[draeath]

I'm a new java programmer, and as such I am looking for ideas to get me to read and learn...

I was thinking of trying my hand on building a launcher for fs2 linux in java (using SWING, so all you need is sun-java 1.5)

I can't promise much now, but any suggestions? I realize there are other launchers in the works, but this would be mostly for my self. Who knows - maybe something nice will come of it?

(i'm thinking of eventually reading command line options from an xml file, so the launcher itself would not have to be updated for each FS2O version...)


I do have a question about MacOSX - how does paths work on the command line? Like unix? (windows has it's own launcher, so I have no intention of building something for that)

[taylor]

Sounds good.  I'd be interested in seeing what you come up with.

And yes, paths under OS X, being a UNIX-based OS, are just like Linux.  Some things can be in a slightly different place, but most of the common stuff is where you expect it.  There is a far greater chance of OS X using filesystems with different capabilities though (ie, may be case-sensitvie, may not) and more often than not the application path will contain spaces.

[draeath]

Thanks! It will be a while before I can get anything usable, there are a LOT of things I don't know how to do.

The filesystem differences won't be an issue, I was mostly concerned about fundamental differences ( / vs c:, / vs \ )

In linux, case matters, and spaces need to be escaped - on a FS without spaces the escaping won't matter (nothing to escape) and the case sensitivity won't matter either.



I can't make any promises, as I have been working 50+ hours a week lately, and I have a lot of other "real life" things coming up but I'll do what I can

[S-99]

Hmm, yes, necrobeam me or something, this is precisely what i was thinking about. Glad someone else is thinking and doing, since really all i can do is suggest. A java launcher such as the java powered fso online installer would be ****ing awesome. Then perhaps something could be made in the fso online installer to include a choice to select either, linux build, osx build, and win32 build in the future. That's really something powerful the online installer is missing, but like i said, in the future which is getting nearer. I am linux only and forever, and would like to change my settings for fs2 in feisty via launcher. Plus like java i think the only dependency in linux would be java, which is pretty basic and not at all hard to find in repos(java is a great idea for something that can be usable on all distributions).

[draeath]

I confess I haven't let done any work with this... my system has been unfortunately freespace free (been doing some work and the only way to make myself do it is to remove distractions)

But yea, I would only be using the java SDK (swing being included makes it easy) - even FreeBSD folks could use it (provided they had a reason to)

But it could also be adapted to work with windows and Mac as well.

[S-99]

Something meanwhile on my front. I got fs2 scp running under wine in ubuntu feisty(it was just missing two dll files). I had the launcher running under wine also, but it was less cooperative and whenever i try to execute it, it just goes to debugging. That was a cool milestone for me, but the purpose of running under wine was so i could run it's launcher too. I might as well go back to the 3.6.9 linux executable and wait for a launcher anyway
Maybe i should attempt a fresh install sometime?
Yeah this java thing sounds really good, a universal launcher it would be.

[Aszarsha]

Ha ! I was thinking to do a cross-platform Launcher with wxWidgets.
In fact, i have to learn wxWidgets (maybe futur plan working on wxFRED... Yes yes, wxFRED... Maybe ) and i find making the launcher is a good training.
A Java launcher could be good, but having to install Java Runtime for a launcher of a game is a bit weird in my mind.

Sorry draeath speaking about that on your thread, but as it deal with cross-platform launcher...

[karajorma]

If you decide against the launcher or want something intermediate between it and wxFRED I've been looking for someone to port the stand alone server GUI to wxWidgets too.

[S-99]

In the meantime it's a ***** getting the win launcher to run in wine. But, a universal launcher that is made for win, osx, and linux versions, i could still run the windows version with wine with the universal launcher under linux.