AGS Editor (Version for testing)- Docking Panels

tzachs · Sat 09/07/2011 23:48:50

I have a new beta version of the AGS Editor for you to test and give feedback.
The layout mechanism has been re-hauled and integrated with DockPanel Suite.

THIS IS BETA. TEST ONLY ON A BACKUP OF YOUR GAME!!!

Here's a short video demonstrating the new capabilities:

View Demo Video!

Among the new features:
* All panels are moveable.
* All panels can be docked to the screen edges, and can be hidden from view (and restored).
* View Room editor and its script at the same time without having to switch tabs.
* A new "Window" menu to control all the windows.
* The layout of the panels is saved when closing AGS (to Layout.xml file), and restored when opening AGS (not including the project's documents)
* New icons for those new windows made by the incredible cat!

Known Issues
* When the script is in floating mode, some of the shortcuts don't work (Ctrl+S, Ctrl+F and Ctrl+H).
* Still, the old limitation of "only one room can be loaded at a time" remains.

Help Needed
Other then testing and feedback, which I would obviously appreciate a lot, there are now several needed icons
Help not needed anymore thanks to the magnificent cat.

Download
Download the demo here!
Mirror here.

mode7 · Sun 10/07/2011 00:34:32

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWEEESOOOOMEEEE!!!

Dualnames · Sun 10/07/2011 13:22:04

I CAN'T SERIOUSLY SAY ANYTHING WITHOUT CUSSING.
SO @#@@@$%@w%#@$^$# #$%^#$%$# 3$%#$%#^%^%$&, THIS IS SO AWESSSSOOOOOOOOOMMMEEEEEEEE!!!

Wyz · Sun 10/07/2011 14:36:11

Oh goodies! It feels like my birthday with all the cool things released lately. Is it possible to rearrange the order of the tabs? If so I'm very happy with this revision!

Matti · Sun 10/07/2011 15:29:09

Very nice, I'll check it out later.

tzachs · Sun 10/07/2011 19:13:48

Thanks guys!

And Wyz: Yes.

So, did anyone try it yet? I'm pretty sure there are tons of bugs in there, so the sooner I know about them, the better I can remember what I did and fix it quickly...

Calin Leafshade · Sun 10/07/2011 19:27:32

This is great, especially for those of us with large screen resolutions.

Also the more that AGS begins to resemble Visual Studio the better.

Will report back on any bugs i find.

monkey0506 · Sun 10/07/2011 22:03:12

I just hope this doesn't improve people's productivity. That would be hoorrrrriibbblle!

Wonkyth · Mon 11/07/2011 05:17:23

Docking is good.

* WonkE3th gives a gold star:

monkey0506 · Mon 11/07/2011 05:43:51

Wait a second..I can have more than one script open side-by-side now. Holy crap man, do you realize how much time that's gonna save me having to switch tabs?! :o

cianty · Mon 11/07/2011 18:23:54

*applauds* Awesome hack, monkey!

monkey0506 · Mon 11/07/2011 21:16:30

Uh, well it's not really a hack. I just docked both scripts to the left side of the editor and then resized them as needed.

It's actually going to be especially useful in designing structures. My current workflow involves copying the structure into the script file, commenting it out, and shifting the comment around a lot. Now I can just leave the header open beside the script and scroll around as needed. Very nice!

cianty · Mon 11/07/2011 21:34:20

Yeah, I meant "hack" in a more... uhm... liberal meaning. Ah, forget it. :

I too have multiple room scripts and custom scripts open regularly so this is a very very handy feature. Also, copying room coordinates (middle click feature, yay) into the script becomes much easier this way.

arj0n · Mon 11/07/2011 21:42:07

Great revision!

Question:
Is it possible when I have a room opened undocked/floating and I want to open another room
having that room opened undocked/floating too in stead of this room being opened as docked again?

tzachs · Mon 11/07/2011 22:06:32

Thank you guys, both for the gold star and the non-hack!

@Calin: My thoughts exactly... After we finish ~~stealing~~using all the cool features of Visual Studio, we need to start looking at all the cool Resharper features...

@ArjOn: Nice catch, I didn't realise that was the behavior, but I think that the preferred way of handing this would be simply to allow more than one room to load simultaneously. I'll dig into the code some more, if I'll see it's too complicated I'll implement your suggestion instead.
Yay for the first bug!

