NationStates: Regional Maps

[NationStates News]

The wurld Assembly welcomes you to a wurld illuminated... by maps!

We outsource the creation of these maps to the many nations of the wurld. It's a two-step process.

Before we are even involved, the nation's best artistic resources are summoned to create an image file which represents them and their neighbors, friends, or enemies, each with a unique color. They may also paint part of the map two other colors: one designated for future nation designation (we can call it "land"), and one that is not ("sea").

Once the nation's leadership decides, they can create a Map Version. If they were inspired by the work of another nation, or making revisions to their own previous version, they should make an Update to that Map Version.

Separately, there are officially declared Maps. Unlike a Map Version, a Map has to be associated with a particular region, and only nations in that region will properly show up on it. A map has a "latest version", which may not have the same author nation - as national leaders, you are great enough to accept when someone has improved on your work, and you can update your Map to someone else's version. These maps can be endorsed by nations that are on them.

A nation may endorse only one map. That is the map you officially recognize. If you leave a region or cease to exist, your endorsement of the map is removed. Each endorsement has weight, related to the nation's wurld Assembly endorsements and influence in the region.

The maps with the most prominent endorsements will be recognized as such by this august instution. Starting with the wurld''s most-supported map:

@@Maps::display_heaviest_map(undef,{})@@

If you have confidence in your nation's artist, it might be good to begin the process by visiting the map drafting area.

While interns and administrators at the wurld Assembly Headquarters have labored day, night, and midnight to release these new informational graphics, there may yet be glitches or obvious improvements to be made. Please point them out in the Regional Maps Technical Discussion.

The most-supported maps at the end of this first week will surely deserve to be remembered.

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[NationStates News]

Some people said you couldn't secretly write and implement a major new feature that melded cartography and diplomacy inside a graphical interface with 20-year-old code. Or maybe they said "shouldn't." It was one of those.

Either way, it was done! And it mostly worked! Not entirely! But mostly!

Congratulations to those regions and nations that figured out what the heck was going on and managed to craft and endorse some maps. In total, 1,307 nations made 4,687 map versions and 879 nations created 896 maps with a total weight of 430,021.

At the end of the first week of maps, we'd like to salute the following pioneers whose maps have the most diplomatic weight:

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Special shout-out to @@JGConfig::nice_name('socialist_platypus',3)@@ of Conch Kingdom for not only holding third place, but for punching above their weight several times during the week with a chart-topping map despite having far fewer wurld Assembly members than their rivals in their region.

Maps are staying, but with work to do as they grow into a full feature, as opposed to something that needed to go live at the start of April, come hell or high water. In particular:

1. Regions can (now) choose whether to hide or display their most-supported map

2. There will be storage limits on what can be uploaded and saved (you all uploaded 1.4 gigabytes of map in a week!)

3. Maps will come with a legend

4. Map activity will be integrated into map pages

5. And of course miscellaneous bugfixes

Thanks for your participation during this first week, and please continue to provide feedback on what you'd like to see in the Maps Technical forum thread!

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