Code: What is Universal Unreal?
Universal Unreal is a system by which players can better connect
with each other for enhanced gameplay. Universal Unreal is a group,
or 'Universe' of servers with a common player base. For example,
UT Strangelove players and servers could make up a 'Universe'.
Players can create an account on your installation's website
to take full advantage of all the features of Universal Unreal,
both in-game and online. It's a bit like Xbox Live, but free
and open source.
For admins, Universal Unreal acts as a massive player information
system. All player joins, ASC/Nexgen IDs, IP addresses, hostnames,
player nicks, server access history, and administrative
actions (kick, ban, mute, etc) are logged to the universe server
and recorded for three months. All of this data can be accessed
from in-game and on the website as well, meaning that you can make
decisions from inside of a match, instead of having to close UT, fish
through logs, and find the information you need before performing a
ban or other action.
Universal allows players to interact with each other (and even
chat) with each other between connected servers or a
web-based installation in real-time. This mod, however, is
much more than simply a UT chat server. This mod also allows
players to maintain a 'buddy' list and receive instant alerts when
a buddy joins a participating server, which is great for unplanned
matches with friends. Additionally, users can enable a HUD overlay
which displays the top 8 most active servers in the universe,
including player counts and the map that is being played, with all
data in nearly real-time.
Universal Unreal is powered by a PHP and MySQL website backend
which is accessed frequently by participating servers. There is not
one central installation. Think of Universal Unreal like UTStats;
each community of servers needs only one installation. For
example, the UT StrangeLove community will run just one
universe server, which will cater to about 12 servers and a
couple thousand players.
For each community / grouping of servers, there only needs to
be one universe web server installation, and then each UT server
is configured to connect to it. | 
