibTech Computers
A ton of work has gone into the ZTC web site, there's more details on that if you go to my news post.  What it comes down to, is that we've finally finished the inventory system and its in testing phases.  Once it leaves that, we'll be putting together things like our product listing and configuration.  Very exciting stuff!

Zibings Network
The Zibings Network updates really come in the form of two things.  First and foremost, we've sorted out a ton of bugs in the connection code and are now testing it on the ZTC site.  So far, its been running almost flawlessly, so we're happy.  Secondly, we've begun recoding ZibNetBot, which you all know and love.  He'll be redone in PHP and run as a Windows Service on our dedicated server, and from what we've done so far I can honestly say I'm looking forward to getting it done and seeing him in action.

Zibings Technologies
With the addition of someone to the Zibings Incorporated team, some new life has been breathed into Zibings Technologies, or as it was once named...Zibings.com Web Services.  I won't go into too much detail, as that would be giving away juicy secrets, but I will say that we're working on something useful for ourselves and for the company.  All of it is aimed at bringing something to life that should've been alive for years.

Epoch Gaming
Ahh, Epoch Gaming, my favorite little thing to forget about, how I do love thee!  For once, Epoch has taken a large step forward on a few fronts.  The web site has been resurrected and is being tweaked to work with the current version of ZSF.  Also, we're preparing to plug in the ZibNet connection code so that it works properly with the network.  Add onto that the fact that we've begun having development meetings for Forgotten War...for once I can gladly say that we haven't forgotten about good old Epoch.

Zibings Incorporated
We've recently added a new Director of Marketing.  Though his name is also Andrew, it is not the same person as me, which means the world to me.  He's already proving to be a very effective and motivated addition, so I think I speak for everyone when I say that his joining us is a welcome event.

 

That's about it for now.  I'm still out campaigning of sorts for Ron Paul, but its been hard to get much done with all the work being done on Zibings.  I'll make another entry when I can, and maybe someday I'll be caught up enough that I can fulfill my dream of blogging on a daily basis.  Until then...take it easy!

 

Andy

IRC Downtime, Part Deux

It appears as though our provider has resolved all of the issues and our network is back at full strength.  Employees can resume connecting to all hubs and/or servers, as can any of you chatty natties out there.  Thanks for your patience!

 

Andy

IRC Downtime

We're not really sure what's happened just yet, but we all know the effect.  Our network's main hub is down and most of the rest of the servers are floating off in their own little world.  All staff members should temporarily connect to elmau.zibings.net through the regular ports.  I'll post more once we hear back from the provider about the issues, sorry for the inconvenience.

 

Andy

Return Of An Old Friend

Well not really, but when you have as little of a life as I do, it certainly feels like something so intangible as an IRC bot is an old friend.

After a long and painful absence, I've finally taken a few hours and patched together our friend ZibNetBot so that he can come keep track of how chatty we are.  I'll soon be adding an MSN search option, WhatPulse stat viewer, trivia game and quote database to him, but I can only do so much in one night.  Stop on by and give him a scratch behind the ears, he does so love that...

 

Andy

Into The Future

For those few of you who've been watching my blog, you'll no doubt have noticed a recent lack in posting.  I haven't disappeared or given up on my blog, quite to the contrary in fact.  I'm considering moving away from blogger in the near future, but for now I'll just be moving the blog to being a part of a greater site for myself.

The site will serve to outline a few of my personal interests as well as be a bit of a portfolio for myself and some of my friends.  I'll still have a blog, and for the time being at least it'll still be based with Blogger, but the eventual idea would be to move over to a new system based on my Zibings Network.  It'll be quite an undertaking, but therefore fun for me and hopefully fun for you.  I'll keep you updated when I start making progress with it!

- Andy

PS - For those of you waiting for my post about my vacation, I'll be waiting a bit longer to do it.  I want to see if I can shoot off an quick version of a new site with it in it as opposed to just making some kind of strange blog post with pictures riddled throughout it.  If it will take too long, I'll just post them on here, no worries!

PSS - I also intend on revisiting my PHP tutorial on STH soon, but have to finish a few other projects within the company before that's really possible.

