Thcrap Questions

[Araceli Caralyz]

Naz here again.

Currently MuffinPimp is wanting to create a new FAQ section, so fire away with all of your questions, concerns and so forth!

[Yoshiquest]

I'm creating a new automatic patcher to support jinx's format for the Len'en project games. I was originally going to just use the translations on the wiki, but that's starting to become annoying, so I was wondering if I could host the patches on the thpatch servers, without the patches becoming listed in the thcrap application.

[Mystere]

So is Thcrap going to support the new fighting game and TH15?  What about the old PC98 or whatever games?  I'm assuming this Thcrap is under new management then when it started, too, is that correct?

[brliron]

I can answer to some questions. 3 weeks ago, I tried to give some deadlines. Here they are : https://www.facebook.com/TouhouPatchCenter/posts/875098309216417
So, thcrap already supports the demo of Touhou 15, and I started to work on implementing HM support in thcrap (and that's a lot of work). And for the old PC-98 games, we'll probably work on them once the ReC98 project is finished (https://github.com/nmlgc/ReC98).

[HalfGrand]

Will the staff at Touhou Patch center please consider changing the name of Thcrap to something a little more... respectful? I would really like to support the Touhou patch center but if the patch centers founder Nameless Legacy deliberately decided to call it Thcrap to "show the developer's actual distaste for the subject matter" then I can't help but feel oppositional to it.

I personally despise seeing the little folder in my DDC directory called "Thcrap". If you want people to support your project efforts then perhaps you shouldn't decide to purposefully alienate fans, especially when your project is a gateway funnel for non Japanese speakers to enjoy Touhou in their native language. I boldly claim that Touhou is not crap and should not be labeled as such. It has inspired thousands of musicians, artists and indie game developers to bring forth an idea that was made by one man that was not for profit in a commercial sence. That is anything but "crap".

I would like to put forward that Nameless Legacy's bias towards Touhou should have no place in the naming or operation of such a large scale translation effort that is primarily operated by regular fans of the series. Touhou Patch Center really cannot be taken seriously if it continues to be unprofessional like this.

If your not going to do it for the fans... do it for ZUN. He has given us *many* great games over the years and having your patcher named "thcrap" is just disrespectful to a man who works hard for not much in return. What would you think ZUN would think if English translation efforts outside of Japan are being worked under the banner of something called "thcrap"?

[Tengukami]

HalfGrand, lighten up please. You have made your distaste for the project well known several times and have been asked to dial back the rhetoric. This screed is completely out of proportion with something as trivial as the name.

[HalfGrand]

Another question.

Did Nameless Legacy create this automatic translation initiative to deliberately gain control over the English speaking Touhou community in his own bid for egotistical power? Many people, and rightfully so, are against Touhou Patch Center due to Nameless Legacy and his past behavior. Like this guy: http://smeghenegham.tumblr.com/post/58063090223/regarding-nameless-legacy-and-his-self-updating

Another question.

Will Touhou Patch Center put in any provisions for controlling Nameless Legacy if he decides to return to staffing Touhou Patch Center in the future? Lets face it, the guy has a track record for being destructive and I would hate to see Touhou Patch Center be stalled in progress if he decides to return and do something stupid and egotistical. Again, same link above.

[HalfGrand]

HalfGrand, lighten up please. You have made your distaste for the project well known several times and have been asked to dial back the rhetoric. This screed is completely out of proportion with something as trivial as the name.

I care about Touhou alot and I want someone like Nameless Legacy far away from handling language patching efforts simply to be a power grabbing cretin who wants to control a fan base. I cannot support something that is made out of bad faith, even if multi-language support is made from it.

I don't want to feel that Nameless Legacy and Touhou Patch Center are mocking all of us by calling their patcher "thcrap". 

[Helepolis]

I am not aware of any development, issues or things about this all (maybe I should seeing all this), but what is most important for me as moderator as this section is to avoid seeing drama being generated here concerning another community or website.

Mature and civil discussions are welcome. They might become tense but as long as people have valid arguments / opinions without the baseless drama it is fine I guess.

The blog you linked is an example of what I prefer not to see here. We're not a community to gain "reach" in order to fulfil personal goals/objections without any contribution to the Toho community in general.

