2010-12-19T00:00:05 Frontier: can i get a copy of the visualiser that i can pass strings into of that format some time? 2010-12-19T00:00:12 then i can really start to debug teh engine 2010-12-19T00:00:15 semantic wise 2010-12-19T00:08:20 antimatroid: hmm... you will need to copy and paste the strings into the wep page. 2010-12-19T00:09:03 that would be fine :P 2010-12-19T00:09:33 ok, I'm just now starting to adopt the new format, as I was unsure how much will change 2010-12-19T00:10:30 yeah, that's cool 2010-12-19T00:24:35 *** antimatroid1 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T00:27:00 *** antimatroid has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T00:28:28 btw, does maxTurns refer to the maximum like in PlanetWars (200) or the number of turns really played == number of "go"s? 2010-12-19T00:29:02 maximum number of turns in the game, you will receive that +1 goes 2010-12-19T00:29:04 max 2010-12-19T00:29:18 go's* 2010-12-19T00:31:24 ok 2010-12-19T00:46:44 i'm installing a future cop lapd demo 2010-12-19T00:46:47 i miss it so much 2010-12-19T00:46:53 best playstation game ever 2010-12-19T00:49:38 lol, except it only runs in windows 95 2010-12-19T00:49:40 lame 2010-12-19T00:51:05 fixed, life complete! 2010-12-19T00:55:14 :p 2010-12-19T01:14:07 ahh, nostalgia overlaod 2010-12-19T01:22:24 wait, if a player receives a go, they output a turn, right? 2010-12-19T01:22:48 you should receive n "go"s for a max of n turns 2010-12-19T01:25:24 Zannick: i just send a palyer go when i've finished sending them new info and expect them to send go back when they've finished sending me moves 2010-12-19T01:25:35 i also send each bot "fin" once the game is over 2010-12-19T01:26:23 because "finish" would be wasting characters! 2010-12-19T01:26:29 :P 2010-12-19T01:26:55 my bot usually just checks the first letter of the string anyway 2010-12-19T01:27:36 we could allow ants to stack , but i think it makes it harder for people to deal with 2010-12-19T01:27:57 right, right, but sending n+1 go's to the player when they can take only n turns is kinda silly 2010-12-19T01:28:06 maybe you meant n go's plus a fin? :) 2010-12-19T01:28:19 i have a "turn 0" 2010-12-19T01:28:25 where i send game parameters to the player 2010-12-19T01:28:34 like dimensions, view radius, max turns etc. 2010-12-19T01:28:41 that way people can't say they hard coded things like that 2010-12-19T01:29:09 and you say "go" after that? before the actual first turn? 2010-12-19T01:29:42 also i disagree with the use of max turns to mean max turn number rather than maximum number of turns 2010-12-19T01:29:51 yes, because once you receive the start parameters and "go", you have 3 seconds to set up and return "go" again 2010-12-19T01:30:03 ah, the ready signal 2010-12-19T01:30:22 maxTurns is the maximum number of turns the game can have 2010-12-19T01:30:42 ie. at the end of turn maxTurns, the game will be called off and the player with the most ants wins 2010-12-19T01:30:47 right, but len([0, 1, ..., n]) is n+1 2010-12-19T01:30:56 yes, but turn 0 isn't really a turn 2010-12-19T01:30:58 it's setting up 2010-12-19T01:31:02 oh, right 2010-12-19T01:31:09 see you have me all confused :P 2010-12-19T01:31:22 i think frontier and i are on the same page 2010-12-19T01:31:33 once we have game strings playing, i'll clean everything up and post 2010-12-19T01:31:43 Zannick: them math majors be using fancy maths tricks :P 2010-12-19T01:31:49 but atm we are changing so much that i think posting would confuse people later 2010-12-19T01:31:52 sigh: i'm a math major! 2010-12-19T01:31:55 ahaha 2010-12-19T01:31:59 there are no fancy math tricks 2010-12-19T01:32:25 Zannick: did you ever play future cop lapd? 2010-12-19T01:32:30 there must be someone else out there 2010-12-19T01:32:38 nope 2010-12-19T01:34:19 are there any non-math majors in here? :P 2010-12-19T01:34:24 me! 2010-12-19T01:34:28 you didn't do maths? 