ZibNet IRC Services: The Unffofical Guide

For those of you who have just joined the Zibings Network's new IRC servers, I wanted to put together a 'quick start' guide for you regarding the services that are available to you on the network. Enjoy!


Glossary
IRC - Internet Relay Chat, this is the type of server that you connect to

Services - These are the things we're about to go over, they are mostly bots that help regulate the users and channels on our IRC network

Nick/Nickname - Your nick or nickname is what everyone sees you talking as (for instance, you will always see me as z|Andrew or z|Andy)

Channel - Channels are 'public' areas where multiple people can chat at the same time, often referred to as 'chatrooms' as well

Hostname/IP - Whenever you connect to something on the internet, you are known by your hostname and IP, they are controlled by your Internet Service Provider (ISP)


Available Services
NickServ - This service helps to protect nicknames so that other people can't use yours, also helps you get access levels in channels

ChanServ - This service will protect and reserve your access in channels, only works if your nickname is registered with NickServ

MemoServ - This service allows you to send/receive messages to other people who's nicknames are registered with NickServ

HostServ - This service allows you to create a 'virtual hostname' to go along with your registered nickname


NickServ
NickServ is one of the most useful (and important) services that is offered on ZibNetIRC. NickServ will hold your nickname for you so that nobody else uses it, allow you to register and hold access on channels with ChanServ, allow you to get a fake hostname through HostServ as well as send and receive messages using MemoServ.

In order to get started with NickServ, you must register. Assuming you are using a nickname that nobody else is using, lets pretend that your email address is bob@email.com and that your favorite password is ILuvm0m. With this information, here is how you would register your nickname (which by the way is El33tJimBob):

   /msg NickServ register ILuvm0m bob@email.com

You will receive a message like this from NickServ:

-NickServ- A passcode has been sent to amale@zibtech.com, please type /msg NickServ confirm to complete registration

When you receive the email with the passcode (make sure you check your junk mail folder), do just as the message says:

   /msg NickServ confirm ZTDsBUrlD

Upon sending this to NickServ, you receive two more lines from NickServ:

-NickServ- Nickname El33tJimBob registered under your account: *HOSTNAME*
-NickServ- Your password is ILuvm0m - remember this for later use.

Where it says *HOSTNAME*, you'll see something different, it is the actual hostname that you are currently connected with. Now your nickname is all ready to be used for all of the other services I listed.

Now, whenever someone connects to the network with your nickname (including yourself), they will be immediately prompted with these messages:

-NickServ- This nickname is registered and protected. If it is your
-NickServ- nick, type /msg NickServ IDENTIFY password. Otherwise,
-NickServ- please choose a different nick.

Since you know your own password, we do what the instructions say:

   /msg NickServ identify ILuvm0m

And NickServ thanks us:

-NickServ- Password accepted - you are now recognized.

Another thing to note, is that there are a few other commands you can use with NickServ. For a full list, type "/msg NickServ help" and it will walk you through the process of reading up on commands. Here are a few commands I found particularly useful:

/msg NickServ group El33tJimBob ILuvm0m - This command allows you to group another nickname with El33tJimBob. This is particularly useful if you have a few different nicks that you like using and access on a few channels with ChanServ since it will make the access from El33tJimBob apply to your other nicks JimBob and INeedARedneckWoman (once they're grouped of course)

/msg NickServ ghost El33tJimBob ILuvm0m - You can use this command to disconnect another person using your nick or if you disconnect and come back to see your old self still connected, this will kill that person's connection allowing you to retake your nick

/msg NickServ sendpass El33tJimBob - If you should ever forget your password, using this command can send it to the email address you used to register the nickname with


HostServ
We'll go over HostServ next as it is something to do quickly after you register your nickname. Now that we've registered El33tJimBob, we'd like to use the hostname i@m.a.hillbilly.and.proud whenever we're using the network. If you're wondering why you'd want to do this, put simply it is safer for you to have a fake one so that other users can't try and determine where you are connecting from. This keeps you safe from flood attacks and even to an extent hacking.