[HalfGrand]

The blog you linked is an example of what I prefer not to see here

Well, I did want to put this article there instead but unfortunately the author withdrew his original findings.

http://thcrap.tumblr.com/post/58035328198/heres-a-photo-post-to-go-with-my-more-in-depth

Mature and civil discussions are welcome

I try my best to be mature and civil as best as I can be. Unfortunately, protesting something that is deemed unfair and even tyrannical means that your going to have to step on a few peoples toes. I reserve my right to protest something that I believe is wrong. Naz wanted to hear my questions, concerns and so forth and he got them. It can't be helped if what I have to say ruffles a few peoples feathers. Free Speech just douse that.

We're not a community to gain "reach" in order to fulfil personal goals/objections

Yes, I completely agree with you. What I am trying to say is that Nameless legacy is trying to fulfill his personal goal of projecting his own bias of Touhou (he thinks its crap, thus he called it Thcrap) through his patcher and I am arguing that there is no place for that in something that it community centered like the Touhou Patch Center.

If Touhou Patch Center simply changes the name of Thcrap to something more respectful and professional, I will be happy and I am sure others will be to. I find the name Thcrap offensive.

[Tengukami]

Honestly, HalfGrand, you are making mountains out of molehills, double-posting, and hurling a lot of accusations and vitriol over ... the name.

You've been talked to about this before. Step away, take a couple deep breaths, and accept that the name is not literally taking a dump on ZUN, thanks.

[Helepolis]

I understand your concerns but you're approaching this completely wrong and I am not going to explain you why. Long story short: Speaking for myself, I am not picking sides. Neither I will personally myself raise an opinion about your concerns/suggestions because reading around makes it an iffy situation.

I can only give you firm advice: If you want a namechange for Thcrap, you should do it at the appropriate locations and discuss with the appropriate people (the ones in charge/running it or contributing). As said, I prefer not to spill drama over here and start a discussion/drama war about it all.

You've made your point and the ones who will agree with you will support you. The ones who disagree obviously won't. The ones who don't care will obviously not care. That is beyond my control. No need to keep repeating the same thing over and over and everywhere. Hence I said we're not a community for personal glory/patriotism.

[Gamer251]

So is Thcrap going to support the new fighting game and TH15?  What about the old PC98 or whatever games?  I'm assuming this Thcrap is under new management then when it started, too, is that correct?

Well another group (being led by cuc, I suppose) is starting on the English Patch on ULiL.
And as brliron said, they will first work on HM support~
I think it's already on new management, but Nmlgc still hangs around to help~

Also, THCrap = Touhou Community Reliant Automatic Patcher
Although it could be changed, there are much more important work to be done than that

[brliron]

Well another group (being led by cuc, I suppose) is starting on the English Patch on ULiL.
And as brliron said, they will first work on HM support~

Well, I said I will first work on HM support.
In order, this will be : static patch for ULiL (with cuc, riatre etc), then HM on thcrap (alone), then ULiL on thcrap (alone).

[Tengukami]

As long as you're doing one for ULiL, will the option of a stand-alone patch for LoLK be provided? I don't expect one for all the games retroactively, but I think a stand-alone option for 15 at least would be nice.

[Soul Devour]

I can only give you firm advice: If you want a namechange for Thcrap, you should do it at the appropriate locations and discuss with the appropriate people (the ones in charge/running it or contributing).

Ah, so like a topic made by one of the people who is a part of the Thcrap team? A topic where said person stated in the opening post to fire away with questions and concerns?

Nazeo made this topic specifically with the intention of taking people's questions and concerns. Nazeo is a part of the Thcrap them. HalfGrand asked some questions which I think can be viewed as concerning and worth answering. There's no need to be rude and jump down their throat before the topic creator, who asked for questions and concerns, has said anything.

[Tengukami]

Nazeo made this topic specifically with the intention of taking people's questions and concerns.

The thing is, there is a difference between asking questions and having concerns on the one hand, and trying to stir drama about a person who isn't even involved with thcrap anymore, especially after said poster has been asked to not do that specific thing before, on the other. Like, he could have asked "hey guys how about changing the name? it's kinda dumb" without going off on a tear about how this is all an insult to Touhou and ZUN personally and the entire project is unprofessioal and can't be taken seriously or whatever. It's OK to disagree or have a minority opinion; this kind of accusatory, finger-pointing drama is not so great.

[brliron]

As long as you're doing one for ULiL, will the option of a stand-alone patch for LoLK be provided? I don't expect one for all the games retroactively, but I think a stand-alone option for 15 at least would be nice.

