Multiple gms for a single realm

[Mystic Lemur]

That makes much better sense to me, thanks. I still don't see this as being much different than using RW on multiple devices. You still must sync your changes, and I believe there are safeguards in place to keep you from syncing a ream from one device that has been changed on another (although I could be mistaken, and if there aren't there should be).

If you can't share a login, and you don't think the sharability of realms will be enough to successfully collaborate, then I agree that your idea should be possible.

[rob]

Given the nature of this thread, I'm moving it to the Feature Requests forum where it can be more easily found in the weeks and months ahead for other users to up-vote. That will give us a better idea of how important this feature is relative to everything else when we prioritize what gets added.

[Vexnos]

Ok... So what if you have 2 GM's for the realm... in my case we want to use the product for Champions. Each judge is writing his own NPC's AND Plotlines.. If each did a sync would it not just add the new data to the file in the sync?

[Mystic Lemur]

No. If they both opened Realm Works at the same time, and were both able to start working on the same realm at the same time, they would each have a separate copy of that realm. If GM Bob syncs his copy, the copy on the server would have all the original data plus the data Bob added. Then, GM George would sync with the server and the server would have all the original data plus anything George added. Everything Bob just did would be gone.

The only way to solve this would be to keep Bob and George from working on the same realm at the same time. Currently this is done by making Bob and George have completely separate realms that they should eventually be able to merge together. Another way would be to put safeguards in place so that George would get a message telling him that Bob already had the realm checked out, and that he'd have to come back later to make any changes. This is inconvenient, but not as inconvenient as having all of your hard work erased because someone else saved over it.

[Farling]

In the future this could be managed by using the shared realms ability.

So just like when you are able to purchase or download a shared realm, and then make local changes, and then resync to include changes from the shared realm when changes are made to it. (All your local changes would remain local to your GM realm.)

The shared realm in your case could be the generic world information.

Your local changes would then be the GM stuff that is specific to your plots (so other GM-players won't be able to see your plot).

[FrameProblem]

Hi guys,

I was quite surprised that multiple authorship was not a feature supported out of the box.

Version control is a well solved problem (have a look at the wikipedia articles for SVN (an implementation of the solutions discussed above) or Git, a distributed VCS that I think should form the model for RealmWorks.

The Wolf Lair guys almost certainly used a VCS in making RealmWorks, so they're probably familiar with the concept.

It isn't especially difficult to implement (cloud sync is arguably a more complex feature), but it might require exporting a non-binary database format (such as the XML used by Hero Lab) which Wolf Lair might not want for non-technical (read, proprietary control) reasons.

[Vargr]

As long as this does not mean, that an internet connection is mandatory, I see no harm.

However, if it does require an always online connection, then RW becomes completely useless for me and that would really be a shame.

[Farling]

Originally Posted by Vargr

As long as this does not mean, that an internet connection is mandatory, I see no harm.

However, if it does require an always online connection, then RW becomes completely useless for me and that would really be a shame.

As has been said in many other threads, this system isn't always online. You only need to be online to sychronise your realm (to the cloud, to other players, to other GMs, etc.).

[Vargr]

Originally Posted by Farling

As has been said in many other threads, this system isn't always online. You only need to be online to sychronise your realm (to the cloud, to other players, to other GMs, etc.).

I know; I just don't want new functionality to mean that this will change.

That is the point I am trying to get through

[Silveras]

Remember that we are ultimately talking about a database, not a file. VCS works on what it is designed to.. files.

In order to have multiple authors, some form of locking and collision conflict would need to be implemented.. and it *would* need to be accessible to multiple users at all times .. which would mean that, yes, the internet connection would be required for all activity in order to manage "check-in" and "check-out" at whatever level was required.

I would ask that people WAIT and see what the forthcoming Repository and Marketplace enable. If I understand it, you will be able to have some quasi-support for multiple authors (two authors each control a set of topics in their realms; both have shared that data and import each others' content into a single working realm).