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PM's XP system, fair or not?

by teabag (Pilgrim)
on May 08, 2003 at 16:18 UTC ( [id://256577]=monkdiscuss: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??

Dear Monks,

Being new in this community I recently noticed that you can gain XP just by dropping by the site more than once a day?

Reading through the helpsection I found out that you have a 25% chance of gaining 2 XP a day.

Now I really do visit the Monastery a couple of times a day, but it got me thinking that even somebody who doesn't, could simply pretend he/she drops by, by writing a simple cronjob script like:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; use LWP::UserAgent; my $url = 'http://www.perlmonks.org/index.pl?op=login&node_id=109&user=teabag&pa +sswd=mypasswd'; print "Checking XP Nodelet\n\n"; my $page = LWP::UserAgent->new->request( HTTP::Request->new( GET => $url ) )->c +ontent; $page =~ s/\s+/ /gi; $page =~ s/\n//gi; my @monkinfo = $page =~ m/(XP\ Nodelet.*?<\/tbody>)/g; foreach my $line (@monkinfo) { $line =~ s/<\/th>/\n->/gi; $line =~ s/<.*?>//gi; $page =~ s/\s+/ /gi; print "$line\n"; }

So my question is: Is just checking the visits a fair way to check if a person contributes and thus earnes those XP points?

Teabag
chmod 666 *.*
'cause everyone should have the right to read and write!

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by kilinrax (Deacon) on May 08, 2003 at 16:34 UTC

    Bear in mind that at that rate, assuming that is your only source of XP, it will take roughly 6000 days to reach Sainthood (i.e. just over 16 years).

    There are other methods to speed it up automatically (I'm sure auto-voting bots have also been suggested); but fundamentally, if you think XP is that important, you're missing the point of PM.

Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by perrin (Chancellor) on May 08, 2003 at 16:37 UTC
    You know, it's not as if you can trade your XP in for a new car. XP has only the value that you give it. If someone cosiders gaining a billion XP with amusing hacks and scripts a good time, he is welcome to do it in my opinion.
      You know, it's not as if you can trade your XP in for a new car.

      WHAT?!?? Well, jeez, I'm not answering any more questions here, then.

      -s.
        /me has an old Escort he'd quite happily swap for 1000XP :)
Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by diotalevi (Canon) on May 08, 2003 at 16:31 UTC

    Eh. Anyone who writes a cron job for that has some motivation for being here anyway. Don't worry about it, really.

Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by benn (Vicar) on May 08, 2003 at 16:33 UTC
    Nice code...worth 2XP a day anyday :)

      And just moments ago, I wondered how many monks used a cron jobbed Mechanize script to spend all their remaining votes just before the fairy came around.

      Karma websites aren't roleplaying games, but so many folks just can't stop trying to play the system. If Eastern philosophy is about balance, Western philosophy is about maximizing. Maximize anything.

      --
      [ e d @ h a l l e y . c c ]

        If Eastern philosophy is about balance, Western philosophy is about maximizing.

        I thought of combining the two, and write a cron job that spends half my votes on -- and the other half on ++.

        Abigail

        I think I'll be keeping a better eye on your vote usage now...

        Maximize anything.
        Couldn't you have said more about this?

        -----------------------
        You are what you think.

      Ouch!

      --
      Allolex

Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by pfaut (Priest) on May 08, 2003 at 18:07 UTC
Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by theorbtwo (Prior) on May 08, 2003 at 16:38 UTC

    No, it isn't. But it is a relitavely easy way. Do you have a concrete suggestion on how to better do it? Anyway, 2xp is nothing, a pittiance. There's better ways to gain XP without doing anything. (In purticular, if you spend all your votes every day, then you'll make saint in about 6 mo (IIRC)... which is why there are steps in place to make it harder to automate voting.)


    Warning: Unless otherwise stated, code is untested. Do not use without understanding. Code is posted in the hopes it is useful, but without warranty. All copyrights are relinquished into the public domain unless otherwise stated. I am not an angel. I am capable of error, and err on a fairly regular basis. If I made a mistake, please let me know (such as by replying to this node).

      which is why there are steps in place to make it harder to automate voting.

      Is this a challenge to post a voting bot on Cool uses for Perl? ;-)

      Abigail

Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by AssFace (Pilgrim) on May 08, 2003 at 16:43 UTC
    XP is definitely the most important thing in the world.

    Now that I know that it might not be a perfect system, I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to sleep again.

    Maybe I'll just have to resort to going back to not caring at all about it... that's just crazy talk.

    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by teabag (Pilgrim) on May 08, 2003 at 17:05 UTC
    Just for the record fellow monks,

    I'm not argueing against the XP system itself, or trying to get myself more XP through this little snippet (especially since I know now it doesn't get me a new car, darn!).

    The code was just to illustrate a point. I'm trying to understand why 'just visiting' gets you XP.

    I can understand why writing questions, answers and code gets you XP.

    What I'm basically trying to say is, shouldn't PM just drop the thank you for visiting XP?
    It might even encourage "XP freaks like me" (who me?) to write more code, questions and answers.

    Teabag
    chmod 666 *.*
    'cause everyone should have the right to read and write!

      I suggest that it encourages people to visit the site.

      "Hm, I wonder what's up on PerlMonks? It's been ages since I was there... hey! I got more XP! I think I'll come back again tomorrow."

      Sure, maybe it's cheap, but I bet it works ;-)

      XP is really just "for fun" or, at most, a measure of what other people think of you. So don't take it for more than that.

      Cheers,
      ibanix

      $ echo '$0 & $0 &' > foo; chmod a+x foo; foo;
      I'm new to PM within the last month. I come around every day and browse the nodes and read the things that I find useful and interesting. I've actually picked up alot of good information that I've been able to take away and use either in actually coding, or just as food for thought. (And I enjoy thinking.)I was pleasantly surprised to realize that I got experience points for this. I don't view the points as being simply for the visit, but for the things I learn both about perl and about the MonAstery. Do I care if other people jump in and out and get points and don't learn anything while here? Nope. That's their loss. As I get more experience, I'll probably post more because I'll have more worthwhile stuff to contribute. In the meantime, it's encouraging to be making some progress every time I'm here.
Re: PM's XP system, fair or not?
by Skeeve (Parson) on May 09, 2003 at 10:30 UTC
    > Teabag > chmod 666 *.* > 'cause everyone should have the right to read and write!
    That's just half-hearted. Do it the right way:
    chmod -R 666 *
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