I've created a core mechanic of my game and want to create a level editor for it. my game is not a tile-based one, so my needs are quite specific. Game is written using Swift and Cocos2d-swift, but i dont think i can figure something out with Sprite Builder.
What you can advice me? Can I for example create a level editor with c# and then use it from swift code?
And what data structure is the best?
I mean is it possible to serialize classes on desktop Swift application and then just load them on ios from file or I'll need to use json/xml?
It might be an old question but I ended up with using a .Net powered solution. I choosed as It has all controls that you need for creating a rich user interface and also, it has a lot of built-in and third party solutions for serializing levels in any way you want. And the c# syntax is very similar to the Swift one.
The only problem is that you might run windows to work with it.
My game in development also needed a non-tile level editor. A few months ago I took some time to make my choice.
Since my project still uses cocos2d 2.x, I don't use the whole new 3.x and SB system. After some investigation I found out that it would be too time consuming to adjust my whole project to the new system and adjusting SB to my needs, mainly because my game engine has been in development for quite some time and is close to finished. Further more, I couldn't find the right information to actually make it work for my game (it needed some odd level architecture I guess).
Finally, I didn't find any other good alternative so I decided to create my own level editor. In this way I had full control and I knew exactly how everything worked which was a huge advantage for me.
Right now my level editor has been finished for some time and works like a charm. I still think in my situation I made the right choice. Also because I learned a lot this way, building everything from the ground up. Having said that, for my next game I will probably go with the main stream and use SB from the start. Also for you I advice you to still check out SB and take some time for it before making an alternative choice...
I'll explain how I did mine. Disclaimer: it has some oddity's which only worked in my situation, but hopefully it helps a bit with choosing your own way to go, that's the goal I'm aiming at...
I used:
max/msp
Although it's developed to make music and audio based software, I used max/msp because it's very easy and fast for creating visual and interface based software as well.
More importend: I happened to be very experienced in it, which shortened the development time tremendously.
javascript
Inside the max/msp patch is a javascript file running. This file is like a bridge between the interface and the visual representation of the level being edited, and the database in which the level
is saved in. 70% of the editor development went into this file I think.
sqlite
All the data is written in a sqlite database. Again, this has been mainly the choice because it saved a great amount of development time in my case. I could have used xml files for instance, but my game was already using a sqlite database and because of this I felt comfortable using it, I had no experience in xml. Also all the code was already in place for a big part, which speeded up the whole proces a lot.
I'm very happy with the end result. It does everything I need, it's easy too use and since I made everything myself from the ground up I know exactly how every works.
Good luck with you choices.
Related
I've been trying to work on a proof of concept (POC) where I can embed a UE4 project into an existing application (in my case NativeScript) but this could just as easily apply to Kotlin or ReactNative.
In the proof of concept I've been able to run the projects on my iPhone launching from UE4 pretty easily by following the Blueprint and C++ tutorials for the FPS. However the next stage of my POC requires that I embed the FPS into an existing NativeScript application, this application will manage the root menu, chat, and store aspects of the platform in the POC.
The struggle I'm running into is that I cannot find how to interact with the xcode project generated from the blueprint tutorial and the C++ tutorial generates a xcode project that i'm unsure where the actual root is that I need to wrap.
Has anyone seen a project doing this before and if so are there any blogs or guidance that you can point me to? I've been Googling and looking around for a couple weeks and have hit a dead end. I found a feedback post here from April of 2020, that was referring to a post in January 2020 that talked about how Unity has a way to embed into other applications additionally a question from 2014 here. But other than that it's a dead end.
A slightly different approach
Disclaimer: I'm not an UE4 developer. Guilty as charged for seeing an unanswered bounty too big to ignore. So I started thinking and looking - and I've found something that could be bent to your needs. Enters pixelstreaming.
Pixelstreaming is a beta feature that is primarily designed to allow for embedding the game into a browser. This opens a two way communication between a server where the GPU heavy computations happen and a browser where the player can interact with the content - the mouseclick & other events are sent back to the server. Apparently it allows some additional neat stuff, however that is not relevant for the question at hand.
Since you want to embedd the Unreal application into your NativeScript tool(menu of some kind if I understood correctly), you could make your application a from two separate parts:
One part would run the server.
The second part would handle the overlay via the pixelstreaming.
