Author Topic: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming  (Read 4456 times)

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Offline DavidKlecker

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AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« on: January 12, 2017, 08:32:39 AM »
I'm back! It's been some time since I have done work with the software but I'm currently in school going for a Master's Degree in Computer Science and software engineering. I want to take some things I have picked up since then and start using them in the software. I have the following news about AutoHARP

AutoHARP Loot is on the way. I have acquired a copy and will start creating the database for it. Not sure when I will finish it but I'm assuming a week should do it.

AutoHARP is finally compiled and working under Mac OSX. This has been a long time coming and the only thing preventing this was that I never had access to mac where I could actually compile AutoHARP. I need to go through each application and make sure it works but having it compile is the hardest and most important step.

A few issues and bug are coming in so I will address those.

AutoHARP does work under Windows 10 for those who are curious.

I am currently looking making a tablet version for AutoHARP. this is no easy feat. Tablet software is quite different from Windows based GUI software. So wrapping my head around the new mechanics is taking its toll. This is a long project and I don't expect anything for at a year but it is on my mind and it will be something I am going to experiment with and work on.

I've received questions about an NPC generator. I've been reluctant do to one because it is a lot harder than some think however I think I have a plan for one.

That's it thus far. If anyone has other ideas or suggestions let me know. If you have issues let me know here or by email. If you have reviews please post them to RPGNow. If you have a 1 or 2 star review, let me know first what the problem is so I can attempt to resolve the issue.

Cheers!

Offline GMLovlie

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #1 on: January 30, 2017, 06:13:34 AM »
If you create a NPC generator, including robots, AIs and so on ... I'll ... :pirate: I don't know what I'll do (besides buying it,) but I'll be really happy!
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Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #2 on: February 03, 2017, 07:15:58 AM »
I will most likely release a small update just to get OSX out before working on the NPC generator. So 2.0.1 will see OSX and a few bug updates and 2.1 will get the NPC generator.

Offline jnelson871

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #3 on: February 25, 2017, 07:32:14 PM »
Reading this made my day. Been waiting a long time to get AutoHARP working on my Mac. Can't wait!

Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #4 on: February 26, 2017, 08:27:42 PM »
Okay! New updates for AutoHARP.

It appears I have already released a 2.1 or so it seems with my old install files. They are all 2.1. So I guess this is the 2.2 version. My bad.

1) Anyways, my mac updates are done! AutoHARP officially is up and running on a Mac. I plan to have this out into RPGNow land by the end of March, but I am hoping I can get it out even sooner.

2) I am currently working on an NPC Generator. I'm debating on whether to hold the 2.2 release until it is done or just release 2.2 now and get the NPC generator runningn for 2.3. It's working, but I still have some work, such as adding levels and getting the randomness of it to be not so random. I also want to add the characters from Martial Law as well as other characters into a Character Pack. My goal is to have 100 characters that can be chosen as templates. The NPC Generator will create a random template if you so choose.

3) Loot is out and I'm trying to figure out what I can do with the information. I was thinking of creating a magic item creator with it, or even have a random magic item creator. Not sure. Maybe people have ideas they want from that book.

4) I do want to release my version of Cyradon that I have had now for a while.

5) I also want to rework the printing so that the DC version of printing will work closer to how the HTML version of printing works. Right now the DC (Device Context) printing (this is done entirely within the framework of the operating system) work, but it's not as fluid as the HTML printing. I'm hoping to change that by working the DC printing a bit to get that fluidity.

6) Android and iOS. I have books for both systems and I have learned and accepted that the best way to accomplish what I would like is to write separately for both. I'm not too sure if I want to have that amount of work in addition to the amount of work I will be doing here soon. That is I may be teaching soon and that will eat into a lot of time. Let's just say, if I work on an android and/or iOS version, then the wxWidgets version of AutoHARP is going to have to stay where it is with no new updates, just bug fixes. However I will not know this definitely until I start working on the Android version. Because Android is Java and iOS is Swift, I may not have to rewrite everything as most of the code will be somewhat portable. So I may only have to write 50% of it which ain't too bad, but still a lot of work. We shall see.

