a spamblock app would be nice

could be a HUD upgrade
or a regualr app that would take up CPU speed.

No kidding.

Optionally, remove the spam altogether. It's kind of a cute idea, but if all it does is generate extra, repetitive, mouse clicking to delete them it's not worth including.

Not true, this spam idea is great, it keeps in the storyline and later on, 1 random email outa lets say 100, can be a special program, or an updated emails DAT file or some like that, that helps you out.

The HUD addition would be nice filtering out as you make and upgrade, the higers ones only elet through good ones and filter out the virueses and trojan wise things.

Plus later on the SPAM mail, can be broaded and expanded on in the game. As you know this MOD isnt ready and fully functional, and this part is/should be expanded later on.

-Kethlar

Actually having to look over every piece of spam in case it's important is not my idea of fun gameplay either.

I mean c'mon, you get this shiny new super-secret hacker email address and immediately it starts getting spammed? That doesn't even make any sense. Even email addresses that are easy to guess don't start getting spammed that heavily unless you spread them around online to be harvested and sold.

First off, as far as "important mail" goes, you only get about 4-6 of them. The rest are just about hardware installation or paying your fees, or mission payments and the such, hardly what I would call important. So while it is a little tiresome while you're waiting for a certain message, it's overall not a horrible addition, I thought it was quite a novel idea. Whether practical or not, that's still to be determined.

Secondly, no one ever said your email was "super secret" or the such. And everyone gets spam, I had an account that I never used and the box got at least 3 pieces ever few days. And if you think about it, your name does get spread around in the game. When you sign up for a mission, they have your email so you can recieve the details. And we all know how large corporations are about selling your name or sending you advertisements even when you don't sign up for anything. Or say you sign up an account on another bank server, it is after all owned by one of the companies in the game. So all that merely to say, it is fairly reasonable to assume that you would get spam even if you don't "spread your name around." Sorry, this post is a result of large quanities of caffeine and small quantities of sleep.

I agree I have 20 email addresses(gmail), just for giving out invites, and every single one of thoes, I never use at all. Yet i get between 5-10 pices every few days, never sent 1 email from there other than invites.
Which then you are right in turn why wouldnt you get SPAM emails, I mean come on, again this email address isnt 'super secure'.
I agree, I agree totally. That is why, there should be a HUD option to filter out certin 'SPAM' emails, I mean of course it can already be coded in the area of 10% filtered, 25% 50% 75%, 99.99% filtered, not 100% filtered, becuase nothing is 100% perfect. But it does go to show a little bit of realism for the time frame fo the game.

-Kethlar

Another idea also would be that not all spam mails are worthless, some of them contains "virus" which you can use to attack companies servers (much like Revelation). Some of them contain higher versions of softwares which are not available in the Uplink Internal Service System.

However, it would be great to have a HUD upgrade or something to block the spam mails (catered to those who are easily annoyed), but then they'll have to "lose out" on the chances of getting those useful "viruses" and "limited edition version softwares".

Unless the Filter is programable, or has different versions.
Meaning different versions do different things, some block all SPAM, some dont black as much some let viruses through, some let certin programs through, some only let specified attachments through, some let certin addresses through. There are alot of different possibilites depedning on what can be coded or is possible.

-Kethlar

Another idea, on top of spam email, would be to make a few of the emails contain viruses, spyware or adware. These emails would be immune to spam blockers. Once you open the email, the virus or adware would run itself (usually with a time delay). Higer level viruses/spyware/adware would be rarer but more powerful.

The basic adware (Level 1) would throw up adverts every so often (random amount of time between 5 and 20 mins between adverts) to annoy you. These adverts would be pretty much the ones you get through email anyway. The more powerful ones (Level 2) would throw them up at more inconvenient times (i.e it sees if you're hacking and then throws them up).

The Level 1 spyware would send information out to people about your gateway. This would increase the possibility that you would be hacked. Level 2 spyware would steal bank account details and remote server addresses. This would increase your chance of having any remote servers that you own hacked into, and increase the probability that your bank account is used faudulently (i.e you get the blame for sending funds to terrorists or they just steal your cash).

Viruses would sit dormant on your gateway until they launch themselves after a random amount of time.
Level 1 viruses would have payloads including random file deletion and security bypassing.
Level 2 viruses would cause hardware damage and temporary denial of service.
Extremely rare Level 3 viruses would alter your system files, sending your hardware into a hugely overclocked state, melting all your hardware. You would have to buy a new gateway and only a few random files would be recoverable.

To prevent these, you could buy anti-adware, anti-spyware and anti-virus programs.

Anti-Adware V1: This program stops 50% of Level 1 adware.
Anti-Adware V2: This program stops all Level 1 adware and 50% of Level 2 adware.
Anti-Adware V3: This program stops all adware.
Anti-Adware V4: This program stops all adware, quarantining it for further use.

Anti-Spyware V1: This program stops 50% of Level 1 spyware.
Anti-Spyware V2: This program stops all Level 1 spyware and 50% of Level 2 spyware.
Anti-Spyware V3: This program stops all spyware.
Anti-Spyware V4: This program stops all spyware, quarantining it for further use.

Anti-Virus V1: This program stops 50% of Level 1 viruses.
Anti-Virus V2: This program stops all Level 1 viruses and 50% of Level 2 viruses.
Anti-Virus V3: This program stops all Level 1 and 2 viruses.
Anti-Virus V4: This program stops all Level 1 and 2 viruses, quarantining them for further use.
Anti-Virus V5: This program is an enhanced version of V4, stopping Level 3 viruses.

Revelation would be classed as exempt from anti-virus detection capabilities as it changes its own code to morph around existing programs, making detection impossible. The only way to detect and destroy revelation is with Faith, which would act like a trap, pretending to be a nortmal program and kill revelation when it tries to morph around Faith.

A special HUD could be bought, so that all Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware and Anti-Adware runs in the background, checking incoming files, emails and running processes, eliminating the need for manual scanning.

It's a lot to think about, but it'd rock!

LOL that is exactly what I was thinking.
To bad i had that in my head just to LAZY to type ity all out. Almost word for word too.

That is the idea I was going after, that is exactly what should be put in which would be great addition. An excelent addition to Onlink.

-Kethlar

ubertehw00tage.

Wow, that's a GREAT idea!