Examples and dependencies
This article describes two new OpenSceneGraph cross-platform examples and the
change in handling dependencies.
Examples of HTTP client and node selection
Once we finished working on the remote debugging example and
reported its completion, we were surprised by the fact
that secure HTTP connection between a debugged application and debug broker
was only working in the web version of the example. Desktop and mobile versions
only worked with insecure HTTP.
Since current debug scheme has no authentication, insecure debugging over HTTP
doesn't really hurt. However, if we want to access resources located at popular
sites like GitHub and BitBucket, we have to support secure HTTP.
The need to support HTTPS on each platform spurred us to create
HTTP client example. Turned out, each platform had its own
preferred way of doing secure HTTP:
- web (Emscripten) provides Fetch API
- desktop is fine with Mongoose and OpenSSL
- Android provides HttpUrlConnection in Java
- iOS provides NSURLSession in Objective-C
The need to support different languages on different platforms resulted
in the creation of so-called 'host-guest' pattern:
- guest (platform agnostic)
- provides networking representation
- used by cross-platform C++ code
- host (specific platform)
- polls guest for pending requests
- processes them
- reports results back to the guest
Node selection example was straightforward and caused no troubles.
The change in handling dependencies
For over a year we had to deal with the following
shortcomings when building OpenSceneGraph across platforms
using conventional methods:
- macOS builds failing due to certain compile flags we use
- hacking PNG plugin safety guards to have PNG support under Android
- iOS simulator and device builds of the same example being in separate Xcode projects
- OpenSceneGraph taking 20-30 minutes to build
These shortcomings were slowing us down and complicating the development of
new examples. Upon hitting these problems ten more times this month we decided
it was time to solve them once and for all. Now OpenSceneGraph is built as part
of each example in 2-3 minutes, and there's no more dependency magic involved.
We took the same approach of building dependencies as part of each example to
other external libraries like Mongoose and libpng-android, too.
With these obstacles out of the way, we can now iterate faster. Just in time
for the next technical demonstration of Mahjong 2!
That's it for describing two new OpenSceneGraph cross-platform examples and
the change in handling dependencies.
Example-driven development
This article explains how the third OpenSceneGraph cross-platform example
opened our eyes to example-driven development.
2018-08 EDIT: the third example has been renamed to the fourth one due to
the reasons described in the next article.
The third OpenSceneGraph cross-platform example
The third OpenSceneGraph cross-platform example explains how to implement …
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OpenSceneGraph cross-platform examples
This article summarizes the work we did to produce the first two
cross-platform OpenSceneGraph examples.
By the time the first technology demonstration of OGS Mahjong 2
has been released, we've already had issue request
(to explain how to load images with OpenSceneGraph on Android) hanging for some
time. We considered …
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First techdemo of OGS Mahjong 2: Gameplay
We are glad to announce the release of the first technical demonstration of
OGS Mahjong 2. The purpose of this release was to verify gameplay across
supported platforms.
Get techdemo for your platform:
Read More
Mahjong recreation start
This article describes the start of Mahjong game recreation.
Plan
We started Mahjong recreation endeavour by composing a brief plan to get gameplay with minimal graphics:
- Load single layout
- Place tiles in layout positions
- Distinguish tiles
- Implement selection
- Implement matching
Just like any other plan, this one looked fine at …
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The year of lessons
So, the year 2017 is approaching its finale, the year's results have already
been summed up. We're going to take a break from igniting the fireworks or
preparation of the champagne so that we can designate our goal for the
following year.
As it may be clear from other articles …
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2017 summary
It's time to step back to see our accomplishments in 2017 and how they connect to the overall goal of Opensource Game Studio project.
Brief history
Opensource Game Studio project is 12 years old now.
2005. We started the project with a fanatic call to create the best game ever …
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Back to the Static
We have been using Wordpress as our website engine for more than seven years. And now it's time to move forward. Or backward.
For some time we've been tracking the development of the new breed of website engines - static site generators.
It seems that this is the technology capable of …
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The birth of MJIN world
This article describes the birth of MJIN world in August 2017.
mjin-player
As you know, we spent July to research scripting. We found a solution that satisfies the following criteria. Scripts should:
- run unchanged on all supported platforms
- allow extending C++ code
We have verified the second criterion by writing …
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Scripting research
This article describes scripting research in July 2017.
Our first goal of using a scripting language was to have a platform-independent code that runs unchanged on every supported platform.
OGS Editor 0.10 supports Python for such a code thanks to SWIG. SWIG provides a way to wrap almost any …
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