This may also change if Xamarin will finally start working for me here in the near future. If it works, then I only have to write it once. However Xamarin would limit me over using the native frameworks.

That's all for now. This week I am going to put together all three versions and get them out. Unless there is a request to just wait for the NPC Generator. I'm thinking at least two more weeks for the NPC generator to be functional enough.

Cheers.

Offline GMLovlie

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #5 on: March 02, 2017, 07:52:30 AM »
2) I wouldn't mind if you held off release of 2.2 until you had the NPC generator up and running and working well. But I think it is probably more important to get that Mac compatibility out there.

5) I have no clue. Sounds good. At least if the PDF ends up looking a tad better - as I'm European its all about the A4 format, not Letter size ;) Currently the A4 messes stuff up a bit. Its usable still, but just doesn't look great.
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Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #6 on: March 19, 2017, 09:58:16 AM »
2) I wouldn't mind if you held off release of 2.2 until you had the NPC generator up and running and working well. But I think it is probably more important to get that Mac compatibility out there.

5) I have no clue. Sounds good. At least if the PDF ends up looking a tad better - as I'm European its all about the A4 format, not Letter size ;) Currently the A4 messes stuff up a bit. Its usable still, but just doesn't look great.


HTML works great with many formats which is why I would love to just move to HTML strictly for printing.

Small Update:

I am having difficulty getting my Ubuntu environment up and running. It might have something to do with the fact i'm running it in a Virtual machine. So since I have a back up laptop I will just turn that into my Ubuntu box and compile from there. As a result I was able to get the NPC generator working for Harp Fantasy. It does not work for Harp Sci Fi, however I'm thinking that won't take long to fix. Given that I am so close to having it done I will continue to work on it and then box everything up for release. So 2.2 WILL have an NPC generator for people to play with. 

2.3 will be for any bug fixes, especially with the new port for OSX, a Character pack, seeing what I can do for HTML only printing. The only reason I keep the DC print option open is that HTML printing will not work in Ubuntu from AutoHarp. The problem is wxWidgets GTK uses Chromium which doesn't want to load client-side XML files. If I write a port for Firefox I may be able to get it to work and therefore I will have HTML only printing which should solve just about all formatting issues including those who use A4 printing and the like. A less technical version of this is that AutoHARP doesn't print HTML in Ubuntu for complicated reasons. There may be a workaround as well. For example, I may be able to using HTML internally in AutoHARP rather than externally. Thank God for forums. :D

Edit: Oh! The NPC Generator will NOT be able to create robots or AI in this version. Next version I will address that. Right now, I want to get a version out there and see if anyone has ideas or complaints and any other directions for it. This version will function as a first draft as I am sure people will have suggestions to add to it. People will immediately notice that functionality wise, it seems limited, with a lot of room for expansion, yet it does more than what is outlined in the Martial Law book.

Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #7 on: March 26, 2017, 07:26:50 PM »
I have completed version 2.2 and will be submitting the exes to ICE here this week. 2.2 gives you a NPC Generator and OSX support.

Offline GMLovlie

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #8 on: April 05, 2017, 07:57:07 AM »
Now they only need to upload the update so I can download the update, and update my software.  8)
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Offline trechriron

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #9 on: April 05, 2017, 12:26:07 PM »
I have completed version 2.2 and will be submitting the exes to ICE here this week. 2.2 gives you a NPC Generator and OSX support.

