so the IDE was made in blitzmax?

can I see the code for it?
How would I make an IDE in blitzmax? is there some GUI included?

Not yet, according to this thread (more specificly the post by Skidracer) it seems BRL are working on a BlitzMAX version of the FLTK.

Ohhh it would be much better to have a common interface in bmx for the native gui of each platform :(

After reading a number of posts which refer to *stuff*, I've concluded that there is a BlitzPlus module and a FLTK module in development. I believe the win32 IDE was made using the BlitzPlus module. I think I remember reading that the FLTK module was tied in most closely with the linux side of things. I've heard of nothing on the Mac front.

It will be interesting to see what develops, and whether I have been reading wrong/too much into things...

Why? You realise ofcourse that FLTK etc. are all interfaces to the native GUI of each platform?

Erm, no its not. Toolkits like these or the ever popular GTK (Gimp tool kit) will have a few cross platform drawing commands and then draw a custon GUI themselves. This is not using the native gui.

Right, the goal would be to use a BlitzMax command to create a button and BlitzMax translates that into creating whatever the desired platform uses for buttons.

We use wxWindows at Epic for the latest incarnation of UnrealEd and that's how it works.

Anything less would be uncivilized.

FLTK has some pretty good OpenGL support. It's also fast, free and cross-platform. I'm a wxWindows user myself, but I've heard good things about FLTK and it should do the job OK.

AFAI can remember Terabit was writing the IDE for BM in BM already two years ago.
BM being multiplatform and all it's a bit strange the W32 version differs so much from Mac IMHO.
Why aren't they the same ?

This is BTW not critisism of Terabit who IMO is a highly skilled programmer.

I -think- skidracer has said that he's the one working on the IDE('s?) - so TeraBit may not even be involved at all anymore.

Yeah it is. True they draw their own GUI, but they use the platforms native Interface with regards to certain widgets (windows for example) input and message handling.

Personally, I think using a GUI that looks the same across multiple platforms is an advantage over using the native GUI. I mean even Microsoft doesn't use their own GUI, why on earth should we?

You're right. He was. Can't say I envy him, must have been a nightmare.

Not really, considering the current Mac IDE was written in Objective C specificly for the Mac.

Why would they do that ? What happened to the multi-platform concept ?
I know it's BM, not the IDE, that is multiplatform but when you have a
tool like BM handy, and know the nuts and bolts of it, why not use it ?
Why do the same job (making IDE) three times instead of one ?
Isn't BM good enough for such a task ?

The question to me is more "why ObjC and not C / C++" which would have been multi-plattform at least codewise.

and the reason for not using BMax is quite obvious at least to me: When the MacIDE was started, BMax modules were not that advanced that it would have been able to access the needed darvin stuff to create the IDE( it isn't even now, as you know, there is no GUI or even event module yet)

I reckon only Blitz Research can answer that one.

If I was to take one wild guess I'd say it was so they didn't have to write BlitzMAX in 'vi'.

I'm not sure anything happened to it.

I'm not sure I fully understand the question. How are they 'not using it'?

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

They aren't.

Sure it is. But it might not have been 2 years ago (?) when work on the IDE was started.

It's called evolution Wedoe. You use your primitive tools (in this case C and Objective C) to make more advanced tools (in this case BlitzMAX).

Again, only something that can be answered by Blitz Research.

My guess would be 'because they wanted to do it in BlitzMAX', and thus it wouldn't matter at all what language the intermediate IDE was written in.

The way I would have done it is as follows,
make the "chicken and egg parts" in whatever tool you have too, C++ or whatever.
Make the IDE using BM with Ultraedit or similar to edit for this one task,
compile three times and voilà, three fully functional IDE's, one for each platform,
all further editing of source is done in this new IDE, stroke of genius !! :)

the ide took 2 years o_O...

That IDE had function folding and stuff. terabit posted a video of it a long time ago.

