New category: "Cross-platform games dev"

General Discussions
#1

c.f. this thread:

http://www.java-gaming.org/cgi-bin/JGNetForums/YaBB.cgi?board=Tuning;action=display;num=1071869284

But, thinking about it, it’s more than just OS X. Java’s WORA for games is being let-down a lot through innocent ignorance on the part of many devs. I have a hard enough time persuading the 10% of authors who hard-code for windows to “allow” me to play on linux by fixing their bugs - and I get the impression it’s far worse for Mac users! :frowning:

If we had a cat specifically for discussing x-platform issues, it would highlight them more effectively than just having individual threads scattered around.

As a non-Mac owner, I’d particularly appreciate having somewhere to keep abreast of the improvements / problems peculiar to Apple’s JVM. As it stands, if I want to check, I have to go searching all over the place to find past threads that mentioned the status quo :(.

#2

+1

A place that listed all the peculiarities of each JVM would be incredibly useful.

#3

[quote]+1

A place that listed all the peculiarities of each JVM would be incredibly useful.
[/quote]
Since I’m still off-work (ill) I’m having a go at an article giving an overview of the current issues - nowhere near as complete and up-to-date as the forum could be, but hopefully a good starting point, e.g. a kind of “most frequently-encountered platform problems” that could be ref’d in the forum posts…

Assuming I don’t give up :frowning: I’ll post it on JGF and update it as and when I get comments from people who know particular issues…

#4

+1

Cas :slight_smile:

#5

+1

Maybe I’ll get to play more of everyone’s cool creations on my Mac…

This stuff should also be covered in a Wiki topic so it is easy to find.

#6

[quote]This stuff should also be covered in a Wiki topic so it is easy to find.
[/quote]
Maybe a central place, which has the most important information, is worth even more than a dedicated forum.

#7

I’ve been requesting one for over a year on these forums alone, and nothing’s ever happened. Having a forum category for discussion will at least serve as a stepping-stone to something better :slight_smile: hopefully drawing some extra attention to the issues.

Also, starting a category is almost zero effort, so is more likely to happen :).

But, if someone volunteers to do something more proactive, perhaps like the Hardware Compat Lists we’ve started on JGF, then I’ll make a JGF section for it immediately…perhaps entirely re-arrange the “java” section (which is only a placeholder at the moment) to make the x-platform stuff obvious and easy to find?

#8

[quote]Maybe I’ll get to play more of everyone’s cool creations on my Mac…
[/quote]
+1 from me too, I think this is a great idea, as I don’t have access to a mac either, so making sure things work can only be done by those who do (well, the bug reporting aspect).

unless someone wants to buy me one, anyone got a few million spare and doesn’t mind losing a couple a grand :slight_smile:

Endolf

#9

Donate to the LWJGL Mac fund and be assured that enthusiastic and comprehensive Mac support will follow!

Cas :slight_smile:

#10

[quote]Donate to the LWJGL Mac fund and be assured that enthusiastic and comprehensive Mac support will follow!

Cas :slight_smile:
[/quote]
I was just about to donate $50,000, but there doesn’t appear to be a button for more than $250 =(

Ah well, off it goes to Cheshire dogs home :slight_smile:

#11

I’m in the last few weeks off two games projects simultaneously at the moment, so I won’t be doing any more on this until mid June at the earliest (maybe not even then)…so probably best to assume it’s not going to happen.

#12

I also think that this is a good idea. For example, moments ago I looked through the forums to see a place where I could post some helpful information on a just released update for the Mac JVM. Unfortunately there was nothing that really fit. The best option would have been the General Discussions forum.

The info is that Apple just released ‘Java 1.4.2 Update 1’, which brings them up to their version of 1.4.2_05. Here’s a quote from the apple java-dev mailing list that might be of interest to some people:

[quote]“Well mouse-button input works now in full screen mode, so that is a HUGE step forward. Unfortunately, when I call setFullScreenWindow(null), I now get a null pointer exception. Before 1.4.2_05, I did not.”
[/quote]

#13

-1 from me.

I think there are better things to create an new discussion forum about. E.g. AI. I think alot of games outthere dont have many intelligent agents/actors and more believable players are the big thing at the moment.

Thats what crytek and AI.Implant have been boasting about, and I think thats the way forwards.

My 2 pence…

DP

#14

If I understand you correctly, you don’t mean “-1”, you mean “if we can only have one more forum, then I don’t want this one”.

But…if you want AI, then go and use a game AI forum on a game AI website? The techniques for AI don’t vary that much from language to language (at least, not when you’re comparing C++ to Java, nor wherever you need a specialised AI lang and it’s not going to be in your favourite lang anyway).

