Why can't we have a better system for level/world sharing?

[zxcv]

Why can't we have a better system for level/world sharing?

Am I missing something? Because all we can do is put a forum thread, and then I believe you can't even filter for tags or general properties, like filtering for length, difficulty etc. You can't filter by stars or grades because there's no system for that.

What if we had anything, could be a site or a Discord server with a bot, or a standalone program, that could track reviews and tags? Could even have easy download buttons too.

Like, we have now Mario Maker fangames made in GameMaker that have an in-game browser, it would be so cool if SMBX got anything close.

[MarioChallengerX2]

I mean, there's a level website system for games like Super Mario 4 Jugadores and Mario Editor to post your levels easily

https://carlosxdjavgames.altervista.org ... iveles.php

http://marioeditor.us.to/index.php?page=2

These sites are dedicated to hosting levels for these games.

https://github.com/A-Aquino/CloudLevels

And apparently, this Github Repo is all it takes.

As for why SMBX doesn't use it, I don't really know. It is costly but, who knows how much it costs actually.

[zxcv]

I mean, there's a level website system for games like Super Mario 4 Jugadores and Mario Editor to post your levels easily

https://carlosxdjavgames.altervista.org ... iveles.php

http://marioeditor.us.to/index.php?page=2

These sites are dedicated to hosting levels for these games.

https://github.com/A-Aquino/CloudLevels

And apparently, this Github Repo is all it takes.

As for why SMBX doesn't use it, I don't really know. It is costly but, who knows how much it costs actually.

Thanks a lot for sharing! Also, SMW Central has a bit of a sharing system.

[Hoeloe]

It is costly but, who knows how much it costs actually.

This is why. Actually hosting this stuff costs money, and it's money that the development team don't have and can't spend on a server that is robust enough to host large downloads.

[zdrmonster12]

I'm not sure if those tags and stuff like that are really necessary, but I haven't downloaded an SMBX episode from here in ages. I posted one of my Battle Levels to https://smbxarchive.wohlsoft.ru if you're interested.

[Wohlstand]

It is costly but, who knows how much it costs actually.

This is why. Actually hosting this stuff costs money, and it's money that the development team don't have and can't spend on a server that is robust enough to host large downloads.

I'll explain more as an administrator who maintains hardware server and at the same time, uses public hosting services:
I do use my own hardware server (referred as WohlNet) that works physically at my storeroom. It has a lot of space to store various data and has a power to do various jobs I, family mates or friends will set. And the shared hosting (referred as WohlSoft) that I ordered as an addition to my hardware server to provide the better accessibility and stability for the world-wide auditory (my WohlNet server is hard to access from some countries). However, it has a limitation to 30 GB totally to host. So, if space gets close to be exceeded, I move various old stuff to my WohlNet server (the archive-wohlsoft-ru store), keeping at WohlSoft the rest of actual and most needed stuff, keeping WohlNet for archives and preserved stuff.

If speak about public servers like shared hostings and VPS, that actually is A LOT OF money if need to preserve many gigabytes of data. And, actually, you dont PHYSICALLY own these storages: various factors like a sudden inability to pay bills and business changes that kills your host, actually not so safe to preserve. For example, current volume of data at my SMBX Archive is 251GB right now. No one shared hosting will provide such big volume for a cheap price. Or you have to rent a physical server. At the Zenon hosting company, where is WohlSoft hosted, I do pay 7728.00 ₽ (£77,94 according to current exchange rate) per year, and I do have 30 GB of shared hosting where my main projects and their public builds gets hosted. I checked how much costs one of VPS servers at the same hosting company, the most expensive plan provides the 140GB space and costs 2500 ₽ (£25,21) per month. At another company, Rusinyx, the most expensive plan for VPS server gives 160 GB of storage, and 8000 ₽ (£80,68) per month. Seriously, even self-hosting on hardware is conditionally cheaper! Also, pay MAJOR attention on the quality of the hosting company: they may provide a cheaper hosting, but they will suck, like, giving a low performance and stability problems. Zenon (where I have WohlSoft-Ru hosted), is VERY stable, but costs more expensive than other companies. Previously I hosted a the Masterhost, and they worked well, until the accident (article in Russian) that kicked my ass to emergencily move to another hosting. I am glad that my friend is employed at Zenon, and I know that I can trust to his hosting company.

On my side, I do run a physical server in my storeroom. Yes, it's also money, but to keep the thing working, I have to pay enectricity bills for coarsely 400 rubles (~£4.03) per month (I installed a dedicated kW/h counter to my server rack to watch for the spent power). But, that's is not all: sometimes I have to upgrade some hardware, like, extending the volume of storage by bying new HDDs, or upgrading other hardware like RAM, CPU, motherboard, etc. also takes a lot of money. This way is cheaper if speak about money spent for the keeping server work. However, I still need to maintain it: keep software up to date, fix problems that may happen during various factors, clean-up the hardware from a dirt, etc. I do have my own server since the end of school (somewhere since begin of 2010), and having it being upgraded several times, because it's one of my hobbies where I learned the engineer profession to build and maintain server and networking hardware, etc. I do use the server not just for public storages: it's my main mail server, my own web hosting, the environment to run various software and networking experiments, XMPP, etc. And then, it's a large storage used for various purposes including hosting of the SMBX Archive. Even more: for SMBX Archive, I plugged the separated dedicated 500GB HDD where it got filled up to 58% right now.

So, if speak about somebody also, there is a help of enthusiasts who has a dedicated servers who is agree to provide an extra space to host the stuff. Kevsoft and his father actually helps me to provide the platform for backups. And so, all content of SMBX Archive gets synchronized with Kevsoft's backup server every night.

Anyway, I gradually work on building the database from the content which is already preserved, and write a kind of a frontend to let people browse episode through it, and build software that will use the REST API to retrieve meta-data and download links. Recently I verified all text documents to make sure the information is at least filled, and so, I can start making a script that will fill the database.

About new additions to SMBX Archive: I and other members of SMBX Preservation Movenent do accept new episodes to be preserved by request, or just by random finding of something interested.

But, if speak about general thing: I could provide a simplier way for people to submit their creations to the SMBX Archive, and that could be used in the future. Right now, people should request me or any member of SMBX Preservation Movement (who has an FTP access to my storage) to upload some stuff to the archive.