--
Backstory! I apologize for like errors in grammar (specifically tenses) but um this is just kind of pointless flavor text so yep. Enjoy if you want.

Spoiler:

After hours of wandering lost in your cold lonesome, you stumble onto a fresh, albeit heavily-trodden, gravel path. You turn to look down it, and you see various signs of life as you look further down this gravel road. You take your first step onto the road, and the sharp gravel stings at first. (Of course you're not wearing shoes! Who needs to be prepared?) The road is choppy, and there are vast sections missing here and there. You have to estimate where the path would take you and guess before you can find where the road picks up again. After hours of trodding along the sharp gravel path, the road finally grows into a fully paved street, and your feet sigh with pleasure. Far in the distance, you can make out mountains, surrounding a city full of noises, confusion, and busy people.

When you reach the end of the road, you find that there are enormous black gates blocking your entry into the city. Two huge men stand at either side, dressed in steel blue garments and towering a good two feet apiece over you. You take a glance at them; the one on the left is wearing sunglasses and a beret... and some enormously obnoxious plaid pants. The other one wears a hooded cloak, with the majority of the hood draped over his face. You can kind of catch what he looks like under the hood, though... it's almost like an amalgamation of Pokémon faces...

The man on the right manages to look down on you while still maintaining his cool, cool styles. "Hey, you," he says, "who are you?" You shrink back, in awe of the man's height. The other man turns his hood towards you and growls out, "Are you here to become a hacker?" The gutteral sound that comes out of his throat seems to echo in space, time, and various other dimensions. You nod, and the man with the cool, cool styles cracks a grin. "Welcome, then," he says, using his enormous hands to lift up the black iron gates in front of the city, "to Emula Town."

You nod graciously and sprint inside, eager to see all that there is to see. The city inside is huge, with various sights and attractions. All around, people are bustling from place to place, but most of the people were congregated around what looked like a fenced garden. You push your way through the people to the garden and you spot a large white sign in the garden, proclaiming "Beginner's Lounge". You're tempted to jump in the garden already, but you hold back, more excited to explore the rest of the city. Towards the left of the Beginner's Lounge is a huge building. "HS" vibrantly adorns the top of the building, recognizing it for what it was. You pull over one of the people randomly walking by, and ask what "HS" is. "Oh, so you must be new here!" the man squeaks. "It's short for the Hacks Showcase building! They say that if you get good enough at hacking," he pauses, glancing over at the Beginner's Lounge, "that you can make it all the way to the top floor: the main section for the Hacks Showcase!" He nods rapidly, obviously excited. "If you can make it into the Hacks Showcase, you'll be known around here by thousands of people! That's what everyone here is trying to work at!" The man continues to nod and grin broader than you could probably imagine. Uncomfortable now, you bid him a deserving "thanks" and approach the HS building. As you reach over to pull open the door, a blue hand appears on your shoulder.

"I don't think you're ready to go in there yet, LUCARIO_MASTER41," a gutteral voice echoes behind you. "You need to have more progress on the hack you want to share." You turn to try to face the hooded steel blue man, but he had already teleported away. But what hack do I want to share? And how do I make it? you think to yourself, bringing out your thinking-man pose. You wander away, thinking constantly of what kind of hack you wanted to do... or how you were supposed to do it in the first place.

Eventually, you find yourself standing in front of an old, beaten down wooden shack. There's a sign hastily hammered on with rusty iron nails; blue paint is roughly splattered across the board, barely legible. It takes a second to read... ROM... Hack...ing? ...101. "ROM Hacking 101", you breathe aloud to yourself.

"WHY YES, HOW MAY I HELP YOU!?" A nerdy-looking kid pops up out of nowhere and beams up at you, pushing his glasses continually up his nose. "This is indeed ROM Hacking 101, where all of life's pleasures can be obtained!" he says enthusiastically. "Well, not all of life's pleasures, but enough of them that it pleases me. My name is Vrai!" He chuckles. "How may I help you today?"

--
[alink id=tl;dr]tl;dr version can be found here, though I do suggest reading the thread if you have the time. ~[/alink id]

Hi there! Welcome to ROM Hacking 101!

