TheCleaner
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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I've been wanting to write a decal plugin but after Paraduck was kind enough to share his code for his chat plugin, I realized that I'm totally lost. I did some more research and found a decal development site but they basically said if you're a beginner don't bother.
I've taught myself enough VB.Net to program my calculator, and I'm pretty good at following directions if they're spelled out, but the decal programming is too complicated to just jump in for me.
I'm hoping there's a step-by-step set of instructions for beginner programmers like myself that could show me how to:
1) Create a decal plugin that intercepts/masks/creates text
2) Put the GUI into the plugin that would look as below
In case anyone is interested, below are the details of what I had in mind:
My hope is to be able to write an expanded friends list that allows an indefinite number of chars and asociates all sub chars with a main and allows a nickname like AKA. Ideally it would even intercept the chat and add the nickname in parentheses next to the character name e.g.:
The Delivery Man (Cleaner) says, "I wish I knew who my main was..."
or:
[General] The Delivery Man (Cleaner) says, "I wish I knew who my main was..."
So that once you know who a character is associated with and you add it in you'll know who's talking to you. It would work by adding and removing people from your actual friends list.
I envision it having a simple box interface with 2 tabs:
1) Who's Online: A list box with 4 columns 1 the nickname, 2 the actual character name, 3 online/offline and 4 Society. The box would be sorted the way current friends list are right now - I.e. alphabetically (by nickname) with the online chars listed up top.
The tab would also have an "Check Now" button so it doesn't constantly need to send checks. The program however would take note of the "XXXX has come online" and "offline" text from the game itself.
The list would look like quest timer and you could delete single lines off the list with a button after each name. At the bottom in addition to the "Check Now" button, there would be a line with 3 text boxes and an "Add Name" button. The 3 text boxes would be for the nickname, character name and Society.
The Society thing would be helpful for identifying PK's who are hiding their Society.
The list would update automatically when you first open the box but would need the button to recheck if you leave it on and people not on the core list, or who are not your patron or direct vassals, were going on- and offline.
2) Core Friends List: This tab will have a list box with all the names from tab 1. It will also allow editing of the list as above. The list however will be a checkbox list like Alinco's mob id list. This will set your core friends list and it will allow the same number of chars as the current AC list. In fact it will be your actual AC list that you see when you check with the native AC interface. This list will be sorted by those included on the list rather than who's online. After a "Check Now" button press, the list will be reset to the Core Friends List. This tab will have a "Set Now" button to make the changes after manipulation in the box.
Anyways, I could do this relatively quickly in regular VB.Net as none of it is really that complicated. The real problem is figuring out how to do it in Decal using VB.Net.
Cleaner
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yaroz_vn
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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As ducky said yesterday... i think.. a plugin such as this would do a lot of taxing on the turbine servers.  The way that you make it sound, it'd have to "/friends_add friendname" and "/friends_remove friendname" every time you click on check.
Now.. if you created a separate plugin that logged into a web site and kept track of your friends, based on a common ID, and all of your friends ran it... it could be possible. Say, you have a plugin that prompted you for a common ID (i.e. Yaroz for me), and it would update when I log on and when I log off (or every 5 min).. and your plugin would query the site to see if I were online, when you logged on, if you had Yaroz as one of your friends inside of the plugin.. that could be doable...
I think this is the way that the old meginjarder plugin did it. I'm not sure, since Mayor took over the code and never let anyone look at it.
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Kaltemar
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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I should warn you, your calculator does not use VB.NET for it's programming interface - it uses a rudimentary form of BASIC (more akin to Commodore BASIC than Visual BASIC). Knowing how to write in that will do you no favours trying to write a Decal plugin, which is a fairly sophisticated task. I should reiterate that if you are a beginner, don't bother. Remember that any plugin you develop, if it crashes, will quite likely take down your AC instance if it fails too.
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Paraduck
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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yaroz_vn posted:
Now.. if you created a separate plugin that logged into a web site and kept track of your friends, based on a common ID, and all of your friends ran it... it could be possible. Say, you have a plugin that prompted you for a common ID (i.e. Yaroz for me), and it would update when I log on and when I log off (or every 5 min).. and your plugin would query the site to see if I were online, when you logged on, if you had Yaroz as one of your friends inside of the plugin.. that could be doable...
