Game Development - 2012-03-02

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12:34 AM

Windows 8 Baby!

I have no clue how to do anything.

I've noticed it's pretty easy to tell if a question is too subjective by the fact that there are a lot of answers and none of them have more than 1 or 2 upvotes

12:51 AM

irrationalgames.com/insider/…

so far away :(

1:08 AM

0

Q: Using OpenVPN to create tunnels to main server

I want to create a network where the main servers IP is never exposed to the client. By going throught tunnels. Here is a sample: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12304631/eliteots/mc/network.jpg By making tunnels through dedicated servers I hope to solve latency issues from some clients that are far a...

networking server

Interesting queston

I think it's a bit confused

it's not that you need OpenVPN tunnels

you need separate gateway and backend servers

A 20 year old student with serious competitors that want to destabilize his business?

What does he do :o

but assuming you have an MMO, your servers are sharded anyways

He wants to hide the gateway server to prevent dos attacks if I read correctly.

hmmm

1:13 AM

wow stackexchange.com looks nice

we're on page 2 preview woohoo

2 hours later…

3:17 AM

do anonymous delegates create garbage?

I'm getting conflicting information

I'd say no

well, "maybe"

for(int i=0; i<1000; i++) Func<int> f = () => { return 1; }; does not generate garbage

for(int i=0; i<1000; i++) Func<int> f = () => { return i; }

might

because you are allocating a class each loop for a new closure

@Jimmy it's possible the slider preview thing is random... i saw us on page 3 :(

sorry actually that's not even a closure.

for(int i=0; i<1000; i++) { int j = 0; Func<int>f = () => { return j; }; }

something like so is pretty likely to generate garbage

Is that because the closure needs the j so its preserved (i suppose on the heap) and its not released with the stack?

3:33 AM

yup

3:43 AM

So the below would be garbage free because no closure needs to be created for "rNode => rNode.Data.LocationComponent.CalculateDimentions()"

I sec pastebin is down :/

public delegate void BranchOperation<T>(TreeNode<T> node);

internal void AddNode(TreeNode<Element> node) {

        var current = node;
	while (current.Data.InstanceData == null && current.Parent != null) {
		current = current.Parent;
	}

	if (current.Data.InstanceData == null) { return; }

	node.DfsOperationChildren(rNode => rNode.Data.LocationComponent.CalculateDimentions());
}

public static void DfsOperation<T>(this TreeNode<T> node, BranchOperation<T> operation) {
    operation(node);

    foreach (var child in node.Children) {

3 hours later…

6:51 AM

hmm yeah that looks safe to me

7 hours later…

1:50 PM

Well, I decided to go ahead and order a million dollars.

Just for fun, I threw in a billion dollars, too.

2:04 PM

I suppose if you order 1000 million dollars you get a deal on shipping or something?

2:44 PM

nah, i mostly just felt silly only ordering one million dollar bill. and a billion dollars was cheaper

so I got one of each

3:40 PM

I really only want about $85k to pay off school. After that I'm content.

Can you order me an $85k bill?

they've got a 100k bill: zimbabwedollars.net/p/zimbabwe-100-thousand-dollar-banknote

oo

I will tell my lendor "Keep the change."

1 hour later…

4:57 PM

So much hate for Windows 8 out there

People don't get it.

Ignorance of others is so annoying sometimes.

William 'MindWorX' Mariager

5:14 PM

It's quite simple. People are afraid of change.

well, i haven't seen it in action on a desktop yet

but it really seems like it's not designed for desktop usage

which is kind of annoying

6:13 PM

There is a bit of a learning curve, but really all you HAVE to use that is the metro style is the start menu

@Damir @TreDubZedd Incase you guys were curious blowing away the partition did kill grub. I just popped in my Windows 7 disk and ran bootrec.exe /fixmbr and everything was all better

@Damir @TreDubZedd I still appreciate the tips even though it didn't exactly work. Good to know there are a few people on here who can answer the occasional Linux question.

6:30 PM

I've recently seen an app for win7,

it blocks all mouse interactions with windows.

then you can attach as many mouse devices to computer an each one separately works as a touch device.

I mean win7 is already designed for touch devices, as you can see on all the tablets.

@tylerrrr07 Now that you mention it, I vaguely remember having to run bootrec.exe /fixmbr when I did the same thing.

Well now we all know and will remember for next time!

@Gajet is the point to simulate multitouch?

6:50 PM

yep,

it was one of my friends, and he was trying to develop an app for windows mobile.

it seems WM simulator can handle windows multitouch as an standard multitouch input.

William 'MindWorX' Mariager

I was a bit dissapointed that Win7 didn't recognize my 17" touchscreen.

2 hours later…

9:02 PM

Anyone have some good references on how to implement scripting into a game? Ideally I'd like to figure out how the real time scripting like the starred youtube video but I'm not even sure how to begin with scripting in a game versus using compiled code.

@tylerrrr07 there are too many scripting engines out there, you can easily use them

also if you are working with C#, there is a tool inside C# to interpret other C# code

hrmmm

what are you using it with?

@ClassicThunder I've just noticed you've changed your profile picture!

