26-10-2001 23:16									#31
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It is frequently said of Java that errors which are runtime errors in other languages are compile errors in Java.

The system of using strings rather than objects completely subverts that very large advantage of Java.

It requires a lot of unnecessary code to test whether the string is a legitimate one. It requires a lot of unnecessary if then else code or search loops, rather than using polymorphism, to select the correct action.

I cannot see where code like:
sites = getSites("farm");
is easier to manage than:
sites = getSites(SiteType.FARM);

The point is that the second one will not compile if SiteType.FARM doesn't exist or if it is incorrectly typed. The first will, if for example "ffarm" is typed by accident. So then I
have to write code to check to see if that has happened. This I will not do.

I did not suggest that the econ model should be restructured correctly (though, in the long run it would be a good idea), only that the interface to other models should use the robust system.

Having been involved in a system with 12,000 classes the prospect of 50 specials doesn't worry me if it makes the code more reliable and decreases the debugging load.

I am not really interested in "selling" anyone on good coding practices, I just refuse to use bad ones myself.

Cheers

	27-10-2001 00:42									#32
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Hi Gary:

quote: Originally posted by Gary Thomas It requires a lot of unnecessary code to test whether the string is a legitimate one. It requires a lot of unnecessary if then else code or search loops, rather than using polymorphism, to select the correct action.

Error checking of the strings for everything in the econ model requires something like 15 lines of code total. There are no search loops or other such junk needed in the code I have that I know of. The names are keys in HashTables, which makes tracking down objects fairly fast. If you get null from the HashTable then you know something doesn't match up. See paragraph below your last quote if its not clear what I mean.

quote: I cannot see where code like: sites = getSites("farm"); is easier to manage than: sites = getSites(SiteType.FARM);

And when a scenario designer wants to add the resource 'bauxite' that we don't have, my approach works fine whereas your approach requires extra code to geterate SiteType.BAUXITE at runtime or some other hack. This counterbalances all the benfits you are espousing, and that I agree are real and significant.

quote: The point is that the second one will not compile if SiteType.FARM doesn't exist or if it is incorrectly typed. The first will, if for example "ffarm" is typed by accident. So then I have to write code to check to see if that has happened. This I will not do.

You needn't do it, I've already done simple name checking and it is trivial. It returns an error message as soon as it comes across any name that doesn't match. If the "farm" sector doesn't find "farm" Resources, or "farm kapital" it squawks. It would choke on any "ffarm" resource. So although any errors are not found at compile they are apparent immediately at runtime.

Seeing as you've said Resources should go in the econ package, it'll be my problem anyway. I am Not going to refactor the whole econ package right now just for this. So how about you make it internally good your way, but make it accept the strings? That way we are set to move to the FARM method at some TBD future point. I can just do it myself and take it off your hands. But I doubt you'd like the result .

Lets just agree on something and get this going so I can kill the fake terrain .

On Mine vs GoldMine, it does occur to me that it may be worth having at least a handfull of resource general types in there explicitly. FE Mine could have a type name field that could be "gold" or "tin" or... that way we could have the Mine objects override some methods in Resource that are finetuned to mining as opposed to Resources like Farmland, or Forest that behave differently.

	27-10-2001 01:08									#33
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This was the result of a server busy message - the message got sent twice.

Cheers

	27-10-2001 01:10									#34
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quote: And when a scenario designer wants to add the resource 'bauxite' that we don't have, my approach works fine whereas your approach requires extra code to geterate SiteType.BAUXITE at runtime or some other hack.

It appears that I mistundestood the use of site types. If they are merely data (that is, read in from a scenario), then none of my comments apply. I had assumed that there was hard-coded information about them. Sorry about my confusion.

If the strings are data, all I will do is search for the string and return 0 if it isn't found (that is, for example, no gold mines are present).

I am still a little curious about how different site types do different things. Is this also specified in the scenario data?

Does this fit your needs?

Cheers

	27-10-2001 03:24									#35
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Yeah, I guess returning 0 if there are no sites locally will work fine. If we can I'd like to include the "is the string a legal resource" test, but I can do that if you don't want to.

quote: I am still a little curious about how different site types do different things. Is this also specified in the scenario data?

Economic sectors like farming or gold mining are named with strings. Usually a square will only have the four basic sectors (Food, Resources, Production, and Services [FRPS]) plus no or one special. Sectors know by a string name what resources they use. (Production works differently, I won't get into that here). Sectors produce a good named by a string. The named goods are either fundamental units in the economic system (FRPS) or are specials that can be converted into some combination of the basic goods. But the good part about specials is if in limited supply, they turn into Many units of the basic goods.

