Save Empire Earth

Greetings to you all,

when I rightclick on one's name and select "locate", usually the system shows me in which game this user is or was last.
Obviously there is a problem, since this system does not always show me in which game the user is or was last. The message "...has not been seen in a game" apears.
Even if I know that the person is a game, and I locate him in the lobby, the message "...has not been seen in a game" apears.
Please fix this so I can join my friends game when they say "join" and there are many games and I have to ask which game because the locator is not functioning as it should be.

It is well known that the locate system is buggy. If you would have paid attention and perhaps read the most recent posts by Ghost, you would understand that there will be no updating or modifications of the lobby at this time due to lack of time. This is the reason that topic was locked. I might suggest being satisfied with the current lobby and having fun with it as opposed to spending all of your energy nit picking and finding reasons to be unhappy. Thanks.

Fixing the locate bug would according to omega conflict with the lobby users' privacy. I forgot what exactly it is it takes for the lobby to do it right, but it's something I remember saying NO WAY to lol.

If a user joins a game and locate does not catch it, then it would be helpful for both the host and the person joining to use Wireshark to capture the packets from the joining process, save it, then send the Wireshark file to me for analysis.

In order for locate to be perfect, everyone would have to install a packet sniffing API, which could potentially be an invasion of privacy. Currently, the lobby uses a very, very basic method that reads raw network data in order to grab game listings and locate users. The locate system was coded based on my tests with multiple users, and tries to detect people joining the game via both the host and the client.

Based on my tests, it will work for most people, but not all. Also, the method I use to ensure someone actually joins can be buggy because when analyzing raw data, the data can be received out of order and there's data from EE that, to be honest, I have no clue what it means. The buggy-ness is supplemented by having both host and client detection, so that in the event that detection doesn't work with the host, hopefully the client will pick it up. It just so happens that sometimes neither detection system works because my tests can't cover every case, so just deal with it.

Not to mention that if a friend tells you to "join", you should be able to use some deductive reasoning and make an educated guess as to which game they happen to be in. Try it some time.