Messages

Quote from: Ryan Timothy on Today at 09:01:45pm
I feel if you add it in the script (typing it manually) the room should check for the functions and update itself.

What Ryan is saying is that he would prefer to edit the script file rather than doing pointy and clicky stuff in the properties pane.   

The problem is, you can change these functions to whatever names you like, though there are sorta default names for these functions....

This is not really a (the) problem.  There are lots of reserved words and built-in functions in AGS already and all Ryan is suggesting is that there be a few more.   

The problem is that in some cases one may want to use the same handler function for multiple events.      For example one could create a module to handle an extended verb/cursor modes (a la Lucas Arts) where there was just one handler function that decoded the verb and responded accordingly.  This is not uncommon with modules created to service GUI events.

A script based interaction system is of course possible and could be implemented a number of different ways.  It would AGS easier to use for some.  However, eliminating the pointy an clicky system would make it more intimidating and difficult to learn for others. 

When the editor opens a game made with an older version it would be nice if the message say what the older version actually is instead of having to guess.

I would be even better if the user was asked if he would like to open the selected game in that older version or at least asked if he would like launch that older version (provided the older version was installed) 

I personally think there should never be a problem, as long as you don't attempt to read/write over it, which may or may not produce a segmentation fault depending on how lucky you are. Some people seem to disagree, one of them being my professor.

@Paper Carnival:  Your professor is wrong.  A "segmentation fault" is a hardware interrupt generated in response to a memory read/write to an address outside of a range specified by a register or RAM table of some sort.  The setting of a pointer variable to a value will cause a memory write to the address of the pointer variable but not to the address which it contains.   Read and write signals to the pointer's address are not issued until memory at that address is accessed.  Since there is no memory access there will be no interrupt and hence no segmentation fault.  This is all done in hardware so the operating system is irrelevant.   It's entirely possible to have a software segmentation fault checker but the overhead would be extremely high and I have never heard of it being done.

I agree with you that this should never be a problem and I'll give a couple of good reasons why.  First of all let us assume that we have an application that contains some code similar to the one you give.  Further let us assume that this is application is a closed loop controls system controlling the flying surfaces on a 757 Jumbo Jet.  And just to make things interesting let us also assume your professor is a passenger on the same plane flying at 35000 ft.

1.  Fault response - How should our application respond to a segmentation fault of the variety that you describe (i.e. the application is otherwise operating normally and will continue to do so if the fault is ignored)?  There are two obvious choices; abort the application or ignore the fault.  In this instance I believe your professor would prefer the control system ignore inconsequential segmentation faults be ignored rather
plunge to his death.   What about other applications?  Can you name any application where it is better to crash than to continue running normally?  So if the only reasonable response to a fault condition is to ignore it then what purpose does it serve to detect it.

2. Reliability/Maintainability - No suppose our application is very mature.  It has been in use on thousands of aircraft for over a decade.   With millions of total hours of operation our application has proven to be stable and reliable.     Now suppose that a single line of trivial code, unrelated to the pointer in question, is added and the application is recompiled.  What if over all these years that last p++ left p just a byte shy of the segment boundary and the new code pushed it just one byte past.    This is a horrible situation - In a complex application it could be a long time before such a bug finally revealed itself.  In this kind of situation any kind of changes made to the application, regardless of how small or trivial, would incur huge and unacceptable risks.

3. Redundant-Convoluted Code - In the scenario you give in the example the pointer value would have to be tested before incrementing it.   So either there must be a redundant if statement (there is already a p<MAX test) before incrementing the pointer or the loop must be restructured in a less obvious and understandable way (which would also likely involve redundant code in one way or another.   No useful purpose is served by requiring redundant and/or convoluted code.  In my opinion redundant, convoluted code fits Ghost's description of "...leaving a loaded shotgun lying around...." much better than a pointer containing an invalid address.

4. Runtime vs Compile Error - If the compiler were able to pick this up then it could be argued that knowing that a pointer contained an invalid address could be useful in some cases.   However this is not the case; segment faults occur at runtime and may not occur until long after the application has been released and in the field.

May I humbly suggest that you upload these and other resources you see fit to archive.org.

There's always the wayback machine : http://web.archive.org/collections/web.html

I pretty much agree with LGM and the others.   Do what you think is the right thing to do.  If that is to offer comfort to your father then do so without expecting anything in return.  If you get a positive response then it will be a pleasant surprise;  if not then you will have the satisfaction of having done the right thing.  Either way you will not have any future doubts or regrets about what you should have done, could have done, have done or have not done.   

The only hurdle you have to overcome is how to convey understanding to the player in spite of the language barrier.  One way to do this, of course, is the 'fish out of water' scenario, where the player is a human stuck in an unfamiliar land and forced to gradually learn the language here and there.

Either that or use the old "fish in the ear" scenario, where someone shoves a fish in the player character's ear and then everything becomes clear. 

How are thing going in Greece now? I hope the worst is over and that things improve for everyone.

I opened up the .agt in Notepad and very quickly browsed through it. I may have missed some, but I think what your're talking about is under #sectionstart unhandled_event.