If we don't include Bauxite in the game and someone wants to they put the info in an ini file (right now its done in static blocks, but I'll update that soon). The info describes how to:
1. set up an "Aluminum" sector that
2. uses the resource "Bauxite" (ore we can just call it "Aluminum" since that's what the output is),
3. produces the good "Aluminum",
4. has an "Aluminum kapital" infrastructure class that tells how many aluminum smelters are present, and
5. enters a bunch of parameters that determine the math of how it all works in 1-4, including the conversion between Aluminum and basic goods.

If we decide we want to go the route where Aluminum is needed to build aircraft, the system will be able to handle that too, but lets not go there right now .

	28-10-2001 04:13									#36
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I'm getting close to the first feeble implementation of Merchants. And to make merchants interesting we need probably at least three economic specials. I thought I would post this so people had a chance to get in their opions if they're strong!

Right now Gold is in there. Gold acts as Services when cashed in because Services = Money in the current system. A second one I'd like is Tin (assuming copper is widespread this means bronze). By my thinking Tin would change into Resources since it is a resource that helps make better mfg goods (it could also be Production). I'm looking for one more (or maybe two) ancient big specials. If we look for ones that match the remaining basic goods (Food and Production) I have a few ideas. Food could be Spices or Salt, since both help preserve food, and Production could be things like metalwares or cloth.

Any ideas?

Needless to say we'll have to characterize specials distributions in the scenarios fairly soon too. And maybe get artwork to show them?

	28-10-2001 06:05									#37
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Exactly what specials isn't that important..Tin, Salt and maybe wool or cloth are OK.

I have a paragraph on specials in the ecology version I'm working on (and which is delayed longer than I like..sorry!). I link their distribution to a few prerequisites (temperature, climate, and such) and after that it's probably best to limit them to provinces or at least continents, to avoid giving everyone the same.
(This is limited to the living resources.)

A question about production, though: while requiring specific inputs for specific products could be annoying while playing, have you considered separating just energy and resource sites? Resources have been fairly easy to attain and conserve during history, but getting energy in sizable amounts, and processing it, was problematic until the IR. Until then population was most important, but after that industrial development. In game terms, FE if you have power infra you can use energy as labor.

	28-10-2001 07:05									#38
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I suppose Wood is a Resource? It was a pretty important trade item in ancient times.

For Production, I suspect that the most important was harness for chariot or riding horses. The nomads couldn't make it and had to purchase it, particularly the metal bits (a pun!). On the other hand they had the horses.

Nails were another standard.

Incense was much desired.

Cheers

	29-10-2001 00:39									#39
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Gary:

I will send you the current econ code in about seven hours, and then you can go ahead and integrate and shuffle on Govt hierarchy to your heart's content. I'm assuming this fits with your plans, and if not, please fill me in. The reason this is a good time at least from my end is I have a heavy week in terms of RL and wouldn't get much done Mon-Wed anyway.

Do you want to do the game.econ type changes too while you have pretty much the whole code? (Need to hear from Laurent on this).

If you get the chance during all that stuff if you can throw in Resources next, I'm in a position to use them in testing the growing capabilities of Merchants.

Simon: I responded to your points in the main Econ thread.

The specials I have in so far are:
Gold -> Services
Tin -> Resources
Cloth -> Manufactured Goods
for Food maybe just Livestock?

	29-10-2001 12:58									#40
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I am currently busy with the game.military retailoring. The area that impact me most are some relocation problems between game.militray and game.model.military, due to other classes that reference the latter. I am slowly cleaning things up and seeing what changes are needed, so don't hurry in sending me something. I already have a mess to clean up, and will be looking into orders in particular. When I am clean enough so that econ begins being a real problem, I will ask for it and send my classes. For the moment it is too much of a mess...

	29-10-2001 15:37									#41
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Ok, Laurent, I won't send you any code until it will either make your wildest dreams come true, or you tell me you're ready

	03-11-2001 00:32									#42
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Haven't got immediate access to email, so I am using the forum.

I got D6 to compile!

Laurent: I might not have included all your new code in the version I sent you. I realized later that I got interrupted part way through incorporating it. I will check this when I get to my office in a couple of hours.

Cheers

	03-11-2001 00:35									#43
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Yippee! I have some minor mods I will send you in about an hour.

	03-11-2001 16:27									#44
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Gary and I have been talking over email on what to do for demo 5.1. What we have come up with between us is:

1. Roads Implemented. Perhaps to build them just have player draw an outline on the map and return a cost? And you'd only be able to build roads within your civ.

2. Civs with real provinces and territory in the scenarios. We will implement Gary's idea for borders (From map graphics thread).

