musings on graphics support

[Jofers]

*Shrug* I'm not a huge fan of the whole "retrofitting" anyways, I just like cool syntax notations.

Besides, you forgot to mention that parenthesis are basic mathematical notation(x + (3*x+4))

[dilettante]

There is always the possibility of a functional syntax like Array(exp1, exp2, exp3, ..) sort of a la VB/VBScript.

This wouldn't have to involve returning a Variant. Just use it for array assignments or parameters maybe?

[BinarySHOCK]

you could always use [] , {} or < > for the array parsing....

Code:

Dim X(0, 2)
X = [1,2,3]

Code:

Dim X(0, 2)
X = {1,2,3}

Code:

Dim X(0, 2)
X = <1,2,3>

i kinda like [ ] myself...

[adosorken]

I would assume that < and > are already taken... [ and ] would work nicely for arrays though...

[Sterling Christensen]

"-" isn't exactly very logical for array concatination... besides, do these look weird to you?

Code:

LINE {1, 1}-{34, 56}, 4
LINE <1, 1>-<34, 56>, 4
LINE [1, 1]-[34, 56], 4

Nah, I think it should either be an external library with "PSET x, y, c" syntax, or built in with legacy QB syntax - if any QBish graphics support at all - I'm still wondering whether it's a waste of time... does anyone care?

[adosorken]

I personally think that the "old" methods should be abandoned, but that's just my opinion.

[Z!re]

I dont care too much about it really..

But it's the simplicity of QB that makes it great (IMO)

For example, being able to spend < 5 minutes to create some crappy GFX demo, no need to worry about libraries and such.


Think of the newb:
"Ok, So I have to learn FB, and SDL, and BASS to get graphics and sound in my program?... Forget that!, I'm sticking with GameMaker"


Doesent matter much though

[wildcard]

I agree with Z!re, its qb's ease of use/simplicity for getting things done quickly that makes it so great.

If FB doesn't support QB like graphic/sound statements out of the box, someone should write a preprocessor that will convert QB to FB syntax.

[adosorken]

Think of the newb:
"Ok, So I have to learn FB, and SDL, and BASS to get graphics and sound in my program?... Forget that!, I'm sticking with GameMaker"

Quite frankly...I like this way of thinking. Keep the dangerous n00bz away!

[marzecTM]

damn it sterling and me already pointed out that an easy to use subset of the old qb gfx commands is no problem at all it wouldn't even take an afternoon to implement that with sdl or tinyptc..

IF !!!

* people are willing to give up the old syntax that is pset x, y, c instead of pset (x, y), c
* (if i'm going to implement it) 8-bit videomodes, cause god damn it it's just too outdated
* you are willing to add some kb to your exe file cause you'd have to go with the sdl library files as well (and no i can't strap that down, cause i'm definetly not going to split up the original sdl library...)

if that is fine i promise you i'll have the lib ready on saturday afternoon, need to do some stuff before at university.

is that fine with you? if so then tell me. i believe that the offered command set will make all the newbies out there really happy cause the can do something impressive like opening a graphics window and drawing to it in that small part of code

screen WHATEVAR

line 0, 0, 320, 200, RGB(255, 0, 0)
line 0, 200, 320, 0, RGB(0, 0, 255)

flip

while(inkey$=""):wend

and there you got your first windows gfx application with 24-bit per pixel and all that impressive windows glimbim

oki?