mingw / eclipse support coming!

[Bak]

So I'm slowly converting the project to use mingw and eclipse as a build environment for windows... so this means you don't need to have msdn to compile and you'll be able to compile and develop Discretion using free software!!!

 

As a side effect expect larger file sizes (confirmed), and slower run-time (won't know if this one's true until the whole thing is converted over). If the performance sucks I'll get the newest msvs 2008 and yeah... we'll use that.

 

I'm pretty excited about minGW... so far I've converted and built the deps (freetype/aedGui), the front end and settings handler module. It doesn't seem to like to play with the older modules, but that may be because I'm using a newer version of freetype/sdl/sdl_* ect.

 

Also, the c/c++ linker is my new enemy

 

the hard part should be over though, now just the grunt work of creating an eclipse project for the modules one by one.

 

Also, S!@#$%^&* is making us a kick-!@#$%^&* skin, take a look at a preview:

 

[»doc flabby]

Kinda offtopic, but i'm really happy to see this project progressing!!!

[CRe]

Agreed with Doc Flabby

[Bak]

finished converting the rest of the modules... already found one major bug in the timers module just by switching compilers.

 

here's another interesting difference in compilers you probably didn't know existed:

 

I had this code

if (picFunc)
{
Point p(p.x + letterSize.w / 2, p.y + letterSize.h / 2);
picFunc(&p, numPics++);
}

with a Point p outside of the scope of the if statement. Visual studio used the intended (outside) value, while mingw used the currently-being-declared value to initialize the structure (which resulted in a structure with junk data in it). meh... I think it's interesting... screw you guys

 

Anyways the performance looks decent. I ran it on a few different resolutions with the minGW one consistently getting a few more fps than the old msvc one. I'm not sure how much of this is due to minGW and how much of it is due to using newer dlls for SDL and such. I suspect it's a little bit of both. Anyways with full screen 1400x1050 at 32 bit color depth (the highest res my laptop allows), the old one gave me 39 fps vs 42 with the mingw compile. so looks like we got a slight performance gain! (note that on 16 color depth the fps doubles to over 70 for both of them; discretion's performance doesn't suck! [also i'm running two screens and have eclipse open])

 

I'm going to get the newest version into the svn branch, merge it with trunk (gulp), make a tag branch and get some sort of executable so you guys can fool around with it. I'll probably also make some videos explaining how you can get started with Discretion development using minGW and eclipse (without needing to buy anything).

 

edit: here you go https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.p...group_id=188579

I even left the modified bombs in for you

[Bak]

Okay good news!

 

The tutorials for starting out with eclipse and making modules are done! That's right you're officially out of excuses not to help. The tools you need are all free and there are video tutorials explaining each step of the process.

 

Covered in the new video tutorials tutorials:

 

* Obtaining the discretion code (and binary) using svn

* Getting the minGW compiler and making sure it works

* Downloading the newest Java Runtime Environment (JRE)

* Acquiring and testing Eclipse with CDT (Eclipse for C++ development)

* Creating and testing a simple Discretion module with Eclipse

* Discretion/Eclipse tricks and tips for accelerated development

 

Again, they're videos, and they assume you don't have any of the tools installed to start out. They are up on the wiki Discretion tutorial site (along with the older picture tutorials). Picture = 1,000 words. Video = 1,000 Pictures or 1,000,000 words. Wow!

 

http://wiki.minegoboom.com/index.php/Discr...Module_Tutorial

 

(also if you missed it in the post above there's a binary which you can download if you just want to run Discretion)

[The Unliked One...]

Looks like this is coming along nicely

And on the helping part, I can probably hit you up with few graphics (looks like only thing you need is a skin so that's fine with me) and for the modules.. I better not touch my fingers on those

[rfinn]

So I'm slowly converting the project to use mingw and eclipse as a build environment for windows... so this means you don't need to have msdn to compile and you'll be able to compile and develop Discretion using free software!!!

 

Huzzah! Eclipse has the added benefit of being on all major platforms to boot.

 

As a side effect expect larger file sizes (confirmed), and slower run-time (won't know if this one's true until the whole thing is converted over). If the performance sucks I'll get the newest msvs 2008 and yeah... we'll use that.

 

Hopefully there won't be much if any performance hit. I'm sure I'm not only speaking for myself, but an Eclipse project would be mighty nice. It can be imported into Xcode as well. *brainstorm* I'm thinking Core Image. Ripple effects when a bomb explodes on your ship, or ghost-fading when you rocket. That'd be sweet...

 

I'm pretty excited about minGW... so far I've converted and built the deps (freetype/aedGui), the front end and settings handler module. It doesn't seem to like to play with the older modules, but that may be because I'm using a newer version of freetype/sdl/sdl_* ect.

 

Aha. I am also having problems getting the modules to build properly. I'm also using the latest and greatest in Freetype/sdl*.

 

Also, S!@#$%^&* is making us a kick-!@#$%^&* skin, take a look at a preview:

 

That's very iTunes of him. But very nice. Will fit right at home on my OS X computer.

[rfinn]

Looks like this is coming along nicely

And on the helping part, I can probably hit you up with few graphics (looks like only thing you need is a skin so that's fine with me) and for the modules.. I better not touch my fingers on those

 

I contacted Ambrosia's legal department asking them if we could use the artwork from the old Escape Velocity series of games. They'd be so wonderfully perfect for the game...but alas. They feel it would be unfair to the artists to use their work in an open source and free environment.

 

Free publicity isn't something I'd consider unfair, plus potential sales boost of the game that Discretion's gfx were based off of. *shrug* Oh well.

[Bak]

That's very iTunes of him.

 

I lol'd. Yeah the performance looks good. Slightly better than before even.