3. Merchants (at least an alpha version)

4. Whatever else we come up with (Laurent?)

Whatcha think?

After that the next big step would be putting F_Smith's old govt/social code into the system to get a government model running. It would then be modified to match Rodrigo's new Gov't system. (At least the more important parts of it).

Technology is mostly coded, but we need to work with Richard to get the spec for individual technologies in the system before we can go anywhere.

And of course there are the military model enhancements, like ships, that will go in fairly soon.

Laurent:

I think for one of the demos soon it would be great to have a utility that would show the player all the values for elements, and units. Its not high priority, but it would help the players get the feel for what they are using. Perhaps this is premature though, and all we need is a couple of tables we can put in the manual. What do you think?

	04-11-2001 00:23									#45
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One enhancement that has been asked for several times (including by Mark) is an indication on the red moves track of how many moves it will take the unit to get there. For those of you who are familiar with Space Empires IV, I intend to use their system of a little number at the end of each line segment, 0 for the current move, 1 for the next move, and so forth.

I did code the infrastructure for this in D5 but didn't add the actual numbers, mainly because it meant farting around with text formatting. However I think I will add it for D5.1.

Cheers

	05-11-2001 13:53									#46
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quote: I think for one of the demos soon it would be great to have a utility that would show the player all the values for elements, and units. Its not high priority, but it would help the players get the feel for what they are using. Perhaps this is premature though, and all we need is a couple of tables we can put in the manual. What do you think?

As a first step, I suggest we show the players the xml resource file (I would attach it here, but since my ISP went *@!# this week-end I am at work and don't have the file at hand). There are three reasons to do it:
1) It is editable by the players so they can say if they understand it (would-be modders).
2) It displays fine in IE.
3) I don't have to show you how bad I am at GUI-design.
I'll add some comments to the file, though.

	06-11-2001 06:06									#47
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I would do that except that xml is not one of the valid file extensions for attaching a file, and the xml file doesn't display in the forum format without huge & gt and & lt modifications.

Cheers

	07-11-2001 20:44									#48
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I have constructed a super-simple tech tree for testing with demo 5.1. The only applications are the military units, and I added a new unit: legion. These techs all depend on Military Tactics, and some of them require Metallurgy or Warhorses.

The techs that affect the economy are simple: Production and Farming. Farming and Warhorses are both under Biology. Metallurgy is under Production. Production level 5 is also a prerequisite for trireme production.

I think we should aim for the following basic functionality:

Tech requirements and helper effects work as they should.

The player can allocate research to all techs, and the mechanics work properly.

The Production and Farming techs allow more investment in the various production categories, as well as increasing efficiency a little. The amount of money spent on these production categories determines the research put into the tech. Farming should also increase the Biology tech a little.

Military Tactics increases the power of all units. Fighting battles and moving troops increases this tech.

Warhorses affects the speed or movement range of cavalry units.

Metallurgy has a small affect on unit power, and affects the cost of the unit.

Once we test the functionality of this basic system and stamp out bugs, we can increase the complexity.

Attachment: xml file.zip
This has been downloaded 7 time(s).

	07-11-2001 21:12									#49
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quote: Military Tactics increases the power of all units. Fighting battles and moving troops increases this tech. Warhorses affects the speed or movement range of cavalry units. Metallurgy has a small affect on unit power, and affects the cost of the unit.

The first one could easily be put in the code since I had already made provisions for power-enhancing techs.

Rather than movement, I'd change mobility (tactical movement). I have little clue as how to implement it fast, though.

To get more than just power increase, I need to detail the tech effects in a file, and thus add some new stuff for the parser. Currently, I thought I'd have just a required tech, and required level in each element and/or unit, and use these to tweak the attack values. I can add a list of affected properties, but that means I'd put lots of tech stuff in the military file. Note you do NOT have to rewrite things like cavalry lots of time, since I have defaults, but that could be a bit complicated. Rich, can you post these effects in a specific thread? I think it requires some design before coding (although I can get Military Tactics alone in pretty fast).

	07-11-2001 22:41									#50
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Richard, that's a Great idea. I'm embarassed we didn't think of a small self-contained test before. (At least I didn't think of paring the 'tech tree' way down.) Laurent, I wouldn't worry if you can't do everything Richard proposes, just so long as there is some fairly strong linkage between tech and miliatary. I doubt we will get even this simple a framework into D5.1, which has fairly modest goals, and will hopefully come out in 2 weeks or so. But D5.2 should work if Gary can put together a crude tech interface and put the rest of the tech hookups in. What do you think Gary?

Last edited by Mark_Everson on 07-11-2001 at 22:53

	07-11-2001 22:48									#51
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I had a feeling the proper architecture wasn't there for different tech effects like movement versus power. Bad planning on my part. I'll post in the technology thread.

