This is a spin-off of another project I was working on, which ran into a (temporary) deadend - the hoster doesn't have the right modules installed. While we wait on the ticket to get that fixed, I put this together.
http://www.sea-shore.co.uk
It's a fairly basic collection game, with a few easter eggs. Collect items on the beach, clean 'em up, don't break 'em and build your collection. You clean items by displaying them on forums etc. Get too many hits in two short a time, or two many hits altogether, and the items break. This version is backed by flat files while we get a database optimised for the beta version - since I built it as an experiment in file handling, the only thing I need to see now is how it runs with more players.
Feel free to give it a go.
The other thing you might notice is the ad at the bottom - it's not (currently) a pay ad, just me testing out a new widget for the Smashwords Tools which are now at http://www.smashingreads.com. Click through for a minisite.
Showing posts with label Smashwords. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Smashwords. Show all posts
Tuesday, 21 February 2012
Wednesday, 25 January 2012
Ereaders and updates
I haven't been blogging recently because I've been too busy coding. My major project has been a lightweight php e-reader that takes Smashwords samples and displays them.
It's now up and running and I've got feedback, ranging from " cool!" to "I can't fault this."
The tricky bit was the launcher - since I wanted it to open from a link and run whethre or not the user had javascript, be useable by Wordpress users and others whose hosts were locked down, and run at a reasonable speed. And it had to be code easily used by non-coders. Let's just say there's a lot that goes on in the background, and leave it at that.
The real problem, and the reason another coder is building a java version is bandwidth. Parsing and sending the sample is almost 250K or our bandwidth each time it is hit - careful coding reduces the impact on the viewer, and the host offering it uses virtually none - but it's still costly. We've got the affiliate link hard coded in, which should help to offset the costs.
On the other hand I mght try and convert it to a desktop app which can read in files. It is already capable of reading in full (free) ebooks from Smashwords, the bandwidth becomes prohibitive. If it's a desktop app then anyone who wants to can run DRM-free epubs in it. It just wouldn't have a library or anything like that.
Right now I'm working on another coding project, this one at the exciting stage where all the variables are being written out on screen when it runs so I can see what the program is doing - or isn't. The problem for that project is going to be artwork and design - I can code and write, but my drawing? Not so good.
It's now up and running and I've got feedback, ranging from "
The tricky bit was the launcher - since I wanted it to open from a link and run whethre or not the user had javascript, be useable by Wordpress users and others whose hosts were locked down, and run at a reasonable speed. And it had to be code easily used by non-coders. Let's just say there's a lot that goes on in the background, and leave it at that.
The real problem, and the reason another coder is building a java version is bandwidth. Parsing and sending the sample is almost 250K or our bandwidth each time it is hit - careful coding reduces the impact on the viewer, and the host offering it uses virtually none - but it's still costly. We've got the affiliate link hard coded in, which should help to offset the costs.
On the other hand I mght try and convert it to a desktop app which can read in files. It is already capable of reading in full (free) ebooks from Smashwords, the bandwidth becomes prohibitive. If it's a desktop app then anyone who wants to can run DRM-free epubs in it. It just wouldn't have a library or anything like that.
Right now I'm working on another coding project, this one at the exciting stage where all the variables are being written out on screen when it runs so I can see what the program is doing - or isn't. The problem for that project is going to be artwork and design - I can code and write, but my drawing? Not so good.
Tuesday, 13 December 2011
Smashwords project
A fairly major project now is Smashwords. I couldn't find an API or RSS that supplied what I wanted for a widget, so I haven't yet got to the widget bits. Instead I ended up building a supporting package - three types of XML file and a lightweight PHP library to expose the data in a convenient array.
This is all still in testing, so there may be minor changes, but it is working well enough to support flat html widgets and php-generated banners.
While Smashwords offers general banners for the site, I'm working on ones specific to authors, individual books and searches.
Once I'm confident I'm not dumping broken code out there, I'll throw it open for anyone else who wants to promote their books or Smashwords in general. The RSS and PHP libraries are also going to be publicly available, since there seem to be a few people I know trying to build for them.
If you want the link, leave a comment here.
This is all still in testing, so there may be minor changes, but it is working well enough to support flat html widgets and php-generated banners.
While Smashwords offers general banners for the site, I'm working on ones specific to authors, individual books and searches.