Now that we've chosen which hostname we want, we will need to request it:

   /msg HostServ request i@m.a.hillbilly.and.proud

Upon sending this, the request is entered into the system for the network administrators to approve. HostServ just says this:

-HostServ- Your vHost has been requested

I like my explanation better, but HostServ and I...we don't always get along. At this point, you should go to #Zibings.com or #Help and request that someone approve your virtual host. When they have done so, send this command:

   /msg HostServ on

And HostServ will turn your vhost on:

-HostServ- Your vhost of i@m.a.hillbilly.and.proud is now activated.

Now whenever someone does a /whois on you, they will see this:

El33tJimBob is i@m.a.hillbilly.and.proud * Jimmy Dean

It can be fun to play with these and will keep you a little safer on the network, make sure you do this as soon as you register your nickname (though you don't have to).


MemoServ
Lets say you (El33tJimBob) want to send a message to your good and great friend z|Andy, just letting him know how great of a guy he is for writing up this nice user guide. Not a problem usually since z|Andy is always online, but upon looking for him in his channels, you see he actually isn't here! Whatever will you do!?

MemoServ to the rescue. You can send a message to z|Andy by using the following command:

   /msg MemoServ send z|Andy You are the greatest, have a cookie!

To which MemoServ will reply:

-MemoServ- Memo sent to z|Andy.

When z|Andy logs back on, he'll receive something similar to this, just like you would if he was sending a message back to you:

-MemoServ- You have a new memo from El33tJimBob.
-MemoServ- Type /msg MemoServ READ 1 to read it.

Whenever he types that command, he'll see this:

-MemoServ- Memo 1 from El33tJimBob (May 15 12:09:54 2007 CDT). To delete, type: /msg MemoServ DEL 1
-MemoServ- You are the greatest, have a cookie!

He can reply with the SEND command, or just begin talking to you in the channels or a private message. The DEL command will remove the message. Some other useful commands from MemoServ..

/msg MemoServ send #Zibings.com You Guys Rock! - This would send a memo to the entire channel #Zibings.com

/msg MemoServ cancel z|Andy - This cancels the last memo sent to the nickname z|Andy

/msg MemoServ list - Lists all of your memos

/msg MemoServ check z|Andy - Check whether or not a memo you sent to a nick was read (doesn't work with channels)


ChanServ
Channels can be great fun. When you start your own channel, you can bring all of your friends to chat there, and when they're naughty, you can kick them, keep them from talking, just torture them really.

You decide (as El33tJimBob still of course) to create a channel called #HardC0reHillBilly. The first step to creating a channel, is to simply join it:

   /join #Hardc0reHillbilly

A new window should show up inside your IRC client with the name #Hardc0reHillbilly on it. Make sure that you have @ status in the channel, otherwise ChanServ won't let you register the channel. We want to have a channel founder password of H1llB1lly and will describe the channel as "The only channel if your neck is red and your britches are low", so let's register the channel with ChanServ!

   /msg ChanServ register #Hardc0reHillbilly H1llB1lly The only channel if your neck is red and your britches are low

ChanServ politely responds by doing a few things:

-ChanServ- Channel #Hardc0reHillbilly registered under your nickname: El33tJimBob
-ChanServ- Your channel password is H1llB1lly - remember it for later use.
* ChanServ sets mode: +ntr
* ChanServ sets mode: +q El33tJimBob

Where you see 'ChanServ sets mode:...', ChanServ is setting up the channel so that it is protected, and then protecting you inside of the channel. Congratulations, you've registered your channel! Now we'll need to setup some other people with access to the channel.

To explain this quickly, everytime you join the channel and have identified with NickServ to the nickname El33tJimBob, ChanServ will always protect you in the channel with the '+q' mode. You can give other people access so that similar things are done. Lets say we want to add z|Andy as an '@' in the channel. You would do so by entering the following command:

   /msg ChanServ access #Hardc0reHillbilly add z|Andy 5

The access command has many options and is pretty in depth, so it best to send a "/msg ChanServ help access" in order to learn about it properly. The command that we sent above would give us the following reply from ChanServ:

-ChanServ- z|Andy added to #Hardc0reHillbilly access list at level 5.

