Tired of broken links in the GT6 Track Database

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BongoFury

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BongoFury23
Because of the high number of broken links i see not too much sense any more to feed this database. Users who might dig here will stop early 'cause of this, i guess far more than 50% of the tracks are not linked properly.

Ok, if users do not understand how to create a proper link and they are not ready to waste theire time by reading this too... there is nothing we can do about it anyway.

Funnywise some of those entrys have a positive vote though... c'mon!

:banghead:

Theree is the possibility of wrong interpretation of special characters like "_" by the database too.
 
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I agree. It seems like people just can't be bothered to read the rules or it's too complicated for them.

Personally, if I find a link is broken I just check the poster's PSN ID and copy paste the link myself. But of course not all people are smart enough to figure out this workaround.

Maybe @Jordan can implement a new subject field (PSN ID) when posting new tracks? And automatically generate the link to their course maker page based on that.

EDIT: This thread probably should be in the main CM forum or Site Feedback for more exposure.
 
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Yes I can't believe there are still loads of new broken links. It's been one month, people should be aware now... And sometimes even the PSN ID is wrong.
 
I get a "User not found" now even if the link was Ok. I can't load any track no more. Maybe gran-turismo.com changed something as well.

Ok, sorry, my fault: You'll get this message when you reached your limit of 30 tracks too.
 
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Not that my whopping 40 downloads are making too many people upset, but I'm glad someone pointed this out. I didn't even realize I may have had a broken link (I did).

It's kind of easy to misplace a slash, or a character or who knows what else.
 
This is a valid concern - but let's remember that it still is a work in progress - just over a month since we got this going.
Obviously, as a popular sector of the game it will attract a mass of players more enthusiastic about, than skilled in, the technicalities of getting their dots and dashes right.
Let's help the situation by double-checking all those fields when we upload or download, and by trying to inform those who have glitchy links that they should fix them.
If we are to play this game successfully with one another and as a group then we have to work with one another and as a group to get the best out of it.

Now that this issue has been given some light at least we are in the same thread (if not the same page) about it. 👍
 
eran0004
But at least it makes you aware of the problem.

Can you not delete the resource?
Click to expand...
There's no point making us aware of the problem. We know that some folk are doing it wrong. There are clear instructions on this site, and linked to from the upload page so I don't know what else you want us to do.

And deleting the resource doesn't let the person know they're doing it wrong. If you've found a link that doesn't work, why don't you let them know?
 
daan
There's no point making us aware of the problem. We know that some folk are doing it wrong. There are clear instructions on this site, and linked to from the upload page so I don't know what else you want us to do.
Click to expand...

Clear instructions are fine on paper. Some people don't read it, some people don't understand it, some people read and understand but still make mistakes. The result is that a lot of the resources have broken links, and that is a problem.

I think the best solution would be to delete the resources that have broken links, or to flag them as broken in the title.

Anyway, to make it easier to convert the links when sharing resources, here is a simple web application that asks for your PSN ID, asks for a link to your track, makes a basic check of the link to see if it's valid and then creates a shareable link:

Here is how it works:
  1. It asks you for your PSN ID.
  2. It asks you for the link to the track.
  3. It splits the link, using '/' as a separator and creates a list of items: ['http','','www.gran-turismo.com', ...]
  4. It validates the list: If the link is correct the list should contains 11 items; the 3rd item should be 'www.gran-turismo.com'; the 5th should be 'gt6' etc.
  5. It replaces the 8th item, 'mypage', with the string 'friend/' + the collected PSN ID.
  6. It deletes the last item in the list (which is an empty string, because of the '/' at the end of the URL)
  7. It uses a for-loop to stitch the link back together again:
    for item in list:
    link = link+item+'/'
There are probably better ways to do it, but this is what I can contribute with.
 
^That's exactly how I imagined the program would be. Now all that's left is to see if it's possible to integrate it into the database software.

Adding pictures for Step 2 would probably be a good idea. Some people might get confused which URL they need to add.
 
I agree to some degree

I wouldn't shut the database or the thread though (like someone suggested here)

To me if someone doesn't care to double check their links it's their loss. I might miss on a few good tracks but whoever cares about their tracks and their work, they'll ensure that the link is right.

