@guy, on Sep 16 2008, 07:12 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Actually, I have thought about such things before. Booms, for instance. The simulator would let you see how the sprite, sound and frameadvance work together. Another one that would be really useful is a preview of the main menu for the colr resource.

A preview in the bööm resource sounds like it might work, and I'll keep it in mind for the next version, but I suspect wëap is a bit beyond what's practical. I was working on a main-menu editor back in the 3.x series, back at the same time as I did the simpler one for the loading screen, but stopped because a bunch of people said they didn't care about it.

@guy, on Sep 16 2008, 07:12 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Whoops, stack overflow error. I opened an intf resource and clicked Edit next to the status bar picture. Reproducible with any intf. Btw, the text on the preview doesn't look right.

I can't reproduce this - the PICT opens fine whether it exists or not, and whether the plug-in contains any PICTs or not, which are the only variables I can think of at the moment. Is it tied to a particular plug-in file or value? Does MissionComputer tell you where the error occurred?

I did fix a refresh bug while trying to trace this, though. The preview looks fine to me, and it definitely isn't bold - I'll check it against the game itself tomorrow, but there's nothing that really jars. Can you post a picture of what you're seeing?

@david-arthur, on Sep 17 2008, 12:44 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

A preview in the bööm resource sounds like it might work, and I'll keep it in mind for the next version, but I suspect wëap is a bit beyond what's practical. I was working on a main-menu editor back in the 3.x series, back at the same time as I did the simpler one for the loading screen, but stopped because a bunch of people said they didn't care about it.

Ha, well I guess if you're not making a plug which modifies the main menu then you wouldn't care :rolleyes:

@david-arthur, on Sep 17 2008, 12:44 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

I can't reproduce this - the PICT opens fine whether it exists or not, and whether the plug-in contains any PICTs or not, which are the only variables I can think of at the moment. Is it tied to a particular plug-in file or value? Does MissionComputer tell you where the error occurred?

I did fix a refresh bug while trying to trace this, though. The preview looks fine to me, and it definitely isn't bold - I'll check it against the game itself tomorrow, but there's nothing that really jars. Can you post a picture of what you're seeing?

Stock Nova Graphics 3:

For comparison, here's what the intf looks like in-game:

This post has been edited by Guy : 17 September 2008 - 07:37 PM

@guy, on Sep 16 2008, 10:12 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Stock Nova Graphics 3:

Hmm... it's interesting that it's happening after the PICT editor is open. It doesn't happen if you open the PICT itself directly from the document window?

@guy, on Sep 16 2008, 10:12 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

For comparison, here's what the intf looks like in-game:

Ah, I think what's happened is that somewhere along the line MissionComputer started anti-aliasing the text. Fixed, thanks.

could you add the ability to read/write data fork based mac resource files?

@rudy, on Sep 17 2008, 10:06 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

could you add the ability to read/write data fork based mac resource files?

Finding the best way to handle these is definitely on my list of things to do for the next version. It shouldn't be hard, since I can just write the data fork over to the resource fork when I create my cached copy, and then use the same code as always to work with it.

@david-arthur, on Sep 18 2008, 12:53 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Hmm... it's interesting that it's happening after the PICT editor is open. It doesn't happen if you open the PICT itself directly from the document window?

No, it's fine then. Notice all the text in the intf editor looks funny. What happens is I click Edit, all the text disappears, the empty PICT editor appears, the text in the intf editor is slowly redrawn from the bottom up, then the error dialog appears. When I click okay the PICT editor disappears, the text in the intf editor suddenly goes back to normal, then a second identical error dialog appears. When I click okay here the program quits. The same issue with the text happens when I click Select to bring up the picture chooser and I have to wait for the text to finish redrawing itself before I can do anything.

@david-arthur, on Sep 18 2008, 12:53 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Ah, I think what's happened is that somewhere along the line MissionComputer started anti-aliasing the text. Fixed, thanks.

Hm, I had discounted anti-aliasing because the in-game text is anti-aliased but now that you mention it it could be because the preview is using Strong anti-aliasing rather than the lighter type that the game is using.

@david-arthur, on Sep 18 2008, 04:23 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Finding the best way to handle these is definitely on my list of things to do for the next version. It shouldn't be hard, since I can just write the data fork over to the resource fork when I create my cached copy, and then use the same code as always to work with it.

Good to hear - back when this was mentioned last you said there were big problems with it.

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 04:27 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

No, it's fine then. Notice all the text in the intf editor looks funny.

That's the display bug I was just mentioning having fixed. It shouldn't have anything to do with your problems, as I couldn't reproduce them even before fixing it, but we'll see in the next beta if we don't track down another cause first. The fact that you get two errors is interesting, but doesn't bring anything to mind immediately.

It happens with every file you try? Has anyone else seen this?

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 04:27 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Hm, I had discounted anti-aliasing because the in-game text is anti-aliased but now that you mention it it could be because the preview is using Strong anti-aliasing rather than the lighter type that the game is using.

The text in the game is very subtly anti-aliased. My only choices are 'on' and 'off', and 'off' seems to be much closer to what the game produces.

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 04:27 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Good to hear - back when this was mentioned last you said there were big problems with it.

