Geoff the Medio wrote:TBeholder wrote:All-important object window ... [has] no hotkey, and cannot be assigned one, only opened from pseudo-tray.
Should be simple enough to implement. Edit:
done /Edit
Yup. It required copypasting two lines from existing hotkeys, which was obvious.
That's kind of my point here: tiny changes that would make interface more convenient were self-evident and not made for years, while things that reduce possibilities for further development - repeatedly.
Isn't conducive to seeing the project's state as healthy.
Geoff the Medio wrote:Tech tree in default ruleset remains laughably socialist and laughably semiliterate.
It being too "socialist" is a new complaint about the tech tree... could you elaborate on what you mean? I'd tend to think of community structure type issues being more a factor of what species is on a planet, rather than what techs they've researched.
Not quite new.
Dilvish wrote: Well, it doesn't seem to be going in the direction of Ayn Randian rock-paper-scissor-playing farmers, that is true.
...
of Ayn Randian... <click> laughingtrack.wav
Dilvish wrote: Some of your beefs though are just weirdly stale-- for example, this comment about the content files being "totally not a script, except it's of course a script" is apparently the shade of some argument from your time here five years ago, but in all the years I've been contributing, 'scripts' is exactly what we've been calling the (majority of) content files. Perhaps that's an argument you halfway won, way back when, but you checked out just a bit too soon to realize it.
Well... I
did simplify it a little, for a summary.
But my point here is - things that are now in txt supposedly because they are "easy"... turn out to be not anywhere as simple as "labeled adjustments for meters to display", often clunky and turning "autogenerated-effects-descriptions" on shows a lot of amazingly messy pieces - and not only in Robotic Shield Interface.
Dilvish wrote: Also, whence comes the bitterness? Did you make a big donation to someone based on some promise of X, Y and/or Z? A lot of us are enjoying the way the game is progressing, what's up with dumping a bottle of stale piss all over our marbles?
To let you tell me why it's wrong, of course. If any.
I just plainly show how the situation looks to me. No more, no less...
In context of myself being a pseudo-random example of someone not dug in too deep to see the forest beyond the yesteryear leaves. I can't claim immunity to the same pitfalls, just that right now obviously am now.
And in the end, it's purely about mine (but then, possibly others who did not ask this question - why not?) doubts of whether it's a good idea to as much as approach said forest close enough to see the leaves.
I see it progressing thusly: when once was a beta with some placeholders (adding some clutter, but not obviously buggy or as much as confusing) for interesting stuff, now there's a beta that gets even somewhat-working stuff cut out.
See your own mission statement? Do
you think the project moves toward it or from it?
If you are fine with the observed trend, or prefer to dismiss my observation out of hand as "not liek u" - well, it's your project, of course.
I only want some clarity on the part of big picture that depend on you and not me - because from outside and right now the big picture looks like it needs clarity.
Dilvish wrote: It sounds like you're a programmer, so if some of the UI deficiencies bother you, fix 'em up! Lot's of folks will say "thanks!" (even if some might complain about how you did it).
I hoped for this response.
It brings up my second point fully:
I would have started with quietly making a branch, fixing half of my nitpick list and trying to make a generic solution to some bigger shortcomings or at least a good stopgap - simply due to being the sort of a critter not attracted to "hello" threads.
If not misgivings about whether it would be anything more than adding a blind tunnel to a dead-end road.
I could revert a specific thing annoying me there, or another while trying to improve something else.
But if the mentioned trend is persistent, it's likely to end up like this: after a few trivial fixes, improving the project would require either branching off from, say,
this point then cherry-picking and pulling forward a branch, or changes that amount to the same. Then master gets increasingly less compatible with it and worse as a source to cherry-pick from at the same time. While a good look at the result and the list of commits can chase away other potential developers before they get to see that branch. I can only speak for myself, of course, but won't even register on the forum and moved on if discovered FO searching github today rather than drifted in and out 5 years ago - do you think it's possible that a dozen of others (and better than me) already did exactly this, and another will tomorrow? Then ultimately this whole process could be highly counterproductive, compared to... anything, really. Even picking up a completely stopped project alone would have
much better prospects than this approach. And there are ones merely slowed down - that are much farther away from "worth playing" (as in, for the sake of playing, rather than to satisfy short-term curiosity with experiments) state - but they move
toward it, not away from it.
Hence the simple reason behind my question: I want to know whether there is any point for me to spend time on FO at all, or it indeed rolls where it seems to roll, so just... let it roll.
I unfortunately was distracted by other things 5 years ago, but had no reasons to ask this question back then. It looked very promising, even with all the warts and ugly placeholders.