2010-12-19T01:34:31 no 2010-12-19T01:34:32 i'm also a cs major :P 2010-12-19T01:34:49 Zannick: so did i (altthough barely), and economics :) 2010-12-19T01:35:05 that was my primary major 2010-12-19T01:43:01 *** amstan has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T01:47:08 *** yasith has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 265 seconds) 2010-12-19T01:52:58 i did the bare minimum for mine 2010-12-19T01:53:51 i filled two majors worth of maths majors excepting first year units though 2010-12-19T01:54:05 maths units* 2010-12-19T01:59:17 *** yasith has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T01:59:31 *** iNtERrUpT has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T02:22:00 antimatroid: I have no ants yet, but you can load and watch the grains change ^^: http://marco-leise.homedns.org/antgui/v2/ 2010-12-19T02:23:27 Frontier: is that one of my maps? it's not getting base locations right 2010-12-19T02:24:05 what happened? off by one? 2010-12-19T02:24:54 wait, dw 2010-12-19T02:24:59 i found a bug already though 2010-12-19T02:25:17 but that isn't going to change anything for you 2010-12-19T02:25:25 did you mix up x/y and row/column? 2010-12-19T02:25:27 the bases should be where then 9's are 2010-12-19T02:26:20 oh, wait, i do grid[row][col] 2010-12-19T02:26:28 i think you plotted the bases [col][row] 2010-12-19T02:26:29 but... they aren't ^^. Look at the coordinates to the right. 2010-12-19T02:26:44 I did, as per the specs :) 2010-12-19T02:27:09 oh yes, you did, can you change that easily? 2010-12-19T02:27:18 no problem 2010-12-19T02:27:19 otherwise i can change it easily, but i prefer indexing like matrixes 2010-12-19T02:27:40 also, with grain numbers on home base 2010-12-19T02:28:02 i need to update that value for you when spawning an ant (which i'm not now), didn't you want that number non-changing though? 2010-12-19T02:28:42 no i want it to change, just not display it on the map 2010-12-19T02:29:00 i have no side panel yet so it is currently hidden 2010-12-19T02:30:35 do your ants dispose random amounts of grain on random locations of the map? 2010-12-19T02:30:44 otherwise i have a bug already 2010-12-19T02:31:21 an ant can deposit up to its full harvest on a move 2010-12-19T02:31:42 if ants crash and no ant survives, their combined harvest turns into harvestable grains 2010-12-19T02:31:51 and i could have bugs too :) 2010-12-19T02:32:56 Frontier: http://pastebin.com/6esqitMw 2010-12-19T02:33:08 run that through, and you'll see the home squares go down each turn when spawning 2010-12-19T02:35:19 i'm not sending you updated grains when harvesting there either, coming right up 2010-12-19T02:37:52 http://pastebin.com/juWz1dcK 2010-12-19T02:39:05 Frontier: i wonder if you might slow down each of your turns :) 2010-12-19T02:39:15 also, thanks for the home base change :D 2010-12-19T02:46:05 Frontier: i see that random appearing of grains, i think it's the bot depositing them there 2010-12-19T02:46:26 i think the starter bot is moving an ant there, then making the deposit for the other ant afterwards, thinking there is an ant to deposit too 2010-12-19T02:48:04 *** Palmik has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T02:51:59 how long do you want each turn to be 2010-12-19T02:52:07 what is it now? 2010-12-19T02:52:09 maybe double it 2010-12-19T02:52:27 500ms -> 1000ms 2010-12-19T02:52:41 what it is now would be nice later once people can go back through the moves step by step 2010-12-19T02:52:51 but for the moment might make it easier to see what happens once ants are on the board 2010-12-19T03:11:10 