Khris, I believe the #sectionstart and #sectionend directives are no longer used  or necessary.  You may want to investigate the possibility of removing them from your template.

error running function 'game_start':
Error: null pointer referenced

And it highlighted:
  while (p<text.Length && text.Chars[p]==' ') {

Perhaps the only thing that the size change did was to cause the global script to be recompiled.   What happens if you don't change the resolution and do a "Build All" command?

This error can be fixed by either initializing the text variable (i.e. text = "") or changing the while statement to something like this:

Code: ags

     while ((text!=null)&&(p<text.Length)&&(text.Chars[p]==' ')) {

And doing a second try at changing resolutions, I switched it to 640x400 without changing any backgrounds and leaving everything default, and this error is at:

SetSpeechFont: invalid font number
Located at:
Game.SpeechFont=getInteger(); // Speech

I haven't looked at the template at all but iot would seem that the custom function getInteger() is returning a number that is not a valid font ID.   Again, I think this is an error in the template and the reason it comes up when you change resolutions is that perhaps everything is being flagged for recompile.   Just comment this line out (i.e. "// Game.SpeechFont=getInteger(); // Speech") and see what happens. 

Thanks Juggernaut and everyone else.  I replaced the drive just after thanks giving but it also crapped out although with a different symptom.   I assume that electronics crapped out on the first one and so in  a few months when old 300G maxtor drivers are dirt cheap I may try to replace the electronics to retrrieve the data. 

The second drive was a 500G Western Digital that didn't have anything noteworthy one it.   I got it from Staples and anyone buying stuff from Staples should take note of their shitty 14 day return policy.   Fortunately I was just barely able to get my money back.  Anyway a pox on both their houses Staples and Western Digital.   

A long while ago I  once got this to work.  If I remember correctly I think I made a little script that changed the working directory to c:\ and then launched the game from the CD drive.   I think there is a way for the script to find out which drive (i.e. the CD drive) it is executing from.   Anyway that's about all I can remember.

what two governments? I didn't mention governments.

Passer-by, please accept my apology.   I mistakenly attributed to you, the examples cited by Zooty (i.e. The Spanish and French revolutions).   

I'm not saying that the methods used are right, but perhaps peaceful avenues were explored and denied to some of these people ...

When you say "denied" do you mean they failed to persuade a majority of elected representatives and/or the population to their point of view?  If so then this is not a reason for violence, which I believe is Nacho's point.  This is how small children, who have not yet mastered their emotional impulses nor learned self control,  behave when they don't get their way. 

I know very little, if anything at all, about Greek politics and I think this is true for most of us giving opinions here.  I hope our friends from Greece are not offended or annoyed at our ignorance.    Perhaps someone knowledgeable, such as Nikolas, could give us a brief overview.

I would agree with ProgZmax if the protesters were from a cross section of the population.  However, it seems that they are all from a small but vocal fringe political faction.   I think some people are missing Nacho's point that in a functioning democracy there are non-violent methods of effecting change.  In the examples passer-by gives both governments were dictatorships where the people had no means, other than rebellion, to effect change. 

I also have not heard specifically what the protesters want changed; I'd bet they don't know either.   It doesn't take any mental effort at all to complain about the way things are but  it's a lot of work to actually think about what it would take to make things better.   

I am of the opinion that the recent events in Greece are the work of immature underachievers rather than the sober citizenry.   I wouldn't be at all surprised if it turns out that the instigators of these events were being influenced and financed by foreign entities.

With regard to the suggestions made by SSH and myself,  please take into consideration that although these ideas will mostly be of interest to module developers, they will be used by and be of benefit to everyone (whether they know it or not).

And here is the root of the problem ... 99% of women (and men, let's face it) are rubbish...

... and the other 1% spend their time making adventure games instead of dating!

I'm one of the lucky ones without too many problems, but there are many people who are struggling at 700 euros a month, for a family to live. And these are people with university degrees.

Makes one wonder what sort of university degrees they have?  I once had a girlfriend who graduated with a BA degree in psychology and was astonished to find there wasn't any demand for such a degree.   Duh!    

Allow structs within structs, pointers and make functions first-class objects...

I wish for a pointer to function data type.  This would be useful in creating custom event handler and other modules where it is useful/necessary to call a function defined in a room or global script from the module.  This would also make it possible to construct a jump table (i.e. index into an array of function pointers to execute the function) which is also useful for custom event handlers.

From what I've read a group of thirty attacked the police car in which the two policemen were patrolling.  The  police stopped the car to disperse the group because I guess that would be their job.  Instead of dispersing the group continued throwing stones and other projectiles and advanced on the officers.   

The article I read also said that it is not uncommon for large groups to ambush the police.  It also said that these people responsible are leftists.

 

You can try substituting %20 for the space characters or try enclosing the path in quotes.

"C:\Documents and Settings\Tom and Kristen\My Documents\second"

C:\Documents and Settings\Tom%20and%20Kristen\My Documents\second

AGS has a couple of legacy built-in dialogs.  There not used often and are not changeable.  If you are currently using any of these you will have to use the AGS GUI editor to create replacements.

If your current GUI is already defined in the GUI editor, which it likely is, then all you need to do is to use the GUI editor to change the text.

Here is a link to the section of the manual that explains how to edit GUIs.
http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/manual/Editing%20the%20GUIs.htm