Alternatives to SDL

Alternatives to SDL

Discuss the source code and development of Spring Engine in general from a technical point of view. Patches go here too.

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Jools
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Alternatives to SDL

Post by Jools »

In response to http://springrts.com/mantis/view.php?id=4627 (interface broken after alt-tab), I really think we need to talk about alternatives to SDL 2. AFAIK, SDL 1.2 didn't have this issue.

Are there any alternatives to using SDL? How about reverting back to SDL 1.2? In my opinion, this issue is pretty major, and the benefit of having more scripts in SDL 2.0 is not that big.
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SinbadEV
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by SinbadEV »

Jools wrote:benefit of having more scripts in SDL 2.0 is not that big
That's because you speak English... if you don't include support for non-English characters you are telling %75 of the world they aren't welcome... not to mention inconveniencing all of those people who speak English as a second language.

(Not disagreeing with your entire comment, just that specific statement)
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Jools
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Jools »

SinbadEV wrote:
Jools wrote:benefit of having more scripts in SDL 2.0 is not that big
That's because you speak English... if you don't include support for non-English characters you are telling %75 of the world they aren't welcome... not to mention inconveniencing all of those people who speak English as a second language.

(Not disagreeing with your entire comment, just that specific statement)
That's true. But I would have to add that my own language is not English either, but that I nonetheless prefer to communicate in English because I do not believe in the quality of translation in general.

I guess this issue is only present in windows, which maybe explains why it wasn't discovered before choosing to use SDL 2.0.

I think it's a quite severe issue: you alt-tab out of the game and back in, then if you change fullscreen setting you get a banner on top of the window that does not respond to any command. And there is no way of getting the UI to work except restarting the program. That's not acceptable in my opinion.
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jK
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by jK »

Jools wrote:you alt-tab out of the game and back in, then if you change fullscreen setting you get a banner on top of the window
Is that the new konami code?
Super Mario
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Super Mario »

Serious question, has anyone try to reproduce this bug with SDL only?
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Silentwings
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Silentwings »

Assuming you mean "with SDL 1.2 only" - I remember doing some brief searching some months back and finding that this bug was confirmed (by SDL developers) as an issue that became present in SDL 2.0.
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SinbadEV
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by SinbadEV »

I thought he meant "Other software that uses SDL 2"

Quick internet search shows that Battle for Westnoth are also working towards SDL 2 in their development branch so maybe that would be a good test case: http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=40694 (as an Open Source SDL 2 migrating project in active development they are in a very similar boat to us)
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Jools
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Jools »

gajop
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by gajop »

Well as long as there as there is a workaround, we could always that. We really shodnt downgrade now. Only SDL2 has support for international users.
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Jools
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Jools »

Well, maybe no point downgrading as you could just disable fullscreen switching in-game to achieve same result. Or people could be made aware to not do it, or to di it on own risk...
Super Mario
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Super Mario »

Silentwings wrote:Assuming you mean "with SDL 1.2 only" - I remember doing some brief searching some months back and finding that this bug was confirmed (by SDL developers) as an issue that became present in SDL 2.0.
No I meant SDL 2.0 only.
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scifi
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by scifi »

well there is no point in downgrading, ive worked with SDL 2.0 before, nothing fancy just a barebones renderer with glew attached to it.

From my minimum knowledge, downgrading or replacing it would take a huge amount of time specially since this is a part of spring itself it would be like tearing the engine apart.

I would suggest waiting for a fix if its a problem with SDL, besides what other framework rather than SDL itself would you replace it with, FreeGlut? thats just like rewriting the whole thing over, but i might be mistaken.
abma
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by abma »

@jools:

did you try non-borderless mode (="normal" fullscreen mode) ?

switching framework imo makes no sense, fix SDL2 instead as (if at all) its a tiny code change to fix this.
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code_man
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by code_man »

Cant say im fond of SDL 2.0, its been a problem with many other programs.
Fortunetly spring doesnt seem very much affected.

Still, if someone would ask me id say stick with 1.2, atleast until the SDL people get their stuff straight.
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Silentwings
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by Silentwings »

Sidetrack: http://springrts.com/mantis/view.php?id=4442, which is one SDL related issue, now has a potential fix and wants testing.
abma
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Re: Alternatives to SDL

Post by abma »

SDL1.2 doesn't allow to switch resolutions without restarting the program. also SDL2 allowed proper utf8 support.

please test the development version:

http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=32881

full screen switch should be fine there (which was the initial problem in this thread?!)
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