Historical Online Learning Foundation

The Historical Online Learning Foundation Studies Group welcomes you to the "Skunk Works", the R&D Center for HOLF.  There are multiple sites utilized to coordinate research and user testing for the Foundation. This site serves as the central R&D coordination hub. 

Current efforts are centered around initial development of Stephen Schmidt's Rolling of the Drums (ROTD) an adaptation of his Napoleonic Wars On-Line (NWOL) game engine as a replacement game engine for Civil War OnLine (CWOL).  It is the goal of this software development to get ROTD to  stage of maturity where coordination of HOLF activities using this software can be transferred to the Distance Simulations Group and a regular schedule of annual events can be offered to the player base.

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Continued users testing of War Between the States (WBTS) software suite, an alternative game engine for CWOL being developed by MALCOM Games Ltd. of Australia, has been suspended indefinitely.  Attempts to coordinate future software offerings by MALCOM Games are underway.

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Stephen Schmidt's began work on  Napoleonic Wars On-Line (NWOL) game engine in March 2003. Envisioned as a multi-faceted game engine in the traditional of the five module CWOL model, Stephen quickly developed the first reliable web-based coded game engine offered by the Foundation. As Stephen accomplished his milestones, it quickly became apparent that NWOL was a new game design that incorporated little from the old CWOL design and offers the members of the Player's Guild a unique approach to a group-based interactive game of the Napoleonic era. Since 2003, Stephen has finished the initial, Alpha stage, development of all modules for NWOL. He completed Beta & large group user tests in the Fall of 2007. Currently, the NWOL software suite drives the premier game event offered by the Foundation, Napoleonic Wars OnLine (NWOL).