EVE Technology Lab

Hey there, fellow capsuleers.

I want to bring to your attention, a project of mine called N.E.A.R. 2.

For the past few months I’ve been working on rewriting version 1 in such a way that it’s a bit more user friendly. Now that I have, I’ve decided to share it with the rest of New Eden.

First I suppose I should explain what the application actually does, for those who don’t know it yet. In short, it’s an intelligence visualization tool with an (optional) audio warning. It accomplishes this by reading the chat logs that you, as a user specify as being an intel channel. You can specify any channel you like except for local. After messages are being parsed it looks to see if anything is in your vicinity and if so visualizes it for you and optionally gives you an audio warning. The visualizing is done with a little radar overlay and the audio can be anything from a TTS voice to a custom audio file.

Installing the application is quite straightforward: download the zip file from the website and unzip it anywhere you like and can keep it stored. Afterwards just run near.exe and follow the short tutorial/ wizard.

If you want information about a user to span sessions, you’ll have to install SQL Server Express (a link is provided on the website as well). This lets the application create a local database in which it can store some information.


Finally, a link to the website: N.E.A.R. 2


FAQ:


1. What is an intel channel? A special chat channel that a group uses to provide each other with info on enemies.

2. Does it track enemies? No. It only uses the information linked in the chat logs, it does not magically track a person’s location, not via screen scrapers, local, or anything else.

3. Does N.E.A.R. send intel data to a backwater cave? No.

4. Is this illegal by EULA or CCP? No. We (can) get no confirmation, because CCP does not involve itself with third party software, besides exceptional cases. But the application has been used by many for years, posted on forums, wiki and has been sent to CCP for check-ups.

5. Can I use multiple characters and channels? Yes, and yes. 100% as many as you like.

6. Do I need an API key or log in? No. You only have to add the “character name” for each toon you want to track, so the app can look for those toon’s chat log files to parse the data.

7. Is the app open source / source code available? No. it is developed and maintained by a small team of enthusiasts. The app would be too easy to turn into a local scraper and do other maybe illegal things with vs. EULA, amongst other problems with open sourcing the project.

8. How does the colour scheme work? The app now has a guide built in.

9. Does the app have windows or TTS voices installed? No. Windows has a standard voice for your default language by default. Any voice you install that windows can use; the app can use as well.

10. What is my money used for if I donate? The app is built and maintained by a few individuals who made this in their spare time. Any money will first go towards maintaining the website and the server fees where the app downloads and checks for updates from. After that it is an incentive for the developers to keep spending time on this project.

have to have a look at this

How do I get NEAR to link with the SQL database?

Certainly looks N.E.A.T. Props to the devs, too bad I'm just lurking the forums and not playing at the moment, otherwise I would've given it a try. I did however take some time to decompile the app and have a look at the code and it seems 100% legit.

Please put up on github.

Unfortunately, because of the way things are currently build this cannot be avoided. It has to do with a bug in the update management and the updated static data to adhere to CCP's new format. After updating the first time it did not download the new static data because of this bug and because the old format is now unknown it crashes. To remedy this there are two options:

1. If presented with the possibility to update, do so. It will then download the new static data and the next time it will run properly again. Do not send a crash report as this will close the application before you can do anything else.

2. Some people however never get this chance so they'll have to download the program from the website. If you unzip the downloaded file in the folder where it is currently stored (overwriting all current files) you will be able to run the program without the loss of any settings. If for some reason some settings got corrupted (which hasn't happened yet for anyone) you'll unfortunately have to start from scratch.

This is by design as it is an application that closes to the system tray. You'll notice that in the system tray (most likely after you expand it) there is a red icon with n2 in it. Hovering or clicking on this icon will give you menu options on dealing with and closing N.E.A.R. 2. Furthermore, in the settings window under 'General Settings' there is a button to save settings immediately instead of on closing. This will also make sure you'll not have to do setup again.

Hey guys. We cannot officialy share the source code, because that would open us up to certain responsibility and reliability when it comes to what happens after people use and mod it. How ever as mentioned before by somebody, you can always decompile it if you have the knowledge.... its basic visual studio skills, im sure any of you programming geekstars can easily do it. I'm not saying we endorse this thing from happening, you know, but if it happens all i can say is, we have not yet gotten to shielding the app from decompilation...........

i want a caldari theme :I

This an awesome tool. I find it better looking and more friendly than others. Are there plans to integrate a function to alert on faction spawns. I know a couple other similar programs have this feature. Thanks for the work you have put in to this tool.