Once I'm confident I'm not dumping broken code out there, I'll throw it open for anyone else who wants to promote their books or Smashwords in general. The RSS and PHP libraries are also going to be publicly available, since there seem to be a few people I know trying to build for them.
If you want the link, leave a comment here.
Friday, 25 November 2011
Should v Will
- be keeping traffic numbers up for the blogs for Project Wonderful
- be writing more squidoo lenses
- be building backlinks to promote my pages
- be writing more Wizzley pages.
Instead, since I got very little writing done recently, I will be doing Nano.
50,000 words. 5 days left. Tight deadline...
Time to type!
Updates:
10:49 am, 1,200 Words.
11:30 am, 2,130 Words
Thursday, 24 November 2011
Smashwords
A new lens, largely because I spotted a URL free that was too good to pass up.
A review of my currently preferred publishing plaform, ways to use it, what's in it for readers and more - including their affiliate scheme. I was rather stunned to find the URL available, as it had been "Under Construction" the last few times I looked.
With a search engine friendly title, a good UR, and hopefully useful original content, I'm pretty happy about this lens.
What I did find today were a few typos in the added content for Great Western Railway. Unfortunately, as I am going to be rather busy today, they won't get fixed until Friday.
The other thing I need to ask - would anyone be interested in a print version of these? It would probably have to be Lulu again since I'm not made of funds, but it is doable. What I need to know is, would it be useful?
A review of my currently preferred publishing plaform, ways to use it, what's in it for readers and more - including their affiliate scheme. I was rather stunned to find the URL available, as it had been "Under Construction" the last few times I looked.
With a search engine friendly title, a good UR, and hopefully useful original content, I'm pretty happy about this lens.
What I did find today were a few typos in the added content for Great Western Railway. Unfortunately, as I am going to be rather busy today, they won't get fixed until Friday.
The other thing I need to ask - would anyone be interested in a print version of these? It would probably have to be Lulu again since I'm not made of funds, but it is doable. What I need to know is, would it be useful?
Wednesday, 23 November 2011
A new lens, a book launch, a new ebook and a busy week
A new lens went up:
This is a reworking of the 2009 lens about Lens Companions. After I looked at the lens companions lens I realised just how out of date it was, and that the URL was no longer appropriate either. So I created a new lens for these ebooks. It has also replaced the blog as the Ciamar Price homepage on Smashwords, as squidoo has a higher pagerank so will send more visitors to the ebooks, but also because any visitors to the lens mean that I get a small share of royalties. It also has a Paypal "coffee jar", largely because a few readers get very suspicious about anything free and want to know the catch.
For the original lens I plan to write an ebook about lens creation and tips and use the lens for that, along with a few other people's titles, rather than waste the work and URL.
To celebrate the new lens, and as if I didn't have enough on with a book launch tomorrow (just in case you'd somehow managed to avoid hearing about it), I've just released another ebook.
The Great Western Railway is a rewrite of the original lulu title. It is currently working its way through Smashwords processing and distribution to flag up any formatting issues that I need to correct.
If you want an advance look, the ebook can be found here:
I'm also investigating an issue with Project Wonderful that will affect blogs that have erratic traffic, like some of mine, but I want one more piece of test data before blogging that.
This is a reworking of the 2009 lens about Lens Companions. After I looked at the lens companions lens I realised just how out of date it was, and that the URL was no longer appropriate either. So I created a new lens for these ebooks. It has also replaced the blog as the Ciamar Price homepage on Smashwords, as squidoo has a higher pagerank so will send more visitors to the ebooks, but also because any visitors to the lens mean that I get a small share of royalties. It also has a Paypal "coffee jar", largely because a few readers get very suspicious about anything free and want to know the catch.
For the original lens I plan to write an ebook about lens creation and tips and use the lens for that, along with a few other people's titles, rather than waste the work and URL.
To celebrate the new lens, and as if I didn't have enough on with a book launch tomorrow (just in case you'd somehow managed to avoid hearing about it), I've just released another ebook.
The Great Western Railway is a rewrite of the original lulu title. It is currently working its way through Smashwords processing and distribution to flag up any formatting issues that I need to correct.
If you want an advance look, the ebook can be found here:
I'm also investigating an issue with Project Wonderful that will affect blogs that have erratic traffic, like some of mine, but I want one more piece of test data before blogging that.
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