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Custom Songs Database + Integration with CustomHero.net
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JCirri  





Joined: 04 Feb 2006
Posts: 4576

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 8:05 am    Post subject: Custom Songs Database + Integration with CustomHero.net Reply with quote

This long-awaited moment has finally arrived! As the software and custom song community has continued to grow here it only seemed logical to extend the database to accomodate easier management and searching of custom songs. If you aren't familiar with customs at all, check out the Software forum for more information.

To first give some background before the new features are explained, CustomHero.net (CH) has been created several months back with the intent to discover and promote only top-quality charts that live up to the standards of official GH charts (all difficulties supplied, tempo and time signatures properly matched, notes follow the music, etc.). Charts submitted to CH enter into a queue where a reviewer on the CH staff will check if the chart is up to standards and either approve the chart, or provide feedback to the author for improvement in order to meet CH standards.

However, while CustomHero.net is geared towards the very top end of quality charts, there are literally thousands of charts that have been created with only Expert difficulty provided, or other such "flaws" that would not meet CH standards. There still had to be a way to manage and search through all of these as well. So myself and the SH staff took it upon ourselves to initialize all data by going through every single author topic in the custom songs forum and manually submit each song for each author with as much information as the author supplied (song, artist, album, length, difficulties charted, video link(s), chart link, file type, offset value, etc.). This overwhelming process began more than 4 months ago (9/18/07), and we have just finally caught up with all current data (over 5,300 songs).

From this point forward, you will be unable to post new topics in the Custom Songs forum, but can still reply to existing ones. In order to maintain compatibility with forum content thus far, however, new topic creation will be automated for new authors upon their first submission through the new Custom Songs interface. In addition to creating new topics for new authors, the system will automatically attach some summary information to the original post (OP) of the author's forum topic upon each new submission to keep up-to-date on the author's content. As of now the format is defaulted to a very simplified "artist - song" with one line per song. The format will soon be customizable from the author's profile with more information options available. The author's existing OP comments will be preserved underneath the automated portion and can still be edited, but the top automated portion of the post should never be changed manually.

The Custom Songs interface on ScoreHero is accessible from the main menu and will first require that you have read and understood what custom songs are and what the hobby requires if you choose to pursue it. I urge everyone to please read that page and follow relevant links to read more before proceeding. Once you've entered the interface there are two main sections, one to manage your own custom charts, and another area to search for those developed by the community. Initially you will see some interesting stats regarding authors, songs, artists and albums. Clicking on any one of those four items for a given song will search by that item (i.e. if you click the artist "Metallica", it would take you to the "browse database" section with "Metallica" automatically filled in the Artist field as the search criteria). This allows very quick and efficient searching just by clicking around, rather than typing in long names. In addition, most columns are clickable to sort by a field of your choice (click again for reverse sorting).

In the browse portion, the Action column on the left always contains two links: "Feedback" and "Download". Feedback is a link to the author's forum topic where you can view other discussion relating to that author's charts and leave feedback yourself (most authors appreciate constructive criticism or compliments on their work). The download link opens a window where the author's chart can be downloaded for use. Sometimes there will be a video camera icon in the Action column as well, which links to a preview video of that chart if the author has provided a video link. Other columns are self-explanatory except perhaps the "Difficulties" column which colors in sections for difficulties that are charted. The representation is as follows:

Code:
                Easy Medium  Hard  Expert
              +-----+------+------+------+
Single Player |  E  |   M  |   H  |   X  |
              +-----+------+------+------+
        Co-op |  E  |   M  |   H  |   X  |
              +-----+------+------+------+


On the "manage your own customs" side of things, there is first a link to submit a new chart which opens an interface where Song Name, Artist and File URL (to the chart) are the only required fields, but the more information you can provide the better chance the community will respond to your work. For existing charts, the Action column specifies two things: Edit and Delete. At any time, you may edit any information about your charts, or take them down by removing them from the database if you wish.

