Today’s new feature: keyboard navigation in the graphical picker.

@scratskinner, on Mar 3 2007, 01:32 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Maybe rotate them, drag them somewhere else, flip x/y values. That sort of thing.

So, you would be able to move a whole group of systems at once? It’s worth thinking about.

@scratskinner, on Mar 3 2007, 01:32 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Say the y of system id 128 equals -500. Flipping would mean getting rid of that minus sign, thus changing it from 500 up to 500 down and vice versa (putting the minus sign in) would be from 500 down to 500 up. (I don't get why negative values would be upwards). Same sort of thing with x. I hope flip is the right kind of word.

So you’re thinking of the ability to rotate or flip the entire galaxy? It would be possible, I suppose, but as Derakon says, I don’t really see many cases where there would be much call for it.

On a computer’s screen or in a window, (0,0) is the top left corner, with x and y increasing as you move to the right and bottom; if, as in Escape Velocity , you’re going to use a centre point rather than the top left, it follows that negative values are to the left and above that centre.

Well, since every where else in life postive equals up and right, negative equals down and left, it makes more sense to have it work like that for the editor. Now if it has to be as it is now because it can't be changed due to how EVN interprets the numbers, isn't worth the effort, or some other factor, then it most certainly should stay.

But I do have to say I never keep that in mind and promptly get confused for five to ten seconds every time I go to make a new planet or system. If there wasn't a graphical galaxy/system display I'd seriously loathe making systems and planets.

Honestly, in a situation like this, it's six of one, a half-dozen of the other. You'll either be confusing the people who don't do much with computers, or the ones who do, and I have no idea which ones are more prevalent in the EV plugin community.

I have a question today: Does anyone actually use full-screen mode in the galaxy, s˙st, and DITL editors?

@joshtigerheart, on Mar 3 2007, 11:08 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Well, since every where else in life postive equals up and right, negative equals down and left, it makes more sense to have it work like that for the editor. Now if it has to be as it is now because it can't be changed due to how EVN interprets the numbers, isn't worth the effort, or some other factor, then it most certainly should stay.

Everywhere in computing, positive numbers mean down and to the right; if EV Nova used the Cartesian convention instead, the engine would just be multiplying every Y value by -1 before calling the display routines; it would make for extra programming and, I think, only confuse matters more. (Can you imagine what would happen if Matt accidentally left one of those -1s out, or mistakenly did it to the X co-ordinate too? It would be quite difficult to trace.)

I'm so used to positive being down that I have difficulty graphing mathematical equations.

Anyway, it's possible for MC to negate the values when the user opens and saves the resource, but this would make it inconsistent with the other editors and frankly it doesn't make sense to implement something that basically lies to you. There's a difference between presenting fields in a more convenient manner and presenting them as something else. As a rule of thumb, if it means actually changing the data, it's not a good idea.

How about just putting very clear labels on the axes so you can't mistake them.

@david-arthur, on Mar 5 2007, 06:05 AM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I have a question today: Does anyone actually use full-screen mode in the galaxy, s˙st, and DITL editors?

Um, I think so. Let me get back to you on that next week. Are the normal window editors for those resources resizable?

@orcaloverbri9, on Mar 4 2007, 01:24 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Anyway, it's possible for MC to negate the values when the user opens and saves the resource, but this would make it inconsistent with the other editors and frankly it doesn't make sense to implement something that basically lies to you. There's a difference between presenting fields in a more convenient manner and presenting them as something else. As a rule of thumb, if it means actually changing the data, it's not a good idea.

I quite agree; one of my design principles for MissionComputer has always been to present the resources in a manner as close to how they actually work internally as is possible without compromising the editor. If it’s really an issue for people, I can probably add labels as Guy suggests.

'Guy' said:

Are the normal window editors for those resources resizable?

Yes, the normal editors are resizable, but if you pick 'Full Screen' from the Editor menu, or if your computer has a small monitor, it switches to full-screen mode, where the menu bar and Dock are hidden unless you move the mouse over them.

The reason I’m asking is that it’s difficult to reconcile full-screen editing with the new paradigm; not only does it conflict with the idea of allowing multiple resources at once, but since full-screen windows have no title bar, there’s no obvious way to close them now that the OK and Cancel buttons are gone.

No cancel button? How do you close without saving? Well in any case, if the zoom button can maximise the window then there's probably little need for full screen.

This post has been edited by Guy : 04 March 2007 - 09:13 PM

@guy, on Mar 4 2007, 06:55 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

No cancel button? How do you close without saving?

At the moment, you don’t (or, at least, the only way is to not save the entire file), but I plan to have a ResEdit-style ‘Revert this Resource’ menu command.

Ah, that'll be fine then

Another question: Does anyone ever use the grid lines option in the system editor?

(Revert this Resource is now implemented, and every editor except the star map is now converted to the new framework.)

Just having a look at MC now... I see the zoom button does (more or less) maximise the window but it currently isn't dock friendly! If you can fix that then I'd say yeah, you can drop the full screen (well I'll say you can drop it anyway but please fix that, if you can :)).
Also, along the lines of closing without saving, is it possible that MC might change data just when you open a resource, like if it finds something it doesn't quite like and automatically fixes it?
Not sure about the gridlines but would it be at all feasible to have some sort of zoom function for both the system and galaxy editor?

btw, have you upgraded your RB or are you somehow managing to fix weird problems using only your current version?

This post has been edited by Guy : 09 March 2007 - 04:37 PM

@guy, on Mar 9 2007, 04:31 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I see the zoom button does (more or less) maximise the window but it currently isn't dock friendly!