This reduces the issue of embedding the UE4 into an application to the(possibly easier) issue of embedding a browser into your application. (Or if your application is browser based - voila, problem solved.)
If you don't want to handle the remote communication, just have the server-side run on the localhost.(With the nice sideeffect of saving bandwidth.)
Alternatively, if you are feeling adventurous, you could go and write your own WebRTC support on the application side to bypass the need for the browser alltogether. It might not be worth the effort though.
Side note: The first of the links you provided is a feature request which hints at the unfortunate fact that UE4 doesn't support embedding. This is further enforced by the fact that one of the people there says somethig along the lines "Unity can to this, it would be nice if UE4 could as well."
Yet a different approach:
You could embedd and use a virtual display to insert the UE4 part into your controller - you would be basically tricking UE4 into thinking that the desired display device is a canvas inside your application.
This thread suggests a similar approach:
In general, the way to connect two libraries like this would be through a platform dependent window handle, e.g. a HWND under Windows. Check the UE api if you find any way to bind the render target to a HWND. Then you could create a wxWindow in wxWidgets and tell UE to render into that window. That would be a first step.
I'm not sure if anything I've listed will be of much help but hey, at least I tried :-). Good luck with your game.
At the same time, the author suggests to:
Reverse the problem:
Using the UE4 slate framework and online subsystem. You would use the former to create the menus you need directly in the UE4 and then use the latter to link to the logic you want to have outside of the UE4. However that is not what you asked for so I'm listing it only for the completeness sake.
There seems to be a lot of conflicting information out there. It might be that support has increased recently, or changes to adobe.com/air have made some information difficult to find - but I can't track down a definitive list of things to avoid.
I know that actionscript won't run in loaded SWFs, I know that some people say that filters and blendmodes and halo components won't work. I've also read many posts saying they will (at least that blendmodes will, and that halo will run, but slowly so still use spark)
I have a large amount of AS3 code to plan for upgrading to work on iOS, but at the moment I have no idea what things will break (or what things will break when those things have been fixed!)
Is there a list of unsupported APIs, or iOS dos and don'ts?
Thanks
:S
First, yes. Externally loaded SWF's will not run. You can however embed SWF's/SWC's into your project and include them inside of your package.
As far as Flex components, stay away from Halo. You should use Flex 4.6 and stick to components with mobile skins. I recommend downloading Tour de Flex http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/tourdeflex.html to get an idea of whats available.
As far as blend modes go, I'm not really sure. I haven't used them in mobile yet. However filters are supported but they are expensive. For drop shadows on rectangles there is something called RectangularDropShadow. This is actually a component and therefor less expensive. However it can only be used on rectangular groups.
You should have access all of the AIR API's. You will however be restricted when using some of File related classes since I don't believe you can leave your Appliaction Storage Directory.
One big performance tip I can give is to use AS3 over MXML whenever possible, ESPECIALLY when creating item renderers. Use BitmapImage over Image whenever possible, again especially in item renderers. Use cacheAsBitmap whenever you have images that don't change often. And stay away from any Flex component that doesn't have a mobile skin.
You may also want to read up on View and destruction policies.
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/articles/flex-mobile-development-tips-tricks-pt1.html
This link also has some more performance tips
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/articles/flex-mobile-performance-checklist.html
I am just starting iOS development. I read some tutorials, watched stuff on iTunes U and wrote some sample code myself. Now I want to take the next step. I want to learn about best practices for iOS development in XCode.
Are there any well written and well organized iOS projects that one could take a look at?
(As I see it, iOS is not exactly the place for open source enthusiasts, however.)
Thanks
Mike.
I agree with several of the other answers that state that looking at many, many projects for mini-examples of what you want to do in your own app is the way to go.
However, you asked for an example of an app demonstrating best practices.
You could do worse than to read Matt Gallagher's blog, Cocoa with Love from beginning to end. However, the app example you asked for is right here.
Not only will it show a variety of techniques, some novel design and best-practices, but also he points out where he feels that he might have done something better.
It's a great read.
I would suggest the following process: (it worked for me)
Think of an advanced app. that you eventually want to be proficient enough to create.
Make a top-down problem-solving tree containing the necessary skills required to build your final app.
