Lasuni API

(Updated 05/25/2010)

Hey Lasoons,

You've all been asking for some sort of API, so we've created one for you. Though this API won't be permanent, it should last a while, at least until we have the time to create a much better one.

As of now, you can pull a bit of data from Lasuni, such as the top 10 richest players, top 10 selling items, and the number of online players. To do this, you'll need to know how JSON works, and a programming language that can utilize it.

To pull data, the url will be http://api.lasuni.com/data.php?p={data}

Where {data} is the specific data you want to pull. Below is the list of acceptable values:

• best_selling
• online
• richest
• userdata : &user={username}
• today

If you enter either one of these values, it will return a JSON array of the data. For best_selling, it pulls the 10 best selling items, contained in the element "items", each one is a separate array containing the elements "title" and "icon". For the icon, be sure to include "http://images.lasuni.com/icons/" before the actual icon file for it to show up.

The item "online" returns one element, "count", which simply has the number of online users.

The "richest" element is an array named "users", each item is the user's name.

To pull user data, simply set "p=userdata" and then set "user={username}" replacing {username} with the name of the desired user. This will either return an error (stating the user does not exist), or another JSON array containing the userdata for this user.

The user data that's pulled is: Name, Mission, Gender, Level, Color, Online (true/false), and the creation date of the account.

For error checking, you'll notice there is always the element "error", and it should always be blank. If it is not blank, then there is an error, and the "error" element will contain the actual error message.

Please be aware that we may update the way the API works in the future, so the way it works now will not always be the way it works in the future. We are making no guarantee that it'll work the way you want, and we hold no responsibility or liability for any problems that may arise from the use of our API.

If you have any problems or questions pertaining to the API, please make a comment on this blog post, or open a help ticket. Though we cannot provide support on making applications for it, but we can try to help if you have any questions.

If you have any special feature requests for it as well, let us know!

Progress Report

Hey Lasoons,

We're working hard on the update and I just wanted to tell you where we're at. As of right now, there aren't that many items left on the list of things to do. Mainly, we just need to get everything working together again. Redoing one system sort of broke a bunch of others, so it's been a pain having to go back through every script and find where the dependencies were.

While doing this, I decided I'd make everyone's life a bit easier by modifying each feature slightly to improve it. One of the things you'll notice that should help you a lot, is that we've added proper, draggable, scrollbars! Hopefully you'll enjoy them.. trust me, I've spent countless hours trying to figure out why they never worked (hence why they were never added to previous versions), eventually, I did find the problem - let's just say that float's don't work as they do in other programming languages.

On another note, we're also planning to add a few extra features to this release. I'm not going to say what it is, but you'll notice it when you first login after the update is launched ;)

As of this last sentence, there are 8 items on the list..

Salon De Hubble

Hey Lasoons,

We're working diligently on the next update and we've decided to take a break on it for a bit to put some work in on the Salon. We're planning to release this around mid- June but since we've started, we have a preview for you!

Have any ideas for this room that you think every salon should have? Let us know by commenting on this article :D

What's with the lack of updates?

So you're probably sitting there, wondering why we haven't updated the client lately. Well, we are actually in the process of finishing a pretty massive overhaul of the entire Lasuni client. We've basically rewritten the entire base for Lasuni such as how rooms are created, loaded, and executed. We've also rewritten the walking engine which is quite a bit of work. With this new update, there should be far fewer bugs than ever before as well.

I'll say this now, I can already tell that the instant we release this update, there will be someone who says "When is the next update?" as if we never released one. It's bound to happen.. *sigh*

On another note, with this new system comes faster load times for all rooms -- and when we say fast.. we mean fast. All rooms are now setup to preload the surrounding rooms near it. This means that while you're strolling around North Hubble, East Hubble will be loading in the background. When you're wanting to head on over to the Hubble Restaurant, you'll notice you're instantly over there (with a special animation as well).

This update won't be immediate, but we're trying to get it out before the 1st of the month. So bare with us, it's not easy to rewrite pretty much an entire game within a few weeks period.

If you have any suggestions, feel free to send 'em in. Though we reply with an auto message sometimes, we still note down your ideas for later use.

Importance of Multi-Threading

Hey everyone,

Just wanted to make a quick post about the importance of multi-threading. Lately, you've all been complaining about getting disconnected after trading and some pretty bad lag.

I've recoded a vast majority of the server scripts that deal with updating users, loading data, and most of the major functions for trading. They are all now multi-threaded, so when you're trading, it shouldn't hold up the rest of the users. Hopefully you'll also notice a speed boost when doing other things, such as switching rooms.

Over the next few days, I'll be rewriting a bit more of the server scripts to make them scale a little better. Let us know if you notice an increase in speed or if something is going too slow.

We are aware of everyone getting an error after loading the client for the first time after an update, and this is mostly due to the current walking engine that we're using. For some odd reason, when you load the client, your cache is cleared to load the new version, but when the isometric engine is preloaded, it doesn't initialize correctly. Once you reload, the isometric engine is already in your cache, so it works perfectly. I've tried fixing this bug in a countless number of ways, but alas, it's still there.

Due to this, I've started coding a new server-side walking algorithm. Once it's complete I'll implement this into the game. What's this mean for you? Well the way I've decided to code it, it'll include a height map for all rooms so you'll notice a lot more steps and hill-type of terrain in future rooms. This also means that you won't have to worry about the error-on load again.

Another side note, if you're having problems accessing the client for any reason, please open a help ticket so we can resolve the issue. Some issues occur for you that don't occur for us, so it's hard for us to figure them out if we can't reproduce the error.

Anyways, I'd like to thank you all for your support, without you, I don't think we would have made it this far.

See you in Lasuni ~ Jason

Potato Fast Fansite Updates

Fansites
Long time no blog! Just wanted to have a little chat with you in regard to fansites. Many users have expressed interest in creating, or being part of a Lasuni fansite. Recently as you may have noticed we added some requirements to what fansites we display on our website, and gave them their own little page.

In our growing relationship with fansites we want to work together best to provide more things for the community to do, such as exclusive competitions and more! To achieve this we plan to offer them exclusive previews, updates and possibly even prizes!

To start this off we've issued all our current fansites with a preview of East Hubble to share with you now! So check out our fansites now to see the preview and hear the latest theories and speculation!

Updates
East Hubble is all finished, just need to make a few small adjustments and we should be ready to release this whole new area for you all! We're very excited to show you what we've been working on lately :).

Potato Fast
As you may have noticed the blog hasn't had too much love recently. To help fix this dilemma we will be blogging about relevant and interesting topics beyond just Lasuni!

So to start this new trend I'm here to introduce you to the wonders of Google Chrome. Both Jason and I use Chrome as our main browser and highly recommend it. Today Google released a new video on their Google Chrome Blog show how potato lighting fast their browser really is! Check it out below, it's pretty awesome!