My intentions is C#/XNA so if I can dynamically interpret C# code that would be good

I found a reference that may be useful

9:10 PM

I've used csscript.net only a little bit but it sounds like it does what you want.

@Gajet Yup sometime last week. Trying to sand out from the masses :)

9:22 PM

i will never change my pink avatar!

unless I do

9:44 PM

I did it!

That was far too painful lol

Now if only I can make it happen in real time...

hrmmm

real time is tricky... you probably have to do something like monitor the script for changes and reload when they're detected

right now I'm running it through a loop and reloading it every iteration but I get an access denied error

Just doing a console app and outputting a string that the method returns in my script

If I can figure this out I'm going to be so excited

If you figure it out, please share with us :)

10:01 PM

real time is not really a good option,

In the starred video, it looked like the script editing was happening inside the game's process. That way, it already has the text of the script available in-memory, and knows that it only has to re-compile it when changes are made (and it knows when changes are made because it's handling the keypresses).

just think about all the compile errors, one may generate before his coding is complete

It was even displaying red icons to denote compile errors, in real-time.

it doesn't really have to happen in the game's process.

it was something like intellisence

10:03 PM

like, you could have your IDE open and editing a script

and the script defines a behavior according to a certain interface

Yeah I'm trying to load a script from a file instead... I suppose I could do file IO to get the text instead of reading the script file through the CSScript API

and your game just recompiles and reloads that script as long as it compiles and passes all your tests for the interface

I think the problem is its caching the compiled script and as such when it tries to load it it runs into a duplicate

I haven't tried CSScript- I just use IronPython for my engine

although instead of CSScript, there's another option -- use a framework like MEF or Mono.Addins

and have it load the .dll instead of the raw .cs code

8

A: What are the pros and cons of Lua vs. Python as a scripting language for XNA/C# platform?

I can't compare the two, as I've only had experience embedding IronPython in a C# game so far. Here's what I like about it though: 1) It's easy! Download the IronPython DLLs, add reference in project, using IronPython.Hosting; var engine = Python.CreateEngine(); var product = engine.Execut...

IronPython is so dead-simple to use.. I'd recommend if it you're looking for a scripting solution for XNA that isn't going to go on an Xbox

Theoretically I'd like it to go on the Xbox in the long run though

I figure if I can get some recongition in the Indie Games its more likely to hit a platform like Steam. I've read Steam is picky about games it accepts and I figured this may help.

10:12 PM

scripting and xbox don't go well together though

While this is true

My thought was if during development we use scripts. When we go live we compile the scripts since its all C# anyway

haven't figure out the logistics in design, etc. but it makes sense in my head

completely unrelated to current topic but @Jimmy why does your question have upvotes while other comparing questions get closed?

that's not my question, that's my answer

and it's not even a good answer, so I don't know :P

also it'll probably get closed

sorry not your question but still the question has 8 upvotes

10:14 PM

@tylerrrr07 that's a good way to do it, then

@Jimmy does dynamic in C#, have a similar behavior as auto in C++?

also @Gajet a lot of times people upvote questions that should be closed because they don't know that the question should be closed.

@Gajet no, var in C# is the same as auto in C++

dynamic declare a variable as a dynamic object, so all member lookups are runtime lookups

@thedaian the fact that the question is getting upvotes by people means it's welcome to their group, whether admins like it or not.

The reason you use dynamic in that situation is because there is no static type for that object, since you defined the class itself in IronPython right before. But with dynamic, the compiler generates the right code to resolve the pointers to the IronPython fields and methods on that class

10:21 PM

I'm not sure but it seems like something not implementable in C++ :'(

yeah, it's a compiler trick

the closest trick I can think of right now is map[string,boost:any] right now, if you know what any does.

I assume something similar to object in Java/C# land

almost the same as dynamic but you can not get access to it's members without knowing it's content type.

it's a little bit more featured than object but it has almost same uses

well using file IO I seem to get it. There seems to be a slight chance of error when resaving the file but otherwise its working

I'm very curious what kind of effect this would have on anything though

Since I don't know what its doing behind the scenes

10:30 PM

usually, Magic.

Heh. yeah.

...I've been coding in C++ for almost fifteen years. And I never knew about the 'auto' keyword.

@TrevorPowell don't worry it's something really new.

Also, bizarre. Why would you have a keyword which does nothing? :)

part of C++11 standard, though it was out there from long before (via C++0x)

10:36 PM

Or rather, "Do the thing that you were going to be doing anyway". :)

It's a new keyword.

although auto in previous versions of C++ did something but as long as I remembered C++ committee itself declared it unuseful. so they changed it's behavior.

Oh. So what does it do now? In the new version, I mean?

@TrevorPowell: one reason is to avoid typing all that std::iterator<std:map<foo, bar>> iter = ... stuff

that always gets on my nerves

Ah, I see. So it's going to handle the whole "just be of the right type for what I initialise it to" thing? Interesting.

I can see how that would be convenient.