And then eventually when z|Andy joined the channel, you would see this:

* Joins: z|Andy (amale@zibings.com)
* ChanServ sets mode: +o z|Andy

As you can see, it automatically gave z|Andy the '+o' (aka '@') whenever he joined the channel. Access levels can be fiddled with, but if you do the "/msg ChanServ help access" command you'll be able to learn all about that.


Summary
To conclude this before you become extremely overloaded with information, I'll remind you that every single service I've shown you has help files already available on the network. To see all of them, simply type this command:

   /msg HelpServ help

It will give you a list of all the help commands you can use, and from there you may learn more in-depth things at your own leisure.

Thanks for reading, and I hope this has been helpful!

- Andy

Hiccup!

Its been far too long since my last update, but we've just been -that- busy with everything at Zibings Incorporated! I've been flying around updating things with the release of our first beta for the Zibings Network, not to mention the server work we've been doing.

Server Migration
That of course calls into question the server migration that never happened. We ended up waiting for far too long to get the server from the new provider, so we cut our losses and put the money into upgrading our current server. As a result there wasn't any downtime, though we are planning on adding another server again in the near future, I'll of course keep you posted.

ZTC Site Beta
Then there was ZTC, which has been another source of my busy-ness as of late. The inventory system is going much faster than I thought it would and will be into the testing phase soon with staff members. After we work out some kinks, we'll be piecing together some of the configurators using the 'live' inventory, so we'll need you all to go build fake computers using the site. Again I'll keep you posted when there's more information regarding the site.

Zibings.com
Along with the release of the first beta for ZibNet, we are trying to fly through and do minor skin and security updates on all of our sites. The first one in line for this was www.zibings.com and it is well into its makeover, hoping to be finished with it completely before the new week begins on Monday.

Zibings Network
As I said earlier, we're all buzzing about our 'Beta 1' release of the Zibings Network. What is the Zibings Network? The basic idea is to create a network of services/sites that will work together with unified logins and profiles so that you can organize yourself, collaborate with others, socialize, etc without having to keep track of 30 different websites and their respective logins. We're excited about it obviously, and we already have both ZTC and Epoch working off of the unified login system. We're working on creating a few more ways to integrate with the system so that we can continue adding new sites without needing months of modification/development, but its a work in progress (and is a beta after all).

ZibNet IRC
I felt this update deserved its own section, though it really belongs underneath the above 'Zibings Network' section since that's what it is part of. We have put the finishing touches on our IRC network for now, and you are invited to come join, bring your friends and chat to your heart's content. The easiest way of connecting is to use our IRC Connection Form and join up using the web-applet. However, should you be one of those IRC experts, you can connect using your favorite client to:

Normal: irc.zibings.net:6667
SSL Enabled: irc.zibings.net:+6670

Epoch Gaming
Haven't gotten to do an update on this bugger for a while, but we are happy to announce the return of Chris Butcher to the development team for Epoch Gaming. He will be in charge of system development for the site. Chris is very dedicated to the completion and ultimate success of Epoch, so I'm very excited to see his contributions.

That's all I have for now, I had thought of another post I'd wanted to put up a while ago and just haven't had time to type up, so maybe tomorrow I'll throw that up. Thanks for reading!

- Andy

Server Migration

Over the next few days, Keith and I will be working hard on migrating the systems over to a new server. The move should be relatively quick and painless, but as always there is the chance for hiccups along the way.

This move will affect all hosted services for up to 48 hours depending on the frequency with which your DNS resolvers update their cache (we use OpenDNS for our computers). There will be no data loss for any services, including webmail, ftp, databases and file structure.

We will also be taking this opportunity to widdle away some more at our inactive hosting accounts. We will still have backups of all inactive accounts for the next 4 months, but after that point we will erase all memory of them from the server.

The new server is running a Core 2 Duo E6700 (2.66Ghz with 4MB L2 Cache), 2GB of RAM, a 400GB hard drive, and is sitting on premier Savvis pipes in Atlanta. The new server will be faster, more secure, and just generally easier for everyone to use.

I'll post again after the migration is completed, wish us luck!

- Andy