	07-11-2001 23:15									#52
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quote: But D5.2 should work if Gary can put together a crude tech interface and put the rest of the tech hookups in. What do you think Gary?

I am offended. The complete tech interface has been available for about seven months (that is, the "couple of weeks" it took to get D5 going).

When I have the upgraded post-D5 code working (and this means tidy up the TF box and repair the movement orders, and the minor and trivial matter of getting the econ frames visible again) I will hook the tech interface in. I assume it will work from the start. For details of the interface see the old tech thread and possibly some subsequent modifications.

The tech system uses a different implementation of the SAX interface for XML from the military model. The military model approach is better because Laurent designed it for the purpose, the tech one was taken from another context and contorted for the tech editor. I hope to rationalize this fairly soon - I have done some of the work, but D5 then the command refactoring have intervened.

I don't think that any subsequent changes will affect the tech code or interface, which are pretty general.

Cheers

	08-11-2001 05:33									#53
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quote: Originally posted by Gary Thomas I am offended. The complete tech interface has been available for about seven months (that is, the "couple of weeks" it took to get D5 going).

I wasn't talking about a Code interface, which you have done, but a Graphical User Interface component. One that tells the player about tech levels, rates of progress, where the RPs come from, and lets the player put money into tech to affect rates of change. This is not even speced out completely, so you Can't have done it already .

I would do it myself, but you wouldn't like it and insist on redoing it, so by default its your job. The hazards of having high standards .

	10-11-2001 01:32									#54
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Aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhhhh!

	10-11-2001 18:17									#55
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Gary: Aside from being able to provoke you into fits there would be another advantage to your doing a GUI for Tech. I could copy it! As you have noticed the econ GUI elements are thrown together by me using Visual Cafe's page designer. If I had something good to use as a template, maybe I could do better .

	11-11-2001 01:06									#56
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You are carrying buttering-up to a new level.

I would need some kind of specification of the choices available to a player. Do they select the things to research? Or the distribution of "research points" among research objectives? I really do not have the time to scan through the forum to get answers to this kind of question.

If someone can give me a list of the decisions to be made by the player, I will do the GUI.

However, bear in mind that the same decisions will need to be made by the AI. This should be implemented in parallel.

Right now I am plowing my way through an movement orders system in the case where there is no guarantee that all the units will be in the same square. What idiot insisted on having that?

Grrrr.

	11-11-2001 05:46									#57
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All we need for now is something like the econ interface where the player adjusts the RP allocation.

Here's a possibility. I hope the forums will read html form tags:

	11-11-2001 06:02									#58
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Yes, tables cause spooky things to happen. Yours isn't the biggest white space I've seen.

What does the RP Allocation part mean? The RPs are tagged so they automatically go wherever they're supposed to, no? So how can the player control it, other than by 'buying' RPs with investment from the treasury? At least that is the picture I've always had.

Below is what I already put in the Tech D6 thread, but since the discussion has moved back here, I'll put it here:

What do you think is best for a simple tech GUI? I suggest:

Tells the player about tech level for each tech,
possibly rate of progress,
where the RPs come from,
and lets the player put money into tech to affect rates of change, and
Estd turns to the next few application breakthroughs (Legion etc.)

The last one is to inject a little fun factor in it.

Got any other high-level ideas or suggestions for implementations of these and/or layout?

I suspect the AI could just run on autopilot (no tech spending) for now. We may not want ancient rulers to have much luck putting money into tech, but I suggest for now we should do it (perhaps overdo it) so the player has something active they can do with the tech model.

	11-11-2001 06:22									#59
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quote: Originally posted by Mark_Everson Yes, tables cause spooky things to happen. Yours isn't the biggest white space I've seen.

I seem to have fixed it. The problem came from the program automatically sticking a {br} tag in whenever you hit enter. If all the html code is on one line, it won't insert all those {br} tags.

quote: What does the RP Allocation part mean? ... So how can the player control it, other than by 'buying' RPs with investment from the treasury?

quote: We may not want ancient rulers to have much luck putting money into tech, but I suggest for now we should do it (perhaps overdo it) so the player has something active they can do with the tech model.

That is the allocation for the discretionary RP's. We always had planned for some RP's, like ones from a forum or library, to be used by the player for any tech.

	11-11-2001 06:57									#60
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Good work on the table, you're the first one to figure it out!

quote: That is the allocation for the discretionary RP's. We always had planned for some RP's, like ones from a forum or library, to be used by the player for any tech.

Ah, that's even better than $ -> tech. I could put in an Education infrastructure class now rather than later, and give RPs for the amount of Education.