This is the, ahem, recoming of a program I had previously implemented here in PokeCommunity's Emulation section, if any of you were around in June 2009. That one had minimal effect because of its emphasis on a one-on-one tutoring structure. People on both sides (tutors and non-tutors) were simply not actually meeting up and I had no way of overseeing it and controlling how people were tutored. It was also especially difficult because of the mass amount of people that wanted to be tutored. There was an incredibly long waiting list (especially for scripting!) that simply could not be bypassed. I had to close it eventually simply because I could not handle running a program of that magnitude and actually keep it quality and under control for so long.

Anyway, as you can see, this program is no longer called ROM Hacking Tutoring, like it had been before. There's actually a reason for that, aside from my fits of fancy. No, it's now called ROM Hacking 101 because it's no longer a one-on-one tutoring session. These are going to be run a lot differently, based off of a similar activity that I stole from Smogon.

The idea is that the RH101 sessions will be held on a special IRC channel, where tutors and various supervisors (at this point, presumably colcolstyles, giradialkia, and myself) will be given voice and/or moderation powers. There will be a tutorial on how to get onto that channel, both for people who have the mIRC program as well as people who have to use a free online site like Mibbit.com to access IRC channels. Sessions will be scheduled only on the avaliability of the teachers/tutors. People who miss the live session will be able to read over a log of the session posted on the RH101 thread. Now, in order to keep the peace while the tutors/teachers will be explaining their topic over the IRC channel (assuming that there will be a lot of people watching/participating in the program), the channel will be set to mute everyone except for the tutors and supervisors. Students/tutees who have specific questions can PM them (I believe it's something like /query in IRC relay stuff) to a specific user, who I will assume for now will be one of the supervisors and not actually the person who is tutoring. I'm going to make that a big rule, so that if someone keeps PMing questions to the tutor who is going over their topic, the tutor has the ability to kick the perpetrating student out of the channel. (They can come back, but if they're going to do the same thing again, they'd probably get one more kick before they get banned from the IRC channel for a day or two). Anyway, the PM'd questions will be reviewed by a couple of people, and the best questions can be answered by the tutors and such overall at the end of the session.

Now, these tutors can't just be any run-of-the-mill people. We really need people who know their stuff (and can answer selected questions at the end of their lesson!), as well as people who actually have a very detailed process of explaining and doing things. You can't assume that the students know anything at all and skip steps; you'd have to explain it in a step-by-step process. It's very, very important that the tutors are of utmost quality and reliable in nature (what happens if so-and-so tutor doesn't show up during the scheduled time of the live session?). I don't predict that these live sessions are going to go for an extremely long amount of time (the one that I used as a basis for this from Smogon took up about two hours, although they didn't have to go into as much detail as I predict we will). I'd like to say that there would be three-four tutors/lecturers per live session, and that'd we'd have live sessions at least once a month (if not more!).

Anyway, the purpose of this thread at this point is to basically get my idea out to the public and get a public view on it. Whether you think you'd fit more of a tutor-like frame or a student-like one, I'd like to hear your opinions. I also want to get a judge on what kind of tutors and the quality of them that we could possibly have, so if you're interested in becoming a tutor I'd love it if you could just pipe up and tell me a little bit about yourself/why you want to be one/why you're qualified. I'd like for you to try to convince me that you're the best to teach whatever you want to teach. And I'm not setting any restrictions at all on topics that may or may not be covered at this point; while some ideas may sound unfeasible to me right now, someone out there could honestly teach an amazing class on the topic and totally burn whatever doubts I had about that class out of my mind. Lastly, I can't remember if I pointed this out already but if/when a live session is indeed scheduled, the public will be notified at least a week beforehand of the date and time, as well as the presumed schedle of how it will go. There will be another post a couple of minutes before it starts (and maybe an announcement in the Emulation forum or something, maybe a mass PM? I dunno). An example of how the schedule will look (again, stolen directly from the Smogon thread on competitive battling):


We're not going to be following a schedule exactly like that, but something very similar in both format and procedures.

