New API developer
Stephane Lo Presti.7258:
Hi everyone,_
I’d like to inform you that Cliff has now left ArenaNet to follow a career opportunity that he couldn’t pass. Cliff has been too busy last week to post on the forum, but he wanted to express his gratitude to the API community and tell you that he had lots of fun interacting with all of you. _(update: see his message at the bottom of this post)
But this is not the end of the Guild Wars 2 API, because ArenaNet will continue to expand the API and support its community of developers. In fact, another programmer who’s been working with Cliff long before the transition will be shortly here to take over Cliff’s role on the API Development subforum. So be ensured that it may not be a big change, we in fact have more developers helping with the API behind the scene.
Thanks everyone for your participation to this community.
EDIT: in fact Cliff wanted to share the following with the API community:
_Hi everyone,
As Stephane said, I’m leaving ArenaNet, but I’ve had an incredible time here. I’ve wanted to work on public API since I started here, and I’m really happy that we’ve been able to start releasing them. I’ve been thrilled with the positive response to the APIs, and the community you’ve formed around creating apps. I’ll be eagerly watching to see how both the API and API apps develop in the future. Thanks for your support and enthusiasm while we’ve worked together._
Stefan Larimore.6872:
Hi All,
I’m the new primary developer on Guild Wars 2 APIs. I’m ramping up, but I’ve actually been working behind the scenes with Cliff for a while now. I’ll do my best to minimize any hiccups.
I’ll be active on the forums, answering your questions, and reading feedback and suggestions. So please keep participating and let us know what you think.
My short term goal is to support the existing un-authenticated APIs while working on our new OAuth2-based authenticated APIs.
Thank you for your participation and I look forward to working with you all!
Nexun.6932:
Hi Stefan
Looking forward to the upcoming changes! Especially OAuth2!
Dr Ishmael.9685:
Oh no, two Stephanes? Let the comedic mistaken identity begin! At least you spell your names differently. :P And welcome to Stefan #2!
Marcus Greythorne.6843:
I’ll be active on the forums, answering your questions, and reading feedback and suggestions. So please keep participating and let us know what you think.
Hi and welcome Stefan! My question to you: how do you think APIs help improving gameplay? I’m really confused why Anet supports people creating maps which show ongoing events etc. when ingame there is intentionally no way to show these events. I can’t see how this improves the GW2 experience. Can you help me here?
The Talcmaster.7391:
Welcome Stefan! Feel free to stop by the gw2spidy chat sometime and say hi!
smiley.1438:
Hello Stefan and goodbye Cliff, thanks for all your support!
Killer Rhino.6794:
Greetings Stefan!
Can’t wait to see OAuth2 get rolled out; thank you for your ongoing work on it! And also, best of luck, Cliff! Thank you for all that you’ve done to get the APIs off the ground, as well as both your immediate and in-game responses.
Stefan Larimore.6872:
Hi and welcome Stefan! My question to you: how do you think APIs help improving gameplay? I’m really confused why Anet supports people creating maps which show ongoing events etc. when ingame there is intentionally no way to show these events. I can’t see how this improves the GW2 experience. Can you help me here?
Hi Marcus,
Thanks for the welcome! To answer your question:
In my understanding, comes down to a question of resources and priorities. Sometimes there is information in one part of the system that is expensive to expose in-game in a quality manner. Or perhaps the information is not deemed necessary for typical play, so its priority is reduced. However, it may be relatively simple to expose via an API. This is where 3rd party apps can come in to fill the void. We provide the APIs, and 3rd party apps provide the advanced experience.
Illconceived Was Na.9781:
Also, player applications/sites can evolve much more quickly than anything that ANet can produce, they can cater to narrow groups of players, or present creative solutions to issues that ANet hadn’t even considered yet. Like any software firm wanting to release quality products, ANet software has to be discussed, scheduled, go through “formal change control,” and be thoroughly tested (and even then, we know, not everything comes out as intended). In contrast, player-developed tools can be planned on a napkin, get tested when live, and the player devs can work whenever suits them.
End result: we get all sorts of useful tools without having to compete with all of the other priorities at ANet. It greatly improves my in-game experience to have access to things like mos.millenium.com’s wvw maps, gw2stuff.com’s boss event timer, gw2state.com’s temple status, the wiki’s full set of details on events and items (recovered via the API), and various other sites.
Marcus Greythorne.6843:
well I don’t know about how you see it, but dragon timers feel just like skipping lv.1-19 in a jump’n run straight to the boss level 20. A lot of API-generated stuff feels like cheating to me. Seeing how many events there are… wasn’t it supposed to be a secret, while adding new events over time in a stealthy manner?
I guess you guys have good intentions, but I don’t feel like communication between teams works properly since goals seem to vary a bit.
poke.3712:
Wow, that’s certainly a surprise, to see Cliff go. I’m thankful that you launched the API and got the attention back on the “extended experience”. What you started definitely showed that 3rd party tools are a great way to extend the game experience. So thank you for that! And I wish you all the best at your new job, and with your life!
That being said, welcome Stefan! I hope you will be able to live up to the expectations that people have with the announcements of what’s coming for the API. Good luck and I hope you have a good time with the API and us
zwei.9073:
Hi And Bye :-)
Looking forward to the upcoming changes! Especially OAuth2!
As am I. It would really help a lot of applications to be able to verify their user as a GW2 player with account in good standing.
Relic.7148:
I’ll be active on the forums, answering your questions, and reading feedback and suggestions. So please keep participating and let us know what you think.
Hi and welcome Stefan! My question to you: how do you think APIs help improving gameplay? I’m really confused why Anet supports people creating maps which show ongoing events etc. when ingame there is intentionally no way to show these events. I can’t see how this improves the GW2 experience. Can you help me here?
This was answered before. They tested displaying active events on the map and found that displaying all the events on the map at once showed too much information and make it look cluttered. Doing so also would make it hard for players to move through the zone.