[REJOICE] Mod switcher with graphical user interface!

[Ace07]

At some point, there won't be a mod switcher. It will be built into the Spring Lobby eventually. But for now, any of these programs are great.

(Currently, cross platform issues are nonexistent for current versions of the game, because you cannot play the game on anything but Windows.)

[FLOZi]

I was hoping to do a switcher capable of converting TA mods, if I ever get round to doing it, I'll send you the source, Dragon45.

[Cheery]

Heh, I think I could do more impressing than just mod database, But as Ace said, it's not worth because the mod switcher will be integrated into the lobby, btw. The sources: http://www.kolumbus.fi/suomen.siirtoval ... 3_5_06.zip

But no competiting then, take napalm with your switcher project if your going to do c++ -coded switcher which is better than this one.

I have to focus to my own stuff so I think I don't have too much time to do anything but observe what's happening there and reply sometimes.

[Ace07]

The lobby could also keep track of mods used by players (usage statistics). Which might be useful for...stuff.

[Gabba]

I'm surprised with all of this talk about cross-platform comptability and GUIs and such, no one has mentioned Java. I am (re)learning it and it seems as if its quite suitable to the needs of the this side-project.

That's right, why not Java? It just keeps better and better with the latest versions, and the big news are, the Apache foundation is starting a project (Harmony) to make it's own open-source Java Runtime Environment, so even the "Java is not open-source" argument will fall soon. "Sun + Apache + the free software community" sounds like a better equation for true cross-platform compatibility than just "M$" (yeah I know there's the mono project but M$'s not supporting them in any way).

[Ace07]

I'm surprised with all of this talk about cross-platform comptability and GUIs and such, no one has mentioned Java. I am (re)learning it and it seems as if its quite suitable to the needs of the this side-project.

That's right, why not Java? It just keeps better and better with the latest versions, and the big news are, the Apache foundation is starting a project (Harmony) to make it's own open-source Java Runtime Environment, so even the "Java is not open-source" argument will fall soon. "Sun + Apache + the free software community" sounds like a better equation for true cross-platform compatibility than just "M$" (yeah I know there's the mono project but M$'s not supporting them in any way).

We aren't using anything M$ to achieve cross platform success. We are using wxWidgets, which is highly reguarded as the best cross-platform GUI API that currently exists. It supports a myriad of languages too. We are looking more into python as we go, because it is fairly quick and easy to learn.

[Tim Blokdijk]

I'm pro Python..

[munch]

Hi There,

Thanks for the excellent switcher:

It can handle AA, OTA, SWTA, XTA and EvOTA.
Can launch spring client or spring.exe.
Nice looking.
Convenient.
Made by me.

Any chance of producing an updated version that handles Gundam too? Or even better a version that has a config file to list all the mods you want to support? I'm happy to write my own .bat files for new and wonderful mods, so I'm thinking you just want a "switcher_mods_list.txt" file like:

Code: Select all

None all_off.bat
XTA  switch_to_XTA.bat
AA   switch_to_AA.bat
etc.

(NB file names are made up from memory - I'm at work right now). That way I or somebody else could add

Code: Select all

Gundam switch_to_gundam.bat

, saving you from being bothered by every new mod that somebody wants support for.

Even better would be a configfile-free system, where you just have all the .bat files in a "switcher" subdir. That way you could add switches in just by copying .bat files into the "switcher" directory. Your code would have to look for all files named "switch_to_<mod nam>.bat", but it's much easier to maintain from a user point of view - each mod's .zip can then come with a .bat file in the "switcher" directory, making switcher integration scaleable and easy to use for your average player.

What do you think? Thanks in advance

Munch

[[K.B.] Napalm Cobra]

The new mod switcher produced by Cherry has a data base thing, I'm not entirely sure how it works but it should be able to handle anything.
My orriginal version was just some hard coded batch commands and nice gui.

[Cheery]

That database is rather simple, file based.

I remember some thing about MySQL program I could use in c. It propably would be the most powerful tool.

But yes, that implementation I did is a file database which contains the mods instead that they would been hardcoded into the system.