Messages

1

Resolved Questions / Stencyl 3.1 (7305) doesn't work with OSX Yosemite

« on: October 21, 2014, 03:04:14 am »

Silly message. Easily fixed.

But can't delete it, so, this shall remain in its place for eternity.

Thanks guys!

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Suggestion Archives / Re: UI Problems

« on: August 25, 2014, 06:15:01 am »

Oh!

That's REALLY clean. And excellently explained (the internal code blocks really helped).

I like it a lot!

Awesome. Thank you so much.

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Suggestion Archives / Re: UI Problems

« on: August 20, 2014, 08:25:16 am »

Given that you can't REFER to the outer loop index0 using "GUI code" (whatever it's called when we're dragging blocks around), wouldn't you then need a code block to set the attribute?

And if you're using a code block anyway, then it's not a huge step (unless you have a ton of code in the inner loop) to just put the whole damn thing in a code block.

I'm always up for cleaner code though, so if you can explain what I'm missing, I'd def appreciate that. Thank you.

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Suggestion Archives / Re: UI Problems

« on: August 12, 2014, 02:04:20 pm »

Yep, that's exactly what I meant, re nested loops.

Have attached a pic (sorry, without hosting it myself, can't figure how to embed image in the post itself), that shows both the stencyl block and underlying resultant code.

I've dragged one of the "current loop count" variables from each loop, but the code only reflects the inner loop, both times.

Oh, and sorry, was unable to view the work around you linked to.

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Suggestion Archives / Re: A bunch of suggestions

« on: August 12, 2014, 02:01:07 pm »

Thanks for the link to those extensions, @GeorgeN - lots of good stuff in there.

And yep, @dripple, you're bang on the money. Editing the Custom Block Details doesn't allow anything helpful. Eg, if you suddenly realise you need to pass another parameter. You have to restart from scratch.

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Suggestion Archives / Re: A bunch of suggestions

« on: August 06, 2014, 07:20:58 am »

Ahh.

I ended up just creating a global code block. Mostly gives me what I need. Looks like this (attached).

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Fixed Bugs (3.x) / Re: A few more bugs

« on: August 05, 2014, 02:54:53 pm »

Re "Apply Name" - no, I hadn't. Because when you change the name, it changes in the list above, so I figured it was done. Apply forces a refresh, which is just what I had been doing manually. But cool, that's... slightly easier I suppose.

I'll keep an eye out for the event drop issue, see if I can produce a reliable repro chain.

Haven't figured one out yet though, and I've definitely been trying to suss out what's causing it - if nothing else so I can do things another way, and stop screwing things up.

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Abandoned Bugs / 3.1 compiles haxe 60%ish slower than 3.0

« on: August 03, 2014, 08:14:46 am »

I don't know what's changed, but compiling a game is significantly slower on 3.1 than on 3.0.

I don't know if that's because there's more default includes (whether they're used or not), but it's a HUGE difference, and if you're working on code where you're doing a lot of compiling, it's VERY noticeable.

This radically slows down your core code-test-fix loop when developing.

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Suggestion Archives / A bunch of suggestions

« on: August 03, 2014, 08:12:31 am »

Just some pain points/things that have driven me bonkers over the last month or so (hard to order, on most of them, I read them and immediately think "Argh! That's the worst!" *laugh*:

• Given how often you do a "print" block followed by a "text & text" block (eg print "blah=" <variable>), and given that print is almost always used for this sort of debugging, some kind of shorthand would save a ton of time (particularly since tracing is the only form of debugging available under Stencyl, there's no breakpoints)
• When an actionscript error occurs, having a larger text box to read the stack trace would be very helpful.
• Having code blocks which would expand horizontally would be very helpful
• When entering new custom blocks (and possibly events) once you've entered the name in the configuration form, it'd be nice if it also changed it in the Event List. It's going to be rare that you'd want different names in each place, and it's otherwise double (or triple - if you enter the same name in the Block Spec field) entry
• Having to click at least twice, if not three times to add an image to an actor. Command-P to add the initial image is good, but then you have to find the mouse and click Image, followed by IMAGE. Which is crazy slow if you're having to add a ton of different animations. Keyboard shortcuts would be very helpful.
• When publishing to Flash, it would be good if Stencyl remembered the last location saved, rather than having to keep moving to the correct path every build
• Being able to use the normal keyboard shortcuts for paste (into a new window) would be helpful (ie, command-V, instead of having to right click select paste)
• Being able to search the preview code window would be VERY helpful.
• It would be VERY helpful if there were keyboard shortcuts for all the common dialogs. Eg command-R for remove, command-D for don't remove etc (same as the Alt key accelerators under windows), command-S/D for save/don't-save, Command-Y/N (or Enter/Esc instead of Tab-Enter/Esc) for yes/no
• It would be super helpful if Stencyl remembered the position and size of the log window between sessions/games
• It would be helpful, on Mac, if the keyboard controls for moving around were the same as system standard. Eg, in the code boxes, Command-Left-Arrow for start of the line, instead of (as currently) Function-Left-Arrow. (Mac standard, Function-Left-Arrow=home). Very disorienting having them be different.
• A keyboard shortcut for syntax checking code would be much quicker
• The command-enter shortcut to test a game would be super helpful if it worked when the log viewer had focus (since it auto-pops up and steals focus every time anyway)
• When publishing to Stencyl Arcade, at the point where the first dialog appears (Is this in progress or not?) a Cancel option would be helpful - in case you've accidentally hit build on the wrong app and want to back out, rather than having to publish, find the game, then remove from the site via the web
• When entering colours, it would be super helpful to be able to paste hex values in, rather than having to type each RBG value separately
• The colour picker - hitting escape doesn't cancel. Hitting Enter doesn't accept (different from every other dialog)
• Shift-Command-S to save a project as would be helpful (and Mac consistent)
• Command-W to close the (eternally self-opening) log viewer would be helpful
• being able to quickly split large spritesheets that combine many animations into separate animations would be awesome (eg, copying/pasting multiple frames, dragging and dropping frames. Anything, really)
• Being able to command-c/command-v to copy/paste selected frames would be much faster than click-select-click-copy-click-swap-click-paste (etc)
• Being able to copy/paste multiple frames would be MUCH faster
• When creating a new animation, defaulting to the name box (so you can immediately enter the name)
• Being able to edit a custom block after you've defined it would be VERY helpful (eg, a long complicated block definition, accidentally hitting enter and having to re-enter the whole thing again manually)
• If you save a project, and then immediately close it, it asks you to save it again (even though nothing has changed). Seems silly

