Oolite Bulletins

Ahruman wrote:

While I could possibly accept an argument for writing applications in a procedural-oriented language, writing large applications in C is dumb and a move away from that can only be a Good Thing. Most of the problems I encounter in ObjC stem from the C part, not the Objective part, and that’s while avoiding the horrible hack that C offers as a substitute for actual array and string support. But that’s an argument for another place. ;-)

Mmm. I don't have problems per se with large applications in C, because how well anything large survives depends on the structure assembled by the programmer; the language cannot save him.

What I do find, though, is that C is unproductive. The programmer spends a lot of time writing low-level, nitty-gritty code, rather than higher level functionality. Fortunately, I love C, so I don't mind...too much.

Cmdr. Maegil wrote:

Callas wrote:

It's commerical, in that someone else is making a profit by doing so. The cost of buying lunch is the price of the commodities and the service that you buy.

If a friend calls you to lunch/dine at his home, it doesn't matter how much HE paid for it, for you it comes for free. But, by your reaction, you don't seem to have ever enjoyed that experience...

I would care how much my friend paid for the lunch he bought me. If he paid too much, I would be concerned - if he paid too little, insulted!

You are thinking in a narrow sense, and in that sense, you are correct; I turn up, I pay nothing.

But in the larger sense, what has actually happened is that your friend has transfered wealth to you, by paying a bill you would otherwise pay, and this is the point made by that quote in the context it was originally (by the author) given; that nothing is free. You may not pay for it, but *someone* paid for it.

Cmdr. Maegil wrote:

callas wrote:

When you pay for your lunch, it's on a voluntary basis.

No, it's not. If a friend invites me, I wouldn't INSULT him by paying. If I'm at a restaurant or buy groceries, I pay because I'm compelled to do so least the manager calls the police!

No. Your action is voluntary, because you are not compelled to buy the food from the retailer.

You are compelled to pay for the food, because you agreed to do so when you choose to buy it; if you had no agreed to do so, the retailer would not have given you the food.

Of course, what can then be said is - "but I am compelled to buy food, or I will die!"

This is where we come back to "there's no such thing as a free lunch".

You are indeed compelled to buy food, unless you wish to die. However, food isn't free, and that means you have to put in some work to obtain food. Such is life.

To argue that other people should be compelled to feed you (the lament that you are "forced" to pay) is in fact to say that they should do the work you could do, to obtain your food, which is essentially to say they are your slaves in this matter.

Cmdr. Maegil wrote:

Sorry if I offend you, but the impression you pass is of someone who has just learnt at school about the capitalism/marxism dicotomy, got dazed by it and is trying to lecture us in a absurdly pedant way. Please, keep the subject to non-realworld stuff, as we play games to get away from it.

I'm not offended at all. You are wrong, but that doesn't mean I'm upset. You are jumping to an enourmous conclusion from three BB posts.

And you keep trying to give the class a lesson of economics.

The point is,
WE DON'T CARE !
Now, stop it!

Callas wrote:

You are jumping to an enourmous conclusion from three BB posts.

Whatever...

Will you two stop it!

Callas wrote:

Mmm. I don't have problems per se with large applications in C, because how well anything large survives depends on the structure assembled by the programmer; the language cannot save him.

Rather than go over it here, I’ll point you at this Usenet thread I serendipitously stumbled across just now: news:[email protected]. :-)

Well, i'm not a huge fan of online games, i played Delta Force once and it was underwhelming due to lagging etc, and people not playing w/in the spirit of the game. But, i can imagine Oolite would be canny fun. The probs would be at the minute - so it seems anyways - the audience isn't *that* large (compared to say WoW) so would there be lots of times where you'd come on and there'd be no one else? wouldn't that just be like playing the normal game? and given the size of our playing Ooniverse, what's the odds they'd cross your path anyways?

i am also of the idea that any money-taking is not good. if we all chipped in for a server and no one actually made anything, that's all well and good but the organising of such a thing might not be fun.

