Exactly so I came to the conclusion that
must be referring to something else.
The shop scanner wasn’t (afaik) affected by the auth addition to the internal api endpoints.
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Digging through James’ post history is a pain and I’m supposed to be in bed already, lol.
He did in fact post a couple months ago that some changes had been made because data was being pulled from the system that they didn’t feel users should have access to. I don’t remember anyone pressing for details.
Couldn’t confirm on hand that it was with regard to the expanded auth checks, which he did expressly respond were to further the goal of eventually adding API’s. \Those auth checks might stop some web services but not any mod with access to the sort of data exposed by the proxy UI or shop scanner.
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I tried but can’t find this post 
I think it was in a testing patch comment/notes. But I could be wrong. Tho I do recall seeing that as well.
Probably used some wording I couldn’t think of 
Maybe nightstar remembers
This one?
Minimal mention if it, but it’s about all I can find, and seems like it might have been what you guys are thinking of.
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Maybe, tho it doesn’t mention if data was being pulled from the system that they didn’t feel users should have access to.
Yes I remember this line as well, but unsure if it was James that said it or not. Could it have been Luca? was going to dig through history in the same post timeline. Nope.
This is the closest response matching up I think:
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Evergreen edited this in just as I was digging it up. I grabbed a link from a little earlier in that thread:
This is in reference to the auth checks they added, in that thread james does not make the comment I referenced earlier regarding data users shouldn’t be accessing. It was pretty casual, and I’m not optimistic as searching his history for words like “access” or “data” is pretty rough lol.
The forum seems to support basic phrase searching but I’m not getting to this easily. I just started looking though, I did actually lay down and try to sleep for a bit.
EDIT: that is the thread where he confirmed they are considering public APIs and lists some of the obstacles to implementing them.
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I remember the comment something along the lines of ‘pulling info they shouldn’t have access to’ but you’re 100% it was James? That’s what I couldn’t recall, who the person was that said that.
Don’t bother, it’s not that important 
Was just surprised that my lurking has missed it.
I’m going to roll with ‘99%’ for safety’s sake 
It could have been any dev I guess and I would have taken it as authoritative but it’s usually James or Luca that posts about the tech stuff ofc.
EDIT: I fully give up some of these release notes threads approach 1000 posts. Take it with a grain of salt I guess.
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The auth change lets them associate api calls with an account. Previously some apis were just public so any new ip could abuse them. With auth they can ban accounts and a new purchase would be required if they are abusing things. I have never been banned.
For clarity xaldafax and havok must be refering to other mod makers being blocked or punished, as neither have happened to me.
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I think in fairness we should consider when that channel was created and understand the reasons this was done. Especially since it was done in EA and not created in Production. Overall, though, I think it does create mixed messages as well.
Unfortunately, I think the lack of time on the Developers side keep them focused on other things and doesn’t give them the time to really look at this area in the game. It comes down to that and the philosophy. Just like some people in the forums feel there is no issue here, I wouldn’t doubt the Devs have both sides of the conversation as well.
At the end of the day, if people knew that those hacking the game can get a whole host of data that gives them a clear advantage over those players they probably wouldn’t be happy. Then with the developers continuing to not just shut that down really speaks bad for the game. Not to mention those players that just enable the behavior even more than the developers. Maybe a nice steam review of Dev and player sanctioned cheating is needed on the forums to address the issue. Give the new players a warning about the powers some people have and that it is only a few not everyone.
I don’t like that there are people that can read a meteor before it lands to decide if they want to attack it or not. I don’t like that someone can walk through chunks and see the resource distribution without barely needing to mine. If they can read those things, I wouldn’t doubt them being able to read beacon expiration timers, inventory of people, or a whole host of other things.
When 1 person does that, then others feel they need to do it and they will. Those actions then cause problems with the players that refuse to play the game like that and instead want to play it the way it is delivered.
