Trinity sources to be released

Hey everyone,

Just to let you know that Beenox plans to release the complete (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/coldstone/")Coldstone(/url) project of (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/pog/trinity")Trinity(/url), without any modification. You will be able to compile it yourself with Coldstone or make any modification you want to it and then share the goodness to the PoG/Coldstone community.

We plan to release it simultaneously or soon after the Coldstone update. Don't ask when the update will be released, it will be released when it's done, period.

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Dee Brown
Beenox inc. - (url="http://"http://www.beenox.com")www.beenox.com(/url) (check our new web site!)
(url="http://"http://www.AmbrosiaSW.com/games/coldstone/")Coldstone Game Engine(/url) / (url="http://"http://www.AmbrosiaSW.com/games/pog/")Pillars of Garendall(/url) developers

Quote

Originally posted by Dee:
Just to let you know that Beenox plans to release the complete Coldstone project of Trinity, without any modification. You will be able to compile it yourself with Coldstone or make any modification you want to it and then share the goodness to the PoG/Coldstone community.

Woo hoo! Thanks Dee.

Now that the announcement has been made public, I would like to put forth some sort of community effort of adding to/modifying the trinity project. I don't know how many people plan on modifying trinity, but if there are multiple people that do plan on fiddling with it and releasing new trinity plug-ins, we could certainly get into a mess really quick. I imagine 20 versions of trinity that people would have to download and switch between to get minor improvements or features, which would be awful.

I'm not sure what the solution is, but we have time since the source hasn't been released yet, and I figured I would open up discussion on it now that Dee has made the announcement.

I've thought about this for a short while and my the only thing I can think of is to set up some sort of "trinity community," possibly done through a mailing list. Those that wish to modify trinity and release the modifications as an updated version of the trinity plug-in would correspond with the others working on the project, and if no one else was currently working on it they would download the most current source code, do their modifications, and then upload the plugin and the modified source code. Then the next person who wished to modify it would download the modified source code, add their changes, and upload the new source + the new plugin. This way everyone's modifications would be included in a comprehensive plug-in, as opposed to having 50 different "trinity plugins" which would be chaotic.

There would also need to be some rules to this, such as timeliness(as no one would want to wait while someone dinked with the code for 4 months), and documentation(if you change/add/remove something, it should be noted so all developers realize it and don't have to "find" it). I would also like to think that the trinity source would be used only to "fix" existing problems(like shapeshifting bugs, spelling errors, etc) and to allow for compatibility with other plug-ins(I plan on adding a global variable to trinity to make it compatible with a plug-in I am writing). Major changes that affect the flow of the plug-in, or adding things like new classes, etc, should be discouraged as they would be better suited in a seperate plug-in.

Anyhow, these are my thoughts on the subject. Anyone else who is interested in developing with the Trinity source, please post your thoughts.

Thanks.

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This may not be your favorite song, but it's got a lot of the same notes.
- KGGO Des Moines in the front?

Quote

Originally posted by Stark Bledfast:
< snip!>

And to think, all I ever wanted to do was make a Trinity-compatible bow...
Seriously though, I have a lot of doubts about such a proposal. Perhaps you have heard of the EVN Expansion Project, a (supposedly) "huge" project in which many people contribute in one little way to making a huge, constantly updated EVN plug-in.Of course, this never really got off the ground, despite what the members may think; the majority of the members are enthusiastic EVN players and a handful of tutorial writers. There are many problems with such an idea, the main problem being that there would have to be a tyrant dictator controlling every aspect of the project, at all hours. He'd not only have to control development and updating, but he'd also have to deal with the unauthorized versions of his plug-in sprouting up everywhere (of course, if you could befriend AAC he could do that for you šŸ™‚ ).
Forgive my criticisms, but I really don't think this idea will get off the ground (it's more likely to be sniped out of the air by us pessimists šŸ˜‰ ). I think Beenox should just release the source and sit back to watch the fun. Of course,the addons page admin could conceivably filter the flow of modified Trinities by only releasing the best ones. I believe we could prevent a Trinity "plague" from spreading without attempting to control it completely.

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The greatest of harm can result from the best of intentions Ā— Wizard's Second Rule, Stone of Tears.
Ā— Cafall

(quote)Originally posted by Cafall:
Perhaps you have heard of the EVN Expansion Project, a (supposedly) "huge" project in which many people contribute in one little way to making a huge, constantly updated EVN plug-in.Of course, this never really got off the ground, despite what the members may think; the majority of the members are enthusiastic EVN players and a handful of tutorial writers. (/quote)

2 differences exist between the EVN:EP(and yes, I am aware of the project, and wanted no part of it) and the Trinity development project:

Size : There are many, many enthusiastic EV:N'ers who want to be a part of a development project. For trinity there are far fewer. With less people to manage there is less of a logistical problem, less personality conflicts to sort out, etc.

Skill : As you stated, the EVN:EP had a lot of people interested, but they were all "chiefs" and very few "indians." For the Trinity project that I am proposing, I am not interested in people converting Trinity or bending it to their purposes. Pretty much you can throw out all of the "enthusiastic players" and "tutorial writers." My envisioning, which I perhaps did not spell out very well, is for plug-in designers to work on this project so that their own independant plug-ins will be compatible with Trinity. Also I envision plug-in writers that want to fix the bugs in Trinity to help out in fixing those bugs.