• Download thcrap, uncompress the zip file into the game's dir.
• Run thcrap_configure.
• Put the shortcut in this zip file [attach=1] in the game's dir.
• You now have a standalone patch.

thanks to the Russian community for finding how to make these portable shortcuts

And if you don't want to do all this, I just did it for you. All you have to do is to put the files in this zip file [attach=2] in the game's directory, and run th15e.

And if by "standalone", you meant "static", you can take my 2nd zip file and remove win32_utf8.dll. You'll have a patch as static as Hisoutensoku's one.

[Tengukami]

Huh. Kind of a convoluted way to go about it but if it lets me move game directories to other HDDs and doesn't require me to run thcrap all over again each time I add a game, then great. Might try this on some of the older games, too. Much appreciated!

[Araceli Caralyz]

Sorry guys, was away for two weeks on army orders.

And for the other thing:

Tsurubami Senri, I wouldn't have a problem with that!
Feel free to poke me so we can set that up.

Halfgrand, I will of course answer your questions.

The name of thcrap is to represent the irony of a fairly decent piece of software under such a name; ( in the very beginning we were less than optimistic for the project's success and placed it under that moniker ) as well as the acronym Touhou Community Reliant Automatic Patcher.

Do note, this is the name of the engine.
Our goal is to not alienate fans, but to bring them together in the form of having everyone being able to collaborate in creating a world where fans are not separated by language.

I personally would prefer to keep the acronym in spirit of such irony.

As for your other question;

Yes, NamelessLegacy has moved on from the thcrap project; he doesn't do the thcrap engine anymore, that would be brliron.
I have stepped in his place.

I worked alongside him for several years and as I said before on several occasions, the guy is strongly opinionated on subjects he believes in.
Some I have agreed with, others I have been vehemently opposed.

The blog attack on him I always will condemn as being unacceptable on any level.

So, what is he doing now?
He is working by himself on creating a PC-98 engine by decompiling the original 5 games back to their original C code.
He has no interest in returning to the thcrap project and occupies himself with the '98 one.

Currently the server is hosted and controlled by MuffinPimp, him and I share in it's monthly upkeep, but as of this writing I myself ( or Nmlgc ) do not have access to it.
My role in all of this is to keep the project stable during our transition as well as being an asset to the team.

While unpopular, I do believe that his public appearance has been blown out of proportion for his own opinions.
Be assured,he never wanted to control the fanbase; he is very laizze-faire; the translations themselves are not controlled by him and any issues that came up from them, he simply created a split in the language so the two groups continued with their work.

I say this as respectfully as I possibly can; the man has created a multi-language auto-updating program, probably the first of its kind, with translators all over the world being able to contribute unhindered; for free, without royalties and out of their own pocket and time.

Do think about that.

Thanks for the questions, I'm back, and will continue collecting them in order for the FAQ section in the future to be as complete as it can.

[mauve]

Never had an encounter with the guy that made me thought he was anything other than a self-centered asshat with a bone to pick. He's still taking potshots at the project from twitter last I saw. Sad and petty.

But, really, none of that matters now, and continuing to talk about the guy might summon him all Beetlejuice style.

I still insist that auto-updating is not what a lot of users would want or be happy with; there's a serious trust deficit to work with there and most outside people are going to think it's kinda shady looking at a first glance. Sure it's nice for the developers, but it's not always for the best. Though, I've always been a cathedral type developer; get stuff right before the users get to see it, instead of emphasizing speed, so I'm biased.

And yeah thcrap is kind of a shitty name, so to speak. Consider this a +1 vote for a rename.

[Tengukami]

For the record, it could be called THDonkeyWang and I'd still use it, because I think the actual name is like the least important aspect of the project to have any amount of care about.

I'm also fairly sure it's trivially easy to disable to autoupdating.

[Araceli Caralyz]

To disable the auto-updater, simply delete the thcrap_update.dll and you will no longer receive any translations or engine updates.

I'll bring the name change up to the other guys, though I do hope changing the name won't confuse other users of the program.

Thank you for your input.

[HalfGrand]

Well then, since NamelessLegacy has passed the torch onto brliron (someone who I respect dearly for his work on the HM patch) and now that I know that a name change for the patch application is at least being considered, my personal gripes with the project are put at ease. With these changes, I think that this project can finally be something that can be a real positive and productive development in the language patching process. I won't have to look over my shoulder all the time in case NamelessLegacy decides to put a virus in the automatic patcher updates in secret. Seriously, NamelessLegacy's character and what I read about him on http://thcrap.tumblr.com/post/58035328198/heres-a-photo-post-to-go-with-my-more-in-depth makes it seem like he might do something extreme like that.