Not sure if we're talking about the same version, but the code when Thor was around was available for other allegiances to install. I had one set up for mine. You are essentially correct with what it did for the friends list. As you mentioned the downside is that it requires your friends to be using the plugin as well.
As for getting started with Decal development, I'd recommend just reading the FAQs and threads on the acdev forums and trying to find a VB.NET plugin source code. That should get you started on making a small scale plugin just to play around with Decal. Then once you get that down, you should be ready to tackle the bigger stuff. 
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TheCleaner
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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Kaltemar: "I should warn you, your calculator does not use VB.NET for it's programming interface - it uses a rudimentary form of BASIC (more akin to Commodore BASIC than Visual BASIC). Knowing how to write in that will do you no favours trying to write a Decal plugin, which is a fairly sophisticated task. I should reiterate that if you are a beginner, don't bother. Remember that any plugin you develop, if it crashes, will quite likely take down your AC instance if it fails too."
OK, now that's news to me since I wrote it in VB.Net on Visual studio, but maybe you're just referring to the complexity of the program... I did say I was self taught and that I'm not a profressional programmer, and I do admit I wasn't born with an innate knowledge of advanced programming, but whatever - thanks for the insult I hope you at least are finding it useful even if it's too primitive for you.
Thanks Yaroz and Paraduck for your replies. Ok so I checked out that site you mentioned Paraduck (ac dev) and not surprisingly I wasn't the first person to think about doing this and everyone's answer was the same - don't do it! All the posts, not surprsingly, also failed to reveal a "person online" function as you suggested Paraduck:
http://forums.acdev.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=4674&highlight=character+online
http://forums.acdev.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1647&highlight=character+online
I did find some VB.Net code in the "Big Post about VB.Net" from the link below though that I'll be looking at just for the sake of learning.
BTW - Paraduck if you see this, I found this post that suggests you had a VB.Net tutorial and sample at one point - you don't still have that do you? Obviously it's not worth rewriting but if you have it saved somewhere that would be great. While I'm sure I'll never be as good a programmer as Kaltemar, I'm still interested in knowledge for the sake of knowledge and would love to see it:
http://forums.acdev.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=94
Thanks again,
Cleaner
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yaroz_vn
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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paradox != paraduck
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Virindi-Inquisitor
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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>> paradox != paraduck
I think that, based on the subject of this thread, you should have said
paradox <> paraduck
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TheCleaner
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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LOL - my bad I didn't notice the different names.
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Lord_Anton
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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am I just not seeing it? lol
I didnt see anyone mention paradox, until yaroz said paradox
looks like cleaner was typing it correct, paraduck
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yaroz_vn
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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he referenced a thread in which paradox gave a link to some programming resources. Since they both had Para in the name, I assumed he did not see the difference.
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Lord_Anton
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oh alright lol
guess I shoulda checked some links =p
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MarkWalt
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"I should reiterate that if you are a beginner, don't bother. Remember that any plugin you develop, if it crashes, will quite likely take down your AC instance if it fails too."
I think this is bad advice. If nobody ever tried to do something hard, nothing interesting would ever be accomplished.
Einstein believed that explaining things in plain English is one of the hardest things to do because it requires one to be thoughtful, and most people (even scientists) just aren't very thoughtful people.
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Virindi-Inquisitor
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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I agree. Feel free to try it, and be sure to use all the available resources.
On the other hand, don't expect decal developers to answer basic programming questions. Be willing to spend significant time searching as well as in trial and error. Do not run to others when something you write does not work.
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TheCleaner
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Decal Programming for Idiots (in VB.Net) - Does this guide exist anywhere? Want a new Friends List
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Thanks, the attitude of Decal programmers is interesting though because for any other programming project I've worked on there were always people who were more than happy to help someone starting out. Given how generous the Decal programmers are with their time and work with the programs they develop, it's surprising how hateful their attitude appears to be with regards to expanding the programming community. Paraduck is of course a very pleasant exception. The second I asked him for an example he was more than happy to provide it. Oh well, as I've said I've given up before I began because the function needed, i.e. one to check someone's online status, is not available.
