Hi Gents,

 

I would like to probe into the world of DB creation.. I know we already have several outstanding DBs from Brad and Rene available. But I would love to be able to understand what you clever folks have to go through in order to create such excellent quality DBs.

 

I would like to start by building one specifically for the GIUK theatre of operations as that is the area im quite interested in, no two guesses as to why, or prizes for that matter lol

 

Are there any guides available that I can get hold of? I am a complete moron when it comes to the PE and find it quite daunting so I wondered if there was any good reference material for such.

 

Also when you obtain information for the platforms, where can I go to get data? I am assuming that the data posted on websites is copyrighted and I cant use it? or is this not the case?

 

Of course I will be around on IRC as you know

 

Any guidance I can get from you guys will be much appreciated indeed.

 

Cheers

 

Terry 'Stalintc' Courtney

Hi Gents,

I would like to probe into the world of DB creation.. I know we already have several outstanding DBs from Brad and Rene available. But I would love to be able to understand what you clever folks have to go through in order to create such excellent quality DBs. I would like to start by building one specifically for the GIUK theatre of operations as that is the area im quite interested in, no two guesses as to why, or prizes for that matter lol

 

Silly rabbit!

 

Okay, if you really, really want to go down this road ... still here? Okay ... my first suggestion is to set out some parameters for your DB. You've already done that to some degree by focusing on the GIUK theater.

 

You should also decide what time period your DB will use, because, as you know, ships, aircraft, submarines, etc are upgraded and altered almost daily, and you will be modeling a particular platform as it appeared at a certain time.

 

You should also decide what degree of 'realism' you're aiming for. I use the term somewhat loosely because all of our efforts at modeling the weapons of war in the Harpoon community are based on what is unclassified data or open source intelligence. Some of it may be obscure, some of it may even be closely held, but generally speaking, much of it is just our best guess.

 

Are there any guides available that I can get hold of? I am a complete moron when it comes to the PE and find it quite daunting so I wondered if there was any good reference material for such.

 

This is where I would start, the DB Editing Guide (still very much a work in progress, I'd say):

 

http://harpgamer.com/harpforum/index.php?showtopic=2883

 

Also when you obtain information for the platforms, where can I go to get data? I am assuming that the data posted on websites is copyrighted and I cant use it? or is this not the case? Of course I will be around on IRC as you know

 

Huge can of worms, as you probably well know. In any event, keep in mind that pure data and basic facts are not copyrighted, e.g. the US Navy's DDG-97 is the the USS Halsey. How a collection of those facts is arranged and compiled in a database might be (emphasis on might).

 

As I'm not generally in the habit of giving legal advice on the Internet, or for free , my best suggestion to you is to make your database your own, something that is distinctively Terry Courtney's work, if you know what I mean.

 

There's a huge amount of data available on the Internet. The largest chore is to filter it and determine what is good, reliable information (if you're shooting for realism in your DB) and what is conjecture (and sometimes there might be reliable conjecture). And, Terry, you're welcome to borrow from my databases to help you find useful data.

 

Much more to come, I'm sure ...

I couldnt have asked for a better reply!

 

That gives me some good grounding to start out with, thanks very much Brad!

I couldnt have asked for a better reply!

 

That gives me some good grounding to start out with, thanks very much Brad!

 

As for the data.

 

Janes, Weyer, H4 Papers, Websearch...

 

For the time frame...

 

You can go my way by creating more than one entry per unit, cause guik is a rather small area, so the number of ships and planes is nothing you need to worry about.

 

About the basic data. I suggest you use Brads offer and take weapon/senor data from his DBs, but you may do the same with my data. (Also the Installation annex!)

 

About the Installtions, there´s no need to create one entry per side. Each entry in the Installtions annex can be used by both sides.

 

regards René

 

btw my hc-euro-db was also focused on guik and med