Oolite Bulletins

CmdrLUke wrote:

The oolite targetting system is really primitive. Simple "friend or foe" displays were sufficient for classic Elite, but become very frustrating in larger battles and missions where specific ships must be located and monitored. Managing large group of mixed friends and enemies is very confusing. Missions that require finding particular ships quickly and then escorting them (like the localhero one) would be made much more enjoyable with more advanced scanner/targetting system.

...

+ target "nearest enemy"
+ cycle through all ships
+ cycle through all enemies, friends
+ store important targets into target memory hot keys

...

Commander McLane wrote:

While I agree that there could be more enhancements to the target computer, I would not agree with the above statement. The quite complex missions with huge and confusing battles in Assassins.oxp are playable (and have been played by many Ooliteers) with the targetting system as it is now.

I find myself in agreement with CmdrLUke that [OO|E]lite's targeting system has little to be desired, even after you have fully kitted out the existing targeting system with the available upgrades. The biggest single problem I have with Elite-style targeting (and I felt this way even back when I was playing it on my Commie-64 & 128) is that you have to point your nose at and "lock up" anything you want to target. We all know what a PITA it is to do this with distant entities that show up on your HUD as just a few pixels (or not even visible at all!). Even with the "Target System Memory Expansion" you can only cycle through things that have been previously targeted in the aforementioned manner. Almost all other space-sims I've played support some variation on what CmdrLUke suggests. Not only can you target something that you have not previously locked up, you can be discriminate as to what you target - hostiles, neutrals, last object that commed, etc.

Given that the basic standard-equipment scanner is capable of discerning between hostiles, neutrals, system vessels (e.g. cops), last-communicating-ship, and non-ship objects, it seems to me that it should be possible to be able to cycle through and "blind target" each of these entity (ship/object) classes as well as the existing target-under-reticle system.

I would agree, for the sake of proper balance, that it should not be possible to blind-target a cloaked ship. Or should it? I've never (knowingly) encountered one yet, so I don't know if cloaked ships show up as a "golf club" on the scanner. I guess the rule of thumb I'd apply would be that if it shows up on the scanner, it should be targetable.

I am in wholehearted agreement with CmdrLUke that the existing targeting system is tedious, and that an eventual upgrade of it to reflect "modern" standards would be most welcome. As a programmer myself (albeit one who works on down-to-the-metal "embedded systems" rather than PC/application work) I can appreciate that not every request made here can be easily implemented, esp. when working with a code base that has no doubt devolved to a (at least partially) spaghetti-like state (I cast no aspersions on Ahruman or Aegidian in saying this, I'm simply speaking from personal experience ). Regrettably, I find Objective-C baffling; were it not the case I'd be sorely tempted to dig into it and make the improvements to the targeting system suggested here myself.

Screet wrote:

I just wish I had a possibility to link the hat-switch to the views, even though the hat has more directions than there are views from within the ship, it would dramatically help to switch between front and aft lasers, and mining for those who have side mounted mining lasers...

Concerning the targetting: For the ships I don't really miss the more modern target cycle keys, however, I do regularly get annoyed when I have to switch the scanner to maximum resolution in order to be able to find the cargo. The best way still is to do some scoopings during the fights

...

Depending on what sort of profiling software came with your joystick (if any), you should be able to use it to map F1-F4 to the appropriate presses on your stick's hat switch or D-pad. I use a Logitech WingMan Cordless gamepad on one computer, and a Saitek X52 on another, and both of these products provide profiling tools that let you map keypresses to their respective DPad/hatswitch controls.

If you don't have profiling tools for your particular joystick, you might want to check out the Pinnacle Game Profiler: http://www.pinnaclegameprofiler.com/

In my last post I suggested that target-cycling keys be provided for each type of entity - hostile, neutral, system vessel and non-ship entity (asteroids, cargo cans). I certainly agree with you that cargo-scooping can be annoying without that capability, and that one often has to use the high scanner-zoom levels to do this, since cargo cans are nearly invisible until you close to very close range.

