RobotMonkeyHead

My memory of first meeting Алескей was when I was trying to code Wario's in-game-moves-list.  I asked for help with the superpause state controller in the support section, and he was right there with super concise, in depth answers to everything.  Very polite and to the point.  No bs.

He's not that social, and I can relate.  But he's super insightful, very well thought out and articulate.  Always the voice of reason, and any time he was needed, he was right on time.  Like freakin Batman.  There were 2 times the forum was hacked, and he had it repaired before I even knew anything happened.  Amateurs by his lights.  He was great like that.  

He showed me a side project he was workin about a year ago. He'd made a pokeball mod for this first person dinosaur related game I can't remember the name of right now.  Really cool tho, funny too, it was an otherwise pretty serious game.  But there you had a pokeball vending machine, and functional pokeballs that could capture in world pokemon that you'd run across every once in a while.

 

ertgertgwetbwrtb

1 )   STARTING AN EMBASSY THREAD FOR A MUGEN SITE
Know a Mugen related website, Facebook page, Instagram, Twitter etc account?  If you'd like a place to discuss it on MFFA, feel free to start a topic here.   If it's your own site, you can update us when you add new features, are having issues or concerns, or are just wondering what people generally think about it.

2 )   TREAT VISITING MODS LIKE MFFA MODS HERE
Please treat all visiting moderators with the same respect your treat the site's staff.  Where they may not have mod powers here, our mods will treat offenses to them the same way they would offenses to MFFA's mods.

3 )   GENERAL DISCUSSIONS
Please keep discourse civil, the point of the Embassies forum is to promote the health of the overall community.  That doesn't mean you can't express criticism here, just refrain from general random attacks that have no real point.  Treat the forum with the same respect that you treat any individual here with.

IKEMEN DISCORD DISCUSSION

   This thread is for keeping up with the Ikemen Discord server's presence in the Mugen community.  Anyone is welcome to the discussion, especially admins and moderators from I.D.  The goal is to contribute to the overall health of the community, so please keep discourse civil.  That doesn't mean you can't express criticism here, just try to refrain from general attacks that have no real purpose.  Keep the guidelines in mind, and treat any visiting staff from other forums with the same respect you treat our staff.

MUGEN DATABASE DISCUSSION

   This thread is for keeping up with the Mugen Database's presence in the Mugen community.  Anyone is welcome to the discussion, especially admins and moderators from M.D.  The goal is to contribute to the overall health of the community, so please keep discourse civil.  That doesn't mean you can't express criticism here, just try to refrain from general attacks that have no real purpose.  Keep the guidelines in mind, and treat any visiting staff from other forums with the same respect you treat our staff.

MUGEN ARCHIVE DISCUSSION

   This thread is for keeping up with the Mugen Archive's presence in the Mugen community.  Anyone is welcome to the discussion, especially admins and moderators from M.A.  The goal is to contribute to the overall health of the community, so please keep discourse civil.  That doesn't mean you can't express criticism here, just try to refrain from general attacks that have no real purpose.  Keep the guidelines in mind, and treat any visiting staff from other forums with the same respect you treat our staff.

MUGEN FIGHTERS GUILD DISCUSSION

   This thread is for keeping up with the Mugen Fighters Guild's presence in the Mugen community.  Anyone is welcome to the discussion, especially admins and moderators from M.F.G.  The goal is to contribute to the overall health of the community, so please keep discourse civil.  That doesn't mean you can't express criticism here, just try to refrain from general attacks that have no real purpose.  Keep the guidelines in mind, and treat any visiting staff from other forums with the same respect you treat our staff.

Yea that's what I thought too, but same here, links workin fine for me as well.

Guest, I'm going to give this ticket 3 more days, and close it, given that the link seems to be working. 

If you're still having problems, please provide a link before the weekend. 

If you can provide a link to the thread you're talking about, I'll scan some older database backups and see if I have a copy.
It's possible that the author either deleted it or merged it with a larger thread.

~ THE RULES ~

1 ticket at a time ~  Each person is allowed 1 ticket at a time.  Please don't open multiple tickets at once.

1 ticket per issue ~ If the issue does not end the way you hoped it would, don't reopen the same issue again.

Stick to your own ticket ~ Please do not comment on other people's tickets, no matter how tempting it may be.


Failure to uphold these rules may result in Warning Points being given,
or in the case of Guests, IP bans may be issued for repeat offenses. 

~ Reminder to Staff ~
Please remember to lock completed tickets to
prevent any possible commenting by guests.

Hey there, nice to see you!

