Maintaining Production Game Boxes

Maintaining game boxes for production is a bit more complex than it would appear at first glance.
This is the way that it has been handled for the board18.org sites.

Two Types of Game Boxes

We differentiate between game boxes that are running on production sites and game boxes that are considered in production status.
By definition, game boxes that are in production status have been played to completion at least once on a production site.
Until then they should not appear in the repository of production game boxes.

Storage of Game Boxes

Production game boxes are currently stored in three places. The first, of course, is in at least one production site.
The second is in the repository of game boxes on Google Drive.
The third is in a redundant backup folder that should be kept on the administrator's local PC.
Also note, for correct sorting, all ZIP file names should begin with a capital “B”.

Non production game boxes that are running on at least one production site should also be stored in a “Not prod yet” folder.
This folder should be kept on the administrator's local PC.

There are two Workflows involved in maintaining this arrangement.

First Workflow

The first workflow is triggered by someone submitting a game box. It goes like this:

1. If the submitter is known and trusted then skip to step 4.
2. Install the box on a test system and try it out.
3. If there are problems then return the box to the submitter with comments.
4. Place box in a “Not prod yet” backup folder.
5. Install box on a production site.
6. End of workflow.

Second Workflow

The second workflow should occur periodically [every week or 2?] for each box in the “Not prod yet” folder. It goes like this:

1. Use The Manage Boxes Page to see if the game has been played to completion.
2. If not, go to the next game in the folder.
3. If it has been played to completion then move the game box from “Not prod yet” folder to Google Drive and the redundant backup folder.
4. Go to the next game in the folder

Minor Corrections

Minor corrections to existing game boxes sometimes skip these workflows.
To qualify as a minor correction, all of the following things must be true.

• No new tiles or tokens have been added.
• The order of all items in all trays must be unchanged.
• The "dups" count of all items in all trays must be unchanged.

Note: Changes to "rots" or "flip" can occur in a minor correction.