I don’t see how any of that “helps the game” in any way in our current state. In the middle of EA with some basic “reading of files” it might have made some sense. The actions have now moved into memory reading and who knows what else and do affect game play so maybe it is time to evaluate the real need of having it until we have a proper API layer.
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I get that “websites” can be used by everyone, but that isn’t always the case. Ultimately, the specific points are not usually the focus of those of us that don’t agree with the hacking and outside data gathering player mindset.
There are many more mods and things people have done now that they are aware of the technology layer to do this. The cat is out of the bag and people have leveraged it for their own good in EA and now in Production. That is basically the same thing @Havok40k was talking about in his posts.
Even things like websites are not always available to people. It comes down to how some people choose to play the game. Unfortunately there are some players that will push the line because of their lack of character to get the most advantage. That is what many of us are talking about.
Basically they are they type of people that see a truck wreck that was carrying money. The money flew all over the place. Some people would help the driver, others would return the money. Still others would keep the money themselves and take advantage of the situation. We have people in the game that are fine doing whatever they can to “win” over other people that just want to play the game they have.
Trying to mix P2W and Hack2Win won’t help solve the conversation on whether hacking is helpful or not and should be stopped at least in how I look at the problem.
A person like Jiivita or Omni who (in the game and uses game tools and features) mines out a whole mountain to try to figure out resource distribution deserves to decide what information they share or not. A person that uses another outside program to read resource distribution in minutes or easily target where diamonds are doesn’t really deserve to be respected on any level in the game.
They are different things and people don’t need to try to bring in all the other scenarios to try to “justify” the lack of character and integrity of a person that wants to take short cuts like this in the game play. People can disagree and play how they want. But, there are a decent amount of players in this game that refuse to allow the game to be ruined because people can’t play fair.
I don’t think anybody was championing dev sactioned cheating, xray or any such thing. 
They’ve probably kept the line a bit fuzzy so they can decide on a case by case basis if they should take action against a mod, because in my opinion there are advantages to some level of user modification. People can customize their game a bit to fit their needs better. It’s nice that we have access to the game configuration files for the forge animation speed for example way before the skip button was introduced.
Or aggregating data that’s presented in the game in an automated manner, it is just the means to cut down on manual work, it could be done manually as well. I don’t count this as cheating, cheating should be discouraged.
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Honestly, I don’t want to get into any specifics. For me this isn’t a “specific” point by point discussion. Instead it is about the philosophy of how people choose to play the game and where they draw their line around stuff like cheating, taking advantages of things, and what they see is “fair” game play.
It is very simple - does a person play the game within the realms of the game or not.
Some of the “mods” and web pages are helpful but I’d prefer them being in the game or using a correct API layer. Other “mods” and way of obtaining data are completely crossing and hurt the game hugely because of the perception they set and the level of unfairness they create.
It saddens me that so many in this community are willing to justify those actions and worse actually “enable” it. To me it just seems a simple answer - NO don’t play that way.
(edit: I want to clarify why I feel this mindset is bad - because is sets a precedent for others to do it and who knows how worse it can get. I respect people on their technical skill level to do some of these things but wish they wouldn’t help enable others who might make these even worse.)
Meh. If the game was fair then there wouldn’t be huge plot bonuses for people that happened to find the game in an early phase and leverage that extra land mass for passive income.
This game isn’t ‘fair’. Whether you paid a lot early on, you have excessive time to play the game and exploit exo first come first serve resource allocation, or whether you are smart enough to dissect certain parts of the program to make it more user friendly.
The moral high ground argument you’re making is deeply flawed.
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I think we all would prefer that, but the dev resources to make that happen just aren’t there. At least not soon.
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First off I never tried to link one level of advantage to another. Trying to justify one set of actions and choices of players versus other decisions by Devs and players is even more flawed.
Fairness is a relative term and everyone here knows that and it makes no sense to try to deflect the general comments I am making here. The “what about” mindset of argument is a waste of time.
We all should be mature and adult enough here to be able to tell the difference and understand each individual context on what is appropriate and what probably isn’t really appropriate.