Use this tree to divide your final app. into 'sub apps'. Start at the bottom of the tree, find a tutorial specifically for that skill, and make a "Hello World" app. that uses that skill.
Keep progressing upwards, creating 'sub apps' as you go.
When you are finally ready to make your final app. (it will take a while), you will have a good handle on how iOS development works. It will also be a great test of your knowledge via direct application!
Getting the hang of iOS development can be tricky; it really does require a top-down approach, and every online resource I've found takes a linear one. The only way that I think a linear approach to learning iOS development would be manageable, is to take it one small task at a time.
As for specific resources, I always google "[what I want to do] iPhone SDK" and browse the tutorials and forum posts that come up.
Here are some open source iOS apps. However, they aren't very well documented and are also very advanced.
TKAWebView - A subclass of UIWebView that handles authentication and downloading.
Welcome to your Mac - An iOS app. to VNC into a PC/Mac and do some cool stuff.
InAppSettingsKit - A settings screen creator for your apps.
Good luck!
The people behind the Parse platform have made two complete projects.
For each project there is the complete source code, a tutorial and the resulting app is also available from the AppStore.
Anywall: https://parse.com/anywall
Anypic: https://parse.com/anypic
They both rely heavily on the Parse platform as the data source, but you still get a feel for an iOS project.
Molecules is a great open-source app that uses 3D OpenGL to render complex models of molecules.
Just keep coding my friend. You'll learn over a period of time. The best way to get dirty in a mud fight is to jump into it... Weird analogy but you get the point.
Maybe someday, we all will learn from you then !
Like you said there many and many source codes are available internet, but most are incomplete.
I found some Open source codes of REAL application currently available through Apple app store are given here
Free iPhone App Source Codes of real apps
and also, you can find many answers here on stackoverflow question - Are there any Open-source iPhone applications around?
You can download free IOS sample projects from http://devcodemarket.com
I realize this is an old thread but I've also been looking for good objective-c code examples recently and I just realized that TextEdit's source code is available at the Mac Developer Library webpage.
Also, here are some popular objective-c libraries that have caught my attention:
CocoaPods
AFNetworking.
you can also go through UICatalog from Developers Library and download the sample code. just google it and you will find a project containing all basics of iphone.
I don't think there is any perfect project that can demonstrate all the qualities of great code. Developers have stylistic preferences and may make mistakes. That said, you should look at a lot of different projects and try to look at the conventions used.
I'd suggest starting on GitHub. Besides for seeing code, you'll see what libraries are out there, which may help further your projects later on. Here's the Objective-C page on GitHub.
(Also, I (GitHub link) think you're wrong about iOS devs not being in favor open source. Yes, there's money to be made, but you can't sell a CSV paring library on the App Store as is.)
Have a look at https://github.com/mozilla/firefox-ios
That is Firefox for iOS, written in Swift.
Cocoacontrols has a wide range of controls written using Objective-C & Swift.
I believe these days, this is one of the most famous website for iOS Developers.
But, before you jump onto this, you have to learn Objective-C & Swift very well, so that you will understand how to use the controls in your app which makes your app smooth.
This is a pretty basic question. I am wondering if the Unreal Development Kit can be used for something other than games, specifically a light show simulator and editor. The site says:
Unreal Engine 3 has been used by game developers, researchers, television studios, machinima directors, artists and students. If you have an idea that needs to be brought to life in a game engine, UDK is for you.
But I have the feeling that it is more game oriented. For my hobby project, I would like to be able to create light show simulations with rotating/moving lasers/lights of changing color, synchronized to sound/music. I would also like to develop an GUI editor for this, preferably in C#, but if it's not possible to access the rendering functionality of the engine from C#, then C++/Qt should suffice. The editor would be used to design the simulation, which would then be rendered/played out in real time.
I guess my base, general question is: can the Unreal Development Kit be used for something like this, not necessarily game related? Or should I go with my original option of Ogre3D, which just focuses on rendering and 3D graphics as far as I know.
EDIT: Just saw this page which again mentions:
Can I create any kind of game with UDK?
Absolutely. UDK is the perfect solution for any kind of virtual world you wish to create, from racing games to simulations.
So my question is now simply: Would I be able to access the renderer or other functionality of my resulting code to integrate it into an editor for my simulator? I guess a simpler, more relatable analogy would be, if I wrote a game, would I be able to write my own level/character/etc. editor for it? And how would I do so? Yes, I know that the UDK comes with editors already, but I mean if I want to make my own.