You seriously decided to call your patcher thcrap because you were less than optimistic for the project's success? Have some confidence buddy! If you don't trust what your working on then other people won't either.  :derp:

Anyway, since I've been very vocal about changing thcraps name, I think it's only right that I suggest some possible name changes that you might want to consider. Just some ideas that I had that you might like:

THalpha (Touhou automatic language patcher heuristic application)

THmakai (Touhou multilingual automatic kinetic/key application initiative)

THmap (Touhou multilingual application patcher)

THpops (Touhou peoples operated patching service)

Touhou World Ignition (in reference to Yotsubane's Crimson Clover World Ignition. A multilingual release of his shooter game)

......

These are just some ideas I racked my brain for. I could come up with more, but hey, nobody asked me to come up with names for the patcher.  :V

[Araceli Caralyz]

I would advise to not give that blog much credit; I have the original text on my own tumblr page; as I responded to it quite sharply.
It's an over-exaggeration of his intentions and his character.

The best way to find out how someone is, is by interaction.

It would be pretty difficult to put a virus in the patcher without noticing, as it is open source, changes are tracked on github as well as mediawiki ( though we are trying to get away from that in order to not appear as a competitor to other wikis ), and having sha-256 changes stored on our end to make sure suspected engines match our hash.
And that I can personally vouch he would never do such a thing

Well, when the project was initially started back in 2012, we expected a lot of opposition due to his and mine less than stellar reputations ( it was just us two in the beginning ), and it turned out our fears were well founded as even three years later we experience a lot of push back.

The name is a memento to the dark sense of humor of continuing to believe in the project.

However, I have pitched the name change idea to the guys.

I'll let the interested know where it goes.

Thank you for your suggestion.

[SuperVehicle-001]

I'm both an user of thcrap and a big contributor to one of the languages it supports (Spanish) and I would also like to vote for a name change. I don't particularly mind the name at all, but thcrap is a great piece of software and seeing it get more accepted and used would be an awesome thing.

[DTM]

I still insist that auto-updating is not what a lot of users would want or be happy with; there's a serious trust deficit to work with there and most outside people are going to think it's kinda shady looking at a first glance. Sure it's nice for the developers, but it's not always for the best. Though, I've always been a cathedral type developer; get stuff right before the users get to see it, instead of emphasizing speed, so I'm biased.

I personally prefer the auto-updating patch as it allows for quick translation fixes or changes if someone comes up with a better translation (or another translation debate occurs), but that's just me.

That aside, to the THPatch people, I think it will be really helpful if you could implement a script that would delete all "dummy" images and files.  Currently, the only way to remove images or translations from the wiki is to redirect it to a dummy image.  The exact process can be seen here (5th bullet) but it would be nice if those could also be deleted on the patch repository (this folder in particular has 2 out of 3 files as those dummy images).  It's a small thing, but it would be nice nevertheless, and I highly doubt there are currently any other use of those dummy files besides "removing" images and translations.

Edit: Or better yet, it can detect whether something has been deleted on the wiki and then delete the corresponding file on the patch repository.

Anyways, thanks for taking in feedback!

[Tengukami]

I'll bring the name change up to the other guys, though I do hope changing the name won't confuse other users of the program.

That's really the biggest reason against changing the name. That, and everyone else having to then reinstall the patches all over again because a couple people had a problem with "crap". Squeeky wheels and grease and all that.

Or better yet, it can detect whether something has been deleted on the wiki and then delete the corresponding file on the patch repository.

This is an excellent idea.

[Araceli Caralyz]

DTM, this will be fixed once we move away from mediawiki.

For those who are interested in the name change, you can create an issue at github and come up with names.
That way we can start sharing those idea via social media so people do not have to create github accounts.

I personally would rather keep it the same, but in the spirit of fairness, I do not get a vote.

[HalfGrand]

The whole problem of people getting confused by changing the name of the patcher is a non-issue.

All you have to do is make an announcement on your website that on a specific date you will change the title of your patcher as well as go over any instance of "thcrap" on the touhou wiki's and replace that with the new name.

Easy peasy! Very little effort for a great step forward!