Already fixed.

@guy, on Mar 9 2007, 04:31 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Also, along the lines of closing without saving, is it possible that MC might change data just when you open a resource, like if it finds something it doesn't quite like and automatically fixes it?

If you open a resource and then close it without changing anything, MissionComputer doesn’t modify it.

@guy, on Mar 9 2007, 04:31 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Not sure about the gridlines but would it be at all feasible to have some sort of zoom function for both the system and galaxy editor?

I did zooming in the galaxy editor in 4.0.0d2, but I’m not sure it would really make sense in the system editor — the game itself doesn’t do it, and the mini-map already allows you to see the entire system at once.

@guy, on Mar 9 2007, 04:31 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

btw, have you upgraded your RB or are you somehow managing to fix weird problems using only your current version?

I’m now using REALbasic 2007 — as MissionComputer doesn’t bring in any money, it never justified the cost of upgrading, but now I have the new version for a slightly odd project to which REALbasic is uniquely suited (taking System 6.0.5-era ports of early-1990s DOS programmes, and adapting them to run natively on Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux), so MissionComputer benefits too.

@david-arthur, on Mar 9 2007, 05:05 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I’m now using REALbasic 2007

It's quite a difference, isn't it?

I'm curious as to the outlook of a Mission Computer for Windows. I'd try it out on the G3 I have sitting here, but Stuffit 4 can't unstuff Mission Computer and Stuffit 7.5 refuses to install. <_<

@jacabyte, on Mar 10 2007, 01:37 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I'm curious as to the outlook of a Mission Computer for Windows. I'd try it out on the G3 I have sitting here, but Stuffit 4 can't unstuff Mission Computer and Stuffit 7.5 refuses to install. <_<

EVNEW?

Actually, come to think of it, the idea isn't as absurd as it once was. A lot of the Mac-specific stuff (declares and the like) would have to be removed or modified, but now that it natively supports .rez, the only major difference that there would need to be is to disable the use of resource forks in all capacities unless you want to implement .bin support.

This post has been edited by orcaloverbri9 : 10 March 2007 - 02:18 PM

Yes, I have EVNEW. I just wanted to try MC so I don't feel clueless as to what is going in this topic.

Edit: Rephrased to make more sense.

This post has been edited by JacaByte : 10 March 2007 - 02:57 PM

@orcaloverbri9, on Mar 10 2007, 02:15 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Actually, come to think of it, the idea isn't as absurd as it once was. A lot of the Mac-specific stuff (declares and the like) would have to be removed or modified, but now that it natively supports .rez, the only major difference that there would need to be is to disable the use of resource forks in all capacities unless you want to implement .bin support.

MissionComputer 3.x can run on Windows and even open files, but crashes when you try to do anything useful, largely because of encoding issues. Crusoe currently relies on ResourceFork to store its temporary files, so at the moment it’s Mac-only, but it has fixed the encoding problems, so theoretically if I switched back to ResBundle it would work on Windows; I may do this, but I’m also exploring the possibility of abolishing temporary files altogether and storing their contents in memory instead on both Macintosh and Windows.

@orcaloverbri9, on Mar 10 2007, 11:37 AM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

It's quite a difference, isn't it?

Certainly it deals with a number of the issues that have cropped up over the years, and both its cross-platform support and RbScript are much better than they were before. It’s also useful to be able to open more than one project at a time, and I like Extends and Assigns.

@jacabyte, on Mar 10 2007, 01:37 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I'm curious as to the outlook of a Mission Computer for Windows. I'd try it out on the G3 I have sitting here, but Stuffit 4 can't unstuff Mission Computer and Stuffit 7.5 refuses to install. <_<

I’m afraid it’s very difficult these days to compress it in the original StuffIt format, but StuffIt 5 or higher should be able to decompress it.

@david-arthur, on Mar 10 2007, 01:33 PM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I'm afraid it's very difficult these days to compress it in the original StuffIt format, but StuffIt 5 or higher should be able to decompress it.

If I had another version of Stuffit I would have tried it by now. I guess I'll go haggle with Stuffit 7.5 some more.

Edit: What the heck? Comma's were being replaced by ’. Okaydoke...

This post has been edited by JacaByte : 10 March 2007 - 06:13 PM

@david-arthur, on Mar 10 2007, 11:05 AM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

Already fixed.
If you open a resource and then close it without changing anything, MissionComputer doesn’t modify it.

Good good

@david-arthur, on Mar 10 2007, 11:05 AM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I did zooming in the galaxy editor in 4.0.0d2, but I’m not sure it would really make sense in the system editor — the game itself doesn’t do it, and the mini-map already allows you to see the entire system at once.

It'd be nice for seeing a large overview of your system (complete with spob graphics) without having to study that tiny mini-map. The game not being able to do it is irrelevant.

@david-arthur, on Mar 10 2007, 11:05 AM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

I’m now using REALbasic 2007 — as MissionComputer doesn’t bring in any money, it never justified the cost of upgrading, but now I have the new version for a slightly odd project to which REALbasic is uniquely suited (taking System 6.0.5-era ports of early-1990s DOS programmes, and adapting them to run natively on Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux), so MissionComputer benefits too.

Ah. So was this what allowed you to add resource fork support back again in 3.3.3?

@jacabyte, on Mar 11 2007, 10:15 AM, said in [ANN] MissionComputer 3.3.3 Now Released:

If I had another version of Stuffit I would have tried it by now. I guess I'll go haggle with Stuffit 7.5 some more.

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