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Is it possible to include some community contributions with the official Gideros release? — Gideros Forum

Is it possible to include some community contributions with the official Gideros release?

MagnusviriMagnusviri Member
edited April 2012 in Suggestions & requests
This is a continuation of the discussion I've been having on the following thread but I'm breaking it out because it kinda deserves it's own thread.

http://www.giderosmobile.com/forum/discussion/758/keyinput-plugin-was-icade-plugin#Item_25

I'd like to request that some community contributions be included with official Gideros releases or that there be an official community release.  I know that it isn't a good idea to include everything and that there has to be some oversight to guarantee quality, proper licensing (MIT seems to be the majority of the licensing used by the community) but at the same time it shouldn't be a burden on anyone in particular.

The main reason I ask this is because I've noticed there is a lot of good community stuff, but it is kind of scattered in many places, github, the code snippets and tutorials discussion forum, and individual websites.  Just today I downloaded something that I thought I didn't have but realized I had it already.

Another issue is I think it will be hard to impossible for me to keep up with all of the updates that individuals make to their shared code and so if everyone pools effort and there is a community release a week or 2 after every new Gideros release (to give people a chance to update their code for the new Gideros) that would be really great.

I realize that people get busy and may abandon projects so code could be organized by the last version of Gideros it was tested on.  If someone is too busy to test it for the new version, then it is just left in that a folder that indicates it hasn't been updated.

And it would kind of be the responsibility of the original developer to send whoever maintains the community download any new updates.  I am envisioning it this way because as the person suggesting this I'm willing to be the one who makes the first download package, but I don't want to volunteer to do something that I don't think I'll get too busy to do.

Another thing is that each example can have a link to their website so that people can go there if they want more information.  And it would be great if everyone mentioned that this is included in the community download, so that if I see some code posted to a thread, I'll know instantly if I have it if they say they added it to the community download.

I'm envisioning the Examples folder that comes with Gideros but with community code.  And with periodic releases, so that I can throw away the old folder when I get a new download and know that it is up to date.

Thoughts?

Comments

  • ZoytZoyt Member
    Would love that.
  • I don't like to suggest things that I wouldn't volunteer for myself, but I would prefer a wiki page of links, which has some explanation of what the link is, and maybe the date last updated. I don't really want to be downloading a community package every month and have to go through and check for updates to things. It's much easier to click on a page, and then click a link to see the code. Especially if it's on Github, because you can just click on the relevant file to see the code. I find that a lot easier than downloading a zip attachment from this site.

    Even maintaining a wiki page like this would take a lot of time, and we are all focussed more on making our own projects - setting up a community download would be even more work. But I think that wiki pages can be updated by the community (?), so then if people update their code, they could then update the wiki page themselves too.

    Github is great in that you can "watch" github projects, and they will tell you when the project is updated.

    ( :x @ github :) )
  • You guys know that the gideros wiki (Development center) can be edited?

    About Github. I think it has a major flaw, at least I could not figure it out. You can create a fork from the master and edit it. Then you can push your changes to the master. All fine. BUT.... if someelse pushes their changes, how cna I get my fork on the same level as the master with the other changes?
  • ZoytZoyt Member
    @MikeHart - I do, but I haven't or GM's wiki yet. And I totally forgot that in the roadmap, they have plans to add a plug-in lister and importer or something like that which is just as good as this.
  • You could use git submodules: http://book.git-scm.com/5_submodules.html
    So let say someone creates a new githup repo "gideros-2012.2.2-plugins", and imports submodules from different authors, so it is in one place for others to download. The original plugin authors do not need to do anything special, their repo is just included (as a submodule) or not. There can be more such repos, like '*-stable", "*-experimental" etc.
  • gorkemgorkem Maintainer

    Thanks for the long and thoughtful comment.

    What we can do is to open a Wiki page, with following titles:

    1. Tutorials: Includes links to tutorials online (Arturs's tutorials are perfect examples for this).
    2. iOS plugins: Name implies.
    3. Android plugins: Name implies.
    4. Code snippets: Code that can be consumed up quickly :)
    5. Full applications: Full source ebooks, games and such.

    Each title will have a table beneath, including the following columns:

    Name | Description | Version | Date | URL (Link)

    Would that make sense? Do you want to see more?

  • I'll check out the wiki then. And if I really wanted a download package, I could script its creation, so I'd consider a wiki page sufficient.

    I'm also going to try out github again.
  • ar2rsawseenar2rsawseen Maintainer
    @gorkem +1 that something like this is needed

    I can't say that everything needs to included in Gideros Studio, because, well I guess it would be pretty heavy studio then. But some central repository (even simple wiki page) is a must.
  • avoavo Member
    wiki page would probably be best instead of a second full download, that might confuse things. Possibly once in a while a lot of the files could be gathered together and included on the download page like the "asset pack" is now.
  • gorkemgorkem Maintainer
    Lets start with a wiki page then, until we have a considerable amount of community contribution. Then we could start thinking of how this can be merged with gideros releases.
  • The asset pack is probably what got me thinking about this.

    I'm not really a wiki person. Should I just create this page

    http://www.giderosmobile.com/DevCenter/index.php/Community_Additions

    And start filling it in?
  • gorkemgorkem Maintainer
    Go with it - I can help you with that. Let's also discuss it mutually via email if you wish.

    The asset pack is going nowhere I believe, there are very few "free to distribute" game assets out there. Unless someone says "keep it", I'm going to remove it I think, after another round of "thinking" :)
  • gorkemgorkem Maintainer
    James - if you want, I can prepare a template here.
  • techdojotechdojo Guru
    edited April 2012
    Go with it - I can help you with that. Let's also discuss it mutually via email if you wish.

    The asset pack is going nowhere I believe, there are very few "free to distribute" game assets out there. Unless someone says "keep it", I'm going to remove it I think, after another round of "thinking" :)
    The problem with games assets is that they are often very specific and intended for a single application.
    That said - Dan Cook's (Lost Garden) Planet Cute prototyping set's often seem to get a lot of interest (he's also updated his Tyrian tileset - available from the same page) http://www.lostgarden.com/search/label/free game graphics.

    As do Reiners Tilesets (http://www.reinerstilesets.de/) although he seems to be moving into 3d models (the original ISO sets are still available).

    The company 6th Mega open sourced their iOS game Puff Puff with all resources (http://6thmega.com/) and actively encourage remixes based on their code / images etc.

    YoyoGames GameMaker software comes with a fair few assets (http://www.yoyogames.com)

    Vicki Wenderlich (indie artist and wife of the iOS tutorial guru Ray Wenderlich) has a faire amount of assets available on her website at http://www.vickiwenderlich.com

    There's some good stuff to be found at OpenGameArt.org (http://opengameart.org/)

    I also found some interesting stuff at Iron Star Media's collection of free game assets (http://www.ironstarmedia.co.uk/resources/free-game-assets/)

    And lastly if anyone's looking for some "space" backgrounds the stuff on the NASA images website is usually all public domain (http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/index.html)

    ----------------

    Oops - almost forgot.

    http://www.spriters-resource.com/

    The ShyGuy Kingdom (http://tsgk.captainn.net)

    and this post on GameDev.net
    http://www.gamedev.net/topic/272386-sprites-sprites-and-more-sprites/

    :)
    WhiteTree Games - Home, home on the web, where the bits and bytes they do play!
    #MakeABetterGame! "Never give up, Never NEVER give up!" - Winston Churchill
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