Another simple improvement

[HoneyBadger]

Is there any way we could get the magic item inventory to be interactive? I realise this would take some attention from Johan, but it would be nice if we could play with/organize our magical items. It's a very small thing, I realize, but it would be a nice feature if this were improved.

The simplest way to do this would just be to allow us to grab-and-drag items within the magic item "box" and then press a key/drag them to an icon to assign them. It's alright the way things currently are, and there are definitely other things which require more immediate attention, but it'd be nice to be able to fiddle with our spare items while thinking.

[Gandalf Parker]

Im not sure if drag-n-drop would work. Thats kindof a windowsy thing isnt it?

[Uh-Nu-Buh]

It's a GUI thing, Gandalf. If you play Dom III via CLI I will be very impressed.

Personally, I would love some polishing done to the interface. The right libraries make it easy to do in almost any language. The trick here would be to make it portable since you have to allow for crazy Winders in addition to X11 for Linux and Mac.

[Gandalf Parker]

It seems like whatever its programmed on comes out ahead and whatever its ported to loses a few things. The D-n-D thing seems to happen automatically on programs written on windows.

Im sure it can still be done, just something abit more manual.

[Arralen]

Dominions uses the SDL library, and only the SDL library - no ..-widgets, no GTK or something else ... do you really expect ONE hobby programmer to be able to be "fluent" with those as well, especially if he has a life?


http://www.libsdl.org/pipermail/sdl/...er/071467.html

[SDL] Drag and Drop
Paulo A Ferreira paulo at novisnet.pt
Sun Dec 4 04:10:54 PST 2005

Benjamin Grauer wrote:
>
> Hi there
>
> i was wondering, it there was some simple SDL-like trick to get DnD
> (Drag and Drop) running, so i can drop some file-links fron
> konqueror/MS-Explorer/etc. into my SDL-app??

Maybe this can help you ?

http://www.libsdl.org/projects/scrap/


Scrap 1.0

Author: Sam Lantinga
Source: scrap-1.0.tar.gz
Requires: SDL 1.0
Runs on: Linux, Win32

Description:
An example of cut-and-paste in an SDL application, using the platform-specific window message hooks SDL provides.

Instructions:
Unpack, and build. Run "scrap example.bmp" in one window, and then the program "scrap" in another window. They both will display the same image, copied from the clipboard.



As one can see, there's the critical "Mac" missing from the "runs on" list ...



http://www.libsdl.org/pipermail/sdl/...er/064976.html

[SDL] Drag and Drop
Paulo Pinto pjmlp at progtools.org

squale wrote:

>Hi,
>
>I want to know if any of you has ever programmed a drag and drop
>behaviour in something like card games, bacjgammon or chess...
>
>In that case could you please tell me the way you did it and if you
>have any source about this (URL, code sample...) it would be greatly
>appreciated !
>
>thanx

Hi,

You should do something like this:

- When you get a click event, check if the mouse
if over a moveable object, say a card. Change into
grabbing mode;

- While in grabbing mode, when the user moves
the mouse, update the object location to reflect the
movement;

- When the user releases the mouse button, return
to normal mouse mode.

The refered normal/grabbing modes are something
that you have to keep track of.

Cheers,
Paulo



Doesn't work as well I think - the icons of the items are likely not "objects" in that sense, but simply bitmaps loaded into a pre-made grid ... nothing to grab here.
This doesn't mean it can't be done, but it's unlikely: Johan does not like coding GUI (its a pain with C/C++, even if you're using SDL or Allegro Library or some widget pack), there are some urgend bugs to fix, and this would be prone to induce lots of new ones ...

What might be much easier done would be auto-sorting, preferably in the very same order the items are on the commanders:
Weapons, Shields, Helmets, Armors, Boots, Misc.

[HoneyBadger]

That would atleast be a great improvement, but I hope we get objects by Dom4. If I were Johan, by the way, I'd hire someone to do all the grunge programming he doesn't like to do, like C/C++.

[johan osterman]

HoneyBadger: I think you overestimate the amount of money dom3 generate for illwinter, or underestimate the cost of hiring someone for such a task.

[Gandalf Parker]

I suspect that some things would involve such a "start from scratch" that we would end up seeing Johan move on to one of his other game ideas rather than dong a complete rewrite for Dom4.
Just guessing.

[HoneyBadger]

Well, you would know better than I, Johan, but I wouldn't bet money against there being one or two fans of the game out there who are quite good with C/C++ and would be only too happy to work on the game-even the drudgework of the game-as an internship project, or as research for a college thesus, and I'll bet there's one or two working at McDonalds that haven't landed a company contract and would rather be programming for minimum wage than flipping burgers. I'd also hazard a guess that in Sweden it's harder to find good programmers for less than it is in the US. I know that a lot of us here-myself included-would love to be involved more directly in the production of the game, it's just the question of getting our backsides on to your couch
You're a fine, extremely hard-working programmer, Johan, and the pressure on you must be enormous. I love the game you've created, dearly, and I want to see it continue and flourish, without causing you any undo stress. I don't know you as a human being, but from what I do know, you certainly deserve to enjoy the fruits of your labor and watch your Dom3 baby grow in beautiful directions without having to break your back in the process. I hope you'll understand that I'm just trying to think of ways to help you achieve that. And thank you, by the way, for all that you have done so far. We're all grateful.

[Gandalf Parker]

Actually thats a different Johan. He is the brother of Kristoffer.

But personally, Ive managed programmers. And your post made me smile.