Editor Wishlist/Coordination

[Calin Leafshade]

It occurs to me that with the release of the source code everyone may be experimenting and doing new stuff, which is cool.

However that means we might all be doing the same thing which would be totally stupid.
So it might be a good idea for ideas to be in the open a little so that people aren't doing something that someone else is doing.

It also might be nice if we had some kind of list of things that people think the editor is missing.

So in that vein I thought I would declare that I'm working on updating the gui editor. If anyone else is working on the same thing then feel free to PM me and discuss it.. or just do what youre doing anyway just for gigglez.

I've already implemented a few things like control locks and control snapping but is there anything else that people think the gui editor (or indeed any part of the AGS editor) is missing?

[Wyz]

Well, I will not be doing any editor extensions myself but I have a few wishes:

• A way to refresh the auto-completion database for instance with a key shortcut.
  
• If someone could hook up the editor with ASpell that would be really swell (Dialog editor and strings used in Say and Display functions, etc.)
  
  I'll edit this post if more come to my mind.

[GarageGothic]

I haven't had time to look at the source yet (have to reinstall Visual Studio first), but I think the room editor in particular needs careful coordination. Someone (ProgZ?) mentioned a wysiwyg'ish approach to see the effects of scaling and light settings on a character directly in the editor, which is a great idea. But it's also a good example of something that would have to be modularized enough that other engine plug-in coders could substitute their own room renderer, for instance to display 3D characters in the editor preview.

Most of my own ideas for the editor relate to engine plug-in functionality rather than enhancing the usability, but I'd be very happy to see the dialog editor redone to actually be helpful - I think there's was a plug-in or external dialog editor at some point, but I don't know what the status is on that.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

I'm still familiarizing myself with vs 10 but I intend to give room edit a well-deserved upgrade.  A few things I've been itching to implement:

1.  New drawing modes (ellipses, selecting a painted region/hotspot/walkable area and be able to reposition it).

2.  Zoom within the default dimensions of the area rather than resizing the form.

3.  Visible characters in rooms.  If they have a non-negative room listed, characters will appear in room edit at the coordinates specified with their base sprite (walking view, loop 0, frame 0).  No more guesswork with precision placement of npcs by tables or doors, etc.

4.  (Optional)  A checkmark option by each mode so you can view objects, regions, walkable areas simultaneously if you want.  This will be especially helpful for getting accurate region placement.

All of these seem possible from looking at the project so it's just a matter of having the time to do it.  At some point I'll likely set up some polls at my website for recommended features to implement, that way the most desirable ones can be tackled first.



In terms of GUIS, these are some improvements I've had in mind for awhile, though at least two of them seem unlikely right now:

1.  I suspect it's impossible without access to the engine to, for example, increase the maximum number of buttons available on a gui, or, indeed, to increase the maximum number of animating buttons beyond 10 (setting this to the number of available buttons just makes sense to me for some reason).  

2.  More user-friendly options including, eventually, a 'dialog' listbox you could drop into a gui to completely design and customize a dialog list gui from within the editor.  This would include the option of auto-resizing itself to fit the text (or not) and support for scroll buttons, a parser, and so on.



Something else I might tackle later on is to add folder support to the Characters pane.

[Sslaxx]

At this point, it might be a good idea to open a new forum section for the editor and its source code.

[Atelier]

Ok, I won't deny that at the moment this is selfishly motivated, but I think in the end posterity will benefit. I pushed this in the previous suggestions' thread so here it is copy and pasted:

Could the parser word list be [optionally] organised into folders, in a way identical to the current sprite folders? That is, users can create their own sub folders for nouns, verbs, commands, adjectives, etc - or for whatever they want (words relating to cake!). Is this complex to do? I haven't got a clue.

It would bring custom organisation to the text parser, which can quickly turn into a jumble, with verbs, nouns, and adjectives mixed in together as they are added. It's a nightmare to keep track of them or weed out words you no longer have a use for. The way IDs work does not need to change - new words would still take the next free number. Something like this should be of lowest priority (clearly, there are so many options open now!), but it would be a lifesaver.

PS. I have full faith and admiration for everybody that will be working on stuff that's over my head.

[Matti]

I totally second all of ProgZs suggestions. They would make everything much easier.

Oh, and as for the GUIs: Aside from locking, snapping etc. it would be cool if one could zoom in like in the room editor.

[Calin Leafshade]

I'm still familiarizing myself with vs 10 but I intend to give room edit a well-deserved upgrade.

You might have problems with updating the room editor without a significant recode of the drawing mechanism.

