Mithril Ryder wrote:I see PL is being mature as usual.
In all seriousness, this was a huge, huge (censored) of a deployment.
Any sort of new login method needs to support the following, natively, with nothing more complicated then your average eve player could be expected to figure out.
Multiple clients rapidly launched from a single install.
Multiple clients from more then one install location, while maintaining separate settings for each install path, even if an account logs in from more then one install path at different times.
Multiple clients using junction links (simlinks for you *nix dudes :) ), also maintaining separate settings for each install path, even if an account logs in from more then one install path at different times.
Any sort of cloud based settings storage *must* respect the fact that if I am logging into another machine (such as a laptop) it is possible that I want the same settings, but absolutely not the expectation. To that end, I propose the following:
The first time you log in for a given machine and install path combo, save that config info to the cloud as a non blocking background task by default.
When logging in on a new machine, where the install path is the same, don't import/use the cloud settings for that install path. If there is any local config use that, otherwise use eve defaults.
On the login screen have a checkbox "use default settings for this install from the cloud", when checked prompt the user "are you sure? existing settings will be replaced by the default cloud settings for this install path!"
On the in-game settings page, have an indication if the current client is in sync with the cloud, and if it is currently set as the default. Have a button to save the settings from that client as the default for that install path, have a confirmation prompt of course.
Once that is working, allow the cloud settings to also save more then the default. (use a randomly generated GUID stored locally in the launcher directory to track when you log in from a new computer). Allow the user to name each "computer" or "set", but assign defaults for speed.
On the login screen, have a "settings management" that opens up a list of your computers, where the settings for each install path can be set as default, or cloned between computers. If possible, separate things that are more hardware dependent (screen resolution, graphics settings) and universal (chat channels open, over view settings).
Could you tell me your reasons for having more than one installation (either physical or via junctions/symlinks) if you are able to start a client with a given set of settings.