HOWEVER, having said all that, the Wing Commander fanboys have a very active modding community, and one of them is actually working on turning Prophecy into an online game. http://www.wcnews.com/news/update/7277 and http://www.wcrevival.de/hcl/
i'm not clever enough to work out the "how"s of what he's done but is *is* possible, and it would seem cost-free.
but as i say, would it be worth the effort? my impression is we'd have to limit oolite to maybe one planetary system w/ a couple stations, Rock hermits etc to make an online game worth joining.

Another problem is of should the programmers decide to incorporate material from an OXP, what do they include? What do they include from the start? Everything stock, or anything special?

Perhaps a slightly different offshoot of the MMO idea could be done. An "online" option, where you can connect to a server, much like how you find in a multitude of games, both new and old. However, servers could have many different functions. A server could be setup as a role-playing one, with many systems and a large world (basically the original MMO concept here). On the smaller spectrum, a personal server could be hosted for a few players to get together in one system (or, at most, half a dozen) to get together to practice or just to fight one another. I figure with this setup, we could have a master role-playing server that would, effectively, serve as the MMO server, while still letting friends mess around with another. In this case, we can also minimize costs, as there's considerably less overhead to worry about. Even if cost becomes a concern, donations can always be encouraged -- perhaps do what some free online games have done and give those who donate a bonus!

The biggest problem I see is handling death. In Oolite, if you die, you return to the last save point. However, I can think of absolutely no MMOs that force you to re-start when you die. This is probably one of the bigger issues that would need to be addressed.

Ahruman wrote:

Callas wrote:

Mmm. I don't have problems per se with large applications in C, because how well anything large survives depends on the structure assembled by the programmer; the language cannot save him.

Rather than go over it here, I’ll point you at this Usenet thread I serendipitously stumbled across just now: news:[email protected]. :-)

Hmm! the BB appears to have converted your news: URL into a link to google groups!

Killer Wolf wrote:

Well, i'm not a huge fan of online games, i played Delta Force once and it was underwhelming due to lagging etc, and people not playing w/in the spirit of the game. But, i can imagine Oolite would be canny fun. The probs would be at the minute - so it seems anyways - the audience isn't *that* large (compared to say WoW) so would there be lots of times where you'd come on and there'd be no one else? wouldn't that just be like playing the normal game? and given the size of our playing Ooniverse, what's the odds they'd cross your path anyways?

Well, I think there are two issues here.

The first issue, as you say, is that you may be alone when you log in. However, being in a stateful MMORPG means you can interact with others even in their absence, and that enhances the game.

Secondly, the size of the universe; it's not actually that large, compared to other MMORPGs. I also suspect everyone would concentrate in Galaxy 1. The size of the universe needs to relate to the size of the player base. There is another aspect to size, though (fnar-fnar) which is the size of the environment in which players personally interact, e.g. a single system. Here we perhaps have more of an issue. We would need groups of players to be able to meet, hunt as pirates or bounty hunters, escort freighters, etc. There would need to be a way, a la Frontier, of knowing what else is in the system and being able to intercept.

Killer Wolf wrote:

i am also of the idea that any money-taking is not good. if we all chipped in for a server and no one actually made anything, that's all well and good but the organising of such a thing might not be fun.

You only buy the physical server once you have a Oolite server.

Killer Wolf wrote:

HOWEVER, having said all that, the Wing Commander fanboys have a very active modding community, and one of them is actually working on turning Prophecy into an online game. http://www.wcnews.com/news/update/7277 and http://www.wcrevival.de/hcl/
i'm not clever enough to work out the "how"s of what he's done but is *is* possible, and it would seem cost-free.

You mean fidicurially cost-free. It costs a great deal, no matter how you pay for it.