Because creating MacOS X apps is very easy using ObjC and Cocoa in XCode.

Think you pretty much answered your own question there. ;] If the FLTK and/or BlitzPlus modules are still in development, it's reasonable to assume that coding an app like an IDE and having the one source cross platform, would be a nightmare task =]


I reckon when we're talking about Max, it was the egg. =]

In that analogy the Chicken was the IDE, and the Egg was BlitzMAX. Since much of BlitzMAX is actually written in BlitzMAX, the tools we have today are obviously the result of an itterative effort.

Thus it's reasonable to assume that BlitzMAX the language, the bcc compiler, the bmk make tool and the BlitzMAX IDE where in paralell and simultaneous development, and all whould thus originally have had to be written in a language that already exsists, such as C++/ObjectiveC.

And it would not be possible to create an IDE that's built onto the BlitzMax modules if the modules themselves aren't finished.

It's like designing a new microprocessor on a pc that hasn't been built entirely yet.

Or driving a new type of train (that can only run on a new type of track) of a railroad system that hasn't been built yet.

What a stupid and expensive sounding idea. =]

No, it's not like that at all.
It's more like making the IDE in UE and then switching to BM IDE after :P

But anyway, this is not a big issue to me and I know all hairsplitters have
catched my opinion anyway, I just think it's a but of a put-off to give the Mac-owners
a fully working IDE and PC-owners not, when it didn't have to be like that at all......

Are Protean still on sale Rob ?
(If it is, sign me up for a copy !)

> I just think it's a but of a put-off to give the Mac-owners a fully working IDE and PC-owners not

When the alternative was not to have blitzmax in my hands yet, I'll take the beta editor that we have for now.

Yeah Protean is still on sale and the BM module viewer is extremely usefull if you programm on OO base and not on procedural base ( which is the only thing the help covers )
( there are other very usefull features like selective module compile etc )
But don't forget Protean BM is still in beta ( available to all costumers )

I wasn't aware there was a MacOSX version of UltraEdit.

What he said.

1. Make the IDE in w32 with UE
2. Compile the source to MacOS
3. Voilà !

That wouldn't actually make a whole lot of sense given the 'max compiler was apparently written first on the Mac...you wanted mark to use two *separate* dev PCs when he only needed to use (his preferred) one?

In any case, the point is moot. Mark obviously decided that it was easier to build an IDE in objC on Mac for Mac first, then move onto Max. If he had written it in Max, you'd be waiting another 6 months at least while he wrote a fully functional, cross platform GUI (wrapper?) in Max. And we already know that he'd much prefer to work on the 3d module than the GUI module next...

The grounds for both 3D and GUI are already done in B3D and B+,
why not just release that now and further improve BM later ?

Maybe because kludgeing it on, would be messy, and a lot of work, and might just aswell take as long as doing it properly anyway.

How so?

Monorail and maglev trains do this.
They cannot run on a normal track.
A new kind of track has to be created in order to use these trains.

Since BlitzMax doesn't have it's GUI support figured out yet I expect it was easier to develop an IDE in other languages for now. When it has official GUI support I wouldn't be too surprised if we'd see a BMX IDE written in BlitzMax that is exactly identical accross the board, which would be ideal.

You may be right but it seems sensible to me.....

Mac owners have a fully working IDE because the Mac version has been launched. You are using beta software on the PC, it's completely unfair to complain about a beta product.


Protean is always on sale. =]


You're right. The Monorail -is- a stupid and expensive idea. =]

If BR knew anything about PR and did it "*my* way the PC IDE would not be beta !
I am *NOT* complaining about the beta, I'm more like whimpering about the way they work,
not about the product ! Can you spot the difference ?

Maybe living on the wrong side of the earth makes them think upside down or something ;P

True, it wouldn't even be out for another 6 months.

You own a PC, not a Mac?

