[Bf-committers] Blender roadmap article on code blog

[Ton Roosendaal]

Hi Daniel,

I wrote the blog post as a discussion piece, something we can spend on for months, or a year, or as much time we need. We have a quite long way to go before "a new GE" can be defined to be feasible anyway.

I would also like to see a wide consensus about future plans for Blender. For that reason you shouldn't see it as 'bad timing', or a suggestion to refocus your work. 

The GE itself, and its current users, will really benefit your work now. Your gsoc project is also meant to solve a lot of current issues (bugs) anyway. I hope you can continue that work happily. 

(Long answer to your questions in a next mail)

-Ton-

--------------------------------------------------------
Ton Roosendaal  -  ton at blender.org   -   www.blender.org
Chairman Blender Foundation - Producer Blender Institute
Entrepotdok 57A  -  1018AD Amsterdam  -  The Netherlands



On 17 Jun, 2013, at 8:00, Daniel Stokes wrote:

> I would like to know more about what Ton means by the line "What should
> then be dropped is the idea to make Blender have an embedded “true” game
> engine" from the blog post.
> 
> What exactly is proposed to be dropped here? It looks to me all that is
> proposed to be dropped is an idea, changing the focus of the game engine to
> make it better at what it can do rather than making it a clone of other
> game engine/game editors. Are we actually talking about removing features
> and/or the ability to publish a game? The blog post mentions creating "3D
> interaction for walkthroughs, for scientific sims, or game prototypes".
> This can still make use of existing code/features as well as the ability to
> publish and distribute these creations.
> 
> As a BGE developer I have often considered a closer integration of the BGE
> and the rest of Blender for their mutual benefit. At its simplest, closer
> integration means better viewport visualization, and more maintained code
> for the BGE. Stronger integration yields even more interesting ideas as Ton
> outlines in the blog post. As I said in my original response, this sounds
> like a great idea as long as those three conditions (mostly we aren't
> losing a lot of functionality for current BGE users) are met.
> 
> As to the idea of me changing GSoC projects, I am not entirely against it,
> but I would like to better understand both Ton's proposal and the potential
> new project before jumping ship to a vague/undefined project.
> 
> Regards,
> Daniel Stokes
> 
> 
> On Sun, Jun 16, 2013 at 10:46 PM, Benjamin Tolputt <
> btolputt at internode.on.net> wrote:
> 
>> On 17/06/2013, at 3:23 PM, Campbell Barton wrote:
>> 
>>> Then it may be a good argument for Daniel to make a start on
>>> interactive-animation tools,
>> 
>> If he is amenable to the switch, then that would make a decent compromise
>> to offer surely?
>> 
>>> While this is a valid point, (as far as I know) none of these devs
>>> have stepped up to really supporting the BGE and helping become a
>>> maintainer.
>>> They mostly submit one feature they need for their game, then become
>>> inactive with BGE dev.
>> 
>> I wasn't pointing it out as a reason against Ton's move, I was using it to
>> support the *earlier* point that there is a lack developer effort/focus
>> toward the BGE. The patches/submissions to Blender aren't being accepted, a
>> good-sized proportion of BGE advocates are recommending that one use a
>> build that applies most of them, and yet they admit is almost a fork due to
>> the variance between "official BGE" and "HG1 build BGE".
>> 
>> Perhaps it will be a benefit to both BGE and Blender if they become
>> separate projects? Blender can focus on asset creation (with the data
>> structures and code compromises that make that efficient) whilst the BGE
>> can start optimising the code/structures it uses to make it better for
>> running a game.
>> 
>>> ... you could argue this is catch22 - if we accepted their patches
>>> they would become more active and submit more fixes.... but I still
>>> think if someone really wanted to become active and take the BGE
>>> forward they could - despite some slow patch review.
>> 
>> Whilst you could argue the catch-22 aspect, I'd have to disagree that slow
>> patch review isn't a big issue in it's own right. Watching a patch wither
>> on the vine is a very demotivating experience, especially if it fixes
>> something and the bug is left in the main project despite you having put
>> the effort into solving it so the core development team didn't have to.
>> That's something being bandied about the Blender-verse lately as well.
>> 
>> Sure, if you want to be active enough, you'll walk over shards of broken
>> glass to keep submitting your patches but that doesn't mean we should
>> expect them to. Again, not an argument against the BGE
>> removal/simplification as I support/defend Ton's decision in this regard.
>> Just pointing out that the argument (like the "it's not as good as the
>> competition" one) is pretty poor on it's own.
>> 
>> --
>> Benjamin Tolputt
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