UPDATE: Ok, I've looked into the code, and while I didn't find any reason it can't be done, it does look like a lot of work, so I'm not going to get into it now, maybe at a later time... For now I've implemented ArjOn original suggestion and I've uploaded a new version with this fix (in the first post). I also added this issue as a known issue in the first post.

cat · Fri 15/07/2011 09:40:25

The video looks awesome, I'll have to try this version. Yay for VS- (and Resharper) Features! If you still need icons pm me with specifications what you need (size, colordepth, which icons needed).

monkey0506 · Fri 15/07/2011 16:31:26

Hey, I meant to post the other day when it happened but I got distracted.

I was loading up this version of the editor when it crashed. The error was that it apparently tried to create a rectangle with Width 0. If it crops up again I'll try and post the full error message, but it was while the editor was loading. I believe prior to opening a project.

Also, the Properties pane isn't always properly updated. For example, I drew a GUI Slider and then switched to the Events pane, and the only way I could get the Properties pane to show any properties for anything other than the slider was to manually select the item from the dropbox. Otherwise as soon as I clicked on something else the pane would revert back to showing the slider's events. $:-\$

There's a couple other cases where I noticed some issues with the properties pane, which actually lead me back to using the non-dockable version of the editor, because I'm designing a GUI, and need to use the Properties pane a fair bit..and it just got annoying.

tzachs · Sat 16/07/2011 17:57:03

Hey monkey_05_06, thanks for reporting!

I think I know what caused the crash, but I'm not sure.
Anyway, if it's what I think it was, then I uploaded a new version that should fix it.
However, if it happens again, then I have no idea and I'll need the full error report.
Also the new uploaded version includes another fix for a crash that can happen when you close AGS.

Now, about the properties pane, maybe I didn't understand you, but I tried what you described and it worked fine for me.
I recorded a video of me doing it, can you please take a look at it and see what did I do different (even better would be your own recording of the bug)?
Thanks..

monkey0506 · Sat 16/07/2011 21:35:19

Did you perhaps try testing the game? I think that's actually when I first started noticing issues is after I first tested the game. I could continue taking a look at it, and if I get any more crashes I'll try and post a full error report. I just got busy/distracted with other things.

Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens · Sun 17/07/2011 21:20:47

Bernard: Neat!

monkey0506 · Tue 19/07/2011 00:18:47

Using the "non-fixed" version, the error came up again. This is upon opening the editor, before the "Select game" dialog comes up:

QuoteError: Rectangle '{X=0,Y=615,Width=0,Height=20}' cannot have a width or height equal to 0.
Version: AGS 3.2.2.112

System.ArgumentException: Rectangle '{X=0,Y=615,Width=0,Height=20}' cannot have a width or height equal to 0.
at System.Drawing.Drawing2D.LinearGradientBrush..ctor(Rectangle rect, Color color1, Color color2, LinearGradientMode linearGradientMode)
at WeifenLuo.WinFormsUI.Docking.VS2005AutoHideStrip.DrawTab(Graphics g, TabVS2005 tab)
at WeifenLuo.WinFormsUI.Docking.VS2005AutoHideStrip.DrawTabStrip(Graphics g, DockState dockState)
at WeifenLuo.WinFormsUI.Docking.VS2005AutoHideStrip.DrawTabStrip(Graphics g)
at WeifenLuo.WinFormsUI.Docking.VS2005AutoHideStrip.OnPaint(PaintEventArgs e)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.PaintWithErrorHandling(PaintEventArgs e, Int16 layer, Boolean disposeEventArgs)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WmPaint(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.ControlNativeWindow.OnMessage(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.ControlNativeWindow.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam)

cat · Tue 19/07/2011 18:32:16

I can't start it. I get a file load exception (could not load AGS.Native). Do I need to copy some files somewhere?

monkey0506 · Tue 19/07/2011 20:52:59

@cat: Unless I'm mistaken the AGS.Native.dll should be included in the download, but even if it's not the Native assembly hasn't been open-sourced yet (that DLL is the only part of AGS currently not open-sourced). So, you should be able to copy it from the latest official AGS version without any complications since it logically can't have changed.