I don't expect you guys to come up with cool titles for your lectures like these guys, but you probably should have everything you want to say and any questions you might imagine people would ask at certain points in the lecture. Also, if you really wanted to (though I can't imagine you would :x), there might be a possibility of doing multiple lessons during one live session. It's okay to have fun during the session, but prodding fun at people (whether they're there or not) to the point of being disrespectful basically means that you get the boot from tutoring during the live session and presumably from doing it ever again. I'm not kidding when I say that we only want the most respectable users to teach the classes. Oh! And before I forget, once the log of the live session is posted, people who missed the live session can come and post questions directed at the tutors during that live session. There's probably gotta be some boundary set here; the RH101 thread is not going to be intended to become a mini-Simple Questions thread.

I've still got to come up with some kind of approval method for tutors who say that they want to join up. I've been playing around with sending a copy of what they want to lecture to Gira, colcol, and myself, or actually going through and making an attempt at lecturing an example crowd. If you have any ideas for right here, shoot 'em out. :[

Sorry for all of those randomly put-together points at the end here. They were all things that I wanted to mention but almost forgot about at the very end while I was typing this up. Anyway, I'm sure that there's still something I've forgotten, so go ahead and throw out all of your ideas and questions and suggestions and stuff out here. I'll get to answering/responding to them when I get back from school probably. :[

There will be an official thread posted sometime in the near future if this gets enough support and/or tutors and stuff. I'm not kidding though, if you even have the slightest intention of becoming a tutor I think you should try to sign up. This program absolutely will not work if there aren't great tutors to provide their thoughts and habits and mannerisms to teach other people. I think I covered anything but if there is anything you're confused about at all, post and I'll try to clear it up.

Thanks for taking the time to read through the thread! And if you've read this far, please post, even if you aren't interested in becoming a tutor. I really want to know your opinions, because I honestly am incredibly excited for something like this, something quite possibly revolutionary, to happen here in Emulation. Hopefully it'll build more talent and quality within ROM Hacking and its subsections and gradually fill the forum with more life. Heck, maybe a lot more people will start answering more and more questions on the simple questions thread or rating each other's hacks and more people will learn and understand more and then the snowball will just start rolling from there.

[a id]tl;dr[/a id]
tl;dr
...it's really not that tl;dr, but oh well.

I love this idea! although im not an expert at anything atm, i have sum suggestions for tutorials. hex editing seems like a given as it is pretty essential for hacking, and i have trouble with it myself =p. other then that maybe for the more advance there could be asm, but i think things like "Anything and Everything about A-map", meaning everything from tiles to the different movement permission tiles and behavior types, would be a good way to get this system going.

I for one support this idea.

My only concern is the effect that timezones will have on the livestream - Not for the people looking to learn (as they can read the log once it is posted) but for the prospective tutors who live outside high-traffic timezones and can't participate as it would require them to wake up at three AM or something. It is a bit of an inconvenience/ let down, but I think that this plan is pretty solid the way it is right now.

On a more sad personal note, I'd like to become a tutor, but I have no idea about what I excel in compared to others seeing as I don't specialise @_@

Johto_legend said:

I love this idea! although im not an expert at anything atm, i have sum suggestions for tutorials. hex editing seems like a given as it is pretty essential for hacking, and i have trouble with it myself =p. other then that maybe for the more advance there could be asm, but i think things like "Anything and Everything about A-map", meaning everything from tiles to the different movement permission tiles and behavior types, would be a good way to get this system going.

Click to expand...

Yeah, definitely. I think a good way to start would just be to work with simple things that most beginners should know and understand; that way, we won't be jumping into the more challenging things when most of the people interested in the lessons won't even understand what's going on.

DrFuji said:

I for one support this idea.

My only concern is the effect that timezones will have on the livestream - Not for the people looking to learn (as they can read the log once it is posted) but for the prospective tutors who live outside high-traffic timezones and can't participate as it would require them to wake up at three AM or something. It is a bit of an inconvenience/ let down, but I think that this plan is pretty solid the way it is right now.

On a more sad personal note, I'd like to become a tutor, but I have no idea about what I excel in compared to others seeing as I don't specialise @_@

Click to expand...

Definitely, and that was one of my big concerns. I was kind of hoping that we would have enough tutors - and enough of a variety of tutors - that eventually we could be holding those live sessions at various times, so that those people who live outside of the high-traffic timezones would be able to give their share with other people that have similar timezones. There would probably be less people watching, and at least one of the supervisors will have to be up at strange times (it'll probably be me :x) but the log will still be posted, and I think it could work out if it was played out like that.

