There’s nothing in the sample BSD license I posted earlier that obligies people to provide source. However, if you do provide source, the the license governs how it is to be used.
In view that Woogley & I think Cas want to post the games on their respective websites, we do need a license that allows them to do it.
Since Cas & co provide LWJGL free of charge (and with source) I really can’t see why we cannot reciprocate. While I believe provision of source is optional, even under the Draft C rules above, I will provide mine (not promising pretty though) as a thank you for all the work put in on LWJGL.
Either way… the problem with that kind of code is… it usually does more damage than anything else.
Beginners will be eigther frightend to death or will imitate the really really (really!) bad style. My 4k game for example was one constructor (which throws Exception) and a one line function for the keyboard stuff.
Aah… that makes so much sense. Thank you. (I wrote that. :P) There are only 2-3 clever bits¹ hidden in a pile of (800+ lines) cryptic shit.
Why would anyone look at that if you can take a peek at alien flux’s code? (No matter what you think of the game - the code is top notch.)
[¹ like “if(d$<$)d$+=(int)Math.pow($-d$,1.0/3.0);”… it’s simple, but I never thought about something like that before. The displayed score gets the cubic square root of the difference added. This way it counts way faster if the difference is huge, which in turn prevents that the game reaches a state were the score is increased each frame.]
The Free Software movement is scary exactly because of things like this.
Sure, I agree it’s a good idea to have an open source operating system. Yes, I could see why some people would want an open source warcraft 2 clone.
No, I don’t want to be forced to give away my work for free to everyone just to enter a silly competition.
Besides, I’d much rather make a 16k demo game public domain than open source.
…and prizes. Apart from judges etc. we need sponsors. Blah^3 was working on something on those lines.
I’m happy giving away my games as prizes crap though they are, and I suspect Elias is happy to give away Tribal Trouble licenses as prizes, so we at least have some runner-up stuff. But it’d be nice if there was a decent prize for the winner, like a spiffy new graphics card or OSX10.4 or a gig of RAM or something.
As for judging: I nominate meself as one, so I won’t enter. Any naysayers?
haha, talking about source code for 16k, i don’t really think it would matter much, most of the java 4k games source was worse than encryption! highly compact uncommented 1 letter variables, it would just take an age to figure out anything!
The BSD license is excellent; the only onerous restriction that it has is that you include it in the distribution, which we needn’t count towards the bytes total
Thanks for all the feedback. Here is one last draft with:
Simplified scoring (I also changed it to out of 10)
Extra note regarding binary only distributions
I have to go out shortly, but will be back around 21:00 UTC and will raise it to issue 1, so we can move on and concentrate on working out the judging, prizes etc.
I’m not convinced by this, lots of things here where you’re ignoring previous conclusions in the previous discussions of all this. I’m sure I’ve missed a few myself, but off the top of my head:
PS: better if you don’t use quotes (use code tags instead) It makes it hard for people to reply to because this board is so buggy
State a version, i.e. 1.4.2_07. If you don’t, then I can easily write code that will be 1.4.2 but not 1.4.2_07 and some judges will pan it unfairly.
So, no libraries allowed? That doesn’t stop people, just makes life more hassle - you should be allowed any library, it just counts towards your byte limit.
This also requires a more sane approach to jars and libraries - just state that the total size of all resources referenced in the core JNLP cannot exceed X bytes, NOT INCLUDING LWJGL jnlp-extension. Easy :).
You should provide a JNLP link rather than stating that - there may be emergency bugfixes etc to 0.97 (you never know), so providing a JNLP link and saying “if you use that, it’s fine” is a better way forward.
Bad idea. It absolutely has to be webstart (read the problems getting 4k games to work).
Why? This is definitely NOT normal for a competition. Standard terms are: you grant the organizers (optional: “and anyone else”) the non-exclusive and perpetual right to re-distribute the actual binaries you submit as your entry.
You haven’t defined either. Both need to be defined. Both, really, need you to give examples of 1-3, 4-6, and 7-10 points, so people actually know what they’re aiming at.
This is java: it’s not “desirable”, it’s “essential”. Just say “games may be penalised otherwise” - i.e. it’s up to judges discretion, but an author who cuts corners is playing with fire.
No need even to mention source / non-source unless you are insisting on one. It confuses and puts people off. Your statement implies that source distributions would get more points (no, really. Look back at 4k for examples of such interpretations actually becoming fact).