Plus there are so many good tracks in the database that I stopped bothering if a certain link doesn't work
Of course if I can construct the right link from user's PSN name and the track ID I will suggest them to update the link

I personally always double check my links
 
eran0004
Here is how it works:
  1. It asks you for your PSN ID.
  2. It asks you for the link to the track.
  3. It splits the link, using '/' as a separator and creates a list of items: ['http','','www.gran-turismo.com', ...]
  4. It validates the list: If the link is correct the list should contains 11 items; the 3rd item should be 'www.gran-turismo.com'; the 5th should be 'gt6' etc.
  5. It replaces the 8th item, 'mypage', with the string 'friend/' + the collected PSN ID.
  6. It deletes the last item in the list (which is an empty string, because of the '/' at the end of the URL)
  7. It uses a for-loop to stitch the link back together again:
    for item in list:
    link = link+item+'/'
There are probably better ways to do it, but this is what I can contribute with.
Click to expand...

How can we promote this?
 
LeGeNd-1
^That's exactly how I imagined the program would be. Now all that's left is to see if it's possible to integrate it into the database software.

Adding pictures for Step 2 would probably be a good idea. Some people might get confused which URL they need to add.
Click to expand...

I added a link to Jordan's instructions post, and an example URL.

J_Cornelius
How can we promote this?
Click to expand...

I don't know if GTPlanet can handle Python, but maybe @Jordan can create a free account for GTPlanet at pythonanywhere.com and link to that application from the resource creation page? In any case, here is the complete code:

This is Python code for the Flask web application. I'm a novice when it comes to programming, so I'm sure there are some flaws and many ways to improve it.

Please pay attention to the difference between two single quotation marks: '' and one double quotation mark: ", as they may look similar.

Code: 
from flask import Flask, request, url_for

app = Flask(__name__)
app.secret_key = 'This is really unique and secret'

ID = ''
instructions = '(see steps 1 to 3 <a href="https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/threads/how-to-share-your-own-tracks-via-url.335446/" target="_blank">here</a>)'

@app.route('/')
def enter_id():
    return """
        <p>Enter your PSN ID</p>
        <form method="POST" action="%s"><input name="id" /><input type="submit" value="Next" /></form>
        """ % (url_for('save_id'),)

@app.route('/save_id', methods=['POST'])
def save_id():
    global ID
    ID = request.form["id"]
    return """
    <p>You have entered PSN ID: %s</p>
    <p>Please check that the spelling is correct before continuing.</p>
    <p><a href="%s">Change PSN ID</a> or <a href="%s">Continue</a></p>
    """ % (ID, url_for('enter_id'), url_for('enter_link'))

@app.route('/enter_link')
def enter_link():
    global instructions
    return """
        <p>Enter the URL link to your track: %s</p>
        <p>Example: https://www.gran-turismo.com/gb/gt6/user/#!/mypage/course/1234567/</p>
        <form method="POST" action="%s"><input name="link" /><input type="submit" value="Go!" /></form>
        """ % (instructions, url_for('output'))



@app.route('/output', methods=['POST'])
def output():
    global ID
    global instructions
    s = "%s" % (request.form['link'],)
    s = s.split('/')
    if len(s) != 11 or s[4] != 'gt6' or s[8] != 'course':
        return """
            <p>The link you entered is not valid. Please read the instructions %s and enter a new link.</p>
            <p><a href="%s">Enter new URL</a></p>
            <p><a href="%s">Change PSN ID</a></p>
            """ % (instructions, url_for('enter_link'), url_for('enter_id'))
    if s[-1] == '':
        del s[-1]

    s[7] = "friend/" + "%s" % (ID)

    s2 = ''

    for item in s:
        s2 = s2 + item + '/'

    return """
        <p>The link has been successfully converted:</p>
        <p>%s</p>
        <p><a href="%s">Enter new URL</a></p>
        <p><a href="%s">Change PSN ID</a></p>
        """ % (s2, url_for('enter_link'), url_for('enter_id'))
 
Perhaps you all have seen more broken links than I, but nearly all the broken links that have been reported to me are actually correct, and either the user's privacy settings or inexplicable gran-turismo.com bugs are to blame for most of the problems. There's nothing I can do about that.

If you find a broken link, you should notify the author or give the track a one-star review.
 
BongoFury
Because of the high number of broken links i see not too much sense any more to feed this database. Users who might dig here will stop early 'cause of this, i guess far more than 50% of the tracks are not linked properly.

Ok, if users do not understand how to create a proper link and they are not ready to waste theire time by reading this too... there is nothing we can do about it anyway.

Funnywise some of those entrys have a positive vote though... c'mon!

:banghead:

Therese is the possibility of wrong interpretation of special characters like "_" by the database too.
Click to expand...

you know how I can post a video of my tracks im not very good with computers
 
There is no funktion in PS3 to export videos from the PS3 to your computer. You have to have a HDMI Capture Card for your pc or use a camera or phone to record your track videos.
 

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