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Author Topic:  Cher's BLOG  (Read 10132 times)

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Cheristheus

« on: 09, May 2005, 03:02:17 »
2005-05-09
The editor is constantly improving. The internationalization / localization works perfectly fine, but not all components are already internationalized, and the localization currently only covers English and German - translators welcome.

Most notable changes during the recent days are:
  • The drawing speed, especially for large maps, has been significantly improved. previously, editing maps with a size of 240x240 or even 480x480 tiles wasn't only a question of memory but of speed. Now it's only a question of memory (start with -Xmx256m for instance).
  • Many minor improvements are going on under the hood. The code reformatting has already progressed very far.
  • I've added a "select all" feature, which especially outdoor map makers will like. Simply press Ctrl+A to select the entire map region. Ideal for using the random tools.
  • You can load multiple maps from the open dialog. Simply select more than 1 file to load.
  • When using "save As", the editor now warns and asks before overwriting an existign file.
  • Several changes in the I/O parts were made to better support behaviours and the new book system.
Poll for those map makers that aren't native English speakers:
Would you prefer the editor to startup in English or in your native language per default? Remember, the Wiki will only describe the English interface of the editor, since we do not have the resources to translate the editor documentation to various languages. I might create a German translation, but even that isn't sure.

Update (2005-06-02): I removed the poll. The poll doesn't make sense anymore, decision is made, map editor gets localized, different localizations have of course different degrees of completeness. I leave poll-specific posts here to not get the posts out of context.
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #1 on: 10, May 2005, 23:46:59 »
2005-05-11
Several bugs have been fixed in the mean time, most notable:
  • Loading arches from collection now works again. This feature was broken in previous versions. It now works again and increases startup time a bit. On systems with low I/O performance, this is another significant startup time booster. The latest CVS source and download versoin
And two interesting new feature have been added:
  • Transparent typesets: You can make some map elements transparent now. This was requested by some map makers and I believe this is very helpful especially when you want to discover some hidden tings that should be removed. And the best is: this feature is memory sensitive. The transparent images are cached for reuse. If more memory is required and some transparent images will be automatically deleted.
  • Lazy-loading of images: Only those images needed are actually loaded now. This is another significant reduction of memory footprint and increase of startup speed.
In addition to that, choosing the user interface is temporarily disabled on the GUI. Choosing image sets was unused and got removed.

Comparison of old and new editor version

Old editor (CVS revision 1.21 2005-01-30), loading from arch/
Memory after startup: 49 MB / 63 MB
Arch collect took 9.5266666666 seconds

Old editor (CVS revision 1.21 2005-01-30), loading from collection
Memory after startup: 48 MB / 63 MB
Arch collect took 8.9956666666 seconds and was broken

New editor (CVS revision 1.35 2005-05-11), loading from arch/
Memory after startup: 9.1 MB / 16.3 MB
Arch collect took 1.9133333333 seconds

New editor (CVS revision 1.35 2005-05-11), loading from collection
Memory after startup: 7.8 MB / 16.5 MB
Arch collect took 1.8236666666 seconds

The memory after startup is given without running the garbage collector. Running the garbage collector after startup will not give significantly better results. The first memory value is the used memory, the second value is the Java heap size.
The arch collect times are the average of the last 3 of 4 consecutive runs.
Cher :)

Marmoth

« Reply #2 on: 12, May 2005, 09:25:13 »
About the poll: I don't think that asking the question wether english is a problem for mapmakers is really meaningfull here, as it is an english forum and therefore, people who cannot read/speak in english will not participate.

For this reason, I think we should take into account the "mute" community of non english speaker and ask ourselves the question: do we want to open this game to other languages even if they could prevent a full communication between designers/players. (im personnally for).

LordGrunt

« Reply #3 on: 12, May 2005, 21:33:32 »
I vote for the editor to have feature of changing language, why not. Cool idea. One point though, the best results to achieve multi-language editor we will have only with the use of *.po or other localization format that does not require recompilation.
Is it possible with java, Cher? Or maybe plain text file will be enough, loaded at runtime?

Cheristheus

« Reply #4 on: 13, May 2005, 00:46:36 »
The localization of Java is done with properties files. The file ending is .properties, the content is plain ISO-8859-1 text. They reside in the same directory as the Java source code files, that's usual for Java (properties are package elements like classes). The currently available are:
daimonin/editor/src/cfeditor/action.properties - the default (English), also defines menus, most keyboard shortcuts etc.
.../action_de.properties (German)
.../action_fr.properties (French)
.../action_sv.properties (Swedish)

Currently, none of them contain all localized strings yet. Not all strings are internationalized yet.

Theoretically, creating a translation does not require recompilation. Practically, the editor contains the translation files in its .jar file, so at least repackaging is required after adding a translation. But since the editor does not take long to build (17 seconds on my machine), this isn't too bad. Choosing the language already is possible but currently requires and probably always will require to restart the editor.
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #5 on: 14, May 2005, 13:57:51 »
Not much this time:
  • Painting with pickmaps now is possible. A random arch from the pickmap will get inserted.
  • The map properties dialog has changed. The directions of the map tiles are now better visualized in the GUI, also you have more control over the individual tile paths. You can revert a path, clear it, type it in, convert relative paths to absolute ones and vice versa, and you can finally choose the map via a file chooser dialog. Map tiling should be more user friendly now. The new map tiling dialog took a while to implement, I hope it was worth it, you like it and it helps you.
Cher :)

LordGrunt

« Reply #6 on: 14, May 2005, 17:21:40 »
Any possible to create english properties file? Would be much easier to translate. Try to post it somewhere if you make it present.