Frankly though? For an app of this sophistication? This is NOT a big list. I really quite love Stencyl. It's incredible. Thank you so much for it.

10

Suggestion Archives / UI Problems

« on: August 03, 2014, 08:07:43 am »

In a very rough list from most annoying/serious to least annoying:

• Trying to remove (from the menu) the first item in a block will always remove the entire contents of the block, not the single item you're selecting
• When creating an actor polygon, it will often make an X value equal to the width of the actor, ie, one pixel off the right hand side - which means you can't grab/move it
• In the coding palette, under Flow | Advanced, there are two "Code (text)" fields. They appear identical
• When editing code in an external editor, if you save in the external editor, you then need to save in Stencyl as well (even though Stencyl is aware of the file change, and wipes the previous output) BEFORE you can syntax check. Otherwise it uses the old file contents. If Stencyl is aware, and we've had to save to show Stencyl the new changes (it does pick them up - replacing previous output pane contents with "success" - which is annoying enough as is) wouldn't it also make sense to just automatically use the new file contents for the syntax check?
• In background (on the mac) you click Delete (the equiv of windows backspace) to delete an image. in an actor, you have to click function-delete (equiv of windows delete key)
• When a syntax error is found, it would be nice to have focus on the message window, so you could hit enter (on the OK) to close it, not be forced to hit escape.
• The drag-and-drop coding environment doesn't handle nested loops (or, if this is intentional, warn the user)
• When publishing to Stencyl arcade, dialog says "would you like to update", and recommends updating. It would be clearer if the suggested button was labelled "Update" instead of "Replace" - some cognitive dissonance surrounded difference between "Publish as New" and "Replace" - particularly none of the dialog text used either of those phrasings.
• Keyboard shortcuts are a bit off under Mac. Eg Game Settings (Shift+Command+4) is globally mapped by the O/S to print an area of the screen
• The drag icon on the log viewer is  misleading - you actually need to grab NOT on the icon, or to the right of it, but below the icon. A wider select zone would be much easier
• On the website, page http://www.stencyl.com/help/view/creating-custom-blocks/ - step 4 has mis-spelt "appearance"

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Fixed Bugs (3.x) / A few more bugs

« on: August 03, 2014, 08:02:08 am »

In no particular order:

• When a code block goes red (syntax error), after you fix the error and rebuild, it doesn't lose the red shading (unless you drag it out of its location and replace it) - even if you clean project and recompile successfully.
• Renaming an attribute does not rename it in either the palette or code window. Thus, you could have (internally) one name and (visibly) a totally different name
• Events will very often stop working (for no obvious reason). Eg, they work, you change a minor line of code somewhere unrelated, and suddenly they unhook and stop firing (even though you haven't changed the event or the calling code)

These are the only majorly annoying (obvious) bugs I've stumbled across. UI problems and suggestions I've put in another thread.

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Guides & How-To's / Building Stencyl Haxe files from inside Sublime Text

« on: May 17, 2014, 05:48:06 pm »

If you edit Haxe code externally from Stencyl in Sublime Text, this may make your life easier.

I spent most of today nutting this out, and wrote up a decent sized blog post about it.

Blog post is here. It's pretty straight forward. Mostly you can just c&p what you need. You should be able to get going in under three minutes, changing only a couple of lines on the provided scripts (to your local directory structure).

Good news is, it's 10-20x faster than zipping back and forth between Sublime Text and Stencyl if you're just checking syntax errors.

Hope it helps!