Thanks for your input, guys!

This is a good idea, but why couldn't the lectures be recorded? That way anyone could watch them at anytime.

Team Fail said:

foullump did his via a live desktop feed from his computer. Do you think it's plausible to do that in this program for people that won't get it by reading a wall of text?

Click to expand...

I'm not sure if I'm understanding your question properly. Could you explain it, erm, more exactly? Do you mean he like recorded his desktop while he did stuff and posted that recording? I don't really know what he did so yeah. :(

Nerketur said:

...This is an AWESOME idea. I love it, and if it's played out well, it can easily help reduce the number of questions about <insert topic here>. Not only that, but if people keep asking about a particular topic, one of the tutors could choose to discuss it. I, for one, support this venture 100%, and I'd love to be a tutor. In all likelihood, I'd probably do a lecture on Scripting in XSE. I'd focus on ways to be more productive, efficiency, little tricks, and tweaks, and when it's best to use static vs. Dynamic offsets. I'd do a bit on memory management, saving variables, a few key issues to watch out for, that sort of thing. I might include a basic scripting lesson, but I like Diegoawesome's tutorial a lot, so I'd probably refer "students" to there.

To be laconic:
Awesome idea, I'd love to help and be a tutor on XSE scripting.

PS: I find it funny that I started scripting just a few months ago, when I joined PC, and I'm already an advanced scripter. I blame my previous assembler knowledge, since scripting is a lot like ASM.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the support. :] But yeah, I think we'd start off with sort of beginning aspects of stuff before moving on to more complicated matters/less necessary things for people to begin their work. Like, efficiency is very important indeed, but little tricks and stuff aren't going to be useful until people actually know what it all means. :D

sab said:

This is a good idea, but why couldn't the lectures be recorded? That way anyone could watch them at anytime.

Click to expand...

Sure. They could be if the lecturer/tutor/whatever (I dunno how to refer to them still) wants to record them. I can certainly understand if someone can't learn through reading stuff, but I can't force people to make videos of what they're doing. I'd definitely promote something like that though.

There are still a lot of kinks to work out as far as this will work and how effective it'll be, so I really do appreciate this input. Thanks guys! :]

i c wut u did thar in the story. cool, cool styles and pokemon amalgamation indeed.

I like this idea. Although, having the questions asked all at the end seems a bit... slow and the asker might actually forget about their question depending on how long the lecture is. Maybe you could test having everyone able to talk; if anyone actually spams or anything, just boot them. Most of the people should legitimately be interesting in watching the class. That way, it's easier to get questions asked, and nobody should leave with something still on their mind.

I'd also be interested in tutoring, mind, but I have no idea in what ;D

Manipulation said:

I'd be interested in being a tutor if I could talk. Like, y'know, do a podcast or something.

Click to expand...

I think maybe we could have a separate branch where people can use other media? It seems like a good idea in theory but I have no knowledge of video stuff/podcasts at all so yep. :]

Ninja Caterpie said:

i c wut u did thar in the story. cool, cool styles and pokemon amalgamation indeed.

I like this idea. Although, having the questions asked all at the end seems a bit... slow and the asker might actually forget about their question depending on how long the lecture is. Maybe you could test having everyone able to talk; if anyone actually spams or anything, just boot them. Most of the people should legitimately be interesting in watching the class. That way, it's easier to get questions asked, and nobody should leave with something still on their mind.

I'd also be interested in tutoring, mind, but I have no idea in what ;D

Click to expand...

Yeah I know right? ;)

Nono, the questions are PM'd to a specified user as they come up. If it's only relevant to the what's being talked about at that specific moment (like "how do I open the rom in this program?" or something) then it should be addressed by the lecture in the first place. That's how I see it. The specific user can keep track of all the questions, and then the best ones can be given to the tutor at the end of their lesson.

I think you're kind of overestimating what's going to go on; a lot of people have similar questions and it's not so much that it'll be like spamming swear words and stuff but more like everyone's going to be spamming the same/similar questions so much that no one can even read what the tutor is saying. Plus, that would make cleaning the log so you only get what the tutor said a hell of a lot harder.

Manipulation said:

Skype is all you need and I can use Pamela to record the conversations for archival purposes.

