Help Wanted List

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Revision as of 21:24, 3 April 2019 by Vera (talk | contribs) (since Geocities Japan has been taken down, it is no longer necessary to have the request in the main body)
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  1. Flashpoint Launcher developers: We use a custom Electron app called Flashpoint Launcher for displaying an launching games in Flashpoint. We need some more help with its development.
  2. Action Message Format support: many Flash games use this method to communicate with remote servers, but we do not have an implementation in Flashpoint. Flashpoint includes a PHP server, so we need help adding a PHP library for AMF, such as this one: https://github.com/emilkm/efxphp
    • Skills needed: familiarity with PHP
  3. Differential updates: currently, each Flashpoint update requires re-uploading all 70+ GB in a new ZIP file. Additionally, Flashpoint has no updating mechanism, so users are required to re-download Flashpoint each release. A possible solution is hosting a git instance on a server. In that case, we would need someone to guide us through the setup process of hosting Flashpoint on a version control/git system. Due to the size and number of files in Flashpoint, something like VFS for Git may be needed: https://github.com/Microsoft/VFSForGit
    • Skills needed: familiarity with git or a similar version control system
  4. Help with XML-RPC games: some Adobe Flash games use XML remote procedure calls for some of their functionality. We need help coding this functionality for each game that requires it, using Flashpoint’s PHP library. Here’s an example of how XML-RPC is used: https://help.adobe.com/en_US/as3/dev/WSb2ba3b1aad8a27b061afd5d7127074bbf44-7fff.html
  5. Portable Shockwave Player plugin:
    • The Shockwave Player will be discontinued on April 9, 2019: https://helpx.adobe.com/shockwave/shockwave-end-of-life-faq.html
    • Once the Shockwave Player is discontinued, it may no longer function properly. This is because the Shockwave Player downloads various legacy components from Adobe/Macromedia servers in order to play Shockwave content. So, we need to find a way to download and save all of these legacy components.
    • The Shockwave Player installs to the following folders: "C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Adobe\Shockwave 12", "C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\LocalLow\Adobe\Shockwave Player 12" "C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\LocalLow\Macromedia\Shockwave Player", "C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Shockwave 10". The first two are for modern components and the next two are for legacy components.
    • It also uses a number of keys and CLSIDs in the Registry. We are not sure how to allow the Shockwave Player to run without installation.
    • A possible solution is to use Enigma Virtual Box: https://www.enigmaprotector.com/en/aboutvb.html. We need someone to look into its feasibility for creating a portable Shockwave Player. It would likely need to be packaged with a portable browser such as K-Meleon Portable.
  6. HTTPS support: Some games have obfuscation or exact URL sitelocks that make them only work on HTTPS URLs. We would like to support HTTPS in Flashpoint without installing a root certificate on the user's system. We need someone to set up the Apache server to use HTTPS, generate an SSL root certificate (self-signed should be fine), and direct one of our portable browsers to trust this certificate on all sites. The Apache server should act as a proxy for HTTPS traffic and serve files from its htdocs folder, just as it does for HTTP traffic.
    • Skills needed: familiarity with SSL certificates, Apache server, and the certificate manager of Mozilla-based browsers


Former Projects:

  1. Help curating Geocities.jp games: there are tons of games on Geocities.jp that may be lost when the service closes on March 31, 2019. We have 1 month to save as many as possible!
    • Skills needed: basic curating. We can help you learn!
    • Familiarity with the Japanese language is a plus, but not required.


See Also: Help Wanted Games