Thanks! I appreciate any answers :)
The UDK only permits you to play with script (Unreal Script) and not with native code (c++). So more complicated projects or integrations are very difficult without the full c++ source code. But if you will re-use the editor (UnrealED) for your project and make you simulation based upon unreal you can do it.
I'm pretty well oriented in what Unreal Engine can do, and answer to your question is yes and no ;)
Yes, you can create your own actors that will be rotating/moving and emitting light. But won't be able to create your own custom editor around UE's rendered. Frankly I don't see why you would need one - Unreal Editor has all the tools needed to design and execute light show simulation (and much more) - all you need to do is to get familiar with those tools.
One thing you could do in external editor (except, of course, for textures, sounds, models, etc) is create some custom setup in saved to text files, and later read in those files in unreal script - it allows it.
"I guess a simpler, more relatable analogy would be, if I wrote a game, would I be able to write my own level/character/etc. editor for it?"
Yes, you can make your own characters and maps. You shouldn't have any need to make your own editor though, the given editor should be enough.
Although you might not have access to the C++ source code, there is a lot that can be done using Unrealscript. Check out all the entries to the Make Something Unreal contest, they were all done using tools available in the UDK.
I need to create a photo gallery for a website running IIS 4.0 or IIS 5.0 (im not sure which). It needs to display a low resolution version of the gallery to anyone, and it must show both the low and high resolution images for "priviledged" users. So I need access priviledges, photo albums and once the site is complete, the person I am doing this for needs to be able to upload their own images to the gallery. It also needs to have a minimal interface as it needs to be integrated into an existing website.
So I need some advice on this with the direction I should approach it.
Does anyone know if their is a customisable gallery out there that can do something like this, such as Coppermine or Jgallery or something. The alternative is to use a web framework like Ruby on Rails, CodeIgniter or Sproutcore (each which require learning a new language). The framework would be more work, but the existing galleries may not be customisable enough. The important bit is the user privileges in an admin panel.
I am relatively new to "web programming", although not new to normal/games programming. I have a few years experience with C/C++ OpenGL and Java. I have also read up on MVC etc, and did hello world with sproutcore, so I kinda get the idea. Although learning a framework is a much heavier investment.
What are your thoughts?
If you don't want to re-invent the wheel you could use Gallery2 (requirements here). It runs on IIS -- you'd just need PHP and a database. It's very configurable (including user accounts), has lots of plugins, and its open source if that's not enough. Also, the development and support communities are large and active.
you could always go the route of Dotnetnuke and then use Ventrian's Simple Gallery module (http://www.ventrian.com/Products/Modules/SimpleGallery/Demo.aspx)
Using DNN offers a ton of functionality, including the security you need, and it would save you from doing any web development.
If you are a bit more adventurous, try Smaltalk based Aida/Web and specially Aida/Scribo CMS (currently still in beta), which include Gallery so called scriblet as well. Scribo scriblets are otherwise web components which you can include directly into a text. You therefore add a gallery directly into a surronding text. See for instance a presentation as a Gallery for example.
I would recommend my own but... If it weren't for the low/high resolution thing with permissions I think it would fit the rest of your needs. I'm going to leave a link just in case you want to take a look at it:
nzFotolog
It's also open-source (although the license is not the best) and you can change it at will if you want. The code itself is clean and self-explanatory. The downside is that I haven't developed it for some time now :(
Having faced a similar dilemma myself I have to say that I found Gallery2 and Coppermine both far too all-encompassing and difficult to customise to the degree I would have wished. I ended up rolling my own using straight, procedural PHP with various bits of jQuery for the GUI fancy bits. At the same time I was able to bake in some e-commerce and data gathering for my wedding photography clients, ending up with something which exactly matched my needs. Certainly, the gallery aspects of this project were, for a complete programming (although not HTML) neophyte, the least challenging - it's exactly the sort of thing PHP is made for.
I'm now taking my first faltering steps with CodeIgniter for my next project (photoblogging software) and I can already see that the framework would make a gallery project very quick, simple and secure.
Flickr.com and their API may be suitable from what you described.
http://www.flickr.com/services/api/