Yo can see ants spawn now 2010-12-19T03:12:35 awesome, i just changed ants to walk more randomly 2010-12-19T03:12:42 i'll make a longer game string and post it 2010-12-19T03:13:08 oh, still no ants? :P 2010-12-19T03:14:08 spawning looks cool though 2010-12-19T03:17:09 hmmm, i have some kind of bug somewhere 2010-12-19T03:17:16 i have ants popping up where they shouldn't be 2010-12-19T03:18:11 *** fgump has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T03:24:38 *** jaspervdj has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T03:25:39 *** Frontier has quit IRC (Read error: Connection reset by peer) 2010-12-19T03:26:46 *** Frontier has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T03:27:49 the damn power chord... 2010-12-19T03:28:06 what did you just say? something about a bug... 2010-12-19T03:33:01 i have a bug my end 2010-12-19T03:33:05 trying to work it out now 2010-12-19T03:34:06 seems to be gone 2010-12-19T03:37:05 Frontier: how far off are ants? :) 2010-12-19T03:37:24 i'll be satisfied for the moment once they appear 2010-12-19T03:41:19 just found another bug when sending fuse spawns 2010-12-19T03:41:28 i was always sending you - the new hp 2010-12-19T03:44:12 *** tapwater has quit IRC (Quit: tapwater) 2010-12-19T03:49:31 antimatroid1: The ant's aren't ready yet. They seem to fade out for no reason 2010-12-19T03:57:12 that could be my bad? 2010-12-19T04:06:58 Frontier: http://pastebin.com/GeNKmzbK 2010-12-19T04:07:02 there's a newer game string for you 2010-12-19T04:09:15 *** medrimonia has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T04:10:54 *** medrimonia1 has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 260 seconds) 2010-12-19T04:15:09 they walk through walls :-/ 2010-12-19T04:16:05 really 2010-12-19T04:16:13 hmmm 2010-12-19T04:16:21 yes, holy shit this looks awesome 2010-12-19T04:16:30 i wanna see :( 2010-12-19T04:16:33 :P 2010-12-19T04:16:45 i can, awesome 2010-12-19T04:17:04 i'll try to work out if the wall thing is happening my end 2010-12-19T04:17:05 oh wait... E and W seem to be mixed up 2010-12-19T04:17:41 seems to be on your side :p 2010-12-19T04:18:15 just send me a W for an E and vice versa 2010-12-19T04:18:34 let me work out why 2010-12-19T04:18:52 doesn't look like it happens in my ascii games 2010-12-19T04:21:20 i think i found it 2010-12-19T04:24:24 nope, i broke it :P 2010-12-19T04:26:42 got it! 2010-12-19T04:26:44 *** fgump has quit IRC (Quit: Leaving) 2010-12-19T04:27:22 it was broken in two places 2010-12-19T04:28:58 Frontier: http://pastebin.com/c78We9zS 2010-12-19T04:30:33 take a look, it works. the only problem is several updates to the same object in the same turn 2010-12-19T04:31:18 you have to have several updates in the same turn 2010-12-19T04:31:24 For example when there is a deposit action and a spawn on the base I get two updates for that turn, which isn't working as you expect 2010-12-19T04:31:24 but this is perfect for the moment 2010-12-19T04:32:21 hmm yeah okay 2010-12-19T04:32:42 i'll do a longer game so hopefully some fights get going 2010-12-19T04:32:50 :) 2010-12-19T04:33:10 grain and hp counts don't change atm do they? 2010-12-19T04:33:19 harvest* not grain 2010-12-19T04:34:04 I'm still not processing A, D & H commands, but that's the bonus round anyway ;) 2010-12-19T04:34:12 they do change 2010-12-19T04:34:36 i haven't seen the harvest change when an ant makes a harvest 2010-12-19T04:35:23 it works on my machine. I think the script is in your browser cache 2010-12-19T04:36:43 lol, horrible memory problems still 2010-12-19T04:36:56 i'm using up 800mb with the engine and both bots after 170 turns 2010-12-19T04:36:57 lol there is a red ant with 1hp and "NaN" harvest 2010-12-19T04:37:01 wow 2010-12-19T04:37:18 that'll be