Click to expand...

Okay. Sounds cool.

Team Fail said:

This thread has it. They're not doing it anymore, but it is a perfect example of what I'm getting at. https://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=206281
It'd be best for "visual" learners. Plus, there is a chat, so people can interact directly and ask of any questions that the user may have without having to PM/VM. Plus, IIRC, it saves it so users can access it again if they missed it.

Click to expand...

Yeah. I don't want to force anyone to have to record their screen or whatever, but it can definitely be implemented if anyone wants to do it, like Manipulation wanting to do a sort of talking-version. Honestly, I don't see this as IRC-specific (though I figure a vast majority of it will be done through IRC), so I'm not really going to restrict it to any media. The only thing, though, is that someone has to be willing to teach through that media and they have to go through some kind of approval that I haven't determined yet. It'll probably end up just being them giving an example lesson to myself or the other mods and maybe a few other trusted people, as far as I can think of.

Well, I think I'm one of the better mappers in the community... so I could definitely do a lesson on that, especially if you're wanting to learn it in a natural style.

The main problem that I can see atm, is that I really have no clue how to explain what I do. Most of the time I literally just see a vision of the map, and sit down and make it. There's no planning, or thought involved.

I could try to break what I do down, but then I kinda feel like it would just be like teaching them how to copy me, rather than how to map on their own.

Assuming I do make a lesson though, it would be easier for me to make a video on youtube in advance, and have everyone watch it, and ask me questions in IRC at the same time, Rather than do the lesson live. There's really no way to teach mapping without visuals.

---

I'm also wanting to learn more about scripting, and maybe even spriting, so I wouldn't mind attending a few lessons about those.

Wow, I'd love to become a tutor for this. The first post just shows how dedicated you are to this and I'd love to be a part of this; it makes me cringe sometimes with the misunderstandings some beginners have and I'd be honoured to get some people on the right tracks right from the start.

This would probably, as you say, make some people not in the know begin to answer questions in the SQT, and it will also probably decrease the amount of old questions being repeated. I'm totally supporting this project, I hope it goes far. :D

Also, expanding on what Manipulation was talking about, regarding podcasts and audio, perhaps we could utilise Skype and www.livestream.com? Zephyr+, when holding the Pocket Sprite livestreams, does so, and when I attended it, it was really great, bar some lag. The only problem here is archiving it, though I guess you could use a screen recorder throughout the duration of the stream, and then upload it? It'd probably have to be in parts though, what with YouTube's 11-minute limit for non-partners.

This is a really good suggestion. But, the only thing I think I can do that I haven't seen many people do is titlescreening. (Mainly the Team section)

I feel this would be a really helpful thing for beginners, and it would make it easier than having to search for tutorials that are three years old, and that have members that aren't active anymore, so there can't be any questions allowed with them.

All in all, this is a great thing!

agentgeo said:

This is a really good suggestion. But, the only thing I think I can do that I haven't seen many people do is titlescreening. (Mainly the Team section)

I feel this would be a really helpful thing for beginners, and it would make it easier than having to search for tutorials that are three years old, and that have members that aren't active anymore, so there can't be any questions allowed with them.

All in all, this is a great thing!

Click to expand...

Thanks! Yeah, doing titlescreens is often a hard thing for people to grasp at first. Plus, gathering a bunch of people willing to re-create tutorials and put them all in one location, I think, is my favorite part of this.

Spherical Ice said:

Wow, I'd love to become a tutor for this. The first post just shows how dedicated you are to this and I'd love to be a part of this; it makes me cringe sometimes with the misunderstandings some beginners have and I'd be honoured to get some people on the right tracks right from the start.

This would probably, as you say, make some people not in the know begin to answer questions in the SQT, and it will also probably decrease the amount of old questions being repeated. I'm totally supporting this project, I hope it goes far. :D

Also, expanding on what Manipulation was talking about, regarding podcasts and audio, perhaps we could utilise Skype and www.livestream.com? Zephyr+, when holding the Pocket Sprite livestreams, does so, and when I attended it, it was really great, bar some lag. The only problem here is archiving it, though I guess you could use a screen recorder throughout the duration of the stream, and then upload it? It'd probably have to be in parts though, what with YouTube's 11-minute limit for non-partners.

