Seeking Feedback Regarding Multiple Developers

[Stabones]

Hi all

I am curious what the best way of supported multiple developers is.

Assume you have developers spread all about geographically.

This presents a problem in that you need to allow your developers the ability to modify quest files, database, etc.

Currently I have a dev box setup. When we are ready to release our first version, there will be a separate live box setup for minimal server interruptions.

How have you all supported this paradigm in the past keeping in my mind security? Security not necessarily regarding malicious devs, but the rest of the world.

Stabones

[Drajor]

There are lots of possible answers to this however any decent source control system will do (most) of what you need. Syncing the database between developers will probably be the most tricky aspect. I wrote/use a relatively small (and slow!) python program for syncing my local development DB with an external/live DB. It is a one way operation though, I only push changes to the external DB.

Consider that EQEmu uses github for source control and I believe it is working well for them.

[sorvani]

The database is really the only hard piece. The best thing to do is simply to use the PEQ Editor for most things.
For quests, you can simply use google drive or drop box, but it makes it hard to know when the change I just made is pushed back down to the dev server.
Since PEQ has a daily dump of the DB, it makes it easy for me to test new stuff without worrying about being too far behind. When I am working on content, I simply grab the daily DB file and source it in. Then as I make DB changes I either code it in a SQL file that I source in after I use the dump, or if it is not game breaking change for the live server I simply change it on the live DB with the PEQ editor after I test it locally.

When I rewrote PoTime to Lua those changes would have made the zone unplayable. Here is the SQL I built as I develpoed the zone. I would source in the daily dump to my local dev server then run this.
http://pastebin.com/n53hZk2b