my bad :) 2010-12-19T04:37:31 i can use the site now to work these issues out tonight though 2010-12-19T04:37:34 i couldn't see such info before 2010-12-19T04:38:24 I may have a big problem with the fusions... they do really weird stuff to my visualizer at the moment 2010-12-19T04:38:57 i may have screwed up how i'm doing it 2010-12-19T04:39:00 i just rewrote it before 2010-12-19T04:43:07 i have an idea for how to stop them bunching up around the home base so much 2010-12-19T04:43:34 atm the firt time i enter a square i add a direction going backwards to follow home once harvesting 2010-12-19T04:43:47 i'll do something similar to heading to the outer regions of unvisisted teritory 2010-12-19T04:50:18 yeah, attacks are broken 2010-12-19T04:50:24 trying to work out how to fix it now 2010-12-19T05:00:31 *** Azrathud has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 272 seconds) 2010-12-19T05:12:30 *** Meatkat has quit IRC (Quit: Leaving) 2010-12-19T05:12:49 hmmm i think i have lots of bugs 2010-12-19T05:12:51 gah 2010-12-19T05:24:10 Frontier: when they walk off the side of the screen, why don't then come out on the other side? is that my fault? 2010-12-19T05:28:18 also, if the game ends before the max number of turns, your site doesn't seem to like it 2010-12-19T05:47:31 *** choas has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T05:50:16 *** fgump has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T05:55:03 You said the number maxTurns relates to the number of "go"s iirc. I'll fix the coordinates... 2010-12-19T06:02:47 Frontier: that is an upper bound on the number of turns and therefore an upper bound on the number of goes 2010-12-19T06:03:04 but if an ant lands on an enemies home base or a player runs out of ants, the game ends before then 2010-12-19T06:03:41 i still have issues my end, but i'm slowly trying to work them out 2010-12-19T06:06:11 *** Kingpin13 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T06:13:46 let me know when the wrapping of ants has happened :) 2010-12-19T06:17:21 *** delt0r_ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T06:18:40 *** delt0r___ has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T06:21:13 Cool... I just worked out how to avoid floats with a "rts" with simple integers and having some cool "physics" 2010-12-19T06:21:19 not sure how folks feel about having to work out how to "fly" your units before you can be tactical however 2010-12-19T06:21:23 Also 2010-12-19T06:21:54 There was a game where you designed space ships that was popular in the 70s-80s (table top game) 2010-12-19T06:22:29 One year a computer entry won it... does anyone remember the name of the game? 2010-12-19T06:22:42 space combat followed ship design 2010-12-19T06:22:46 delt0r_: i'd be down :) 2010-12-19T06:24:18 delt0r_: http://pastebin.com/ztW4K8xz 2010-12-19T06:24:22 http://marco-leise.homedns.org/antgui/v2/ 2010-12-19T06:24:27 paste that into that 2010-12-19T06:24:54 the wrapping is broken on the gui atm, but you get the picture 2010-12-19T06:25:50 it is no longer broken 2010-12-19T06:25:52 doesn't run on my FF 2010-12-19T06:26:12 version 3.6.3 2010-12-19T06:26:45 yay 2010-12-19T06:26:55 frontier: i also had a successful fight in that example above 2010-12-19T06:27:39 delt0r_: works in my chrome 2010-12-19T06:28:01 doesn't work on mine FF or IE either 2010-12-19T06:28:22 antimatroid1: so by "i'd be down" --having to learn to fly is ok? 2010-12-19T06:28:32 yes 2010-12-19T06:28:42 can it be 3d flying? 2010-12-19T06:29:03 rabidus: chrome is the way of the future 2010-12-19T06:29:14 big brother is watching... 