The Amazing Multimedia Map

June 13th, Runevillage received one its best features ever. After months of slaving over a hot stove, Glodenox brought exclusively to the Village a map. But this is no ordinary map and Glodenox is no ordinary member. A Legend in his own right, he once again showed what talent can produce.
The map can be used to interact with Quests and City guides. Simply hover your mouse over the area required and you get an option to go to the guide. There is even a drop down menu for you to choose an area or guide from! When you have zoomed into the piece you want, the drop down menu then gives you more choices of where you want to be and quests related to that area.
As Hiker said in the Intro on the Home page, It’s the largest one-man project anywhere! So who is the amazing Glodenox ? What was this all about? I cornered him in a dark cellar and tortured him until he gave me an interview.
Actually, that last bit isn't true. He was happy to take time out from a hectic schedule and provide some details. Besides, the cellar wasn’t dark.

I started by asking him what gave him the idea for the map initially?

“When I started learning HTML 9 months ago, I liked the system of image maps (clickable areas on an image), so I always kept them in my mind. I was also doing a lot of quests with the guides of RV, but I found it annoying that when I was looking at the map on the site of Runescape that I couldn't just click at those icons... And I also found the Runevillage site too static, and that for a fansite of a dynamic world. And then, lying in my bed I suddenly realised that I was able to make a system myself where every icon would link to the appropriate guide. The next day I started working on it, and that day was the 26th of September last year. The first map I created was Falador, and all people seeing this were very enthusiastic about it, even Hiker said that it would be something like that they he'd love to see on the site. This all encouraged me a lot.”

So basically, Glodenox had learned HTML 9 months previous and went ahead with this! He started work on it on 26th September and so it began to take shape. Obviously there were many challenges to a project this size. What exactly they were he was detailed in explaining. Not all of it was technically based either. Outside life played a big part in it.
“There were a couple of difficulties, I had to find a good, clean way to show in the boxes where the person is going to if he clicks in the area, I had to define all the areas, which I solved with a program later on (luckily). Something else that took a lot of time was ensuring that all browsers give the same result and that the system doesn't give any mistakes. But the biggest challenge of all, was creating this project during the school year. I also had to learn a lot of things (Javascript e.g.) while I was also having to learn for school subjects. The combination of those two was hard sometimes, especially the last weeks of the uploading... I was having exams at that time, and I'm sure my points won't be so good now...”

The attention to detail is impressive but even the supplied maps didn’t always fit the requirements. I asked him what he needed to add.
“Most of the guides I needed were already on Runevillage, so that made it easier for me. Some though -like a guide of all shops of Runescape- weren't yet to be found on the website, so I decided to make one myself.”

So how long did it take to make exactly ?
“I haven't really counted the hours of work, but I'm sure it was over 100 hours of work in total. And that being spread over a period of around 8 months... I think I spent approx. 1.5 hour on it each day which is about 75% of the time I'm sitting behind my pc each day (longer in weekends though). A month ago I relooked my post with which everything started, to my surprise it was already 6 months old - something I didn't expect... I thought it was about 2 months old or so...”

Runescape, being the dynamic environment it is, never stays the same for long. This must bring it’s own challenges so I wondered how he was going to keep the map up to date ?
“I am able to send files to King Zonk (who greatly helped me with uploading it by the way) and he'll upload those for me.
He tells me when he isn't going to be online and even gives me the reason, and that makes it easier for me to work with him of course, it creates a bond.
With my membership having ended a month ago (I hardly played the game any longer anyway), it will be a bit harder to get all information. But as I'm also taking care of getting the new guides of RV finished, I see lots of things about the paying side of Runescape and I learn from them. That I'm helping the guides getting uploaded also enables me to provide the file containing the piece of the map that needs an update because of that guide with it, so updates will happen to both at the same time.

The motivation for a project like this must have been tremendous and it goes without saying that having launched it, there must be other projects in the pipeline. Glodenox was a little evasive about his details and who can blame him? But this is what he had to say.
“This was my biggest project so far. I'm also working on that list of all Runescape Shops, which is I think about half way complete by now, but as it's linked to the other project, I more see it as an extension.
I'm also going to release something else which won't be informational, but just for pure fun. I won't release too much about it yet though since I haven't tested anything yet. And there are also some other things that are in my mind, but I haven't really thought a lot on them yet.”

Whatever they are, this map will be a milestone in his career. There is a link to the map from the home page of Runevillage.
I am very grateful for the time Glodenox took to answer my questions. By GCSE