how about mouse-area generator?

[Sami Tervo]

while i was programming own inventory-system for my game i got pretty pissed off because i had to check coords for every damn button (theres lots of 'em).

but i got an idea. in world of webdesigning theres apps which can make you imagearea-coords just by making rectangles to the picture.

how about writing similar program to agi? you could import agi/normal-format picture to program and draw rectangle or even circles and program would make necessery code. would save lots of time.

[Nick Sonneveld]

That's an excellent idea.. it could be incorporated in either Joel's or Blacki's logic generators.

- Nick

[Joel]

I could possibly add something like that to the BLG (or someone else could, after the source release). The only issue is that the BLG is, at least at the moment, geared more toward generating a starting point for logics and not toward generating code after the logic has been created. If these rectangles will be known before the logic for the room is created, then there's no problem, but if they won't be, then the BLG wouldn't be very useful for that situation. I think Nick had a similar idea about ego positioning, though, so this is a possibility. Just tell me what you think.

On the other hand, if I understand blacki correctly, although the AGI assistant appears to be geared toward adding things after you've got your logic already started, the AGI assistant will be an HTML/JavaScript based generator, in which case it won't have the necessary capabilities to do something like that.

[Andrew_Baker]

Sure it could.  Hell, if you wanted you could even have a paint shop type program where you literally drew the buttons on in solid blocks and associated each color to a specific function.

[Blacki]

The generator I'm making is a Java applet, different to JavaScript.  It's just like running an application on your computer except it's on a webpage, instead of it's own window.
As for the mouse-area thing;  I will have to load a picture resource, if I put that in I may as well just make a program that basically does everything for you.  A point and click program is not something I was planning to make, and I don't think it would be popular.
It'll end up like a FrontPage vs. Notepad sort of thing.

still wanting some feedback... I'm gonna ask again, any ideas or opinions...

For now you'll just have to write/type some notes about your Picture when you make it. eg.

drawer in box X23 Y34 - X29 Y38
door X45 Y50 - X60 Y70
you get the idea.

I'll finish this one without the loading Picture resource and mouse features, I might make another version later...

[Joel]

Ok, I did misunderstand. If you're going to write it as a Java applet it may be just as well to simply write it as a standalone application and use the Swing package or something so that it doesn't require a browser to run. It would still be portable and it probably wouldn't be much more difficult if any at all than writing an applet.

[Blacki]

Yeah, well I could release it in an application as well, but I thought it would be good to have an applet since it is only fairly small you can use it before you download it.

[Sami Tervo]

Blacki: A point and click program is not something I was planning to make, and I don't think it would be popular.
It'll end up like a FrontPage vs. Notepad sort of thing.

oh come on.. thats the idea of the program, to speed things up.

mouse-area generators only needed to make those
if(v27==1 && v28 < 41 && v29 > .......-stuff so programmer could e.g. copy that stuff to clipboard and add it to his program's code.

[Nailhead]

I think this whole idea is great! I too would like to see it be a point & click app.  

[Blacki]

Yeah, you're right it probably wouldn't be that difficult.
Could also add in a point and click thing for putting the doors and drawers too.

I'll try to get the Picture resource loading in windows...  and x,y thing running properly, no promises though.

[Brian Provinciano]

I could improve my AGI Mouse hack by adding an AGI command "if(mouse.on.obj(oX)) {}" which would check to see if the mouse is over a view. However, I am focusing 100% of my efforts on SCI Studio's template game right now. When I'm done, I'll do the hack.

[Nick Sonneveld]

The notepad vs frontpage argument is useless.  I write all my pages using Composer, run them through a template program and upload them.  The less I have to worry about writing actual html, the better.  I prefer abstraction levels.

With AGI games, I think people would rather worry about how their game fits together and puzzles and only work with low-level code for complex stuff. (that can't easily be generalised)

For things like defining sections on the screen, looking, position of ego when entering rooms... things that you do all the time when making agi games.. if this was made quicker and easier to do then we could encourage more people to try agi.

- Nick

[Joel]

I agree with Nick. The only reason I don't use programs like FrontPage and Composer is that they all produce bloated, non-standard HTML (the biggest offender in both cases being the much overused FONT element) that is difficult to read and modify at the source code level.

I think point and click software would be very popular for AGI utilities, as long as it didn't produce bloated, difficult-to-read code. I'm honestly not really happy with the way the ego positioning controls are done in the BLG, because the BLG requires you to find out coordinates from a source external to the BLG itself, and that's a psychological burden for the user. I'm actually going to very seriously consider adding support for point and click ego positioning. As I said, I don't know if I'll get around to it by version 2.0 final but it's definitely something I'd look into.

[Blacki]

I won't release AGI assistant until I'm happy with it...  And there won't be no messy difficult-to-read code in there.  I'm trying to make it easier...

There shouldn't be much of a wait though...