And I still will never use it. xD

10:41 PM

check wiki

it has the complete list of uses of auto keyword.

link?

though I really hate(and love in the same time) when it used it in function template.

wow, yeah, that original use is completely useless

Yeah. Originally it was a scope modifier. Specifically, a NOP scope modifier. xD

auto in the newer standards being equal to var is useful

10:43 PM

link : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%2B%2B11#Type_inference

Bleah. I don't see how people think that 'auto' and all the extra baggage that comes along with it are preferable to actually knowing what your program is actually doing.

it saves me from typing std::map<string,string>::iterator and that's all I need.

:( there's hardly any baggage though. and you'd usually follow some kind of styl guideline

like, even if you say "I'm only going to use auto for iterator declarations"

it already makes your life better

True. Decltype looks like it's taking one step too far for my comfort.

and besides I always know what my code does, no matter how I've written it!

10:46 PM

Gajet: I use typedefs for that.

preprocessor commands! my worst enemy!

(that's actually a good idea...)

I never liked typedef, though I had to use them in some special cases.

typedefs are awesome, but I never liked the practice of typedeffing pointers

@thedaian I would say the same thing for _

typedef std::map<string,string> StringMap;. Then you can use StringMap::iterator . That's infinitely better than auto. :)

10:50 PM

hi

of course, sometimes you end up one off iterators and such...

but i like the idea of typdef-ing for iterators like that

makes a note to refactor his code to include that

hello @newprogrammer

hi

nope, for me it's auto=>std::map<string,string>::iterator=>StringMap::iterator

sorted but how I like their usage

what is a data structure that you can add or remove elements to

but adding an element

that is already in the list does nothing

and removing and element that is not in the list does nothing

probably a map

though it depends on what language you're using

10:53 PM

c++

or set

set

between map or set

which one gives constant time

Yes, set. :)

basically any redblack tree does it

10:53 PM

both, but a map has a value attached to your item

i wont be needing that, jimmy

for add/remove

then I guess go with set

not that if you really need constant time, it would be hash_set

According to this site: cplusplus.com/reference/stl/set/insert

insertion is logarithmic

but set should be fine for most purposes

it's a comparison between O(1)* some number versus O(log n) * some smaller number

10:56 PM

Really depends on language/libraries at this point. :)

C++, standard library if that makes any difference

if you have experience with that

you could try both and see if it makes a difference

you're right, ill just do that

2

Q: What is the difference between set and hashset in C++ STL?

When should I choose one over the other. Are there any pointers that you would recommend for using the right STL containers.

c++ performance stl set hashset

it may not even matter

thanks for the advice everyone

11:01 PM

Can anyone give me some suggestions as to what might be a good tool for creating 2D skeletal animations?

I'm currently looking into Blender, but I can't find any good tutorials.

blender is not a tool for 2D, they create 3D animations with it!

@Gajet I know, but you can use it for 2D animations and level-editing as well. As you can with Maya, for example.

googling for "2D skeletal animation" provides some answers

@PaulManta it's like buying/using a laptop as a calculator.

@Gajet I should know that, shouldn't I? I've been looking into this for two weeks. I was hoping I'd find someone with more experience in here that can help me.

I've used Blender for so long it's probably easier for me to do 2D animation in it than to learn an actual 2D program

but it's probably not what you'd want to do if you're starting fresh

11:06 PM

@Jimmy Do you know any good tuts on 2D animation? Or, any other good tools for a newbie.

nope :P

12 basic principles of animation

The Twelve Basic Principles of Animation is a set of principles of animation introduced by the Disney animators Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas in their 1981 book The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation. Johnston and Thomas in turn based their book on the work of the leading Disney animators from the 1930s onwards, and their effort to produce more realistic animations. The main purpose of the principles was to produce an illusion of characters adhering to the basic laws of physics, but they also dealt with more abstract issues, such as emotional timing and character appeal. The book and it...

I think a lot of classic literature is based on the 12 principles

as far as the "art" side of animation goes

as far as the technical side of which program to use, I have no idea

Animators usually learn 2D hand-drawn animation first, and then move to apply that to the constraints imposed by skeletal animation systems. Or at least, the impressive animators I've worked with all started with hand-drawn animations.

(Or otherwise image-based, as opposed to skeleton-based)

I worked with this guy for a few years: http://chrisj.com.au/thepassenger/movies.html

@TrevorPowell I'm interested more in the programming side of things, coding different interpolation and animation transition methods and providing a nice interface to use them. But I need to also make some basic animations to test out the code.

well, that's a different question

Ah, cool. I've always just created my own test data using a text editor, for that sort of thing. Not sure how many specialised 2D creation tools there are. I'd imagine that most folks would just use Blender or something like that.

11:14 PM

or just make the editor in their own engine

the reason there's less 3rd party 2D stuff is that it takes about asmuch time to learn someone else's framework as to just roll your own since the math is pretty straightforward

in 3D you have to deal with weight-blending, quaternions, etc so it's like 10 times as much work to roll your own system

I will never escape the nightmare that is getting rid of sharp creases in geometry at bent joints like shoulders and elbows and knees

@Jimmy I'm going to have to do that math anyway when I write the rendering code, but I don't want to deal with writing a full editor, even if it's just a basic one.

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