SgtSchultz wrote:

As a programmer myself (albeit one who works on down-to-the-metal "embedded systems" rather than PC/application work) I can appreciate that not every request made here can be easily implemented, esp. when working with a code base that has no doubt devolved to a (at least partially) spaghetti-like state (I cast no aspersions on Ahruman or Aegidian in saying this, I'm simply speaking from personal experience ). Regrettably, I find Objective-C baffling; were it not the case I'd be sorely tempted to dig into it and make the improvements to the targeting system suggested here myself.

I am not a programmer in RL, but in my opinion, and without meaning disrespect to anyone, I believe that if you look closely, you will find that things have gone the other way. The code has actually evolved, is now much more structured and has cleaner object implementations than before (and all architectural improvements are the result of Ahruman's work). Also, if you have some experience with object oriented languages, you will find that Obj-C is actually very easy and pleasant to work with.

another_commander wrote:

I am not a programmer in RL, but in my opinion, and without meaning disrespect to anyone, I believe that if you look closely, you will find that things have gone the other way. The code has actually evolved, is now much more structured and has cleaner object implementations than before (and all architectural improvements are the result of Ahruman's work).

Why, thank you. :-) It’s nice to know it doesn’t just look like pointless pedantry and distractions. Sometimes I wonder.

Also, if you have some experience with object oriented languages, you will find that Obj-C is actually very easy and pleasant to work with.

…unless your object-oriented experience consists exclusively of C++, in which case it is likely to be extremely confusing. (This is not meant as a dig at C++ programmers, but is based on years of experience of hanging out on mailing lists and IRC channels full of ObjC newbies. It could be seen as a dig at C++, but that’s an oft-repeated flame war I won’t indulge in here.)

another_commander wrote:

I am not a programmer in RL, but in my opinion, and without meaning disrespect to anyone, I believe that if you look closely, you will find that things have gone the other way. The code has actually evolved, is now much more structured and has cleaner object implementations than before (and all architectural improvements are the result of Ahruman's work). Also, if you have some experience with object oriented languages, you will find that Obj-C is actually very easy and pleasant to work with.

Hmm. I'm happy to hear that Ahruman & Co. are taking the time and care to clean things up and make some effort to improve the structure of the OOlite codebase. I am a programmer IRL, and one of my less pleasant tasks involves working on a code base that was never very good to begin with and has devolved into near-illegibility. Furthermore, in part because the code is so bad and subject to side-effect bugs when changes are made, what I am allowed to do to improve the situation is very limited. This experience has heightened my empathy for others placed in a similar position.

I did take a look at ObjC a while back. One area of difficulty I experienced was being new to OO programming - it is used much less frequently in the low-end microcontroller-based applications I commonly work with. Nonetheless, I'm sure I could twist my brain into the proper mode of thinking given sufficient motivation. I have already had some limited success in this. The other difficulty, and a much steeper hurdle IMO, was learning how to use the NS (and other) APIs. I suppose it's just a matter of digging in and gaining sufficient experience. I do wish for a good, practical, hands-on-oriented reference I could use to assist in the process.

<sigh> Getting off-topic here, best I stop now.

LittleBear wrote:

Maybe its a Dell thing! I get (on the key next to the 1 and above the Q) ¬ and `. Hmm my Acer laptop is the same.

No; standard UK layout.

LittleBear wrote: ↑Tue Sep 30, 2008 8:51 pm

In assassins missions holding down ¬ on the keyboard will identify your target amongst a group. Holding down this key causes Oolite to mark on the scanner the last ship to hail you (lines come up around its golf club). In the battles I've scripted the target always tends to send a cheeky taunt over the comms channel, so you can use this to ID him.

JensAyton wrote: ↑Tue Sep 30, 2008 9:25 pm

That’s a ~ on my UK keyboard layout.

I've added this tip to the Assassin's Guild wiki page, as well as to the Communication wiki page. I'd never noticed the radiating lines when I pressed the ~ key on my Apple keyboard.