I'll talk with Ian in class tomorrow about the Manuals for sure.

Tom
________________________________________
From: destiny-bounces+tomast=bsu....@lists.launchpad.net 
[destiny-bounces+tomast=bsu....@lists.launchpad.net] On Behalf Of Doug Shook 
[dssh...@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, April 19, 2010 6:40 PM
To: zache...@gmail.com
Cc: destiny@lists.launchpad.net
Subject: Re: [Destiny] Big Changes

Also, moving the questions to a different spot on the screen will take the 
users focus away from the rabbit more than we already do.  Its difficult enough 
the way its set up now...I think trying to keep an eye on the rabbit and 
another part of the screen (potentially far away from where the player is) at 
the same time would be too difficult to keep up with.

On Mon, Apr 19, 2010 at 6:37 PM, Doug Shook 
<dssh...@gmail.com<mailto:dssh...@gmail.com>> wrote:
The answers are a consideration as well as the questions.  I have already been 
toying around with this idea for Battleship and have a ballpark figure for what 
I think each should be.

While I think that moving the questions and answers for frogger would greatly 
improve the game, I'm skeptical that we have time to accomplish this given that 
in order to make it happen ALL of the graphics would need to be redone as we 
can't afford to make the application window any bigger than it already is.  The 
questions aren't so much of an issue for frogger as the answers.  To get more 
space out of the answers I'd suggest possibly reducing the font size as the 
most viable option.  It was never designed as a vocabulary game per se, so 
while the answers will have to be relatively small (7, 8, maybe up to 10 
depending on the font) it will still function well for math and a lot of vocab 
type questions.


On Mon, Apr 19, 2010 at 6:27 PM, Zach Elko 
<zache...@gmail.com<mailto:zache...@gmail.com>> wrote:
Well, there are a few ways to look at this...

>From the perspective of the Question Generator, we need to be aware of the 
>maximum size that each game can support graphically. Some talk has been made 
>about relocating the questions and answers in Rabbit Runner to a new location 
>and replacing the answers in the gates with "A, B, C, D" for the multiple 
>choice element. I almost feel we *have* to go this route in order to make 
>Rabbit Runner useful for more than a few types of questions, because the size 
>of those gates is really limiting us at this point.

The same concerns are there for BS, but for different reasons. So in that case, 
just find out how much space we've got and limit the stuff based on that.

Also though, we only really need to support reasonable lengths for answers.

For vocab, there is no way they'll need longer than 25 characters for an answer.

For math, I'd venture to say that 10 is a safe length.


Zach J. Elko
Ball State University Unified Technology Support
Certified Hardware & Software Technician


On Mon, Apr 19, 2010 at 2:34 PM, Doug Shook 
<dssh...@gmail.com<mailto:dssh...@gmail.com>> wrote:
Another task that I just thought of to add to the list is determining what the 
maximum input size should be for the questions/answers in all of the games and 
adjusting the Question Manager to enforce this.


On Sun, Apr 18, 2010 at 9:32 PM, Zach Elko 
<zache...@gmail.com<mailto:zache...@gmail.com>> wrote:
I've already talked with Ian about the stats screens for Rabbit Runner and 
Battleship, so him and I are going to tackle that. Basically, he'll make the 
image have the labels we need, and I'll apply the stats text on top of the 
image in the appropriate places. This allows us to have a "fancy" image but 
still get our data on to it.

Also, Ian, make sure you either inform Tom, or work with Tom in regards to the 
game manuals since you and I had discussed how we wanted to do that.


Zach J. Elko
Ball State University Unified Technology Support
Certified Hardware & Software Technician


On Sun, Apr 18, 2010 at 9:30 PM, Doug Shook 
<dssh...@gmail.com<mailto:dssh...@gmail.com>> wrote:
Thanks for the suggestions Ian.  I, too, have noticed that it can take a minute 
for the sets to load up and there is an item on my list for adding in some sort 
of a notification about this.  On the bright side, however, when I use it on 
campus (as the kids will be) it goes much much faster than when I use it at 
home.  Still, making the ftp UI more friendly can't hurt, and I plan on making 
it happen.