Killer Wolf wrote:

but as i say, would it be worth the effort? my impression is we'd have to limit oolite to maybe one planetary system w/ a couple stations, Rock hermits etc to make an online game worth joining.

I think your view is extreme. If people do congregate in Galaxy 1, which is only 256 planets, there would be plenty of variety, although the risk would still be that there would be too much space. If you look at the star map and can see where other people are, then you can choose where to be. I think a player base of perhaps 1,000 would be enough to make the Oolite MMORPG functional.

Ahruman wrote:

Callas wrote:

Mmm. I don't have problems per se with large applications in C, because how well anything large survives depends on the structure assembled by the programmer; the language cannot save him.

Rather than go over it here, I’ll point you at this Usenet thread I serendipitously stumbled across just now: news:[email protected]. :-)

I'm one of the "few people" who've written their own string handling library. Does that mean I'm good? =-)

Magus Zeal wrote:

Another problem is of should the programmers decide to incorporate material from an OXP, what do they include? What do they include from the start? Everything stock, or anything special?

That problem is a particular case of the general problem of how rigiourously you stick to the original. OXPs are an excellent solution to that problem but their strength in a single player game (permitting individual choice) is their weakness in a multi-player game.

If there is only a single MMORPG server, the programmers will simply have to decide what goes in and what does not.

The advantage of a single MMORPG server cluster is concentration of the player base and cost.

The advantage of multiple MMORPG servers is customization.

Magus Zeal wrote:

Perhaps a slightly different offshoot of the MMO idea could be done. An "online" option, where you can connect to a server, much like how you find in a multitude of games, both new and old. However, servers could have many different functions. A server could be setup as a role-playing one, with many systems and a large world (basically the original MMO concept here). On the smaller spectrum, a personal server could be hosted for a few players to get together in one system (or, at most, half a dozen) to get together to practice or just to fight one another. I figure with this setup, we could have a master role-playing server that would, effectively, serve as the MMO server, while still letting friends mess around with another.

I think people would spend most or all of their time on the main server, because people focus on their primary characters in the locations with the most people. It's about status and success and competition.

Magus Zeal wrote:

In this case, we can also minimize costs, as there's considerably less overhead to worry about. Even if cost becomes a concern, donations can always be encouraged -- perhaps do what some free online games have done and give those who donate a bonus!

We minimize direct fidicurial payments, by taking them in the form of services from players with servers or players who pay for servers. The costs are higher this way, since the value that is expended is less efficiently used.

I think giving a bonus for a contributing is a bad idea. People give because they believe in a cause. Giving them a very weak payback for giving distracts from the motivation to give because you believe.

Magus Zeal wrote:

The biggest problem I see is handling death. In Oolite, if you die, you return to the last save point. However, I can think of absolutely no MMOs that force you to re-start when you die. This is probably one of the bigger issues that would need to be addressed.

The last save point is not the same as restarting. Restarting means from the very beginning of the game.

Callas wrote:

I'm one of the "few people" who've written their own string handling library. Does that mean I'm good? =-)

Not really, I've written my own versions of Basic in 6510, 68000 and and I'm still crap.

No seriously, lets give the ego a rest and get on with what's important; Oolite!

CaptKev wrote:

Callas wrote:

I'm one of the "few people" who've written their own string handling library. Does that mean I'm good? =-)

Not really, I've written my own versions of Basic in 6510, 68000 and and I'm still crap. :D

No seriously, lets give the ego a rest and get on with what's important; Oolite!

I was questioning whether or not writing your own string library actually can mean anything concrete at all about how good you are.

Does it really matter!

Ahruman wrote:

Callas wrote:

Shame Oolite is written in Objective-C - I'm only a C programmer.

If you’re familiar with OO design concepts, learning Objective-C is about half a day’s work. If not, maybe a few days.

The obvious has just descended upon me like a 16 ton weight.

The server doesn't have to be written in the same language as the client.

In fact, it is less probable than probable that the two very different tasks are best written in the same language.