I’m not savvy with licenses, I just want to run this like I did the 4K. If they provide a source, then good. If not, big deal! If you’ll noice on my site, it clearly says “this site will never release source codes, authors must do this on their own homepage” - and that’s exactly how I want it. Java Unlimited is a game site, not a source site… surely BSD does not force source to be released?! I’m half-sure CC doesn’t, anyway…
Scoring is unlimited and based on rank. Each judge will rank each game in order; then each game's average rank from all judges will be the final score. The best score is therefore (1,1) and the worst score is (n, n) where n is the number of games entered.
and
Entries may be submitted under any license which also grants at minimum the competition organisers the non-exclusive perpetual license to distribute the binaries.
and
The game [b]must[/b] be launched by Webstart and Webstart only
and
The game [b]must[/b] work on all versions of Java from 1.4.2_0 onwards. Failure to work on [b]any[/b] of the judges' machines will result in disqualification*. So there. Better get it right eh? No harm in testing before you submit.
and
The game must run on Win98, WinME, Win2k, WinXP, OSX10.3+, Linux x86 (insert suitable version here...?) and failure to run on all platforms results in instant disqualification.
Disqualification sound a bit harsh? Well, tough, the whole point of the LWJGL and Java is that it works - everywhere - and that is your primary concern before it actually plays or looks good.
Cas
except judges using Linux, who deserve everything they get
[quote]I’m not convinced by this…
[/quote]
Blah, you saw the rule proposals yesterday and were the second person to post (after Cas). It’s really rather late for a rehash, but I will attempt to answer your crits
Code rather than Quote. Ok, because it’s you.
JRE release numbers - You get 1.4.2_07 with Mac OS X, so it’s a good target. However I’m not going to insist on it.
Not many libraries come in under 16k. The GAGEtimer might be nice, but while the jar is a bit over 4k, the dll is about 94k unpacked. On the whole not a realistic request.
It does make sense to provide a shared copy of LWJGL, so as to avoid multiple downloads, but agreeing who is hosting would need discussion, which would be best kept separate so as not to hold things up.
I certainly would prefer webstart, since that would avoid issues with installing libraries, but did not want to exclude anyone who did not have decent hosting where they can set the required mime types.
BSD - There has already been much discussion & dissent on this. It is impossible to keep everyone happy, but I am not about to start designing a custom license for the contest, as that would just start another hare running.
I tried to breakdown the scoring into sub-groups, but folks weren’t having it. I am delivering what the majority have requested.
Cross-platform is a key part of java. However how many people have a PC, Linux box & a Mac. OK, others can help with the testing, but good cross-platform performance is difficult to achieve when you don’t have the platform at hand. Thus this is ‘desirable’ rather than ‘essential’.
9 I mentioned binary only specifically because people were already confused and assuming that they had to supply source, even though this is not mandated by the license. Hence the clarification. It is redundant information, which is why it is a note, not a requirement.
So overall, I think you have a point with items 4 & 5 identified above. We should look at 4 as a separate item for websites hosting a set of competition entries; I understand you have been putting something in place at JGF to specify libraries. Does it do this?; Also perhaps you could offer your services at JGF to help any folks who can’t serve their own jnlp’s, thus resolving item 5, although mandating this is going a bit to far. (Besides think of how much fun you will have lambasting anyone foolish to submit an executable jar.)
Scoring is unlimited and based on rank. Each judge will rank each game in order; then each game's average rank from all judges will be the final score. The best score is therefore (1,1) and the worst score is (n, n) where n is the number of games entered.
and
Entries may be submitted under any license which also grants at minimum the competition organisers the non-exclusive perpetual license to distribute the binaries.
and
The game [b]must[/b] be launched by Webstart and Webstart only
and
The game [b]must[/b] work on all versions of Java from 1.4.2_0 onwards. Failure to work on [b]any[/b] of the judges' machines will result in disqualification*. So there. Better get it right eh? No harm in testing before you submit.
and
The game must run on Win98, WinME, Win2k, WinXP, OSX10.3+, Linux x86 (insert suitable version here...?) and failure to run on all platforms results in instant disqualification.
Disqualification sound a bit harsh? Well, tough, the whole point of the LWJGL and Java is that it works - everywhere - and that is your primary concern before it actually plays or looks good.
Cas
except judges using Linux, who deserve everything they get
[/quote]
I hope this is tongue in cheek, particularly the last part. If not I am not going to rework though the whole thing again.
I’m prepared to change the rules to webstart only if you like, but any other changes will have to be made by someone else as my patience has run out.
Alan ;D
/Edit - I think you might be serious - OK that’s me out
What if it don’t run because of a bug in the jre, LWJGL or driver? Have LWJGL got FMOD, devil and all other features running on all the platforms you mentioned? Besides whos got the resourses to test the game on 30 different configuration of jre/platform.
On a related note. Is it allowed to specify high minimum requirements on the OpenGL features used? Lets say using an extension only available on high end cards.
The game must run on Win98, WinME, Win2k, WinXP, OSX10.3+, Linux x86 (insert suitable version here...?) and failure to run on all platforms results in instant disqualification.