@tzachs: I tried to edit my post but apparently thanks to my poor internet connection it didn't submit the changes properly. The "fixed" version presents the same issue. The problem seems to arise if starting the editor with any panels docked to a screen edge, but hidden. I can send you my Layout.xml file if you need it. The only way I've found of correcting the problem (which is consistently persistent) is to open a project, pin or close any windows that were docked to a screen edge, save and exit, reload the project, and then I can unpin the items that I want hidden. I have to re-pin or close them when I exit though or the same problem comes up again.

tzachs · Thu 21/07/2011 20:52:43

-- UPDATE --
New version now uploaded, with:
* New brilliant icons by the even more brilliant cat!
* Fixes (hopefully) for the two bugs reported by monkey_05_06

@monkey_05_06:
You have been incredibly helpful, I can't thank you enough.
- Your tip about running the game first, indeed helped me to reproduce the bug (finally), and now I hope it's solved. Let me know if you encounter this issue (or anything of that sort) again.
- The crash is now fixed too. I managed to reproduce it once or twice, but it didn't happen consistently, and it gave me a headache trying to figure out why. I finally realized that it only happens if you have a panel in the bottom in auto-hide, and if you hover your mouse around the bottom at the time the application loads (which you obviously like to do

). It is actually a bug in the Dock Panel Suite itself, but I managed to work around that.

@ProgZmax: Thank you, and also thank Bernard from me...

cat · Fri 22/07/2011 18:13:37

Seems to link to the repository

and not the dll in the extracted folder:

(this is from the new version V4)

monkey0506 · Fri 22/07/2011 23:49:43

The issue when loading the editor seems to be fixed, haven't tested the other one yet.

Although there is another problem. What revision of the editor did you use to make these changes? I checked some changes in a while back, and they've gone completely missing from the SVN. I can't check them back in no matter what I try. Anyway, I'm secretly working on something that very specifically depends on some of those changes, and whether it was before I checked them in or after they somehow went missing, the changes don't exist in your version of the editor. $:-\$

Nevermind that. I was confusing myself because there is no engine code in the dev branch, so I was confusing that with the trunk.

However, there are some changes I've made in the current dev branch that I need for something I'm working on, and I would like to be able to use your version of the editor. I don't know if you checked out the trunk or the dev branch, but could you try and merge your revisions with the items I checked in to the current dev branch, please?

tzachs · Sat 23/07/2011 14:30:49

I've uploaded a new version.
cat, this version has some dlls that weren't in the original upload, so I think it should work for you now, please check and let me know.
monkey_05_06, this version also merges the changes you made to the branch.

monkey0506 · Sat 23/07/2011 15:11:48

Sweet. I made some latter revisions that I'm holding off on checking in because I'm not sure if there might be something else related to it that needs to be updated, and it would be silly to check in a partial fix. I say "fix" because what I'm talking about now is specifically a contradiction against the manual.

I can deal without those specific changes though as it's a non-essential subfeature of what I'm working on. The whole process would be rather expedited if the API I was using had proper documentation, but I'm figure it out. The dockable panels aren't specifically relevant to what I'm doing with that, but it will be nice to be able to get accustomed to it since I'm sure it will be accepted into the official version.

Thanks man, and I'm glad that my bug reports were useful to you. Hopefully I'll be able to find..er..hopefully there's not any more, but if anything else crops up I'll let you know.

arj0n · Sun 24/07/2011 00:02:16

v5:
Very small thing:
-Create a second room and edit it.
-Make it windowed.
-Edit room 1, Edit room 2, Edit room 1, Edit room 2, and so on.

Every time a room pops up in edit mode, it's location is not the same as its predecessor.

cat · Sun 24/07/2011 17:21:37

Now it works! Hooray for resizable search result window!

tzachs · Sun 24/07/2011 20:26:33

@Arjon: Thank you, I uploaded a new version (version 6) with a fix for that issue.

@monkey: Awesome, I'll be waiting for a few days for more bug reports before checking in the code to the branch. Also, good luck on your secret project (I took a small peek to your checkin notes, so I vaguely know what it's related to

)...

@cat: Awesome x2... btw, if you (or anybody else) encounter this issue on some other future versions for testing, know that all you need to do is go to a version that's working and copy all files that are missing from the new version.
The reason this does work for some people, is (from what I've read) because if you have visual studio installed, then you don't need several dlls.

EDIT: And, I checked in the changes to the branch.