Whether looking for the latest information about Halo titles from 343 Industries, discovering and exploring its ever-expanding universe, or engaging with its passionate and growing community, Halo Waypoint gives millions of Halo fans a place to call home. Halo fans aren’t simply gamers and gamers alone however, as many community members seem equally fascinated with the technology that powers the experiences they enjoy.
Recently, Sandra Lemon - our ridiculously talented Development Manager for Halo Waypoint & Halo Channel at 343 Industries - gave a talk detailing the development and evolution of HaloWaypoint.com. While the discussion is certainly aimed primarily at technology professionals, we thought it might be cool to give our fans an inside look as well; Halo Universe denizens seem to be a pretty discerning and well-learned crop, after all, if I do say so myself.
The talk will explore how ASP.NET MVC and several Microsoft Azure technologies were leveraged to not only create and evolve the new website from the inside out, but also ensure that the site could meet the performance expectations and scale demands of the fan base, particularly around high-profile title announcements and releases.
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> > Forgot to reply after I watched it.
> > That was interesting!
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> Thanks for taking the time to check it out! Like I said, very tech-heavy, but really cool information and a neat look behind the web dev curtain.
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> <3
> Grim
Well thank you Grim, that was fascinating. Most of it was beyond the scope of my knowledge, but I could see the creativity and the hard work that must have been devoted to this undertaking. It’s always admirable to see people hard at work doing what they love and are talented at.
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> > Did the cake taste fine Grim? That is my big question? If you got a slice I mean xD
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> Divine.
Was expecting a GIF to go along with that…
I’m a bit into web development myself, so this video was particularly interesting to me. Was hoping for a bit more addressing the occasional forum blackouts, but oh, well… Anyhow, any plans to reimplement advanced features like
Post count
Join dates
Likes/liked count
Buddy lists
Viewing other members’ statsI’ve been waiting for those since the new site first popped up.
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> Was expecting a GIF to go along with that…
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> I’m a bit into web development myself, so this video was particularly interesting to me. Was hoping for a bit more addressing the occasional forum blackouts, but oh, well… Anyhow, any plans to reimplement advanced features like
> - Post count
> - Join dates
> - Likes/liked count
> - Buddy lists
> - Viewing other members’ stats
> I’ve been waiting for those since the new site first popped up.
What Sandra told me about the blackouts was that “Xbox Live has been having some issues. We are working with them to figure out how to prevent this moving forward. Sorry for the disruptions.”. So it seems they’re at the mercy of the Xbox Live platform in that regard.
Like you - I am curious about those features being missing in action. Time stamps on posts are another thing I quite miss. When I was archiving our posts from the old forums the time stamps were extremely useful. It’s also extremely useful for citing people’s posts!
I’ve asked Sandra about why threads have a “1k post” soft limit. I’ve seen some threads go to 2k without issue.
Very enjoyable watch, thanks for sharing Grim! I’ve been curious since release about what the forums were built on, none of the usual identifiable markers. Pretty cool that you managed to come up with your own custom solution. Aside from some missing features and a few bugs, I really quite like them. I’d love to see that responsive grid up on github too. Take it there’s no sneak peeking at the deployment that’s coming up in the next few weeks? (I can bribe with more cake <.<).
I’ve posted a couple of enhancements that could work well for the site myself on the forums, between community creations and the Waypoint Support forums. Guess I might submit the suggestions over to Sandra (or Marius?) to have a look at
I am recruiting for DHG we are a massive gaming community with over 40,000 members. We host tournaments where you can win microsoft points xbox live gold and more. We have game nights where we just have fun and play on forge created maps made by community members. You do not haft to change your gamertag to join. Little commitment is required to join. (details will be explained in a party) you haft to be 16 to join but dont fret we have a junior division. Message me on xbox if this sounds like something for you. My gamertag is DHG Tweety. We have a website www.dhghq.com
(I can bribe with more cake <.<).