2010-12-19T06:33:09 http://pastebin.com/B87f2xBv 2010-12-19T06:33:11 run that game 2010-12-19T06:33:15 if you can :P 2010-12-19T06:33:21 sigh: 2010-12-19T06:34:13 what? 2010-12-19T06:34:27 http://marco-leise.homedns.org/antgui/v2/ http://pastebin.com/B87f2xBv 2010-12-19T06:34:43 pass the text from the second link into the text field of the first link and click load 2010-12-19T06:34:49 then give me your response :) 2010-12-19T06:34:53 ok 2010-12-19T06:35:15 there are still lots of bugs 2010-12-19T06:36:13 load button doesn't seem to do anything for me 2010-12-19T06:36:31 it works for me if i paste it right after i load the page 2010-12-19T06:36:36 otherwise it stops working 2010-12-19T06:37:13 ok, yeah... got it 2010-12-19T06:37:14 antimatroid1: Sorry doing some surfing. No, not 3d --just 2d... 2010-12-19T06:37:41 but its "non holomorphic" or whatever its called 2010-12-19T06:37:54 ie turn radius is a function of speed 2010-12-19T06:38:19 but you can turn on the spot... but "fastest" route is a very hard problem 2010-12-19T06:38:22 oh god, don't remind me of caculus of variations 2010-12-19T06:38:29 oh yea 2010-12-19T06:38:32 and then some 2010-12-19T06:38:44 yeah, bring on multiplayer optimal control theory 2010-12-19T06:38:59 i'm down, but i may be in a minority 2010-12-19T06:39:00 but because all "terrain" is passable, the idea is that suboptimal is good enough 2010-12-19T06:39:06 and strat is more important 2010-12-19T06:39:39 you could do a 2d fly the copter like game 2010-12-19T06:39:45 so a simple stop, turn, move, stop will work 2010-12-19T06:39:47 where it was symmetric top to bottom and no gravity 2010-12-19T06:40:05 its space based 2010-12-19T06:40:15 in a nubular 2010-12-19T06:40:19 nebular 2010-12-19T06:40:29 sigh: i'll make you a longer game :) 2010-12-19T06:40:32 In fact I will now name the game Nebular 2010-12-19T06:40:58 antimatroid1: looks interesting... defending home base might be difficult 2010-12-19T06:41:12 now i have the int math defined, i should be able to finish it today... 2010-12-19T06:41:18 need better bots to see what the dynamics are like 2010-12-19T06:41:21 then we have a non ant option ;) 2010-12-19T06:41:25 :P 2010-12-19T06:41:40 int math? 2010-12-19T06:43:19 sigh: i expect to have home bases forced further apart than that later 2010-12-19T06:44:26 sure... but still, if it takes too many resources to defend then I don't think that's good for game play 2010-12-19T06:44:50 it will be like close maps in planet wars where most of the units are tied up defending hom 2010-12-19T06:45:52 *** Epona has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T06:48:21 i don't expect it to be very easy to intrude the enemies base 2010-12-19T06:48:21 sigh: Floats between langs can give different rounding behavour... resulting in diverging "game engines" 2010-12-19T06:48:37 I wanted to avoid that... esp if you need "trig" 2010-12-19T06:48:40 ah, so you are doing fixed point? 2010-12-19T06:48:44 yep 2010-12-19T06:49:26 forcing IEEE is not good enough since you need the math libs to give 2 ulps or so... and C/C++ does not do this out of the box 2010-12-19T06:49:59 also x86 have odd rounding behavoir if you don't force IEEE at compile time 2010-12-19T06:50:25 its working now, there was another firefox bug, but it's working 2010-12-19T06:50:52 I've never had to deal with floating point details much :) 2010-12-19T06:51:07 http://pastebin.com/Tf9W3wJe longer game 2010-12-19T06:51:09 FireFox was right on the first error though. Chrome was just more clever with all this 'did you mean...' stuff 2010-12-19T06:57:04 *** mceier has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T06:58:55 omg the numbers are so big 2010-12-19T06:59:38 Frontier: yep :P 2010-12-19T06:59:53 that's a 32x32 map 2010-12-19T07:00:21 i think that's probably big enough 2010-12-19T07:00:36 and probably much smaller would be too small 2010-12-19T07:10:44 *** Naktibalda has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T07:11:07 sigh: i'm surprised at your comment at defending being hard 2010-12-19T07:11:23 i was thinking we might need to limit the number of grains so bots might even have a chance at getting near the enemies base 2010-12-19T07:12:05 i'm probably wrong... was just a guess 2010-12-19T07:12:13 not like i've played the game :P 2010-12-19T07:12:34 nobody has :P 2010-12-19T07:16:49 btw antimatroid, you could send an U id 0 harvest before an ant dies. Then the HP would actually drop to 0 on screen 2010-12-19T07:21:34 Frontier: yeah i saw that, hadn't got around to changing it yet :) 2010-12-19T07:23:18 i'm also trying to clean up a bit 2010-12-19T07:23:39 there is one thing, currently if ant ant dies from an attack, it drops its harvest before an ant can come on and get it 2010-12-19T07:23:46 an ant* 2010-12-19T07:38:15 reload the page :) 2010-12-19T07:40:29 slower? 2010-12-19T07:40:31 cheers 2010-12-19T07:43:31 Frontier: what's with the fight swapping? 2010-12-19T07:43:50 an ant can be fought from more than one direction, although it does look cool 2010-12-19T07:49:58 what can I do? I only animate the attacks, not the defenses :p 2010-12-19T07:50:57 but do they make it back to their square by the end of the turn? 2010-12-19T07:51:31 and it probably doens't make sense if an ant goes off to attack another while a third comes in to attack to first 2010-12-19T07:53:19 they return to their squares :) 2010-12-19T07:53:27 that's cool then :D 2010-12-19T07:54:59 how hard would a back/forward button be? 2010-12-19T07:57:30 not that hard i guess 2010-12-19T07:58:54 *** sigh has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T07:59:30 i'm not sure the increasing number size based on number of grains looks better though 2010-12-19T08:21:54 have fun with your buttons 2010-12-19T08:24:29 <3 <3 <3 2010-12-19T08:26:25 i'm trying to work out what's causing the memory issues 2010-12-19T08:26:47 and cleaning up while i'm at it 2010-12-19T08:31:26 and i am taking a break now :p 2010-12-19T08:35:39 sounds reasonable :) 2010-12-19T08:35:44 thanks so much! 2010-12-19T08:36:04 i just started downloading something to watch in bed 2010-12-19T08:36:17 takes me at least as long as a show takes to watch to download 2010-12-19T08:36:21 even xvid :( 2010-12-19T08:37:49 delt0r_: i'm wondering if we should each create a separate ant thread at some point with the different specs 2010-12-19T08:38:38 i do miss the idea of each ant for itself, but i really like the home bases and fear the other may just end up adding the start to being pattern match until working out who/where everyone is 2010-12-19T08:39:21 32 6 90 2010-12-19T08:39:21 3 22 2010-12-19T08:39:21 8 5 2010-12-19T08:39:21 ....74............8.#...###....# 2010-12-19T08:39:21 5......#..8#....#4#....#..#..... 2010-12-19T08:39:24 .6.......#..9...5.#.#....#...... 2010-12-19T08:39:26 42..#...61...#..#.#...9.....#... 2010-12-19T08:39:29 874.#..6#4......3#..........3..# 2010-12-19T08:39:29 please no 2010-12-19T08:39:31 4....#...8#9....1...........#.8. 2010-12-19T08:39:34 ...........1....9#8...#....4.8.# 2010-12-19T08:39:36 ..........#3......4#6..#.478#..3 2010-12-19T08:39:38 90 turns!! 2010-12-19T08:39:39 .....9...#.#..#...16...#..24...# 2010-12-19T08:39:41 ..#....#.#.5...9..#.......6..... 2010-12-19T08:39:42 amstan! 2010-12-19T08:39:44 .#..#....#4#....#8..#......5.... 2010-12-19T08:39:46 .###...#.8............47....#... 