Website
From DarkRO
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[edit] Presentation
DarkRO's website can be found at http://dark-ro.net and contains lots of valuable information about DarkRO such as installation procedures, features list, forum and more.
[edit] Website
[edit] Background
The website was first opened in July 2005 when the server went public. The address was http://dark-ro.myftp.org/darkRO at the time. The skeleton was pretty simple and the style quite unique. The layout had dark colors in general to fit the theme of the server. The website also had lots of features and a great amount of information to display regarding the server or the world of Ragnarok in general.
The Web Server was on one of Maurice's machine at the time (it was downstairs in his basement) which served as a 24/7 dedicated server. It was also on that same machine that DarkRO was running (then later DarkRO PK - but not Force[1]). With the low population, the processing power and bandwidth usage weren't real issues. But, when important patches were released, it would terribly lag in game due to the restricted upload rate.
That's when in December 20, 2005, the website was moved to a professional hosting data center. DarkRO's new web address was then (and still is): http://dark-ro.net. Although it was in a shared environment, it wasn't taking much CPU processing power and memory (at the time) which was great since we could take advantage of the huge bandwidth available (and upload rates).
[edit] New Design
Around May 2006, the daily traffic to the website was pretty huge. This was partly due to the immense success of Force which opened only a few months ago in January 2006. Therefore, the website was moved to a new dedicated server machine (at the same hosting company). Maurice took this opportunity to do a complete overhaul of the whole layout which is somewhat inspired of a Star-Wars-like theme. This layout is still used today and can be seen at http://dark-ro.net. In March 2007, a new custom Control Panel was integrated to the website which was a big improvement on the aesthetic and efficiency level when compared to the old common one (common as in downloadable and usable by other private servers too). See below for more details.
[edit] Forum
[edit] The phpBB days
The very first DarkRO forum was created before the website itself in July 2005. The free downloadable forum platform from phpBB was used at the time. The first ever account was a test account made by Maurice which was deleted not too long after. The 2nd account is today Maurice's account. Lots of people have been asking why it shows "Member No. 2" in Maurice's profile and this is the reason behind it. The forum was long just barely used with people coming and going. However, during the DarkRO PK days (starting in September 2005), it became more and more active drawing many more regulars to the forums. It's around that time that our very first Global Moderator was hired: Kelvin. GMs also obtained full moderator powers around then.
[edit] The Invision Power Board (IPB) days
The phpBB forum platform was very basic in general with a great number of simplistic features. However, it was known to have lots of security holes (recurrent issue with free software). Some important features (such as banning or deleting) were quite sloppy as well. Knowing that Maurice had in mind at the time to implement DarkRO's very own Control Panel attached to the website, it was imperative to get rid of those problematic holes. Which lead to the main reason behind the forum move to IPB 2.1.7 in November 22nd of 2006[2], after a one-time license was bought from Invision.
At first, the lack of skins was quite obvious and the forum kept a very simple colorless tone for a very long time. And in April 21st of 2007, the forum system was upgraded to 2.2.2[3] with our very own DarkRO skin as an extra which was made by a professional. Some other custom skins made from community members (originating from the forum skin event started in December 19th of 2006[4]) were also released although they were only partially completed at the time.
[edit] Control Panel
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[edit] First Control Panel
[edit] New Custom Control Panel
The second control panel, or the "new" control panel, was created and implemented on March 28th, 2007. Two months before its implementation, it was tested by the Dark-RO staff, and a handful of Dark-RO players. After two months of testing it was finally released to the public. The new control panel contained the following:
1.) More secure coding, making the CP less prone to SQL injections and other website exploits.
2.) Serial codes that are required for the more important functions. eg. password change, email, etc.
3.) Integration of the CP into the main website, to reduce phising sites.
4.) Two separate CP's one for Force and one for Pie
5.) New vacation system. Allows accounts to be "frozen" for a long period of time, so that it won't be deleted automatically after 1 month of inactivity. When in vaction mode, you cannot access your account in-game.
6.) New database on all of Dark-ROs items, monsters, and descriptions. Drop rates have been changed according to rate.
7.) As well as the new complete database pictures of all, except a few items and monsters have been added.
8.) New character features. eg. the ability to unequip everything from the CP, look into your inventory, reset character looks.
9.) Search functions, for guilds etc.
10.) The CP is mainly meant for players, staff members, such as police and GMs, do NOT have extra privileges. This way, if someone managed to get into a GMs CP, they would not be able to do much.
11.) New donated system, accessible from the CP. Full complete guide here: [http://dark-ro.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=10568
12.) Ability to manage, money between characters, marriage status, guild status, and of course basic account functions.
--Ares 22:59, 8 July 2007 (PDT)
