Hi,

We want AppGameKit to be the tool you want. So to avoid us designing how we think it should be, we have created this short survey which covers some key areas on how the scripting system will work.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/7GDBGZW

Thanks for your participation.

Rick

What does '6. The AppGameKit Tier 1 is presently a BASIC script, would you prefer the language to adopt a more C++ style?' mean?

There are a billion differences between DBPro and C++, I don't think anyone's been pushing any syntax or features of that are special to C++.

I thought the question on case sensitivity was somewhat ambiguous. With case sensitivity presumably each of LoadImage, loadimage and loadImage would be recognised - but as different things.

So it's possible I gave the wrong answer.

Case sensitivity is about the compiler taking any of those loadimage commands and recognising them as the one command. So;

LoadImage = LoadImage
LoadImage = loadimage
LoadImage = loadImage
LoadImage = LOadImaGE
etc

If it was case sensitive only LoadImage would be valid.

This requirement is split almost 50/50 at present in the survey. So it would make sense to make it case in-sensitive and maybe hook in a tick box for case sensitivity later on.

Rick

Thanks. I ticked the right box then.

This requirement is split almost 50/50 at present in the survey. So it would make sense to make it case in-sensitive and maybe hook in a tick box for case sensitivity later on.

Yes, keeping everyone happy is difficult at times so that's probably the best you can do.

Rick, are you surveying outside the current TGC community as well as within? I envision AppGameKit as having a potential to bring in new customers, rather than just serve the existing loyal core. The question is especially important with respect to the general issue of exactly how "basic" tier 1 should be. On another thread there are suggestions which could be interpreted as asking for something closer to C, but they are from the more experienced long-time users of DBP who are going to buy anyway. My feeling is that the potential customers who are not in the TGC fold as yet would prefer to stick their toe in the water with something as close to Basic as possible, but I think some semblance of actual market research is the best way to determine that.

I recall you did a survey of existing forum members some years back to get a feel for the demographics, and also analyzed geographic sales. You didn't publish the results, except to mention that the US was the largest market and a great preponderance of forum members were male. You indicated that age was scattered all over. (I know of at least 3 active forum members in their early 60's, and there are obviously forum members working on their 12 year molars.)

Any chance of publishing the results now? I presume that you didn't want to publish the results back then because you would be publishing them to the major competitor.

We are interested in getting feedback from anyone who might consider AppGameKit in their development process.

I don't have the full results of the survey right now but so far it's looking like the majority would like to see some alterations. I expect the language is going to be very close to DB Pro but with some minor changes e.g. use of brackets. I don't see it being a complete overhaul.

o Lack of spaces in commands

o case insensitive

o Use Of brackets for all commands (except arrays which use square brackets)

o entity system instead of object numbers
(ie. enemy = loadimage("enemy1.png")
enemy_pos = position(enemy,x,y,z)

Did I miss anything?

Ive just taken the survey, very excited about this. Ive been away from the DB scene for a while due to primarily working in web development but Im not beginning to get involved in mobile apps and thus this project is very interesting and will bring me back to the DB scene.

Now I wonder how many 'old' members are still here, back from the RGT/LLRGT days!

Hi Rick, Mike and the rest of you!

I haven't touched DBP in over 2 years now but I'm getting really excited about developing for mobile devices. Just ordered an iPod Touch 4G yesterday and getting an Android phone later this year. Really excited about the possibilities of using tablets for board games, that might turn out to be huge.

Anyway, I think a few questions in the survey needs some clarification:

Q2: I assume voting yes here means I'm for removing the space, but it could be misunderstood. I prefer without spaces just to make things cleaner, and easier for people coming from other languages.

Q3: DBP is case insensitive, maybe you should include that in the description. Oh, do I hate case sensitive languages, that's just annoying.

Q6: What exactly are we talking about here? I hate header files but I'm not against declaring variables. Classes could be nice. I don't mind {} but I don't like ;. I like !, !=, ++ and -- but find == to be easy to forget. And I'm sure there are things.

I have a lot of free time this month and I would just love to get my hands on some documentation. Or even better a beta, but I guess that's too early. I'm eager to start coding right now but in the mean time I'm gonna start on the graphics for 2 simple games I have planned.

I'd say start coding then....use DBPro and learn Box2D physics, then it will be easy to convert to AppGameKit when it comes out.

Is this going to be dark basic for devices or c++?

Mike

It's not going to be the exact same syntax so I would have to go through all my code and that's not something I like doing. I also do not have DBP installed on this computer and I don't own Box2D. Having some artwork ready before I start will make programming smoother anyway.

Wow long time since I last spoke to you mate, nice to see your still going and it appears your in the same boat as me, all the money is now in Apps, being able to develop these quickly and easily in a language I know, love and have supported for over a decade, it all seems very promising.

pirate mode would be cool

I think this is a cool project. I just recently got an iPad and would enjoy developing game apps for it. Can't wait to try the finished product!

Is AppGameKit going to be GPL? I'm between projects right now, so if a Linux dev environment is in the plans, I might want to get in.

Sorry guys. Forgot to check the FAQs in the other sticky. I think it answered most of my questions.

Took the survey. Can't wait to see some more of ADK. Good luck guys!

Am I the only one sceptical about the idea of taking on-board the opinions of random people taking a survey who probably don't know much about language design, and how such changes could benefit the language?