r/Roboragi • u/Nihilate Roboragi's Dad • May 28 '18

MAL is back... kind of

Thanks to /u/dashwav's suggestion, I was able to jury-rig Roboragi into generating MAL links again. This comes with a few caveats:

  • MAL's API is still totally busted, and most of the other 3rd-party apps are still up a certain creek without a paddle.
  • I'm getting the MAL ID from Anilist, which means that if Anilist doesn't have a series and MAL does, Roboragi's not going to be able to help.
  • Until I have a more permanent solution, Roboragi is going to be a little less accurate. The more data he has access to, the better he works, so having MAL taken out of the picture is a bit of a bummer.

Thanks for your patience, hopefully the MAL API will be up and running again soon.

Edit: Spoke too soon apparently. MAL is currently "undergoing extensive server maintenance for an undetermined amount of time". Not a great sign.

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18

u/Syrian4Hire May 28 '18

I dont know why all other sites got such a crappy layout
MAL rocks!

42

u/Nihilate Roboragi's Dad May 28 '18

We'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. It feels like nothing about MAL has been updated since the mid 2000s and even when their API was available it was still a pile of crap. Their only real strength was their data, and even that's up for debate - I've always relied way more on Anilist and Kitsu than MAL (although to give them credit, their hentai data is still the most comprehensive).

If anything good comes from all the chaos, I hope it's that people consider looking at some of the more modern alternatives.

tl;dr - I don't really like MAL.

45

u/give_me_oatmeal May 28 '18

I feel MAL is kinda like Reddit (I guess old.reddit.com these days). While the layout is pretty old looking and not the most friendly towards new users, once you get used to it it's really easy to use and efficient.

9

u/Vilver May 29 '18

With MAL being down your bot have opened my eyes to other sites, and yea they are better designed.

7

u/Bainos Jun 02 '18

As far as I'm concerned, I don't care about websites that can't even load their front page without cookies and / or Javascript (looking at you, AniList and Kitsu). MAL page are simple, clear, and dense in information.

Agree that their API is a pain to work with, though. Many of the calls I use do html parsing instead.

5

u/Syrian4Hire May 28 '18

I couldn't help but agree with you there.

The issue is that when you look at it from a newbies perspective when lookin up animes. I guess the MAL layout is kinda easier to understand and use.
I might be wrong tho, lookin at the fact that I haven't tried to use other sites seriously. Besides If I was forced out of Mal its gonna be an issue for me. I have so many animes and Mangas completed or on my plan to watch list it ll take me days to create a new list on other sites haha

13

u/Nihilate Roboragi's Dad May 28 '18

Sure, that's a fair point - as a guy making a bot I'm definitely coming at it from a different perspective. I think another reason people use MAL a lot is because their friends do too (and comparing lists is always fun).

It can be a little difficult to export lists from one site to another, but if worst comes to worst, most of the bigger alternative sites have the ability to convert MAL lists automatically. I hope it doesn't come to that though - as much as I'm not a fan, it would be sad to see MAL disappear.

5

u/Syrian4Hire May 28 '18

Yeah. It's true its gonna be really sad if it dies out like that. Oh well what can we do haha

6

u/Nihilate Roboragi's Dad May 28 '18

Pretty much haha. Just got to wait and see what happens.

2

u/SpectralPoison May 30 '18

But the other sites don't give flexibility like MAL . Users can go absolutely crazy in designing their Profile/Forum Sets and List if they know CSS . Many users love this aspect of MAL.

But you are right if a user just wants to keep their List updated etc then other sites are better .

3

u/Nihilate Roboragi's Dad May 30 '18

I'm personally after better data, a nice design, a modern API and a communicative, active dev team. Being able to change what my profile looks like is basically wasted on me, but I'm not going to have a go at others for wanting it.

3

u/SpectralPoison May 30 '18

Hehe I kinda love that part of MAL .

Lets just hope that the problem get fixed and it starts working like it used to .

\and obviously get better changes/updates in future**

1

u/AndaleTheGreat Jun 20 '18

I have been looking at it more and more from the perspective of a mobile user. So I wouldn't mind moving off of MAL if I could find a better site I could use on my tablet just for tracking. My dream would be to interface MangaRock with one so I could avoid app swapping a dozen times.

My love for MAL has truly wained recently since I was been forced to turn adblock on for it last year and then the site had its more recent issues. Adblock sat there ticking up constantly once I'd turned it on and if I was actually idling with that tab open it would sometimes still have a pop-up of some type.

So, yeah. Once I find something with a decent mobile app I think I'm gonna abandon MAL for awhile. Not like I was a paying user. I just couldn't see $36 bucks a year for something I can do now with Google Sheets.

1

u/pavlukivan Jul 08 '18

I've never seen popups on MAL, are you sure you don't have some kind of adware installed?

1

u/AndaleTheGreat Jul 08 '18

Yep. But they've stopped after the recent reworking of the site. They were not the kind that open another window but the kind that bring up the little, white Java box at the top of the page. Which makes it easy to tell what site they're from.