Let me just ask you, being an expert on PR and everything, what you would have done. You're running a company with an existing userbase. You've got a new product ready (well, more or less) that may appeal to a small percentage of that userbase (the 5 or so people who didn't buy BlitzPlus for the GUI elements, but for it's improved 2D performance), or a large percentage of new users (everyone who wants to make cross-platform 2D shareware games).

Now considering your business goal is profit maximisation, would you release that product now, so you could start a new revenue stream (as previous ones have probably dried up by now) or whould you continue doing product R&D until you where ready to release a product that appealed to your entire existing userbase, keeping in mind that since your old products aren't really generating any new revenue anymore, you might be run out of business, well before you reach the second goal?

For someone who is such an expert on PR, you don't seem to have much of a sense of business practices.

Pretty obvious isn't it ?

Actually I'm pretty good at that.

No, not if they did what I describe above. You are turning the situation upside down. I'm talking about what they *should* have done, not what they already did.

- The Mac-base of people are very small compared to the possible PC-base.
- This is completely new ground and you not being the adventurous type know that may be hazardious.
- BM should appeal both to existing B2D, B3D and B+ users with the right launching.
Even hints about phasing out the now old Blitz-versions in a year or two would create massive sales to the existing base.
- A lot of the existing BB-users are diehard fans of BB and will buy BM no matter what just because it is a BR product, sales guaranteed !
- Telling Mac-users in 6 months time that BR will now also release BM for Mac pointing at the large amount of PC users already using
it (at that time) and the cross-platform advantages would generate a lot of Mac sales, then do the same with Linux-users
or even possibly the Linux marked before the Mac marked.
- If you goal is maximum profit you always concentrate to the largest group first. There are a lot more to earn if you export a product
from Denmark to the world than if you import a product to you country selling only to danes, don't you agree ?

The biggest problem BR have at the moment is that they are *not* listening to their existing users,
totally messed up the forums for no reason watsoever and fail to reply to a lot of questions asked.
If they had hired a person who knew even a little about handling of customers and for God sake
someone who could answer questions, fast and professionally, they would be a lot better off.
Skidracers at times grumpy appearance on threads are more like an old burned-out switchboardhag than what BR should try to appear as outwards, IMHO.

The *good* thing they did for themselves this time is the module-system of BM who will create revenue for a long time as new modules are being released.

There does exist firms with even worse PR handeling than BR tho.

AND AGAIN: I am *not* complaining about BlitzMax, it's a great tool, and will probably evolve to be even better in some time !!!

I don't blame Skidracer a bit for being grumpy. If I had to deal with this community every day and had to be nice about it, I'd get bitchy too. You people are annoying. :)

I'm not, I'm blaming BR for using him as a frontend toward customers.

"If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen !"

Customers, the people who give you money/you crave money from, always are.
And that will never change !

AND AGAIN: I am *not* complaining about BlitzMax, it's a great tool, and will probably evolve to be even better in some time !!!

Hey, I bought 5 copies of BlitzPlus, are you saying I'm the only one to buy it for the 2D performance? ;]

I belive the blitz ide should be made open-source for us. We would then add better features.

nooo.. that would open up for a hundred different version of the IDE.. and imagine all the complaining and confusion around that scenario... :(

Or one can use TextPad as an IDE/editor, works like a breeze :-). Took me ten minutes to create the file for syntax highlighting, and now I compile with ctrl-5.

Open Source? That's an answer to a question nobody asked.

I gave up and bought protean.

That's a false positive. The North American and European markets are dwarfed by the possible Chinese and Indian markets, tho' I don't hear you argueing in favour of Cantonese or Punjabi versions.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Why?

Read Marks worklog more closely.

And so they have. So tell me again how there's some universal flaw in BR marketing? People are actually buying a veriosn they can't use (the Mac version, obviously) just to get access to Windows and Linux versions.

No you don't. No money in selling an AIDS vacine in Africa, even though it's a massive continent where AIDS is running wild. Why? No one can afford to pay for it.