Disqualification sound a bit harsh? Well, tough, the whole point of the LWJGL and Java is that it works - everywhere - and that is your primary concern before it actually plays or looks good.
Cas
except judges using Linux, who deserve everything they get
[/quote]
Except how are we supposed to test everyone’s machines to see if it works? We can put it up here, but the problem is sometimes people don’t try it for you. I put mine up for the 4K and got 3 people to test it. I don’t know anyone else who wants to try it out. I basically get to try it on 2 machines and hope for the best elsewhere. So I should be disqualified for not having the resources other people have?
I think to solve the problem of not having resources there should be a mandatory qualification round involving feedback from judges on the various system configurations that will be used for final testing. The feedback should be restricted to issues with running the program. During the main round if the code fails on a system that was not tested during the qualification round it doesn’t count against the entry.
The trouble is that we all have different views and it is difficult to find a compromise that we all agree to. The best we can hope for is a set of rules where we are all equally unhappy, but willing to accept ;D
rant on
I’m in a fairly reasonable position regarding cross-platform and have all (eh, most of) the OS’s required by Cas. I’m short of a third decent box, but could lash something up or borrow one. I’d still have to install & uninstall OS’s to work round all the versions in Cas’ post, but I could do it. (I have copies of Win 95, 98, 2000, XP, Suse 8.2, Rehat 5.1 (old) & a broadband connection so can DL other variants, Mac OS 10.3.7, 10.3.9, 10.4, 10.4.1) But does everyone have that luxury. I think not. That gives me an unfair advantage.
Regarding insisting on webstart. I have several websites and know how to set mime types as I have done so as to serve J2ME over WAP. However it does cost money (not much though) to rent hosting so not everyone will have it. Another unfair advantage to me 8) Yippee.
However I was trying to provide a set of rules that provided a level playing field but did not require cheque-book engineering (check-book for the americans). Stupid me, when I could have put in all those difficult to meet requirements. Possibly I could have frightened everyone off and been the only entry. Bound to win then. Heh, there is still time.
rant off
In all seriousness, the Draft D rules I did yesterday are a good compromise. If I modify them to meet Blah’s & Cas’ last posts, then we will get adverse comment from others who disagree with them. (I’m still wondering whether Cas was serious or just trying to wind Blah up. Certainly wound me up )
The only modification I think is worth considering is insisting on webstart; if of course there are no dissenters. Of course if there are no dissenters, that probably means everyone is intending to use webstart anyway, thus there isn’t actually a problem. In which case why waste time on it.
Anyway, I think Draft D is good enough. Hopefully we are all equally unhappy.
Ah, I gave you the benefit of the doubt and assumed you’d go and read some of the previous discussion and hashing out of rules sooner or later. I only spoke up now because it seemed that you hadn’t and weren’t going to before starting the competition :(.
TBH, I’m not really bothered, I’m only trying to warn you away from mistakes that you’ll regret later. I’ve run lots of competitions, from tiny freebie stuff up to 6-figure prize funds, and I just hope to make sure other people don’t make the same mistakes I have made in the past.
Sure, JGF is there all the time for anyone to use for this. Feel free to upload a game now and see what happens (and when you’ve finished playing, click the “request this game be deleted” button from the admin interface). If you break anything, I’ll want to know and fix it, obviously :P. I absolutely have to fix the random crashing problem that takes the server down once a week or so, and believe me it’s my number one priority ;), but apart from that I know of nothing that isn’t working.
Nah, he was completely serious - and, FWLIW, it’s a good set of rules. Not necessairly “popular” but “good” (the two obviously being different things ).
[quote]any other changes will have to be made by someone else as my patience has run out.
[/quote]
I’d been prodding Cas et al about this competition since March :P, asking them what they wanted to do, how they wanted it run, if they wanted help, etc, so I feel for you. Indeed, my last question was “have you decided to delay this until LWJGL 1.0?” :P.
(no, they weren’t any more responsive than in this thread ;))
[quote]The trouble is that we all have different views and it is difficult to find a compromise that we all agree to.
[/quote]
This is why I’m not really interested in a “competition by committee”. It has been useufl in the 5 threads (this being the 5th, IIRC) debating what a comp should be to get all the different inputs and feedback, but ultimately these things are better being led by one bullish personality who just makes a series of consistent decisions and ignores what people like/dislike (part of what makes Cas’s rules good).
Different commenters are each imagining different styles of comp, and I think you’ll find that if the style is decided upon - the purpose - then there’d be much less argument: some, for instance, are more interested in a “competition for programmers to show off to other programmers”; I’m most interested in a “competition to produce decent imaginative mini games with shared assets” (and indeed I negotiated some assets that could be used for free by competition authors, but the LWJGL guys weren’t interested cos it flies in the face of the style of compo they wanted); etc.
