EQEmuWorldBuilder developers needed !

[Trumpcard]

Well, we think it's come far enough that now we want to have an integrated world creator tool to go along with the emulator releases.

What we would like is a few developers interested in working on this project, we'll set up a CVS respository alongside the server code for you to work from. Designwise it should be coded so that updates to the database structure are easy to adapt to the worldbuilder code (so we don't reinvent the wheel everytime we modify the database.) It doesnt need to be flashy, but structuraly solid and supportable, as well as adaptable. (this doesnt mean it needs to run both in linux and windows), I'd rather see a well designed Windows tool , most linux monkeys like myself have a windows box as well so I dont think a linux port is a requirement.

If you are interested, and have prior development experience, come to #eqemu on irc.eqemu.net and talk to myself or Hogie, and lets get this ball rolling !

Thanks!

[Drawde]

A world building utility on the same lines as EQEmuAdmin would be a REALLY good idea.
The admin program does have a NPC/zone viewer but it's incredibly slow at reading the data from the DB - would there be any way to optimise or speed up this process in the world builder tool?

I'll still be working on my own DB as a seperate project but will be happy to contribute things to this project (tradeskills, loot tables etc).

[Trumpcard]

On thinking about it, I think it would be better to have a suite of tools rather than a single utility. A few seperate tools would alllow you to load less into memory, and would probably speed up the tool a good bit as you wouldnt need to deal with information outside of what your primarily working on.

ie, itemeditor, spawn creator, faction assignments, etc, all in different tools.

Seperate tools would keep each of the interfaces less cluttered, and would help from a speed perscpective. WC's tool is great, but he releases it on his own schedule, this would be something that could be integrated with the server, and perhaps even bundled and delivered with it.

[fnemo]

if we can add some request about those tools is that they can be used network-wide. I mean, I use my Windows 2K station for almost every thing except the server which is on a linux box (without any keybord / mouse / screen) and if it's usable over the network it's very usefull ... isn't it ?

I'll try, on my side, to do a webmin plugin (webmin is a tool to allow configuration of a linux box via https with lots of plugin)

We'll see. If any one wanna help :p

[Lyenu X`Arie]

I'd be interested in helping with this however I can, even just by writing code by request and not being part of the team (since I probly don't have a very karma with Hogie still =/). Anyways just let me know =).

[TheClaus]

I would love to help out unfortunately my skills are only in VB and even then they lack. I do like the idea of having seperate tools to do the job. When I made my tool for NPC/Spawn it was just that and nothing else. Also I would recommend rather than connecting to a db to give the person a option of connecting. I find connecting to the db is slow and when you are inputting spawns it is quicker to just dump to a txt file and then dump it into the db. As long as you keep the id numbers in sync it will be cool.

[Trumpcard]

Lynenu, anything you can do is greatly appreciated... I dont know the whole story of what happened, but any coding you do for the project will be appeciated and used.

Claus, nothing wrong with VB if you ask me. It's a good, rapid prototyping language that is perfectly suited for simple GUI frontends... If you dont need the performance and full features of a full OO language, why use it? (Unless its just what you program in). I'm not a bigot when it comes to languages. If you can write a good, simple tool in half the time that gets the job done, that makes you twice as smart as the guy that spends twice the time developing in another language to do the same thing while he's bitching about how you do it... lol... As far as a database connection versus sql output, why not have both options if possible? 1 button says write to database, another outputs to a .sql file.

[TheClaus]

Alright Trump then I'll help out where I can. I still might have my old source code for the NPC/Spawner program. I'll see what I can do with it.

[Lyenu X`Arie]

Same here, just send things that you need done, and lets get this thing started! =)

[Trumpcard]

We'll, thanks to Kaiyodo, we have a very quick and useful item editor now to use, and we hope to be releasing it with the emulator releases.

Things that need to be done.

Some are being looked at and worked on. A spawn editor for instance is being worked on by melchoir, but it's still alpha.

The one thing that would be the most useful in my opinion is the ability to permantly place spawns in game, and manipulate them directly and easily. I know #dbspawn was being put in, but dont think it was ever completed. We could use alot of 'tweaking' commands to allow you to easily move a spawn around a bit to place it properly in game. (I would love to see a way to target a spawn and type #spawndelete and have it remove them from the database and zone.

In game utilities would be great. I think with an item editor and external npc/spawn editor in hand, we should be in a good position, but more ingame utilities would still be great for tweaking.

I visual tool that would show the zone maps, and allow you to place/edit/move mobs would be great. WC's tool is a great example, it's just very slow. If it were its own tool, with the ability to drop and drag spawns around the map, copy them and drop new ones, etc, all visually, I think we would have it down pat. Or integrating the 3d viewer with some spawn/creation utilities..


Anyone have any ideas? Post them up here, I'm just pulling things out... What are things that need to be easily editable? Kai also has a spell editor, theres no reason indivudual servers shouldnt post there own 'hakpacks' ala NWN that would force you to need to download new spell.txt files for instance on truly custom servers.

[Lurker_005]

1 round about way I had thought about for editing spawns in game was macroquest. It would be a LOT better if it was just coded into the emu though.

Quick description of how I thought of using macroquest:

/macro deletespawn <- runs macro, typed or as a hot key


deletespwn.mac would do
/say #npcinfo <- think that gives the spawn ID
parses for the spawn ID
outputs teh SQL commands to delete the spawn to the log file
then just source the logfile to actually delete the spawns.


Biggest drawback is it takes 2 steps, and dosn't happen imediatly in game. Upside is it is really versital. Using the same idea you could move the spawns or set someother property without changing the emu code to add that capability.

[Lyenu X`Arie]

I have some code on my computer of a command to edit spawns in game, I'll finish it off and let you guys try it out on my server.