Excellent!
Trentin C Bergeron (TreChriron)
Bard, Dreamer, & RPG Enthusiast

Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #10 on: April 06, 2017, 12:37:14 PM »
I apologize for the delay. Small medical emergency aside and other projects piling up aside, I have submitted AutoHARP 2.2 but have withdrawn Architect 2.2 for the time being. Architect is giving me issues that right now don't have a good explanation. Apparently it just wants to crash when I make a selection from a list. It does this intermitantly and I do think this shows up in the older version of 2.1. This is a strange issue because from what I gather, I'm not doing anything wrong in the code, it almost looks as if this is an issue with the wrapper code I am using called wxWidgets. The only work around I have is to save frequently, and I mean frequently. That way, when it unexpectantly closes, you are not out all that work. I am currently in touch with the other programmers and hopefully I can trace where the issue is coming from.

I will let everyone know when the files get uploaded.

Thanks for your patience.

Offline GMLovlie

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #11 on: April 06, 2017, 04:44:16 PM »
Ok, so disclaimer: I may be actually blind or have misunderstood.

I can't find the NPC generator.


Also, when downloading the updates, it seems both Fantasy and Sci-Fi have 2.1 and 2.2 files uploaded. There also seems to be an issue with downloading some of the files for Sci-Fi - not sure exactly what files, as the names on drivethrough are different from the ones I get asked to save. I think.

What it looks like on drivethrough for me (attached.)
"What about the future...? We can only hope, we cannot however account for the minutiae of the quanta, as all accidents in an infinite space are inevitable."

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Offline dagorhir

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #12 on: April 06, 2017, 06:04:49 PM »
I downloaded the Autoharp-22-... files. I don't see any NPC generator either.

Offline NicholasHMCaldwell

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #13 on: April 07, 2017, 07:09:15 AM »
I upload the new files and then remove the old files. There's a short period when OBS sends the update emails before I can delete the old files, so you may have downloaded during the transition.

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Offline dagorhir

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #14 on: April 07, 2017, 07:23:12 AM »
It shows version 2.2 in the About dialog so I downloaded the correct files. It looks just like 2.1 although I haven't had a chance to play with it.

Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #15 on: April 08, 2017, 08:10:19 AM »
That's strange. I would think you guys were downloading the demo but I didn't submit the demo. The NPC generator should be under tools. The bet litmus test for knowing you are running 2.2 is the about box. If it says 2.2 AND there is mention that it works under OSX then you have the right files. I did test these install files so I'm surprised the NPC generator isn't showing up. Anyone do a fresh install?

I am unfortunately away from my computer. Keep me posted and let me know.

Offline dagorhir

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #16 on: April 08, 2017, 09:09:23 AM »
I found the problem on my computer. The shortcut was still pointing to the old exe file instead of the new. Even after I had uninstalled the previous version.

It's now pointing at the right exe and I can see all the new features.

What was really confusing is that the old exe was showing version 2.2. Is the program getting this from an external file? This is one thing that should be hard coded into the exe.

So to fix the issue, delete the contents of the folder before installing or install in a different folder. On windows the shortcut will fail but you can browse to the new AutoHARP-release.exe file and it will work.

Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #17 on: April 08, 2017, 09:14:36 AM »
The old version being 2.2 could be all me. It's been a while since the last update and I honestly believe I forgot to tag my last update. My install files showed a 2.1 extension so I naturally assumed I was on 2.2. Based on my directory structure I can still keep track of old updates because I do still have a tag for 2.0 and I now have a tag for 2.2. I;m glad you found the issue though. I was nervous there for a second. :)

Offline dagorhir

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #18 on: April 08, 2017, 11:53:37 AM »
I needed the time to troubleshoot. Nothing like a Saturday morning for that.

Are there any changes to the database structure that I should know for my custom databases?

Offline DavidKlecker

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Re: AutoHARP 2.1 - Upcoming
« Reply #19 on: April 08, 2017, 12:46:08 PM »
Yes, there are database changes. I cannot remember offhand all of them. Professions has a database change. I think skills has one and there is a whole new database file called NPCGenerator. I would have to look up my computer for the exact changes. I'm away from my computer and won't get to it until monday. Your custom database should work for AutoHARP however it may not be able to take advantage of some of the new features and fixes. I'll get you those changes asap.