Currently the editor delegates all drawing functions to the Native DLL, which is not open.
You can't edit the drawing functions in any sense or add anything to be drawn, only the positioning of the entities currently recognised by the editor.

So perhaps a good start would be to rewrite these drawing functions into the main source.

EDIT: Although actually now i think about you could always draw on top of what has already been drawn.

[Dualnames]

Here's a simple thing I'd like..

Event triggering:
eEventAfterFadeIn()

data= room that just faded

Yeah, I can code it as a module, but it'd be a nice addition. And I suck at C. Like a lot. It's a simple thing, but that doesn't mean it's not a useful thing.

-I'd like to also draw hotspots in-game
-And a good thing would be to allow hotspots to have their name change in-game

[Calin Leafshade]

Thats all engine stuff Duals.

This is for *editor* changes

[Dualnames]

Oh, well the editor is great as an IDE. I'd like a button supported by all AGS engines saying "Calin loves you"
Bottom right corner. With a japanese animation smile preferably. Something cute and adorable.

On a serious note:

NOTEPAD INTEGRITY.please! A man has to be able to do that. Nottttttteeeeeepppppppaaaaaaaddddd!
Thank you.

[abstauber]

Aww... and I have to learn java :'(   But it's already very cool to see some C# knowledge around and I keep my fingers crossed, that Calin doesn't burn out (too quickly).

What I like to see in the editor is folders for modules

The next cool thing would be bringing the "Edit Functionality from module editing to the dialog editor. Since dialogs can contain script, I'm desperately missing bracket matching, search & replace and so on.

These would be awesome.

Btw. I bet organizing this inside a tracker would be much easier

[Wonkyth]

Once I've got my new lappy, and a few life things sorted, I'll have a look at this.
Although, for the moment I'll have to be using the express edition, any news as to whether it works?

[Dualnames]

I'm using MS Visual C# Express 2010 and works great.


CD-Key in case someone needs it (if it's against the rules I can remove)

Spoiler

PQT8W-68YB2-MPY6C-9JV9X-42WJV

[close]

the program is free, it just needs a free registration. It's no biggie. Then just load the project and do a simple conversion (it asks for conversion) no biggie there either. Really simple steps.

[Scavenger]

A lot of these suggestions are really cool. I can't wait to see what's gonna come out of this!

Personally, I would like to see:
- An improved palette editor, maybe room specific. I'd like to be able to view my palette from within AGS.
- More elegant sprite importing for 8-bit sprites. GIF animations never have a "don't remap colours" option, so importing a massive amount of sprites is arduous, especially if they're room specific.

And that's all I can think of for now. AGS is pretty elegant otherwise for me.

[Matti]

- Drag'n'drop for sprite folders!
- A checkmark option "ALWAYS USE ALPHA-CHANNELS" for importing sprites
- Auto-selection of the delay-panel when selecting a frame, so that you can immediately type in the delay

I'll extend this list if I come across other issues.

[mode7]

It would be cool if Roomedit could load alpha channels from pngs as masks (walkbehind etc..) It wouldn't need to actually use them in game (which would be cool too) but just not having to deal with those 8 bit BMPs would really help a lot.

[RickJ]

Calin how about adding the ability to copy/clone  or "cut and paste" controls?  For example one would create a control such as a button and edit it's properties in the normal way.   

The copy function could be activated by right  clicking the control and selecting copy from a context menu.   This would save the control's properties in a clipboard/buffer.   The GUI editor's cursor would be loaded with the copied control so that a left click would instantiate a new control at the click location with the same property values as the original.  The X,Y position would be changed to the current cursor position.   If the user drags a rectangle then the x,Y position as well as the height and width properties could be changed.

The copy function would also need to create a unique name.  Perhaps there could be an option to popup a text input box that would allow the user to enter the control name or press enter or OK to accept the auto-generated default. 

[Calin Leafshade]

Hmm, Copying a control does sound like an excellent suggestion.

However GUIControl is an abstract class so I guess I'd have to implement the ICloneable interface for each inherited class separately.. which sounds boring ^_^

I'll look into it.

[cat]

For GUIs:
-Moving Gui elements with the keyboard when selected
-Selecting multiple Gui elements at once
-Gui alignment tools like in VS could be useful too

This probably won't be too difficult, I might have a look at the source code when I have more time.

Maybe we should build some kind of taskgroups where people focus on one part of the IDE like Gui-Designer, Roomeditor, Dialogeditor. Maybe even with separate sourcecontrol for each group?