If your goal is maximum profit, you appeal to the group with more purchasing power, or poor judgement, preferably a combination of both.

Surely that would depend on the product? Supply and demand and all that. If I was to import something that was in short supply and high demand in Denmark, then surely I could make much more money than I would by exporting something to the rest of the world that was a dime a dozen.

Which is totally a non-arqument as Eclipse is just that (an open source IDE) and have none of those problems you mentioned. The proverbial proof, is in the pudding.

You contradict yourself FD, the reason why China and India is not as appealing markeds are becuse most people there, as in Africa, can't afford it.

It is your own words from a thread in the OT section I as was hinting about. Saying something about being cured forever to be adventurous ever again.

It once upon a time stated for months that BlitzMax was due for release September 2002.

BR makes good products and the existing users know this.
Mac have but a small percentage of the marked and there are millions of possible windows-buyers
out there ready to spend their money if BR played their cards right.
As of now they do not, they treat their existing users bad by not listening to questions,
not replying on threads, closing threads and deleting posts and they won't even comment on it.
They are a small company, they can't treat customers the way Microsoft, Pinnacle or Adobe do.

You should listen to me on these matters because I'm quite good at this, I do
know a lot about marketing and how to sell and how to make customers feel good.

IMO there should be someone who knew about these matters hired by BR and everything would be a lot better off.
- Someome always polite no matter what is being thrown at them
- Someone who can reply fast and individually if possible
- Someone who answers mail
- A woman would be to prefer as most of this type customers are men and they will automatically treat a woman better, accept more and so forth.
- Mark as head programmer should update his worklog at least once a week and use half an hour at the start of every workday to address the community
- Stop the secrecy, be more open about everything, tell why they changed the forums, why they won't answer mail etc, we are not all idiots in the community
- Make BM for windows first to make the existing customers feel they are being taken care of, not degrade them to second to the (evil) Mac-users.
- Customers are the ones who keep BR in business nowdays giving BR money for their *Windows* products, we should be treated *good* !
- Mark's worklog should not be hidden among the other workslogs, there should be a big button on the homepage for "Marks Worklog".
- Unregistered users should have somewhere they could post questions they'd like to have answered before purchasing BliztBasic.
......I could go on and on.

In my first year as sales manager I tripled the sales and I doubled it every year for the next three years I had that position,
I do know what I'm talking about here, there are lots of psychology in it and I know a lot about that too.

Your comment implies BTW that BM is not worth the money and that is BS.
Selling AIDS vaccine in Africa is a great idea, if they don't have the money to buy it you just have to find someone who
will pay it for them ! See the opportunity, not the problem, do you get it ?

We agree on that the IDE would be better off as open source given what we have today.
(Yes I did cave in an bought Protean, great tool, BR *should* have made a deal with Protean making it the official IDE,
that would make a great package, BM could be $100 instead of $80 and everyone would have loved it.
BR could forget all about IDE and concentrate on other stuff,
it's called outsourcing, software-companies do it all the time.)


AND AGAIN: I am *not* complaining about BlitzMax, it's a great tool, and will probably evolve to be even better in some time !!!

Windows users are taken care!
This is why it was released on mac first as mac is not a large bunch of bugs and users that are totally incapable of installing ANYTHING especially drivers.

So Mark can fix the real coreissues of BM and when BM works fine he can start carrying for the tousands of "bugs" ( 99.99% by users that are to lazy to read docs, 0.01% real bugs ) that will come up do to the largest computer problem in the world ... this living thing between keyboard and chair ...

Because of my website I got contacted by a possible Blitz-customer the other day asking all kinds
of questions about BlitzBasic, I guess he came to me due to lack of response elsewhere.

Well, I did in the end recommend him to buy Blitz3D, how about that ?
:)

What's that got to do with phasing out B3D/B+?