There have been some significant technological changes since then (some of the most significant work I did for MissionComputer 4.0 is all but invisible to the user), plus this time around I have a much stronger motive. Insert the obligatory cryptic grin and all that jazz...

@david-arthur, on Sep 18 2008, 09:28 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

That's the display bug I was just mentioning having fixed. It shouldn't have anything to do with your problems, as I couldn't reproduce them even before fixing it, but we'll see in the next beta if we don't track down another cause first. The fact that you get two errors is interesting, but doesn't bring anything to mind immediately.

It happens with every file you try? Has anyone else seen this?

Hm, okay. I've tried a few different files and all the same. Btw, I opened a file larger than 14 MB and it immediately brought up a size warning. This is also displayed on closing the file, even if I haven't changed anything.
(edit) Oh one other thing, the image preview in the picture selector is slightly too big for the border containing it (as seen when previewing large images like intf backgrounds).

@david-arthur, on Sep 18 2008, 09:28 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

The text in the game is very subtly anti-aliased. My only choices are 'on' and 'off', and 'off' seems to be much closer to what the game produces.

Heh, okay off should be fine.

@david-arthur, on Sep 18 2008, 09:28 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

There have been some significant technological changes since then (some of the most significant work I did for MissionComputer 4.0 is all but invisible to the user), plus this time around I have a much stronger motive. Insert the obligatory cryptic grin and all that jazz...

Aye

This post has been edited by Guy : 17 September 2008 - 05:02 PM

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 05:56 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Btw, I opened a file larger than 14 MB and it immediately brought up a size warning. This is also displayed on closing the file, even if I haven't changed anything.

This is correct behaviour; MissionComputer takes the resource-loss issue seriously. The warning gets more panicked if the file exceeds 15 MB - it even gains an exclamation mark.

By the way, if there's anyone here who hasn't typed load "mc",8,1 on the Welcome screen lately, it's worth a try.

Ha, I can type stuff! :laugh:
Er, out of bounds error hitting return at the bottom.

You should make another easter egg: Type l33t to enable l33t support.

This post has been edited by Guy : 17 September 2008 - 05:17 PM

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 06:15 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

Ha, I can type stuff! :laugh:
Er, out of bounds error hitting return at the bottom.

Perhaps sometime I'll make it functional - it would save coming up with an interface for the shän editor. (I already fixed the out-of-bounds error the other day.)

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 06:15 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

You should make another easter egg: Type l33t to enable l33t support.

There's support in it somewhere, but I could probably make it more visible.

There is? Where/how?

I have a question, have you made the cargo type pop-up display extend more types of cargo?

Remember how you added the feature for developers to create a desc on the fly when making the outfit? I was thinking that sort of concept could be applied to other places. For example, a person wants to create a new buoy string when editing or creating a system attribute so developers won't have to guess what RID to assign, they can just create whatever a resource needs on the fly.

@guy, on Sep 17 2008, 08:00 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

There is? Where/how?

I think it's listed if you activate developer mode by typing 'magic' in the Welcome screen.

@coraxus, on Sep 17 2008, 08:32 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

For example, a person wants to create a new buoy string when editing or creating a system attribute so developers won't have to guess what RID to assign, they can just create whatever a resource needs on the fly.

Such things are a bit more complicated because they can be individual strings in an STR#, but I'll keep it in mind.

DA, there's a bug in the 'load "mc",8,1" bit. If you get to the end of the 40-columns at the last line and try to make the page scroll, MC encounters an out-of-bounds error. It says that the location of the error could not be found. Also, how do you get out of that screen without crashing MC?

However, that easter egg is as classy as it can get. Seriously. I spent the best years of my life on a C64.

This post has been edited by rmx256 : 18 September 2008 - 08:09 AM

@rmx256, on Sep 18 2008, 09:07 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

DA, there's a bug in the 'load "mc",8,1" bit. If you get to the end of the 40-columns at the last line and try to make the page scroll, MC encounters an out-of-bounds error. It says that the location of the error could not be found. Also, how do you get out of that screen without crashing MC?

Click, or if you're really dedicated, cursor over to the Menu button and press Return. The out-of-bounds error is already fixed for b2.

@david-arthur, on Sep 19 2008, 12:27 AM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

I think it's listed if you activate developer mode by typing 'magic' in the Welcome screen.

Ah, so it does. What else is different in dev mode?

@guy, on Sep 18 2008, 04:58 PM, said in MissionComputer 4.0b2 now available:

What else is different in dev mode?

It shows icns, and a whatever resource types specific to MissionComputer are used by the current version. Basically its purpose is to bypass tasks for which I would otherwise need ResEdit while developing MissionComputer itself. (The trigger is a reference to certain old free versions of HyperCard, which came with editing features disabled, but activated them if you typed 'magic' in the message box.)

People's interest seems to have moved on to future plans for the most part, but has anyone found any remaining bugs in 4.0b2? I'm getting very close to release (the launch commercial is even ready), so now would be a very good time to report them. Ditto for anyone else who wants to be added to the credits.

I haven't had much chance to try it out much, sorry.

But I wouldn't mind being in the credits for reporting bugs in the alpha stage.