Good places to start are the website by Steve Rabin (Editor for the AI Programming Wisdom series of books), aidepot, and gamedev.net - all of which have vastly more people and expertise in AI than you’re going to find here. I’m not sure if Rabin’s site has forums, but it’s certainly THE place to go for game AI stuff.

#15

I know, but there are Java-specific things that need to be discussed about AI. For example:

In A* path finding, C/C++ people discuss using Binary Trees to sort out the F values of the adjacent points. In java, you would use a TreeMap because it already does the sorting.

There are alot of “gotcha” in AI with java. And I think that these gotchas are better discussed than cross platform issues.

DP

#16

USE THE WIKI… I tis the one spot on JavaGaming.org that any java.net member can modify freely. We can make it what we need as far as a central place to find this info.

It’s not perfect, but it works so it is worth the time needed to figure out how to use it.

#17

[quote]I know, but there are Java-specific things that need to be discussed about AI.
[/quote]
Fair enough. Although that is a very small example, I see a general class of similar ones - basically, that there is no forum which discusses the efficient java implementation of the “standard” game AI algorithms, and the lack of pointers and the specifics of java objects as opposed to C++ equivalents mean there are plenty of differences that matter.

Much the same is true of physics systems, except that there are physics engines in java, whereas the AI engines (there are MANY of them) are known only to AI researchers and aren’t really used by people outside of that. We have a physics forum; why not AI?

So…instead of complaining here and trying to block other people, start your own suggestion thread for it!

I don’t use the following forums. All these will be deleted tomorrow because they are useless to me :

Physics
Java3D
J2ME
JOAL
Your Resumes Here
Volunteer Projects

DP - get real. This is not your private board to simply reject (or block) a category just because YOU don’t use it and YOU would use a different category more. If you have a good reason why this should not go ahead - e.g. a category called “C++ sucks” is probably a bad idea on many levels, not least that it calls into question the professionalism of this community - then that’s fair enough.

#18

the professionalism of this community has been in doubt way before I even joined by YOU using it as YOUR own BLOG. If you look at the discussions on gamdev.net and similar C/C++ forums, YOU would know what level of professionalism is needed around these kinds of forums.

Java is about cross platform. If any cross platform issue that needs sorting, sun or apple already has a document about is somewhere. YOU get real, and start doing some work and look for things before posting.

As many people say, if you are using the sarcasm tag, then dont bother writing that sentence in the first place.

There is already a push for cross platfrom stuff at the LWJGL department, and thats how you solve things. By the underlying API, not by changing your own code.

DP

#19

Come on guys, there are not enough Java game developers around the world we could let you kill each other.
You’re belonging to a disappearing species so please act appropriate.
The day you act like the good old James Bomb in 007 you’re going to get your licence to kill. :wink:

Bla uses this forum as a kind of Blog regularly but then, be fair: there are not many articles anyway here around, so let’s be happy he fills this forum with life. :slight_smile:

Back to topic:

[quote]c.f. this thread:
Java’s WORA for games is being let-down a lot through innocent ignorance on the part of many devs. I have a hard enough time persuading the 10% of authors who hard-code for windows to “allow” me to play on linux by fixing their bugs - and I get the impression it’s far worse for Mac users! :frowning:
[/quote]
I agree 100 %.
Many Java games tend to be a mess because usually they just run on … Winblows! :frowning:
This is not because of Java but because of the developers.
So… yes, there’s need for the suggested sub-forum.

In short: +1

#20

Clearly I’ve been annoying DarkProphet a lot with what he sees as my takeover of JGO and turning it into my “personal blog”. I’m not particularly bothered, although TBH I don’t see the problem. Sure, between myself and Cas we made 10% of all posts on this board (literally - you can check the numbers on the front page). But…that’s because we’ve contributed huge amounts of information, have appealed to and/or prodded “the powers that be” repeatedly and insistently (…some of which may even have helped the forthcoming reward of a modular JRE that ChrisM has hinted at…), and generally dragged the community forwards through little more than sheer persistence.

(NB: I only singled out Cas because IIRC he is the single most prolific poster and the instigator of LWJGL (which has been pivotal for myself and others), and was clearly THE major personality on JGO when I arrived. There are many others who have contributed huge amounts too, and their accomplishments are no less praiseworthy - but I think it’s fair to say that without the drive of the top 5 or so posters we’d be a lot further behind as a group than we are now - more so than just the loss of posts; the consistent and continual input has helped draw more people out of the woodwork and convince many more people to commit to java game development above and beyond the effects of any single particular post)

PS yes, this is OT. But it’s also bumping the number of views of this thread, and I’m getting frustrated waiting for ChrisM to do something about it. And…apparently I’m annoying DP sufficiently that he keeps OT’ing threads on this (DP, why don’t you just email me about this instead, or start a thread in Off Topic?)

PPS :stuck_out_tongue: