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Click link below to download (url="http://"http://homepage.mac.com/thorprime/NovaBurst.sit")NovaBurst Dev Release(/url)
This is just an early preview to get feed back on what you guys want in an editor. Please comment here
ps. Keep in mind that this is only a developmental release and many features don't work.
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(This message has been edited by ThorPrime (edited 08-31-2001).)
What I would want in a resource editor:
A system editor that gives you a visual of the universe and allows you to edit it from the map
A planet editor that allows you to preview planets
An interface that allows you to have several editors open and acessible at once with the least possible clutter
An editor that is updated as new features are added to Nova
An editor that doesn't ruin plugs like EV-Edit is notorious for
------------------ Cuz I'm a 21st Century Digital Boy I don't know the Monty Python but I've got a lotta toys My daddy is a Renegade, his name is Hellcat Helian Wait a second...
A very nice looking editor, which shows promise. But it's hard to see how it will be able to compete with W00tRalphTools which are basically the 'official' editors of EVN. However, I don't think that they cover everything you could ever need to create a plugin, so maybe you could contact R&R; and ask which features your editor could support which would complement their editor suite? Or it could be a great EVO editor.
I do think your editor needs more options, but 21st Century Digital Boy has covered most of what I have to say.
------------------ 'You really want to know? Yes, I'll tell you. I'll tell you why I'm lying here. But God forgive me... And God help us all. Because you don't know what you ask of me.'
Quote
Originally posted by Evil Homer: **A very nice looking editor, which shows promise. But it's hard to see how it will be able to compete with W00tRalphTools which are basically the 'official' editors of EVN. However, I don't think that they cover everything you could ever need to create a plugin, so maybe you could contact R &R; and ask which features your editor could support which would complement their editor suite? Or it could be a great EVO editor. **
So far the only thing can think of that NovaBurst has that NovaEdit doesn't is carbon. An EV/EVO version will most likely happen. Maybe before the Nova Version.
Originally posted by 21st Century Digital Boy: **What I would want in a resource editor:
**
1: I'm not shure wether or not I can implement this with realbasic or not. Perhaps if I generate the image then place a button behi......
2: Good Idea, Will include.
3: Another good one.
4: Of course
5: I hope it won't. Hasn't yet
A few more I though of:
A built in spell checker (for descs)
Something that would simplify editing & creating the Shan resource - that one looks like it could get pretty complicated. Perhaps a visual setup...
Have a color picker come up in the various places where Nova asks for HTML colors
A built in EVN bible (perhaps the section for the resource you're editing pops up in a side pannel
Perhaps have some options built into the editor for inovations that would otherwise not occur to the player or be difficult to set up.
Have an option for "cloning systems" that are going to be changed with control bits - it would be easier and more fool-proof than having to entire reconstruct the systems from scratch.
Include a Dialog Box editor - eventually someone will want to do that for one reason or another.
Have it warn you when you've exceeded whatever the maxium desc lengh is, and any other "hidden game constraits".
Have a warning pop up when features that are quirky are acessed
And the visual system interface was done in both EV-Edit and EVO Dev Map. It's pretty much the same interface as the Map in evo, only with the option of moving the systems around with the mouse and opening an editing dialog box.
I'll let you know if I think of anything else
21
The only features that will make your editor stand out from NovaTools competition are conveniences especially ones that can't be accomplished with mere templates. Editors now not only have to be functional, but make things simpler. Even things we are so used to we might think simpler wouldn't be a good thing. You should rarely take out the option of the old way, but this will always be a work-in-progress. You will never finish the program. If you can't think of anything to add, you can always ask me. These features will probably be hard to code, but I know you can do it. However it may take you forever. I don't have unreasonable expectations as to time. And there are probably more important items than these. I actually recommend you put these at the bottom of your list.
Less abstract Nova Control Bits. Instead of entering strange letter/number abbreviations, NovaBurst could list missions, times, and other control bit setting events that will activate the mission in several menus each in a seperate tab.
OS X Icon OS X has huge icons. Use a program like IconMachine to paste renderings of your icon at all sizes. This greatly improves the feel of your product.
Improved Mission Layout Another option for viewing missions is in the actual order of the game. A flowchart(especially one I don't have to make) is extremely useful for visualizing. You could probably reuse much of the same code as the system map.
Find and Replace and/or Copy Linking Let's say I finally think up a good name for that government. Or I mispell a character's name for an entire mission string. Find and replace or copy linking throughout the entire plug-in, not just missions, would save me tons here.
Debugging Like Conflict Catcher Remember the old days when we needed legal pads to find extension conflicts? Conflict Catcher solved that problem more effeciently. But even though Conflict Catcher supports plug-ins of applications, it still doesn't work as well especially with resource forks. It ends up taking too long to be worth it. Nova Burst could use information about common problems and process of elimination to pinpoint problems without the legal pad. The included EVN Bible mentioned in a previous post could even help to give insight on the nature of the problem.
Control-click Menus for Tight Systems When we use VisBits the effect is lost if the new system isn't in nearly the same place. But a visual editor means you can't see at least one version of the system. Make a control-click menu with a list of the closest systems in situations like this.
------------------ Signed, Brian Schack "DOS Computers, manufactured by millions of companies, are by far the most popular, with about 70 million machines in use worldwide. Macintosh fans, on the other hand, may note that cockroaches are far more numerous than humans, and that numbers alone do not denote a higher life form." --The New York Times, November 26, 1991 (also quoted in MacAddict 4)
Originally posted by 21st Century Digital Boy: **A few more I though of:
1: Don't count on it, spell check in appleworks then past in. (RealBasic aint pivy to this but I may be wrong)
2: Is in current release but will be further improved with preview.
3: What would a graphical resource editor be without one?
4: yet another good idea, especialy for the newbies.
5: I'm not quit shure what you mean there
6: you mean resource duplication, probally
7: But of Course
8: Bug warning, If you knew somthing is going to crash Nova, why only warn instead of preventing a resource from being edited like that?
Those interfaces were done with C not Basic. I'll try but I can't promise anything. Maybe someone would be willing to donate some time and/or experience into creating such an editor in RealBasic.
Originally posted by Ellmist: **The only features that will make your editor stand out from NovaTools competition are conveniences especially ones that can't be accomplished with mere templates. Editors now not only have to be functional, but make things simpler. Even things we are so used to we might think simpler wouldn't be a good thing. You should rarely take out the option of the old way, but this will always be a work-in-progress. You will never finish the program. If you can't think of anything to add, you can always ask me. These features will probably be hard to code, but I know you can do it. However it may take you forever. I don't have unreasonable expectations as to time. And there are probably more important items than these. I actually recommend you put these at the bottom of your list.
1: You can count on this.
2: I garenty this one
3:Mission edditing will be something like that.
4: I'l try to get that in, would be great for TC's. But prob not until after the initial complete release.
5: Due to the fact NovaBurst only works with one plug at a time i don't see how it could find conflicts between two plugs. I hope to have some kind of prevention of internal conflicts of a plug.
6:how Bout graphical and Numerical system placement for when the system placement needs to be exact.
Originally posted by ThorPrime: ** 8: Bug warning, If you knew somthing is going to crash Nova, why only warn instead of preventing a resource from being edited like that?
It would let people change the fields in any order you want. Take increasing memory- nautrally you do the top field (min amount) first and the bottem (preferred) last. That would be fine, except you get an error when putting a bigger min that preferred. Warnings are better than perventing.
------------------ Silent Night, a plug-in for Nova, will feature a small, unique galaxy. With only three races, I will be able to change the galaxy to my hearts desire. To help me finish it faster, I will not be slowed down by making ship graphic- I will use the ones from Nova. ------==========------ Approving someone else's work is not the same as creating it yourself- Bill Watterson, Author of Calvin and Hobbes
I just thought of a few more Wish List items:
1: With some tedious testing on your part, you could avoid tedious testing on the part of every plug-in developer by calculating the memory needed.
2: This would probably be just as tedious as #1. NovaBurst could calculate the time needed to load and put that into the plug-in so the developer wouldn't have to line up the load status bar manually.
3: In several of my never-published plug-ins that I never finished I used VisBits extensively. Unfortunately I had trouble distincting different versions of a system. A version column or a flowchart for each system would help me keep track of these. Since the version number method doesn't have field in the EVN resources, you could create another resource or use the data fork that the user wouldn't edit directly, but the editor could use to keep track of information EVN wouldn't see, but NovaBurst would need for automatically controlling what Nova would see or improving the interface.
4: The advantage of the flowchart or system versions of #3 wouldn't mean much with the way people use VisBits now. But Nova Control Bits give us enough flexibility to allow a system to have several possible futures easily. But if a developer wants several mission strings to change different aspects of a system, they have to create all the combinations manually. If NovaBurst would find out what aspect needed to be changed for the mission string and took care of the combinations automatically the developer would have more time for more, longer plug-ins.
5: Finer control over the AI ship's custom enhancements than the resource shows is possible. NovaBurst simply creates an identical ship resource behind the scenes and makes the actual link in the file to this other ship resource. When the main ship resource is edited, the custom one is also edited except in the aspects that it has been customized. NovaBurst would try to condense as many custom ships as possible automatically. With any that were slightly different, the program could suggest that the user make them identical.
7: You didn't seem to understand what 21st Century Digital Boy meant when he suggested the feature that innovations that may be hard to implement be suggested by the editor to newbies. An example of this might be that the size of the power/fuel status bar represent how much power can be held. This wouldn't be mandatory, but some people might like it and never think of it, have time to create enough ďntf resources, or the know-how.
8: Nova test expressions act unpredictably when the developer doesn't force the order with parentheses. The solution to this is for NovaBurst to have preferences that will fix it in different ways or ask the user on a case by case basis.
9: The checkboxes for jump speed in the ship editor don't accurately represent what you can choose. Obviously a ship can only jump at one speed. Therefore a slider would be the best way to show this. There are other controls that could better be replaced with sliders or other types.
10: NovaBurst preferences might have the option to list resources numbers starting at 1 or 128.
11: Features for team development are so few that some people find they can do a better job single-handedly. Simply making two plug-ins compatible would help tremendously. If that is too far from what you are trying to do with the editor then you might think of a way of allocating resource IDs to authors without the developer spending a lot of trouble.
12: As you know dëscs in Nova support scrolling. A conveniance to me would be to know where the first page ends depending on the size of the window.
13: Many resources like the përs now have ActiveOn fields. That means they can be handled similar to VisBits with flowcharts, versions, automatic combinations, etc.
Not really necessary. you can either export text and check it with a word processor or use a "universal" spell checker. (I use Casady & Greene's Spell Catcher, works in most apps including ResEdit.)
------------------ Joe Burnette "I find that humans can be divided into only two meaningful categories: Decent Humans and Sonsofbitches; both types appear to be evenly distributed among all shapes, colors, sizes, and nationalities." -- Keith Laumer
Originally posted by 21st Century Digital Boy: **What I would want in a resource editor: A system editor that gives you a visual of the universe and allows you to edit it from the map **
OK I've got the basics of a graphical map/syst editor.
Is this inteface you guys wanted? Numerical and graphical cordinate entering.
That's amazing...That's exactly what we were looking for, and the interface is even much better then that found in EVEDIT. Keep it up! Don't let it go the wya of EEEV!
- Anatole The Redeemer
------------------ There will come a time, when the/curse of the One above/will not be tolerated further/when the Lineage of Caine will be weak/and there will be no Embracing for/these Childer/for their blood will run like water/and the potence in it will wither/Then, you know in this time that/Gehenna will soon be upon you. - The Book Of Nod
You have REALLY been working! I didn't expect you to do so much this soon. If you keep this up you will definitely have an excellent editor. But you need to keep it up. Good editors of the past(EEEVO,EVO God, etc) have been lost with no developer support. A very minor(as in not effecting my opinion too much) complaint:
The editing fields at the side would be better in my opinion only shown as an option or inside of another window. Forcing them here gives me less screen real estate when I want to solely design the map.
Please tell me if this is already in there, I haven't d/led nor have I read the whole article but what could really make it stand out would be the option to create/edit EV, EVO, AND EVN plugins, that would be superbly awesome. Or at least make another version of this for ev/o since Nova's engine is so incredibly different (YET COOL AS CAN BE w00t!) Matrix
------------------ ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US AOL/IM: IonStorm332 Email:Ionstorm332@yahoo.com Gameranger: Ion Storm
Originally posted by Matrix: **Please tell me if this is already in there, I haven't d/led nor have I read the whole article but what could really make it stand out would be the option to create/edit EV, EVO, AND EVN plugins, that would be superbly awesome. Or at least make another version of this for ev/o since Nova's engine is so incredibly different (YET COOL AS CAN BE w00t!) Matrix
My plan is to release 3 versions. one for each EV,EVO,EVN. Although I can't of any good names for the other versions.
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How about for the grapical syst editor, you can see whether systems are uninhabited?
------------------ G4, the faster computer. (url="http://"http://www.ziggadon.f2s.com")The Ziggadon Plug-in Web Site(/url) is growing, comments needed.
What happened to the require/contribute flags?!
------------------ "Toadflesh!"