Cheristheus

« Reply #7 on: 14, May 2005, 18:31:36 »
Grunt, if I may quote myself:
Quote from: "Cheristheus"
daimonin/editor/src/cfeditor/action.properties - the default (English), ...
Cher :)

LordGrunt

« Reply #8 on: 15, May 2005, 01:30:41 »
my bad :) sorry.

Is it accesible in any other place than cvs?

Cheristheus

« Reply #9 on: 15, May 2005, 11:09:55 »
No. It doesn't make sense to make it accessible anywhere else. If someone wants to create a translation and doesn't know how to use CVS he can always talk to me and I'll send that file per e-mail. That will also prevent multiple people redundantly working on translations for the same languages.
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #10 on: 19, May 2005, 01:23:50 »
2005-05-19
I've just finished a huge commit which is mostly of internal use. There are still many internal refactorings required to perform before really adding new features. I've fixed another bunch (several hundrets) of compiler warnings, and finished work on a notable new feature:
  • Improved map tiling dialog: I've changed the map properties dialog to use tabs. The first tab contains all you know except map tiling. The second tab solely contains map tiling. Now you can:
    • Delete a single path with a mouse click,
    • Revert map path in case you changed your mind
    • Choose a map from the maps directory using a file dialog and
    • switch between a relative and an absolute paths using an easy switch. This is especially interesting if a mapset might get moved. All paths to maps that will be moved with this map should be relative, other paths should be absolute. Now you have easy control over it.
    Also, the components in the new map tile tab are layout accordingly with the Daimonin map directions.
Anouncement:
Along with the usual minor bug fixes and improvements, as soon as the progress with refactoring the editor is far enough, I will add (without warranty)
  • A map splitter that will split large maps into smaller ones (usually 24x24) and set tile paths correctly
  • Behaviour dialog to better control AI's behaviour
  • Lua Scripting for the Editor - write your own editor plugins using Lua
  • Arch Editor to edit the basic arches from within the editor, including the creation of new arches and the import of png images
  • Treasurelist Editor to edit the treasure lists from within the editor
  • More basic edit tools like paint below, delete below, randomizer (changes an arch to another arch from a predefined group), configurable for your personal preferences
  • Bookmarks for frequently used maps
  • History of recently opened map files
  • User definable highlight filters to highlight certain parts of maps
  • Connection highlighter that highlights all tiles that contain arches from a connection group
  • Face browser to easily choose the face of an object from all available faces
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #11 on: 21, May 2005, 19:50:36 »
2005-05-21
There were some more huge commits in the past 2 days. Again, mostly of internal use, yet some minor end-user features:
  • Mob in spawn points are shown now. If the mob has no direction, it is shown as ??? since even mobs in spawn points should have a set direction.
  • wall transparency now includes misc object ostacles like trees and tables
  • The zoom / preview now is nicer to use. Also, it's possible to save the preview, even if zoomed. Also, the zoom / preview uses no icon anymore, which is a work around for a Java bug that seriously leaked memory.
Most important: new ".anim" filetype
The most notable addition is a new filetype called ".anim". It is added to allow the definition of animations outside .arc files, which can be usedful for, for instance, artifacts, since artifcts can only reference (but not define) animations. The format of a ".anim" file is 100% identical with that of the "animations" file (the same parser is used).

More to come, for sure!
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #12 on: 23, May 2005, 17:21:20 »
2005-05-23
This time, only internal changes and bugfixes:
  • Removed face ids. Faces are referenced by name only now.
  • Broken collect arches dialog display is fixed.
  • The filechooser can be speed up when opening maps by disabling the map file checking in the options.
  • When loading anim files and finding errors, the editor now reports such errors.
  • When opening files, the directories "CVS" and ".xvpics" will be hidden.
  • Minor bug with random fill dialog was fixed.
  • The collected faces and bmaps, except for bug.101, are sorted alphabetically in their files now, which should make debugging easier, in case it is required.
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #13 on: 31, May 2005, 14:22:14 »
2005-05-31
  • Online update feature You can use Help > Update to get the latest DaimoninEditor.jar now
  • It's not possible to open more than one arch attribute dialog for the same arch anymore (Mantis #0000128)
  • The intern arch panel is not shown anymore. Map makers should have never used that anyway.
  • Double faces, mostly half-height walls, are now recognized and optionally drawn double-stacked the same way the client does.
  • int64 support for values
  • Build numbering - the about dialog now shows the build number
  • Add inv now is showing the face from the beginning on (except for mobs, which reminds you of setting an initial direction)
  • Plus several other minor internal tweaks

A description of the update feature can be found in the Wiki:
http://www.daimonin.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=phpWiki&file=index&pagename=Updating%20the%20Editor
Cher :)

Cheristheus

« Reply #14 on: 02, June 2005, 15:08:22 »
2005-06-02

Announcement
  • The handling of Artifacts will be changed in both, the server and the editor. It's possible that for inconsistend changes, the CVS version of the editor will be unusable for 1-3 days when you use the most recent artifacts file from CVS as soon as michtoen committed it.
  • The preferences (user definable settings) handling of the editor will be completely changed. Nearly all of your preferences will be lost. The current old .ini file style preferences will be completely replaced by Java's own user preferences storage. As soon as the change is done, new versions of the editor will for a while search your .ini file and ask you wether to delete it (usually you'll want to).

This affects: Font, Start window size / position, Look And Feel, and nearly everything from the Options dialog.[/list]
Recent Changes
  • ISO-date for new maps: The date for new maps is now formatted in ISO-, not US-format.
  • When using Create Image, you're now warned before overwriting a file.
  • Set your Artist name in the options, this name will now be inserted in the map description when creating new maps.
  • The size of new maps, language preferences and main window position are no longer stored in the .ini file but in preferences.
Cher :)

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