Regarding SH/CH integration, here is how things work. If you have an account on CustomHero.net, you will be required to confirm a ScoreHero account prior to submitting any charts there. After you have confirmed your account, you'll have the choice to submit charts either through SH or through CH. All submissions through CH will automatically be submitted to the SH database simultaneously. However, if you submit through SH and have confirmed your SH account through CH, there will be a checkbox at the bottom of the interface labeled "Submit this song to CustomHero for official review?". By checking that box, your SH submission will also submit to CH, otherwise the song will only be entered into SH's custom song database. If you have not confirmed your account through CH, you can still submit through SH and the checkbox will not be shown. Charts that get approved by CH.net will also be receiving extra recognition through SH's search capabilities.

There's still some information that can be submitted about charts that's not shown anywhere publicly, such as "comment" and "file type". When I figure out a way to condense the information better, I'll add these to the manage/browse displays also, but I didn't want the width to stretch any wider than it is now. So don't think that we forgot about those.

This was an absolutely enormous amount of work, and not everything has been tested at full-scale so as usual there are likely bugs still to be worked out. If you notice any odd behavior, let us know in the Bug Reports forum.

Thanks to all who made this wonderful hobby possible, and to everyone who's tediously helped initialize the data over the last four months (especially Armageddon!). Hopefully this will promote better quality work, interest, and replay value for GH in general. Enjoy!
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EWiggen  





Joined: 27 Oct 2006
Posts: 868

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote


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microgamer2vs2  





Joined: 04 Feb 2007
Posts: 1636
Location: Xianyang, Shaanxi, China

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:24 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sounds like a crapload of work...I can't even begin to imagine all the time that had to take. Kudos, can't wait to test out the system.
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Phr34k  





Joined: 20 Mar 2006
Posts: 1082
Location: London, Ontario, Canada

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:26 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Holy jesus *collapses* I never thought the day would come when the user submissions would go live.

HUGE thanks to all those involved with the indexing process. JC, DGP, krim, elx, sock, ech, carrot, army (holy fuck army.... did like 80% of it himself), kaiser, Priddo, EWiggen, LocalH, dho, Deimos, and myself.
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JCirri  





Joined: 04 Feb 2006
Posts: 4576

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:37 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I would also like to extend thanks to everyone who helped with the customs queue (initializing song data from the unorganized mess in the Custom Songs forum).

Here's the final breakdown to show how much manual effort was involved on everyone's part:

Code:
+----------------+----------+
| username       | numSongs |
+----------------+----------+
| Armageddon     |     2330 |
| Deimos         |      487 |
| dho            |      477 |
| elx            |      433 |
| EWiggen        |      420 |
| Echelar        |      276 |
| Phr34k         |      152 |
| discgolferpro  |      145 |
| ImaCarrot      |      139 |
| JCirri         |      118 |
| socrstopr      |       99 |
| Alakaiser      |       91 |
| krimsunmunkeys |       63 |
| Priddo         |       55 |
| LocalH         |       25 |
| Piso           |        9 |
| Matt           |        9 |
+----------------+----------+

This definitely would not have been possible without these efforts. Army in particular stepped up and motivated others when it looked like the queue would never be finished. He was literally getting up 3+ hours before he had to leave for school some days to knock out 10-20 authors a day before he left. Also thanks to the non-staff members (dho, EWiggen, Priddo, LocalH, and Piso) who took on the task when asked to help. And of course the others on the team who contributed to this task while assisting me on other matters as well.
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Last edited by JCirri on Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:07 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Armageddon  





Joined: 05 Jun 2006
Posts: 3006
Location: Durham, NH

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:42 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

It's really nice to see all of our hard work finally come to fruition. Well, after all of this work, all I can say is "have fun" to all of you customs people! It's been fun, but I am so happy to finally be done with the customs queue forever! PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

Note: If you guys really want to imagine the amount of work we had to do, imagine a GIGANTIC list of over 800 authors. That's right, over 800 of them, and we had to submit each and every song for every single author. THAT, my friends, is why this took so long.