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Thorfinn_Sigurdssen
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That's what I thought originally, but I've actually learned a lot more about programming because I had to figure a lot of stuff out for myself. I'd never even used the Object Browser before, but it pretty much became my best friend when writing plugins. It's a textbook example of the 'teach a man to fish..' cliche- if every time I asked what method or property to use for something one of the decal devs just told me, I'd still be asking for help every time I did any coding.
Decal programming isn't for the faint-hearted. It's really not a good thing to try if you're not past the stage of being a beginner, and by forcing would-be devs to find things out for themselves, it weeds out the faint-hearted, and pretty much ensures that plugins are only developed by reasonably competent coders. Personally, I consider that a good thing.
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MarkWalt
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More like you're excusing bad behavior.
Good advice, given when asked for, is always a good thing to do. Not everyone is willing to do that.
I was once in New York City, and asked someone for help finding a place. They guy was so nice, not only did he tell me where to go, but he offered to take me there. If he had told me to go find a map because that would make me a more knowledgeable person and a better navigator of New York City, he would have been correct. He also would have been a jerk.
Being condescending is easy. Being helpful and thoughtful is hard.
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Virindi-Inquisitor
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You asked for directions in NYC and someone actually stopped and was willing to talk to you? Wow, that's quite unusual!
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Drakier
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TheCleaner posted:
Thanks, the attitude of Decal programmers is interesting though because for any other programming project I've worked on there were always people who were more than happy to help someone starting out. Given how generous the Decal programmers are with their time and work with the programs they develop, it's surprising how hateful their attitude appears to be with regards to expanding the programming community. Paraduck is of course a very pleasant exception. The second I asked him for an example he was more than happy to provide it. Oh well, as I've said I've given up before I began because the function needed, i.e. one to check someone's online status, is not available.
Not everyone is cut out to be a developer. There are far too many people who "want" to be developers, but have no patience, experience, or anything that goes along with it. We help people who help themselves. That's what Thor and Virindi were mainly getting at. I WANT people to program who WANT to program. But they have to have SOME drive to do it. They can't just come up to us asking us questions and expecting we'll hand them all the code they need to write their plugin.
Most of the plugins these types of people also want to make border on the bad side of things as well. Many of the people we see coming in asking questions about how to develop plugins only do so because they want to make a plugin that does bad things, and no one else has written it yet because of the Decal Code of Ethics (with the exclusion of pretty much every Darktide Plugin).
In fact, 2 of the last 3 people I have helped with coding in the channel have turned out to be people who abused my help to create plugins that I don't approve of and wouldn't have given my assistance to otherwise. In a way, we get tricked into helping people create things we don't agree with, and when we deny people the assistance, we get called names or told we somehow have bad attitudes or whatever. I guess the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. *shrug*
Those who have the desire to REALLY learn to program will do so with or without our help. Those are actually the people we are more likely to help as well because they have a drive and determination, and they've done extensive leg-work on their own to get past most of the main n00b obstacles. If you have questions, research them first. If you still do not have an answer, then ask. We aren't opposed to assisting; we just expect people to use Google first!
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Kaltemar
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Perhaps I also need to clarify what I meant as well, since it wasn't clear. When I say "if you're a beginner, don't bother", what I mean is that Decal plugins should not be your first project. Developing for Decal with its complex interops and filters, etc, can be quite difficult, and you are better off experimenting with less complicated projects before attempting to touch Decal plugins. You could still put one together, but you should still be warned that broken Decal plugins can wipe out your AC instance, and that if you're developing any sort of combat assist plugin, you'll probably die a few times in the testing  .
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MarkWalt
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"You asked for directions in NYC and someone actually stopped and was willing to talk to you? Wow, that's quite unusual!"
New Yorkers have that reputation, but it's largely undeserved. I currently live in Seattle, and although Seattle residents are "polite"... they're polite in a politically correct sort of way. New Yorkers are actually really helpful people. They're just rather direct about it.
I was once chastised for jaywalking in Seattle, and not by a police officer but by some folks waiting for the light to turn. I seriously doubt a New Yorker would have given it a second thought.
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To be honest, that analogy's slightly flawed- the difference is that the devs can be contacted again, somebody you asked for directions is unlikely to ever see you again. If you'd ask for his contact details and called him every time you needed help, I'm fairly sure he'd tell you to go buy a map.
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