Battleship still isn't equipped to handle vocab sets very well, I've been 
working on that off an on for weeks.  It's on my list of things to fix up too.

And while I'm on the subject of listing work that still needs to be done, the 
FTP needs to be tweaked to allow the addition/removal of classes, as well as 
the ability to change the server settings.

The window headings for Battleship and BF are blank right now, minor, but they 
should probably be added in.

I think that the green background for the stats screen in BF should also be 
changed to something graphical.  Nothing complex, maybe just the grass graphic 
or something perhaps?

Hangman also has an issue with the Launcher in that it's only running through 
one word at a time before automatically quitting.  I believe that this has to 
do with how it's interacting with the launcher.

Also, next weekend I'm borrowing an iBook from Burris so that I can get an 
installation ready for the PPC macs.  Hopefully there won't need to be many 
changes made to the software to accomplish this.

These are the only issues that I'm aware of at the moment.  Not really directed 
at anyone in particular, mostly just talking out loud to keep my own thoughts 
straight, but please feel free to add things to this list as they come up so 
that we have a record of what all needs to be done before launch, thanks.


On Sun, Apr 18, 2010 at 8:57 PM, Ian Crotty 
<archangel...@gmail.com<mailto:archangel...@gmail.com>> wrote:
My apologies for not sending an acknowledgment e-mail sooner, I've been a bit 
busy this weekend.  Every looks really good and I've very happy everything is 
tied in now.  I've been testing it off and on all weekend.  BS did have a 
hiccup when I tried to load Pedro's Journal vocab, but I get the feeling that 
was more my VM being uppity.

The menu is functioning perfectly and I couldn't be happier with it, great job 
on that Doug.  The only thing I've noticed is when the Launcher pulls the 
files.  It takes some time, at least for me, to pull each file down from the 
iLocker account.  The kids won't have the terminal to let them know what its 
doing.  I think either a progress bar or even just a message box saying 
something like "Retreiving files, please wait" would be adequate to let them 
know that the game is doing something and didn't freeze up.

Otherwise I haven't encountered any problems with the menu system and the 
games.  Zach, the blood smear is awesome.  It really adds to the game.

I'm hoping to have the new levels up by Tuesday.  I plan on 10 for now.  If you 
think there should be more, please let me know.  Doug, thank you for adding 
those new enemies in, they look great and add some more flavor to the games.

Thats about it from me.  I'll keep play testing and get those new levels done.  
If I run into any problems I'll post a bug report or let someone know.  Cheerio!

Ian Crotty
UTS Hardware Technician
Ball State University


On Thu, Apr 15, 2010 at 6:01 PM, Doug Shook 
<dssh...@gmail.com<mailto:dssh...@gmail.com>> wrote:
I just put up a bunch of changes on the repo.  A summary:

The question set ftp stuff is up and kind of working.  The Question Generator 
appears to work but some of the features are still missing, and some of the 
uploading/downloading functionality is still buggy, especially in the Question 
Manager.  I would avoid using the Question Manager for now, unless you're 
attempting to fix the bugs.  I uploaded it because it mostly works and because 
I was hoping that I could get some help from you guys to fix some of the bugs.  
I'll report all of the ones I'm aware of to the tracker later tonight, and I 
hope to have most of the features finished and the bugs worked out over the 
weekend.

I had to make some changes to QuestionSet in order to make this stuff happen.  
Now instead of taking the index of the requested set as an argument it simply 
takes the filename and loads it directly.  RR, BS, and hangman have all been 
updated to reflect this change.

The new menu system is also up and uses the Question FTP stuff.  There are one 
or two bugs in there as well, but in general it works great.  I will post those 
bugs on the tracker later as well.

If you have the time please go through and test some of this stuff and report 
any bugs you may find.  Remember that in order to use the Launcher you will 
have to update the entire repo and rebuild RR and BS before rebuilding the 
Launcher.

I think that's about everything, but if you have any questions or advice feel 
free to holler at me.

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