The Hacker Project - a free online game

request:  Could you please make killing processes on your own gateway free?...  I can think of at least 3 ways it screws up the game if you don't.

The rules:
1.  Each post must contain the solution to the previous pattern, followed by your own new pattern.
2.  The solution to the pattern must be the simplest solution given the data you provide.
3.  If a pattern too confusing, people can request that it be lengthened to give them more hints.

I'll start off simple, with a classic...

1, 1, 2, 3, 5, x, y, z

On that note, mark/complete screw up mtype too.

Eh...  In real life there are multiple ways to hide a file, almost all of which are less resource-intensive than secure encryption.  You can use operating-system provided hiding functions, which essentially are equivalent to changing a file name, you can attempt to camouflage a file in with others with a given file name, you can edit permissions such that it is not possible to get to a file, you can simply unmount a partition it is stored on, you can apply stenographic techniques, etc. etc.  I assume that the automatic hiders use some combination of these techniques, but all of these require significantly fewer resources than applying a block cypher on a file of similar size.

I do agree that encryption needs some sort of an upgrade though.  As-is it has 1/3 the functionality of hiding, at a much larger resource cost.

I have no problems with IP changing as a whole, but as-is there is basically zero chance of you being found in that hour, let's say there are two IPs to be cracked obstructing the path, which is common enough for the people doing a lot of IP changes.  At 10 minutes each, and, let's say, 5 minutes combined for all other nodes that were bounced through, we come to a grand total of 25 minutes to find...  Then let us say another 20 minutes to crack the password of the IP-changer, bringing us to 45 minutes to cancel.  Let's say the one who did it wasn't that good at this IP changing bit and had a 15 minute delay after the offensive process started before he started an IP change...   This would mean that the player who is getting their stuff messed with would have to check at least every 30 minutes to ensure that they keep their stuff...  Checking every virus 48 times a day is impossible, making it rather futile.  In this case even if they do find the culprit, the only thing that does, is keep their stuff from being erased/stolen...  That is it.  The remaining part of that hour will never be enough to even temporarily damage the capabilities of the offender to steal more stuf.

The above of course makes a silly assumption...  It assumes that it takes an hour after an action to change an IP to begin with...  This is a stupid assumption.  There is nothing that keeps someone from queuing up IP changes before they take action, which is much more common, and is the real problem here.  If someone finishes a queued IP change immediately after starting an action, nobody can touch them, it is as simple as that.

That is invulnerability, just like having good software is, only this invulnerability takes little to no actual work to gain.  Humans play this game and realistically, they have neither the patience, nor the physical stamina, nor the available resources to sit on their asses all day and track every single one of their virii in this game.  If someone -does- have a particularly large amount of time to play here, this is further balanced by them tending to have more viruses to check and more other things to do here...

I propose a compromise of two simple changes to fix things a bit:
1.  Make IP changes take longer.  60 minutes is a rather short span of time compared to other actions in this game, and does not give anyone a reasonable chance of finding someone.  I propose that the new time be 2.5 hours.  This is long enough to conceivably track and crack someone in most conditions, but short enough that it is still impractical to consistently detect.  This also would make it less convenient to keep an IP change at ready before taking action in case #2 isn't adopted.
2.  Make it impossible to start -new- actions during an IP change.  Rather than kill processes when the change takes place, it would also work to make it so one is unable to start new deletions etc. while an IP change is already going...  This way people are actually limited by the time restrictions, whether the delay itself is increased or not.

Well, if Mr. X is capable of never sleeping and checking every one of his viruses on all servers every minute, he certainly deserves that much...

Basically right now, everyone on every PC in the world is running as admin, this seems somewhat strange to me, so I propose secondary account system, for logins other than admin, could be added to allow people to share limited account access with friends/allies.
-For secondary accounts to exist at all, the owner of the server would have to add an account name to one of their servers.  Once it was added, the listed player could log in as that account.  This would allow people a more convenient means to give friends access to their stuff.
-Secondary accounts would have lesser permissions to admin accounts, they would not be able to view/edit logs at all, they would not be able to kill any process started by the admin account, and they would not be able to delete any admin files.  You would still not be able to bounce through a server without admin access.
-On the other hand, secondary accounts would not leave logs themselves, would be free to download/upload whatever, and can kill/delete things started by any secondary account.
-Secondary accounts could be cracked, but only if the name an account holder was known.  In that case, this cracking would take 1/4 the time required for a normal account.  The bypasser/breaker requirements would not be lessened.
-An account (with the name in the server description) could be added to the starting truelights to make things easier on new players (quick crack times getting started, and no logs to give them a bit of safety.
-Cracking admin when one already possesses lesser account access and is logged in as such would also take only a portion of the time normally required, and would not require bypassing the firewall, but would leave a log when it was started and would have a running process on the server being attacked.

Good/Horrible?
 

Now you've gone and upset them...

Is there any chance of only getting your highest leveled program of a given type to count?...

       You sir have just managed to insult the very core of who I am and everything I stand for....

For now I'll forgive you though...  You know not what you say.

O.O  I only posted that after I had verified it.  A 5 hours of research made me drop 500.  This happens because while HPD is calculated in, programs are not.  Meaning when I research for 40 hours I lose 4000 HPD, but gain nothing that would benefit my power.

While I agree that the formula was in need of adjusting to tone down some effects of software, completely removing software from the calculation isn't a good idea IMO.  Before power gave a rough idea of who could hack who, which was nice...  Now...  Not so much...  Researching actually makes you go down in power now.

I'm looking forward to a power drop of 4000 any minute now which will keep all but three or four players from hacking me.

Basically, it'd mean upgrading your operating system.

Well, yeah, all of your processes are killed if you have any, and would not be able to be restarted while it was going on, and inbound connections would be temporarily disabled.

  Essentially, yes...  The idea would be that to upgrade a kernel requires its source code while NPCs would only distribute binaries if they did at all..  The idea was that being able to find an npc that upgrades most of you stuff all at once would be overpowered, so instead they would give you a short term benefit, but very little long-term gain.  Upon further reflection, I don't think this part is really neccesary.

Okay, so a bunch of operations use the kernel as their main process and have 0.1 next to them as a version...  So, I'm just suggesting  an ability to upgrade the kernel shown.  The rationale would be that the Megacorps, in their supremacy have limited the availability of software such that only operating systems which comply with certain "standards" are widely available.  These operating systems allow for easier entry, easier infection, and more limited capabilities.

Kernel upgrades would very slightly reduce the resources used by all processes, and possibly slighly increase the used version of all running files...  Maybe there could be two options to choose that differ between the two?.  Because they help everything at once upgrading a kernel would both be a lot slower and more costly than upgrading regular software, and would have a period of inactivity/vulnerability associated with it.  If I were upgrade my kernel to 0.102 now, all processes would stop and connections would be disabled for two hours, then for a 15-30 minute period after that was up, I still wouldn't be able to run any processes, but connections would be enabled again.  NPCs distributing kernel versions (Say, a hypothetical internal Hakuza OS) could exist, but the versions they distribute should probably be completely non-upgradable, which would leave you having to revert to your previous kernel, or return to the starting kernel if you wanted something upgradable again.

Yes the above is rather specific, feel free to take any parts of it that are decent and throw away the rest.

(tl;dr : Make kernel version that improve the abilities of all running processes)

IMHO This news is now one of the coolest aspects of the game.  Rarely do browser-based MMOs have even quasi-active plots.