[WIP] ToEE Front-End X 5.0 Progress Report

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

Module list population is now implemented - you can actually choose a module in the list and its description and picture will be shown. No activation is possible at the moment yet, so it's just visuals, but it's a good start - you can see the new module system shaping up. Also, I did away with the module type column in the module table as the new TFE-X only supports native ToEE Front-End X packages (the converted old style front-end modules are unsupported now, which, as we discussed, is absolutely OK). Also, screen resolution can now be chosen from the front-end.

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

@ Salk: Thanks, I appreciate it!

Today I continued working on the infrastructure of the new Front-End. Now the functionality to inject DLL hacks is fully supported. Also, the front-end differentiates between active and inactive modules and sets the proper interface state upon selection. Module option lock-out is now supported (fully compatible with TFE-X v3.x), certain options such as Humble NPCs can be locked in either enabled or disabled state if necessary (used in the Co8 mod).

Some extra news: 1) the new Front-End will be open source. I will either just ship it with the source code (in a separate zip archive, I believe) or set up a svn/git/hg repository for it. 2) The new Front-End, as opposed to the old one, will automatically save the options that are either enabled or disabled, across sessions. I think the old functionality (where some options were auto-saved and some weren't by design) was somewhat confusing and counter-intuitive, and making option changes permanent until they are changed again by the user seems reasonable (this will also allow to maintain compatibility with some of the quirkier old TFE-X functionality without inventing some even quirkier hacks).

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

^ I agree. As transparent as possible is good (without violating longstanding norms ... I hate it when software updates abandon time-honored conventions like context menus, right/left clicking, what the back button does, etc. ).

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

Yeah, I completely agree, Gaear!

Some news: cleaning game cache on startup is supported now and is no longer a user-accessible option (it's done automatically because the end users pretty much always need it enabled).

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

A test version of the new About box. This release is for all of you, guys, who have made my life so interesting and full of adventure and innovations here at the Circle of Eight!

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

Activation is progressing along nicely, I think I should have the module activation mechanism finished tomorrow. The activation interface is much similar to the new deployment interface, it's fully responsive and shows its progress in a similar way. A nice extra touch is that the front-end is able to determine the space requirements for a module and tells you how much space the unpacked module is going to occupy once activated. Here's a screenshot.

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

@ sirchet: Unfortunately, most likely no, and I don't want it to delay the release of v7.8.0 or anything - the new front-end is probably about 50% done at the moment; moreover, it will need testing once the necessary feature set is implemented. I believe the next iteration of the Circle of Eight mod (v7.9.0) will already feature the new front-end though The new TFE-X will go into public beta testing and will be immediately usable with the current releaase of the mod as soon as it's ready.

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

Thanks for the vote of confidence, sirchet!

So, some big news for you guys: the module activation is finally working, at least in a sandbox test environment. I will test it and experiment with it during the day to see how it behaves in a real ToEE folder - will actually try a full deployment and activation of Co8 7.7.0 on top of a clean game installation on both Windows and Linux. Keep your fingers crossed, this is a major milestone in the creation of the new front-end!

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

Yes, guys, that's a dynamic progress bar you're seeing there - not only are the installation steps reported, but the progress bar gets updated (in small steps which, depending on the total number of files, can be as small as 1%). Also, so far so good with the tests - the new TFE-X worked well on a real ToEE installation on both Windows and Linux and was able to switch back and forth between the vanilla game and the Co8 mod 7.7.0. Also, some numeric options are now implemented (level cap, max number of player characters in party, delayed blast fireball).

A question: can you please remind me if the max number of PCs in party has certain specific lower and upper bounds? (such as, e.g., it's not possible to set the max number of PCs less than 3 and more than 8 - for some reason these two numbers come to mind but I can't remember what it was for real). Also, please let me know about the lowest and highest allowed values for the Delayed Blast Fireball delay.

- Agetian

 

Re: [WIP] ToEE Front-End X 4.0 Progress Report

@ Gehennis, sirchet: Thanks a lot for the input! If I recall correctly, 0 was also an option for the delayed blast fireball, please tell me if I'm right or wrong.

The portrait pack support is in. ToEE Front-End X now supports the new style portrait packs similar to the ones provided in the Downloads section of the Co8 boards. However, there's a significant difference: the portrait pack package must be a ZIP-packed archive (instead of RAR) and it must have the extension .tpp (lowercase for portability). Otherwise, the internal structure must be exactly the same as in the portrait packs in the Downloads section (basically, files in the folder data/art/interface/portraits with the full structure of the folders intact). The .tpp packages are supposed to be put in the same location as the standard add-on packages for TFE-X (the folder "addons/<module_name>"). Only one portrait pack can be active at a time, but it can be activated separately from an add-on (so, installing an add-on does not restrict you from installing a portrait pack, and vice-versa). Also, TFE-X automatically does all the housekeeping and correctly removes the previous portrait pack before installing a new one.

- Agetian