Note 2: I now harbor a special hatred in my heart for LostandFound, who had 134 songs (at that time) that I had to submit. My face when I first saw those topics was a combination of and .
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muna  





Joined: 04 Jun 2007
Posts: 2929
Location: South Florida

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Cool! Just in time for me to start making customs!
Great work.
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Headbang  





Joined: 28 Sep 2007
Posts: 474

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:59 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow, this is amazing.

Thankyou for all the very hard work.

Let me buy you a cyber-beer.



Edit: After registering, I got this:



I don't know if this is just my laptop, or a small coding error.

Just thought I'd bring it up.
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Last edited by Headbang on Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:07 pm; edited 1 time in total
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CleverTangent  





Joined: 03 Sep 2007
Posts: 965
Location: North of Atlanta, Georgia

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It's...beautiful.

Query-able database... <3 <3 <3

Thank you to all of the people who helped out.
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Silly  





Joined: 06 Jul 2007
Posts: 3450
Location: Nottingham, England

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Awesome job guys.
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Karlott  





Joined: 15 Jan 2008
Posts: 15

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sweet! Question now...PC players are really getting shafted on DLC (we have exactly...none of it. Downloads coming soon! on the online menu since release) so, will this also be searchable by platform? Or is the custom line pretty much limited to PS2? Most custom vids I see seem to be for PS2.
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dho  





Joined: 20 Feb 2007
Posts: 606
Location: Baltimore, MD

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It's been fun to help ScoreHero out with this. I just started towards the last month or so of this project, but I've had a lot of time to spare to put into it. It's been particularly interesting to see all the different songs and musical taste out there. While not all the charts meet CH.net standards, there are still plenty with all difficulties + coop and I'd venture to say a portion of those are indeed CH.net quality.

That said, manual data entry is a *limited* amount of fun. With the stream database (which now has about 140 streamers), I've had about enough of manual data entry, hehe.

--dho
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Sisorex  





Joined: 30 Nov 2007
Posts: 173
Location: Jersey, C.I

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Karlott wrote:
Sweet! Question now...PC players are really getting shafted on DLC (we have exactly...none of it. Downloads coming soon! on the online menu since release) so, will this also be searchable by platform? Or is the custom line pretty much limited to PS2? Most custom vids I see seem to be for PS2.


Using the tools available in the software forum you can use the charts in GH3 for PC. I've done it myself with a few, and am beginning work on my first chart. Fantastic news on CH, and a great job done with a lot of effort to provide this service for us. Its things like this, the competitive nature underlying SH, and the community that persuaded me to donate, and possibly donate further now!

EDIT: I was about to put this in Bug Reporting but as it fits with the news item, and saves me bumping my postcount, I'll put it here: Running a search for an artist beginning with "Suff", i found an artist called "You Suffer" who made a song called "Napalm Death". The information is hte wrong way round, as Napalm Death was the artist, and You Suffer the song. This may well be fault of the author, rather than the transposers, but I felt it was worth mentioning so it can be picked up and rectified.
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Last edited by Sisorex on Fri Jan 25, 2008 1:54 pm; edited 1 time in total
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adzicents  





Joined: 22 Jan 2007
Posts: 1207
Location: Melbourne, Australia

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 12:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Congratulations ScoreHero! This is a HUGE milestone indeed and will enforce alot of new charters and members looking for custom playing. Will there eventually be scoring integration for customs? I know it's a fuckload more work, but it's just a query.

One again, Congratulations everyone on the staff team for getting this done!

P.S. Holy fuck Army, you need a fucking medal.
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Chil  





Joined: 05 Jan 2007
Posts: 850
Location: Delaware

PostPosted: Fri Jan 25, 2008 2:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'd just like to say thanks to all the mods and staff who kept going with this project. I look forward to having CustomHero be a great success and I'm in the process of updating all my charts for submission.
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