Hot damn @CoolAnimeHustler that's a lot of suggestions.  
I must say, it warms my little monkey heart to see all these un-ranked megalithic talents up for promotions :)

After some consideration by staff the following people have been approved for Creator:
@Ultra Fatality

@Dj Luke
@DS12 Productions
@ELECTRO
@NEON 7
@★Tsukasa_Mike★
@Betalille

@RMaster007
@deathlazer

Congrats gents, welcome to the ranks!  You're now all officially Creators!
Prepare yourselves to fend off requests to make every favorite obscure character out there :)

Not (yet) approved for Creator rank .
Deoxgigas
Wolf_Stak
Wild Ram
Strong FS

These guys all show great potential, but they haven't been around long enough, or created enough content.  ...or released it here at least.
If any of you 4 are reading this, Excellent work so far.  Keep it up and you'll have your creator rank in no time.

Also it is ok to nominate yourself for a rank, if you think you've earned it.  You'll be reviewed same as anyone else.  
Anyway, thanks again CoolAni for bringing some unsung talent to light!

Nope Man
Well Formed Argument Man
Gas Powered Crack Bong Man
WTF Woman
Dumb Ass on YouTube Man
Cussing Voice Box Man

 

On 5/9/2016 at 6:01 AM, OxyontheWolf said:

Kimmy Gibler Turd-Salad Man

~ FOURTH PRESENT UNWRAPPED! FINALLY! ~
LIVE GAMING LOUNGE IS LIVE! 

I know the suspense was unbearable, but alas... the mystery of the 4th and final present has been revealed.  The Live Gaming Lounge has gotten a complete rebuild and now has chat, voice chat, popout jitsu, a live widget on the timeline, a stream calendar widget that notifies up to a week in advance, the ability for everyone who participates to help grow one another's channels, and a complete set of detailed instructions for how to use everything in it.  The purpose of the LGL extends beyond mere general gaming madness however.  It's secret relevant purpose is to give members a place to demo and discuss games for potential sprite / sfx ripping for future Mugen creations.  It's also packed up and moved out of the forums and is now... I believe the proper term is stomping through the clubs.  Check it out here!

A quick note about Chatpod being returned for store credit.  A couple members pointed out that it was redundant, and they were right.  It was.  We have a Discord server for all our chatting needs, and the forums timeline displays All the activity here.  So yea, the Chatpod was basically a useless drain on server resources, and has appropriately been dropped.  Why did I do it in the first place?  I originally got the chat for (teaser alert) an update to the Ikemen Dojo and LGL.  The Dojo's development fell behind schedule (currently nearing completion), and at the last minute I realized I could make the Chatpod instead.  So it was essentially me trying to cover my own ass and come through on my promises, but it was a rushed last minute idea.  And a bad one.  Sorta like that x-mas gift you buy the night before christmas eve.  And so I apologize for the flopped gift.

Anyways, uh back to how sweet the new LGL is!  Here's some screenshots.

BEFORE


AFTER


And here's a look at the features:

Aaaand this concludes this years showering with gifts.  I know they were late as hell, please just know that it was not due to a lack of effort.  About 90% of all my free time in the last 3 months has gone into these features (and the dojo), things just did not go quite as I'd planned.  Learned: in the future to make sure these kinds of things are done before I go promising release dates.  As Ryon eloquently put it, it's valentine's month already, there's only one kind of stocking getting stuffed now.

So I hope you all enjoy the presents, put em to good use, have some fun with em, whatever makes you happy that's what they're here for!  
Cheers and happy belated as fuck holidays!

No prob, happy to help.

I get so stoked when people are interested in Ikemen.

It's not hard, the syntax is a little different, but pretty much the same difficulty as making one in Mugen.  
Here's a nice tutorial by Electro on MFG with an example and video.
http://mugenguild.com/forum/topics/ikemen-screenpack-tutorial-162227.0.html

@IDGCaptainRussia Yes seriously.

@Ryon  For sure.  I kinda isolated a bit for a minute there, really, dealing with that double post bug.  Every time I would go to go on the forum, I just felt guilty.  Like my job is to fix and prevent that kind of stuff, so instead I would just go on youtube and watch db management tutorials, read articles, and try to figure out how to fix the thing.  But now that that's done, I'm starting to peek out of the cave again, and it's great to see a particular strange familiar face.  
 

Dude Aлескей is fucking godlike when it comes to this shit.  Totally the hero in this story.  And the database bs like 6 months ago.

Speaking of good chums, I gotta say it to its great to see you.  It's been a minute lol, I missed ya!
 

~ THIRD PRESENT UNWRAPPED! ~
CHAT POD IS UNLEASHED!

