Week 30/2013: Codex, outlook for 1.12

skyjake

Last week we were preparing two patch releases, started on 1.12, and I created an index of all our source code commit tags.

There was a request that in the automap, the map title would be displayed at the bottom of the view rather than the top, as that would be more in line with vanilla and also because the rest of the status bar information is at the bottom. I added the 'map-title-position' cvar for this purpose, and it defaults to 1 (bottom).



This new option is now in the unstable 1.12 builds.

The 1.10.4 patch is now available (build 939). We basically cherry-picked all the game-side changes from 1.11, plus some important fixes for other components (like the detection of the current build in libdeng2). The news post has more information about the patch.

We are also preparing 1.11.1, the first patch for the latest stable release. As usual, the plan is to release it within two weeks of the initial release.

Codex

For a few years now we've had the practice of tagging all our code commits with certain keywords. So far they've only been used to organize the build reports by topic, but over the weekend I was thinking that it would be nice to have the all the tags of the entire source code repository indexed in one place. I quickly wrote a script that generates the Doomsday Codex, or "code repository index". It isn't yet integrated into the main site as it is rather an early version, but already you can view the history of the source code in some quite interesting ways:

• History of a certain topic, for instance the Server.
• Commits can also be grouped by topic like in the build reports: Server (Grouped)
• You can see how the commits are divided between contributing authors.
• You can navigate topics via related tags.
• See which topics have received the most attention (by number of commits).
• Each commit links into GitHub where all the details can be seen.

I think the Codex is a great new perspective into the history of the project, and over time it should grow even more useful as we continue to tag commits and incorporate new views and search tools in the Codex pages.


Plans for 1.12

Now that we're back in unstable mode, it's time to see what we can do for 1.12. In many ways, the direction will be heavily influenced by what we've started in 1.11. I will be doing new UI elements and incorporating existing ones better into the new task bar UI. DaniJ will be continuing map data and map rendering improvements.

For 1.11 I was hoping to get around to improving the Shell a little with things like Game Options configuration, but didn't have enough time for it. There are a few other multiplayer related changes pending (e.g., master server communications), and I plan to revise the client's multiplayer setup UI for 1.12, so it is more likely that I will also have time to work on the Shell.

My plan for this week is to continue improving the client UI with new widgets to improve the console autocompletion feature.

Vermil

I feel a bit picky, but here goes.

Firstly, a little bug of sorts; when one shrinks the screen size, the automap title moves downward, potentially right into the STBAR graphic. It also slightly overlaps the top of HeXen's STBAR graphic by default.

Is there an option to completely turn off the automap title feature and go back to Vanilla, regardless of whether the resulting automap title matches up?

I'm just thinking that one way of handling cases in Doom where a mods CWILV lump(s) is 'unsuitable' would be to simply allow the user to turn on/off the feature at their discretion. As Heretic and HeXen don't have CWILV lumps it would function as an option for rendering the title in the Vanilla font and layout (i.e. in Heretic, the map number would be to the side of the map name).

Of course position of the automap title is a bit of a prickly issue; in all three Vanilla games, the automap title was positioned in the bottom left corner (slightly tabbed in Heretic and HeXen to avoid the raised bits of their STBAR graphics though), though Dday 1.8.6 deviated from this in Heretic and HeXen and placed it bottom middle in those games.

But one can’t so easily render the automap title in the bottom left in modern Dday, due to their being no guarantee that the STBAR hud in Heretic and HeXen stretch (and hence the raised bits on either edge of the graphics) all the way to the edges of the screen (depending on a user’s aspect ratio). Hence I imagine bottom middle is as close as Dday could get to Vanilla.

Another option could be to allow users to scale the automap title (i.e shrink or enlarge it at their discretion); some Doom mods use reasonable looking CWILV lumps, but Dday simply renders them too big on the automap.

Which reminds me, Vanilla HeXen did not display the map number on the automap, like modern Dday does and if Dday now intends to, it should probably use the MapInfo map number rather than the real map number, in order to synch up with the level warp cheats; currently the cheats use the MapInfo number while the automap title uses the real map number.

Of course, something else to consider is replacing the map number in HeXen with a hub number. Given players in HeXen don’t move through map numbers in sequence, the map number is really only something of use to modders when testing their maps rather than every user. Or maybe both could be displayed.

skyjake

Good points Vermil. The automap title will be adjusted in the future. I won't be actively working on it right now, but at some later point in time before 1.12 it will be improved.

For now, "hud-title 0" disables both the map start and automap titles.