Has there been any thought to adding the ability to run HL in a 'server' mode, where information can be read and written via external network calls (via whatever protocol is easiest to integrate)? Currently, while yes, you can export data in a variety of formats to be used in 3rd party apps, it is static data. This removes many of the great features of HL's scripting that could otherwise be very useful. Making some sort of API that could read out profile data, and make changes would allow 3rd party dev's to create custom tools for their games. It wouldn't have to even be all that efficient, as really, we're not talking about a ton of data here. Even if it was just the ability to fetch XML of a given character, and then post changes to it back to HL (like, say, activating a condition), and then be able to pull out an updated XML with the newly calculated stats.
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- The Lone Wolf Development Team
HL external data access
- Thread starter Fuzzy
- Start date
I think a problem with that is while it might be possible to take the HL engine and toss it into some sort of server mode, it'd be a complete hack to do it easily. To do it properly would take a lot of work and there probably isn't a good business reason to do it yet.
I'd personally argue at some point a web API for Hero Lab would be a natural growth outwards for the company. They're getting a taste with "cloud services" now probably with Realm Works and all it'd take for a biz reason would be talking with people over at Roll20, Siteworks(Fantasy Grounds) and Paizo(their new VTT) to make it so those systems could pull characters and data from the HL web API.
But you'd be talking years to set up that sort of stuff since those companies are really no where near to leveraging anything like that. And for Wolf there probably isn't an internal reason to leverage something like that. I could see it useful for getting the HL engine backing an Android app, but that'd require your Android device having net access which a lot of people aren't going to want.
I'd personally argue at some point a web API for Hero Lab would be a natural growth outwards for the company. They're getting a taste with "cloud services" now probably with Realm Works and all it'd take for a biz reason would be talking with people over at Roll20, Siteworks(Fantasy Grounds) and Paizo(their new VTT) to make it so those systems could pull characters and data from the HL web API.
But you'd be talking years to set up that sort of stuff since those companies are really no where near to leveraging anything like that. And for Wolf there probably isn't an internal reason to leverage something like that. I could see it useful for getting the HL engine backing an Android app, but that'd require your Android device having net access which a lot of people aren't going to want.
I am looking at this for the exact same 2 reasons you state. First, for VTT type applications (even if it's as simple as a G+ Hangout app). Second, for android/ios/windows phone/tablet tableside use. You talk of people not wanting to be tied to internet, and I believe Rob made that same excuse to me over a year ago, but i think that is a closed opinion based on the 'industry' guys who only seem exposed to the game anymore at large cons, where yes, internet can be lacking. MOST role playing is still done in player's own homes (or, the proverbial 'mom's basement'), where internet is readily available.
Yeah, my interests are the same as yours. My October project was writing a Hero Lab to Maptool(a VTT) converter and my November project is to get around to writing a Hero Lab save file viewer for Android. So I have a bit of hands on experience with this from a fan perspective 
On the VTT front the online tabletops aren't anywhere near ready to tie into a web API like how you're thinking of(from what I've seen). That'd really take a pretty strong business alliance between the tabletop companies and Wolf, because there'd be a lot of coding on both sides for this.
On the Android front while a web API tie in would work for you and other home players, Hero Lab is pretty big with Pathfinder Society and that takes place at stores and cons. So any mobile tool should really support them.
On the VTT front the online tabletops aren't anywhere near ready to tie into a web API like how you're thinking of(from what I've seen). That'd really take a pretty strong business alliance between the tabletop companies and Wolf, because there'd be a lot of coding on both sides for this.
On the Android front while a web API tie in would work for you and other home players, Hero Lab is pretty big with Pathfinder Society and that takes place at stores and cons. So any mobile tool should really support them.