It's been a while - but we've finally added a proper forum for the brainCloud development community.

We don't do this lightly. Although we're a small team - focused, direct support is important to us - which is why our direct chat forums have been in place since day 1 of brainCloud's launch.

That said, especially in the past six months or so, the call for community forums has become deafening - and as our community of developers is rapidly growing, we're realizing that enabling the community to help support itself (in addition to our crack support team) has its appeal! (We're Canadian, not dumb!)

After a long search, we decided upon NodeBB for our forum software solution. The software is modern, nimble, and fast - with a clean look-and-feel. We were also able to integrate it with our Portal logins - so you don't need two accounts to participate (that was important to us). As a bonus, NodeBB is also built in Canada! (We honestly didn't realize that until just a few days ago!)

Now that we've got our forums in place, we're hoping that you all will visit often and contribute! It's too clean and tidy now - come on in and mess it up!

Feedback welcome!

Cheers!

Paul.

Update - we suspect that this is the same problem:

https://forum.unity.com/threads/ios-post-request-with-raw-data.690514/

Hi folks,

We've discovered what looks to be a pretty significant issue with using brainCloud for large packet requests on IOS devices. (edit: removed mention of Android as we have confirmed that it does not occur on Android devices).

The issue appears to be limited to Unity 2019.X.

More info here - https://getbraincloud.com/apidocs/warning-unity-2019-x-ios-issues/

We are constructing a minimal test app so that Unity can easily repro this issue (i.e. trying to take brainCloud out-of-the-test loop) - and then we'll submit the defect to Unity directly.

We'll keep you posted.

Paul.

Hi folks,

Our planned 4.6 release was getting too big - so we're splitting it into 4.55 and 4.6.

The 4.55 release should arrive within the next 30 days.

The big headliner feature is at long last, brainCloud will support Amazon In-app Purchases !

There are also a bunch of useful API additions. Check out the details on our Roadmap.

The bad news is that Cloud Code Folder are still planned for 4.6 - which is going to be a bit longer. That said, we're working hard to get it right!

Cheers,

Paul.

Hi guys,

The plan is to release 4.5 in April.

Cheers!

Paul.

We are pleased to announce the new brainCloud Roadmap! site.

This Roadmap gives a view of:

• what we're currently working on
• what we're planning to add to the platform
• what we're considering adding to the platform

(Note - we won't be necessarily putting everything we're working on here. We still like to surprise!)

Make yourself heard! Vote for the features that are most important to you - and submit suggestions for new features!

In the short-term, go check out the list of goodies that will be included with Release 4.1 next week!

Paul.

Good news?

Looks like Unity is aware of the defect (and working on a fix)...

From discussion here - https://forum.unity.com/threads/ios-post-request-with-raw-data.690514/

Paul.

Hi folks,

brainCloud 4.9 is coming soon! (i.e. will be released in the next 2-3 weeks).

Here's a quick summary of the new features:

• Amazon GameLift support
• Join-in-progress for Room/Relay server games (i.e. backfilling)
• Query available Lobbies
• Unity client compression
• AppStore item purchases
• Tournament management APIs
• $text query support (for custom entities)
• Async Match API improvements (returns summaryFriendData in calls)

And more.

For all the details - see the release notes - https://getbraincloud.com/apidocs/braincloud-4-9/

Any questions or comments - post them here!

Cheers!

Paul.
(PS - brainCloud 4.9 contains an important change/fix for script path handling. Folks organizing their scripts into folders will want to take note. Of course, there's a compatibility flag so the changes don't take effect until you want them too.)

See our GameSparks Migration FAQ.

Hi folks,

brainCloud 4.6 is now live!

The biggest change is that we've upgraded our MongoDB abstraction layers to be compatible with MongoDB 4.X going forward. All without affecting the brainCloud APIs that our customers use.

In addition, there are a few cool new features including:

• Script API Usage Stats - makes it easier to understand the performance and cost implications of your scripts
• SAML End-user authentication - for those writing apps that require SAML authentication
• Random Custom Entities API - great for those writing custom selection or matchmaking services
• API Keys System - a foundational component for our new Builder APIs, coming soon

In addition, there are mucho improvements to the client libraries including:

• Greatly improved RTT connection handling
• Removed tons of previously deprecated methods (so the client libs are now cleaner and leaner!)

For all the details, see the release notes here - https://getbraincloud.com/apidocs/release-4-6/

Feedback welcome!

Paul.
(PS - Also a reminder, anyone moving to the 4.6 libs (from libs earlier than 4.5.6)- if you are using Relay Servers, be sure to upgrade your relay servers as well - instructions in the 4.5.6 release notes - http://getbraincloud.com/apidocs/release-4-5-6/ )

Update 3 - okay - the networking optimization is back in place now.

(Though we haven't turned it on for the Portals yet - just want to ensure there aren't any issues first...)

Paul.

Update 2 - we have had to revert the changes for now.

We discovered an issue with properly enforcing IP restrictions in some scenarios. We'll re-deploy the optimization when we have a fix.

Paul.

Update: We've updated the networking for the Portal as well. So it should <hopefully> feel more snappy as well!

Paul.

... that SHOULD speed up world-wide response times from the servers.

That said - it's a bit difficult for us to measure of feel the impact of those changes from around the world.

So if you are finding brainCloud snappier (or slower) from where you are now - let us know!

(Note - so far we've changed this for the api.braincloudservers.com and sharedprod.braincloudservers.com endpoints -- we have not adjusted the Portal URLs yet - so you won't see any difference in the Design Portal).

Anyway - if you have a change - let us know if you see a difference - good or bad!

Paul.

Hmm, not really...

You can get the number of sessions created in an hour with this call: https://getbraincloud.com/apidocs/apiref/#capi-globalapp-sysgetdailycounts

But brainCloud doesn't otherwise track a concurrent session count per app.

There are certainly 3rd party analytics packages that you could link into your client that would give you that sort of information though.

Paul.

I see - clever Ali.

So basically the matchmaking was a custom implementation using custom entities.

I assume once all players had been decided the last player in ended up creating the async match and then it went from there?

And agreed - sounds like a good use case to add to our list.

Paul.

FYI - this feature was added in brainCloud 4.13 - https://getbraincloud.com/apidocs/release-4-13/

Hi,

brainCloud currently offers two forms of matchmaking:

Offline matchmaking - for async match (i.e. words with friends) or one-way multiplayer (i.e. class of clans) style games. Both of those multiplayer types require you to have an opponent to play against when the match starts.

There is also online matchmaking - which uses our lobby system - which is suitable of any online / real-time sort of multiplayer.

(That one doesn't require you to have an opponent in mind when the lobby starts... and the lobby can start a match via a relay or room server session right away...)

That said - I get the feeling that you are talking about more of an async match scenario (i.e. not-necessarily-online multiplayer) - where the match can start before an opponent has been identified.

Am I correct that that is the scenario you are wanting to target?

It's an interesting approach - as there's a much lower chance of matching against another player who isn't going to respond in a timely manner.

Let me know if I've got the scenario right and we'll give it some more thought...

Paul.

So - the 3rd party service would use OpenId to log into your brainCloud app to verify whether a user exists or not (and presumably to potentially get other permissions).

Is that the suggestion?

Paul.

Hi Dan,

Thanks for reporting that. We'll get it fixed up.

Paul.