As already proven by most of the people on this forum, including myself. And -especially- Yavin <grin>

Just that I'm not convinced everything he puts there are reliable......

How is that a contradiction? And 'being able to afford' it is not an issue, as the increased number of sales could compensate for a lower retail price, and besides Mac owners (seeing as they have already bought Macs) have already proven they have the purchasing power required.

I don't see how that's relevant considering I'm not BRL's marketing strategist. Besides, I was speaking about buying shitty software.

I would think that most people have sympathy for how release dates can slip when the lead developer needs some time off, to take care of his mother, who is slowing being killed by cancer.

I can't believe someone who works as a nurse doesn't.

You keep saying this but it's simply not true.
Firstly Windows-buyers are generally opposed to buying software. Ask Microsoft or ESA/Elspa and they will tell you that next after the PlayStation, Windows is the single most pirated platform in the world. Look at all the rediculous copy protection schemes that have emergerd recently. Just because there is a handful of honest Windows users doesn't mean everyone is.
Secondly Windows-buyers are also generally opposed to developing software. Been to "The Party" or "The Gathering" lately? Notice how many people there produce somethingf as opposed to how many people just come to play LAN games. Remember what it was like 15 years ago? Mac owners on the other hand are creative by nature. I don't know why, but the Mac just has a broader appeal to artistic types, and even tho' many creativity programs have found their way to the PC the Macintosh (and Silly Graphics) is still the platform of choice for art studios and advertisemnet professionals.

So how big is the Windows market really? Yes it's true that the various Windows platforms are used by probably 85% of everyone who has a computer. That however does not nessecarilly make the Windows market the most lucrative, because not everyone is a potential customer. The kind of person who is likely to buy BlitzMAX has to fit a very specific profile, one I might add that in my personal experience isn't very common amoungst Windows users.

I believe James fits the bill on all three of the above.

I disagree. Mark as a programmer should update his worklog when he's made progress, and should spend the majority of his time programming (as that's what programmers do). I would wager that Mark already spends well more than half an hour a day with community issues.

It's not about being an idiot, it's about being a childish whineing hatemonger. Software design is not something you can do in a commision, and especially not as large a commision as the Blitz community with as conflicting interests as we have here (not if you ever want to ship a product). If you want to know what happens when developers "listen" to their users, take a long hard look at DBPro.

But existing customers are being taken care of! Existing customers have 3 (4 if you count Maplet) products to keep them happy. Whineing over BR wanting to expand their userbase into new markets just seems petty in that regard, wouldn't you agree?

No it doesn't.

No it isn't. Nobody is going to "Pay it for them" because doing so is not a very good tactic for profit maximization.

Problem is, Protean is Windows only.

I'd still prefer an Eclipse Plug-in. Eclipse has many features that Protean is lacking.

I agree that they should out-source development of the IDE. The question is who should they out-source it to?

The obvious answer is for microsoft to build the .net framework on OSX and Linux.
Let's do a poll first to gauge support, then mount a campaign to get microsoft on the way. And perhaps those who seem to have so much free time should take up the reigns ;-)

:-)

I don't know where to start regarding you last post FD, I have trouble taking you seriously.....
I have great respect for you and your earlier posts but that last posting is ridiculous.
I have already answered to almost anything you make a point of.
I think you should admit for once you're very wrong and leave it at that.

I had no idea that Mark's mother have had cancer for the last two years, noone told me that,
you use that against me personally as if it were something everyone knew, well I didn't !

I'm leaving this thread now, have a field day if you feel like it, I'm not going to repeat myself again.
I'm sorry if I got a bit to carried away in the debate....

No you haven't. You've just taken an opposing position. There's a difference.

First of all, I often admit to being wrong. If I'm so wrong however, it should be a simple matter to refute my claims. So go right ahead.

She died in January of 2004. Again I suggest you read the worklogs more closely.

There is a framework for linux and I'm relatively sure there's one in the works for osx.

