[WIP] ToEE Front-End X 5.0 Progress Report

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

Cool, thanks for the info. I agree it's really not an issue.

Is there any chance of getting slightly more robust error reporting? I mention this because a user is having problems running ToEE as we speak (not a TFE-X issue, just ToEE/antivirus), and he has reported the familiar "must have patch 2 installed" line. The thing is, that almost always means that the executable has been deleted by antivirus, so what I'm getting at here is could we update the error messages to be more comprehensive/accurate? If would be helpful if a user could report that "TFE-X says that my exe may have been deleted! Eureka!" both for us and for them.

 

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

Even right now error reporting in the new TFE-X is much more detailed than in the old one. In particular, if toee.exe is going to ever be missing after the deployment is complete, TFE-X is going to report that the executable is missing. Moreover, since the TFE-X-repair functionality is now automated and integrated, it will attempt to recover toee.exe from known locations (inside the module, if available, and also from its local backup in TFE-X.tfe) before giving up. If it has to give up, it'll report that toee.exe was missing and could not be recovered. I'm still working on improving this procedure.

EDIT: In beta6, if toee.exe is originally missing in the game folder before TFE-X is even deployed, TFE-X will report that toee.exe is missing and abort until the problem in remedied (beta6 will be up soon).

- Agetian

 

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

Fantastic! :thumbsup:

 

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

UPDATE: Beta 6 is uploaded, TFE-X error reporting has been improved. Also, improved responsiveness and feedback when uninstalling a module.

- Agetian

 

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

UPDATE: Release Candidate 1 is posted. Improved JRE 6 compatibility, some minor source code cleanup. At this point, the new TFE-X should be ready for broader testing - I mean, it works fine on all three PCs I've tested it on, including deployment, installation, and add-on management. If there are issues in there, they can only be pinpointed by broader testing. Waiting for your feedback, fellas. As usual though, be careful and make backups. Do not use TFE-X on your precious copies with lots of saved games just yet unless you feel adventurous (just to be on the safe side, you know).

- Agetian

 

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

Okay - feedback time!

I've tried out the new TFE-X 4, and the verdict on my end is that it works like a charm. :clap: Unlike you however Ag, I seem to have experienced faster activation speeds than with the previous version. When I first activated v7.8 yesterday using the prior version, it took me over 10 minutes to activate the module. With TFE-X, it took me a total of 7 minutes - 2 minutes to deploy (I believe) and only 5 minutes to activate the module. That was pretty awesome actually, especially considering that v7.8 is quite a bit larger than any previous Co8 release. I bet I was 12 minutes overall yesterday, so that would be a 5 minute improvement.

One thing to note is that I deleted all old versions of the modpack from the ToEE root folder prior to installing TFE-X 4. Before I had had lots of them - all the way back to v6.0 at least. I see from reading the readme that the number of modules residing in the game directory might affect deployment time, but you don't mention that for activation time. If it does potentially affect activation, we should advise players to delete old modules to save activation time. But anyway, I launched the game all the way through and everything came off without a hitch. :mrhappy:

Also, I have to say that the dynamic status updating is fantastic. There should be absolutely no excuse now for players to prematurely terminate activations either through impatience of ignorance. Great job. :thumbsup:

Here is some specific feedback/suggestions -

• I'd like to make an updated TFE-X 4 icon if you don't mind. The prior one was the usual ToEE grey, and the one I associate with WorldBuilder is the green one that TFE-X 4 currently uses. How about a nice shiny black one?
• Suggestion: for the level cap, number of PCs/NPCs, and delayed blast fireball figure, could we have a drop down or push over menu (like with game resolution, for example) instead of having the user input the value? I think that way we would avoid more errors in that they could only use the available options, and also it would look a little slicker. If not, no big deal.
• Suggestion: at the concluding activation screen message, could we have an 'okay' button to close instead of telling the user to click the x, along with a 'click okay to exit' type message? That is rather nitpicky I know but I am trying to think mainly like random unaware player who likes to have everything done for him/her and likes big fat friendly looking buttons to click with friendly messages.
• Last suggestion: could the module name and status text fields and text be larger by any chance, or is that set by the OS? It's not illegible or anything as is, but again in the interest of user-friendliness, a bit larger might look more happy/non-threatening.

Okay, lastly, to any/all other interested parties out there, please install and test this and provide your own feedback for Agetian here. We need as many trials as possible to assure safe operation, though I feel pretty confident in assuring you that you won't likely have any problems. And even if you do, nothing is really actually potentially fatal here ... worst thing that can happen is that you'd have to reinstall everything. Your computer will not blow up.

Oh and Linux/Wine testers would be great too, likewise Windows Vista, 7, and 8. My OS is still XP.

Check out the power of X!

 

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

Thanks a lot for the valuable feedback, Gaear! I really appreciate it! And I'm happy you're having a great experience with the new front-end thus far! Thanks a lot for the suggestions, too, they are definitely all worth implementing and are absolutely possible to do, so I'll work on implementing them in the next couple days! Interestingly enough, the ideas with the confirmation button and with the dropdown selection menus for numeric values crossed my mind yesterday as well, so we seem to be thinking in the same direction! :thumbsup: Thanks a lot for testing again, I'll post an updated version with your suggestions implemented ASAP!
P.S. The fonts at the moment are mostly set by the OS, but the size is not impossible to alter, of course - I'll tweak things a bit today and see if I can come up with reasonable defaults that will work well on all systems!
P.P.S. Glad to hear you're having faster activation speeds, too! The speed will vary from system to system and may depend on a lot of factors, but yeah, on the whole the new front-end should be on par with the old one, and at least not majorly slower or anything (and hopefully even somewhat or much faster on many systems, like yours or like my Linux box! )

Oh, and about the icon - will you be able to submit the updated icon or would you like me to try to come up with it? I like the idea about the shiny black one, by the way!

- Agetian

 

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

By the way, for the new front-end the number of modules in the game folder shouldn't matter on either deployment or activation time. I can't find the relevant bit in the readme to remove it though, can you please tell me where you're reading it?

- Agetian

 

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

Sure thing -

 

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

Oh, kk, got it fixed, thanks Gaear!
Ok, now working on those suggestions

- Agetian

 

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

@ AjiTae: EDIT: Oh, nevermind, it's for the windowed mode - that's a good find! Yeah, I think it might be worth including it in the front-end! Thanks!

- Agetian

 

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

UPDATE: Uploaded Release Candidate 2. Made the main interface somewhat more compact. Improved the readability of some fonts, especially on MS Windows (the fonts that were not affected are difficult to tweak without breaking them either on one system or the other, so I guess the interface will have to stay more or less the way it is now, hope it's OK...). Condensed the two buttons "Enable Intro/Disable Intro" into one. Changed the way the level cap, the delayed blast fireball delay, and the max number of PCs in party are chosen (now these options use lists and drop-down menus). Changed the icon to a sleeker-looking black shiny one. The activation windows now feature an OK button to close the window once the operation is complete.

- Agetian

 

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

@ AjiTae: Yeah, nevermind, figured it out. Thanks, this is interesting indeed!

- Agetian