(quote) **There are many problems with such an idea, the main problem being that there would have to be a tyrant dictator controlling every aspect of the project, at all hours. He'd not only have to control development and updating, but he'd also have to deal with the unauthorized versions of his plug-in sprouting up everywhere (of course, if you could befriend AAC he could do that for you Your criticisms are welcomed and encouraged, and if they can help make the project work, then great.

(quote) I think Beenox should just release the source and sit back to watch the fun.** (/quote)

This is their intention. The trinity development project is an idea of my own and has no relation with Beenox at all. It is a selfish idea, actually, because I intend to design a plug-in that is currently incompatible with Trinity. It is my intention to modify Trinity in a way that is becomes compatible with my plug-in(although to the end-user who would download my version of Trinity they would see no difference in how it worked... this would all be code-level changes). And I would like to make a way so that if others want to make alterations to Trinity, the changes I made would still be there. So I am being selfish.

(quote) Of course, the addons page admin could conceivably filter the flow of modified Trinities by only releasing the best ones. I believe we could prevent a Trinity "plague" from spreading without attempting to control it completely. (/quote)

This is true. However we would still have "Trinity_Stark's_Version" and "Trinity_Cafall's_Version" and "Trinity_Original_Release" et all. And if someone wanted to use my plug-in along with the additions of Trinity, then they would have to download my release of trinity. And if someone wanted to play a plug-in made by Cafall that requires his version of trinity, then they would need to download that as well, and then make sure they had only the correct version of trinity installed when they load POG. A real hassle and headache.

It is my opinion that if we can find a way to make changes to the Trinity source so that all of our changes remain even after someone else modifies the source, then we should do so. This way when we create plug-ins that are compatible with Trinity only due to modifications of Trinity, then we can put a line in the readme that states, "Must use Trinity version 1.4 or higher." Then our only problem would be to make the user read the readme, which I believe is a much more difficult task

Does this make sense? Is my vision clear, cloudy, or just a pipe dream?

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This may not be your favorite song, but it's got a lot of the same notes.
- KGGO Des Moines in the front?

Btw, Andiyar set up a new webboard for the Trinity Development Project(TDP). I've placed a couple posts outlining my ideas for it on there, so that we are not discussing between several boards.

So if anyone has thoughts on this thread, please move to the TDP board and we can discuss it there.

The board is located (url="http://"http://epitheisterra.sourcecod.com/viewforum.php?f=13&sid;=")here(/url).

Thanks!

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This may not be your favorite song, but it's got a lot of the same notes.
- KGGO Des Moines in the front?

i hav, absolutely, no clue, whatsoever, .....like.....totally, but, i just wanted to know, does trinity run on a pc?.....and.....uh.....like.....does the 1.0.1 update or whatever version it is go on pcs? cuz, i havent seen an update thing for pcs, but ive heard trinity ken b put on pcs, but dangit, trinity requires the update doesnt it?
Zim: GIR! WATCH THE BEAM!
Gir: OH! I WANT A TACO!
Zim: GIR! WATCH THE BEAM!
Gir: Burrito.....
Zim: GIR! FOR THE LEAST TIME! WATCH THE BEAM!
Gir: Must.....obey.....Taco - Man.....
Zim: Ugh, Gir, watch the burrito beam
Gir: Eyes go red* YES SIR!
(Edited by me, cuz i didnt no the real words)

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Quote

Originally posted by phantompenguin:
does the 1.0.1 update or whatever version it is go on pcs?

Welcome to the boards. I believe Pillars of Garendall 1.0.1 is the only version available for Windows - 1.0.0 was Mac-only.

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David Arthur
(url="http://"http://davidarthur.evula.net/")davidarthur.evula.net(/url): MissionComputer and the Talon plug-in
(url="http://"http://www.ev-nova.net/")EV-Nova.net(/url): Forums Once Again Accessible
(url="http://"http://www.evula.com/")EVula's Lair(/url) | (url="http://"http://www.evula.com/survival_guide/")EV Nova Survival Guide(/url)

Quote

Originally posted by David Arthur:
Welcome to the boards. I believe Pillars of Garendall 1.0.1 is the only version available for Windows - 1.0.0 was Mac-only.

Mr. Arthur is technically correct in that the Windows version is the same as the 1.0.1 version for the Mac. Unfortunately the windows version of PoG was not given a version number, thus defaults to 1.0(and hence the confusion).

Here is what happened:

PoG was released for the Mac first and was released as PoG 1.0. Bugs were found and an update was begun. Instead of releasing the Windows version with the known bugs only to release an updater shortly thereafter, it was decided to hold off on releasing the Windows version until after the update was completed. So when the update was finally completed the Windows version was built, packaged, and released using the 1.0.1 code. However since it was the first and only version for Windows it was defaultly named 1.0. The mac version however had to be updated to utilize the new code, so it was named 1.0.1.

So the bottom line is this:
Mac PoG V1.0.1 and Windows PoG V1.0 are the same thing.

Trinity will run on Mac PoG V1.0.1 and it will run on Windows PoG V1.0.

My hope is when the next update comes out both versions will be given the same version number to avoid confusion. Hopefully they will both be labeled 1.0.2.

I hope this clears things up.

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