Please no!
Cocoa is just so much better than _any_ other framework. Its power and elegance make .NET look about as good as MFC (for those that don't know, that means 'not at all good').

A better solution is to use GNUStep to port the OS X 'IDE' to Linux and Windows. ;)

Forward thinking... nice :-)

As for the IDE.. I think Eclipse would be a viable cross-platform alternative ;-)

Are you working on a BlitzMax plug-in for Eclipse, Brucey?

Cacao isn't the same thing as .NET
in best you can compare .NET with Java but java is just java not a framework for many different languages ...

eclipse would be a alternative ... someone works on a BMX Eclipse thing (see worklogs) ... but there are people that do not really like JAVA that much ;)

I think more people dislike the .NET framework!! ;)

if they dislike it or not is unimportant.
It will be windows standard framework within the next 2 years

people behaved the same when XP came out but they learned their lesson ( .NET 1.0 was crap and made lot of probs. 1.1 is far better and 2.0 will kick the whole thing :) )

Oh, well I guess you're right, really. But that's no reason to go start believing the -opposite- of everything Mark says, either ;]


It could probably be claimed as a charitable tax deduction, in which case I could imagine a number of large companies offering to spring for it for a bit of cheap publicity.


There are communities who have done that themselves. .NET has about as much portability as BlitzMax does in the games department, but when it comes to app programming the differing GUI elements from platform to platform make it an absolute headache, if not impossible, to get working right.

I'm interested in seeing how BlitzMax handles it in the future, but I can't imagine it being too pleasant... We already know that the BlitzPlus module is for Windows, FLTK for Linux, god knows what for Mac... It all comes down to the wrapper/helper module.


I don't think anyone was publicly told what the problems were, but Mark had posted publicly somewhere (once or twice) that he was having family troubles/regarding his mum.


Well not I. At least .NET is fast.


Microsoft have already forced it onto XP users via SP2 (or was it in SP1?) and it will almost certainly make it's debut 'non-removable' appearance in Longhorn. No doubt will be included in Win2000SP5, too (again, if it hasn't been already).

was forced with SP2?

Don't know ... had it long before due to Visual Studio 2003 ...

In longhorn the kernel is .net based as the Win2k3 kernel is straight connected to .net as well.

WinAPI won't exist anymore, DX in its actual form does not exist anymore and unmanaged stuff will have a hard time on longhorn ...

so BM will have quite some problems then I fear ...

The Win32 Api will continue to exist for a very long time. Removing it would break every existing application, which is exactly what microsoft has always tried to avoid throughout the evolution of Windows.
Applications can be traditional windows applications, Longhorn managed code based on XAML, WinFX, etc, and a combination of both, where an application contains both managed and unmanaged code. E.g. an unmanaged C++ app will be able to access features of Avalon, in various different ways, to provide features specific to longhorn.

Yeah MS tried to avoid stuff
But as a mather of fact Longhorn is the first "from scratch" rewrite of Windows since 10 years or more.
So every feature is specific to longhorn, no ( or hopefully no ) "old crap" is around anymore

Sorry, but that is not true. You might like to go and look at the documentation in the longhorn developer centre on msdn.
Longhorn introduces a new way of developing applications, using XAML and WinFX, together with other new technologies like avalon.

It is a bit naive to think that longhorn is built from scratch. Windows contains tens of millions of lines of code - they are not about to rewrite all that. Just imagine the number of bugs they would introduce. The task would be so enormous that it would never appear. They would have to re-implement everything, including the Win32 API (note that msdn states that most existing applications will continue to run on longhorn).

The user interface stuff will change - avalon, aero, etc - as there will be new ways of doing things e.g. indigo, XAML, etc, but all existing Xp-style stuff will still be there as well.

Not to mention that Longhorn seems to be continually de-scoped every month to reduce the 'new' features 'cos Microsoft can't deliver...

Gee whiz, sorry I brought it up ;]