Ladies and gentlemen, we now have chat.  Live chat, in a little un-intrusive window that's accessible just about everywhere on the forum.  And not only can you chat about your grandmothers hugs, but it handles picture embedding, let's you spice up your noise with your favorite onion head emojis, member tagging (just click their name), lets you turn sound notifications on and off, aaaaand keeps you up-to-date by auto-posting links to all forum activity.  Links that open in new tabs, so they don't fuck with your scroll flow. This nifty little doohicky does it all.  So, let the babble begin!!!  Happy Hanukkah and Kwanza to those who celebrate!  And happy un-hacked now to everyone at MFFA!!!  Uber special thanks to Aлескей for that one :)


Here's where you find it.  Just click the little tab, and it'll pop out.                                           And here's what it looks like.  Oh yes.                          
                                        

(You must have at least 3 posts before you're allowed to chat, in order prevent spam)
One more to go....

lol they're being opened over the course of this week.  
I originally wanted to do them all on the 1st, but I didn't have the time to get all of it together, due to the malware issue, and general holiday chaos on my end.
Oh life.   But anyway....

~ SECOND PRESENT UNWRAPPED! ~
TIMELINE FEATURE REVAMPED

Once upon a time, we had a "What's New?" button on the top nav bar that brought you
to this, how do I put it, "difficult to look at" activity stream.


But now we have a snazzy new "Timeline" button, which brings you to this shiny new 
updated timeline, which I've done up in the theme of other social media sites like twitter and ye ol' fb.

Lots of styling work went into this, pulling back certain text, pushing other text forward to make things easier to read,
easier to pick out what people are actually saying, and who was saying it.  The comments on posts got re-styled to get rid

of that vertical line on the left, round out the edges, and space them properly from the sides.   The discord widget was
completely fuckin overhauled,  and so was the user block widget.  I also converted the popular topics list into a scrolling
top 100 topics, and overall the sidebar might undergo some small changes over the next couple weeks / month as it gets
settled in.  The embeds got some attention, the nav bar and rss buttons got it too.  The top area, custom stream
menu (in the pic where it says "Posts by Members I follow") got completely redone.  but...

The pièce de résistance in this feature is the "What's on your mind?" button up top.  It let's users add a new status update
in the spirit of twitter-book, which rounds out the whole "timeline" theme.

Aaaaaand there you have it.  We now have a social media stream on MFFA  lol have fun, enjoy!  Put it to good use!  
Share shit, drop some fucked up memes on me!

Happy Christmas, Newtonmas,  Quaid-e-Azam's Day,  Koliada,  Pancha Ganapati and Decemberween!!!!!!


(....aaand a little teaser.  We, uh, "might" be voting on some new reaction emoticons to go with it soon, member submissions welcome :)

Finished up the story in the first post.

And yea pretty much. 

Sitelock is like "Level 40 bork-storm!" 
          Forum paralyzed, and attempts to deal 300 damage to RMH

Алескей is like "Level 50 unbork!"
          Forum wakes up, and RMH takes no damage

Now we talk and try to figure out if that bork storm really did come from Sitelock, or if there could be someone else nearby. 
         

What the hell just happened?

A sunny christmas afternoon, family stuff is all done with, holiday noise is finally dying down, and me and my gf come home to our apartment.  Great, time to release the 2nd x-mas present to the forum, awesome.  So I sit down at my desk, go to log into the site, and... "Site Unavailable Contact Bluehost or, If You're The Site's Owner, Click Here for Details." ...  Fuck.  So I click.  "Site is temporarily locked due to Malware / Viruses.  Please contact Bluehost."  Motherfuckers.  On christmas no less.

Enter Bluehost chat support.  Basically goes like this:

Me:  "It seems our site is flagged for Malware, what happened?"

BH:  "We recommend using our trusted partner Sitelock to fix it! 
They'll scan all your files and remove all viruses!"

~That quick.  No questions, nothing.  Just pay Sitelock ~
 
Me:  Do you have the list of infected files and the IP addresses that have accessed those files?

BH:  No we do not have The IP addresses that have accessed the file, but here's a list of the infected files.

~ At this point I begin download a back up of all the sites files from 3 days before ~ 

Me:  Why can't I just replace the corrupted files with backups from a few days before, when we weren't infected?

BH:  We do not allow file restores on locked sites.

~ First off, what is that feature for, if not this?  None the less, somehow, the files are downloading, and I still have FTP (back door) access... ~

Me:  Ok I'll take a look, see what I can do, and if I do pay somebody it's going to be someone I trust that is not affiliated with bluehost.

End of chat session 1

So seeing as how the backup files seem to be downloading just fine, I make the announcement on Discord, that the fix should only take a few hours.  Finish downloading, and then upload the clean files to replace the old ones.  I have the list of broken files so it should be easy enough.  Then the download times out.  Yea... our site is pretty freakin huge, especially considering that we do host the work of a few special creators.  And so there goes the easy fix.  Now it looks like I'm actually going to have to pay somebody to do this, because manually removing malware from files is beyond my abilities. 



Google.  Within minutes, I'm finding articles upon blogposts of people having similar things happen to them through a variety of hosts.  Apparently Sitelock is coupled with a ton of major hosting companies, and a ton of people have written articles about their site being basically held hostage by Sitelock who then demands an enormous amount of money to clean the site, and then even more for a yearly security package.  "Shit, are we mid-scam right now?" I start thinking to myself.  Either way, scam or not, I'm going to have to pay somebody to fix this, and there is no way in hell I'm pressing charges or pursuing this at all if it IS Sitelock, so it doesn't really matter.  Outcomes the same.  But I did find this one guy who wrote a ton of blog posts detailing Sitelocks misadventures, and he does the fix for pretty cheap. 



So I contact chat support again, to ask what Sitelock charges.  Sales pitch for the monthly fees begins before the question is answered.  I tell them I don't trust Sitelock and that this whole thing smells wrong, and that there is a zero percent chance that I'm paying monthly fees.  I just want the thing fixed as quickly as possible.  That's all.  $300 for a 1 time fix is their going rate.  And more than that per year for ongoing "protection".  ...take a second to think about this.  Considering the fact that most people are just going to fold and pay this, how much money... anyway Nope.  The guy that writes about how messed up Sitelock's behavior is, charges half that.



Aaaand so I contact that guy.  White Fir Designs.  He's ready to go, says he can have it done in a few hours.  I also contacted this site, who never got back to me.  So I post another announcement on Discord updating everyone, and then I talked with Aлескей.  I figured if I'm going to pay someone to do this, HE's getting dibs on the job before anyone else, if he wants it.  (Granted this could be incredibly difficult, requiring great skill and well worth compensation.  And I'm prepared to pay someone anyway, so truth be told I should pay him if he's going to do it.)

So he decides to take a look at it, and see if it's something he can do.  I tell the White Fur guy that one of our staff's administrators is currently taking a look at it, but to please be prepared.  If he can't fix it, we need it done quickly.  He's ready to go, says it usually only takes him a couple hours.  Great.  I post another announcement on Discord saying Aлескей is giving it a shot, and if he can't do it, we got someone else lined up.

I come home from work last night at fuck all o'clock in the morning, -3 degrees outside, and... what's this? Hell to the Mutherfucking Yes!  Aлескей says the files should be good to go.  I immediately get on Bluehost's chat support, and have them scan the site.  And they come back with "The files are still infected.  We're generating another malware.txt file in your root directory with the details. ....shit.   I open up that file, and check this noise out:

Quote

Warning:  Files may have false positives.  Please review each file to make sure each file actually contains malware.  Please note that we are not a security company  The Content listed below may not be a complete list of malicious content on your account.  This is just what we have found that appears malicious.  These files appear to contain malicious code.  You will want to review the files and remove the injected code from important files and/or remove unused or invalid files.
RUNNING SCAN

Yea.

...saga will be continued soon in this post...
going out to dinner and movie with gf, (new star wars, finally!)
Anyway, to be continued...

Enter Bluehost chat support, act 3.  I go back to Bluehost chat support, and tell them we had a professional coder clean the files, and also again that I don't trust sitelock.  I posted the content of the malware.txt file in the chat and asked: 

"We are not a security company" "Files may contain false positives" "these files appear to contain maiclious code" "You are ultimately responsible for all of your content". So if we're responsible for all of our content, some of which may or may not contain malicious code according to the guess of Not a security company, then what the hell is our site actually locked for?

"I'm sorry for the inconvenience. We'll scan the files." lol ok great.  I leave for work.  Come home and the site is back up... Ok, sweet!  But, nothing changed since the last time except I used the words "cleaned by professional coder" and "I don't trust sitelock".  And magically we passed their test.  Abra-ca-friggin-dabra?  So their first rescan wasn't done or done improperly  ...perhaps they scanned a cached or older version of the files or somehow?  I don't know.  But Aлескей fix worked, and we're back up and running, and that's what matters most.

I couldn't help but bother Aлескей at work to let him know his fixes fixed the site, and that we were back!  Joy!  Christmas is... srved.  And as awesome as he is, no charge, fix was easy enough.  Thank you kind sir.  Saved the day, and quick and free!  Aaaand we are back on our feet!  And life on the forum can resume as usual.  

Wherever that hack came from... idk.  Keep it mind that it very well could've been legit.  This narrative is just what I went through trying to deal with it over the last couple days without much time to process, between work and x-mas.  Although I am clearly not alone in my suspicions, they could still be misguided none the less.  But all the passwords have been changed, and me and  Aлескей are going to discuss it further soon, and see if we need to change any of our security measures.

 Soooo happy mugening guys!  Sorry x-mas didn't turn out to be quite as fun as we'd planned.  
We'll just unwrap all the presents on new-years instead :)

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