Click to expand...

Heh. I'd like to think that the first post is moreso me just constantly thinking about implementing something like that here; I scribble down a couple notes here and there and then just kinda daydream some more. :] I do appreciate the compliments though, thank you.

Yeah. Honestly, I haven't thought out exactly how the teaching process was going to work through all of the possible subjects, like mapping and graphics editing. RH101 might become a thing where some of the sessions will be held on IRC and some of the other ones might be on livestream. I think that something could really be worked out here, though I still have research to do. Plus, though, we still have to have people willing to use livestream and stuff to do that.

QuilavaKing said:

Well, I think I'm one of the better mappers in the community... so I could definitely do a lesson on that, especially if you're wanting to learn it in a natural style.

The main problem that I can see atm, is that I really have no clue how to explain what I do. Most of the time I literally just see a vision of the map, and sit down and make it. There's no planning, or thought involved.

I could try to break what I do down, but then I kinda feel like it would just be like teaching them how to copy me, rather than how to map on their own.

Assuming I do make a lesson though, it would be easier for me to make a video on youtube in advance, and have everyone watch it, and ask me questions in IRC at the same time, Rather than do the lesson live. There's really no way to teach mapping without visuals.

---

I'm also wanting to learn more about scripting, and maybe even spriting, so I wouldn't mind attending a few lessons about those.

Click to expand...

I think with mapping there's less to teach than what most people think. I mean, you show someone what a tile error is and how to avoid them, and you show them how to make a map more playable, and... then what? To be honest, I think it'd be a cool idea to sit people down and just record good maps being made, so the process can be sped up and people can just kind of watch other people map so they can see how other people do it. Teaching people how to map definitely isn't something that can be done over IRC; you're right.

Spherical Ice said:

Wow, I'd love to become a tutor for this. The first post just shows how dedicated you are to this and I'd love to be a part of this; it makes me cringe sometimes with the misunderstandings some beginners have and I'd be honoured to get some people on the right tracks right from the start.

This would probably, as you say, make some people not in the know begin to answer questions in the SQT, and it will also probably decrease the amount of old questions being repeated. I'm totally supporting this project, I hope it goes far. :D

Also, expanding on what Manipulation was talking about, regarding podcasts and audio, perhaps we could utilise Skype and www.livestream.com? Zephyr+, when holding the Pocket Sprite livestreams, does so, and when I attended it, it was really great, bar some lag. The only problem here is archiving it, though I guess you could use a screen recorder throughout the duration of the stream, and then upload it? It'd probably have to be in parts though, what with YouTube's 11-minute limit for non-partners.

Click to expand...

ustream automatically records your streams, so you can just watch them again later, without having to upload it to youtube. (Youtube doesn't have a time limit for non-partners anymore btw.)

I've done this in the past with several other people, and I find the best way to do it is via TeamViewer. It's a neat program that allows you to connect to your targets computer and remotely control it from your screen (you see what's on their screen and you can do w/e you want, thought they still have control of their computer too. I think that it allows for easier interaction than say talking/chatting about it). The only disadvantage I can think of about using that is the timezone inconvieniences and the fact that you need decent internet connection speed for it to run smoothly.
TeamViewer has a chat too btw.

Alignment said:

I've done this in the past with several other people, and I find the best way to do it is via TeamViewer. It's a neat program that allows you to connect to your targets computer and remotely control it from your screen (you see what's on their screen and you can do w/e you want, thought they still have control of their computer too. I think that it allows for easier interaction than say talking/chatting about it). The only disadvantage I can think of about using that is the timezone inconvieniences and the fact that you need decent internet connection speed for it to run smoothly.
TeamViewer has a chat too btw.

Click to expand...

I've... tried that before. I mean, with that first ROM Hacking Tutoring... No one wanted to download it and it really didn't work out at all. The thing with these other methods is that anyone can come in whenever and it requires no downloads; we don't have to worry about the student side of the tutoring because if they're available and want to see, then they can see; if they aren't, I don't have to worry about them not making any times. TeamViewer kind of leans towards a one-on-one tutoring basis which is really what I've been trying to avoid because that's what's going to kill this off again. People are, indeed, lazy, and don't meet whenever you want them to.