2010-12-19T08:39:49 fffffuuuuuuuu 2010-12-19T08:39:51 *** rabidus has left #aichallenge 2010-12-19T08:40:25 *** rabidus has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T08:40:27 rabidus: wb :D 2010-12-19T08:40:29 sry :p 2010-12-19T08:40:32 np 2010-12-19T08:40:41 i'm glad that didn't do the full game 2010-12-19T08:40:45 hehe 2010-12-19T08:41:04 rabidus: what do you think anyway? :P 2010-12-19T08:41:11 i'm not glad that irssi didn't recognise that flood 2010-12-19T08:41:13 missclick 2010-12-19T08:41:15 false paste 2010-12-19T08:41:42 think about what? the game? 2010-12-19T08:42:37 yeah 2010-12-19T08:42:37 antimatroid: Download this in case I shut down my laptop: http://marco-leise.homedns.org/antgui/v2/v2.zip 2010-12-19T08:42:49 got it, thanks 2010-12-19T08:43:40 yeah well.. i'm quite .. umm.. .. hmm.. i don't know the words 2010-12-19T08:44:11 i'd like to test it with some simple ai with reasonable framework 2010-12-19T08:44:14 ie. easy start :) 2010-12-19T08:45:43 rabidus: i can give you the input format if you want to make a bot :P 2010-12-19T08:46:18 hmm.. any server software ? 2010-12-19T08:47:26 lol, we just got that gui going with the game strings :P 2010-12-19T08:47:39 i have an engine, but it has a horrible memory leak atm that i'm trying to track down 2010-12-19T08:47:53 well frontier did anyway 2010-12-19T08:47:59 well.. i can try something :) 2010-12-19T08:49:27 http://pastebin.com/qB8JmxVR 2010-12-19T08:49:39 that's basically all you need to know 2010-12-19T08:49:46 feel free to ask anything :P 2010-12-19T08:50:09 oh, wait 2010-12-19T08:50:19 do you have any map generators or something? 2010-12-19T08:51:06 http://pastebin.com/Gc5ACPfs 2010-12-19T08:51:11 i do 2010-12-19T08:52:07 http://codepad.org/v327Hamw 2010-12-19T08:52:12 there is a sample map at the bottom 2010-12-19T08:52:33 the numbers at the top are 2010-12-19T08:52:34 dim 2010-12-19T08:52:34 base1row base1col 2010-12-19T08:52:34 base2row base2col 2010-12-19T08:52:48 allright 2010-12-19T08:53:07 note this is only a possible option for the next contest 2010-12-19T08:53:16 not what will be used, or even if it is the exact form 2010-12-19T08:53:16 hehe, sure :) 2010-12-19T08:53:29 just making sure that's clear :) 2010-12-19T08:54:26 i'll put up the code for my engine and the bot it's currently using in the next few days 2010-12-19T08:54:31 i want to get rid of the memory issues 2010-12-19T09:36:02 *** zerd has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T09:58:27 *** Rubicon-|-Cross has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T10:21:51 hmmm i have no idea what's causing memory issues :\ 2010-12-19T10:29:44 *** iNtERrUpT has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T10:41:08 :( 2010-12-19T10:46:31 *** amstan has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T10:46:31 *** ChanServ sets mode: +o amstan 2010-12-19T10:46:59 Frontier: still looking, but about to give up for the night 2010-12-19T10:47:13 amstan: http://marco-leise.homedns.org/antgui/v2/ 2010-12-19T10:47:37 cool 2010-12-19T10:48:34 its still buggy, but i'm working on those 2010-12-19T10:50:30 must admit that i like ants less and less 2010-12-19T10:50:45 why? 2010-12-19T10:50:47 i rather like it 2010-12-19T10:50:58 boring 2010-12-19T10:51:17 how? 2010-12-19T10:51:24 there's plenty of strategy to this game 2010-12-19T10:52:01 there is a lot of strategy in go too 2010-12-19T10:52:06 but go is boring too 2010-12-19T10:52:36 what do you like? :P 2010-12-19T10:52:50 I remain unconqinced that there is that much stratagy with current maps 2010-12-19T10:52:55 unconviced 2010-12-19T10:53:12 well I always said... i didn't have a better idea. 2010-12-19T10:53:27 however my mini RTS is comming along nicely... 2010-12-19T10:53:48 should be out tonight or tomorrow morning 2010-12-19T10:54:09 i'm going to bed shortly 2010-12-19T10:54:14 so hopefully when i wake up :D 2010-12-19T10:55:25 amstan: In my next attempt at a suggestion, I am doing a small space based RTS game..however folks with need to "learn to fly" there ships... its simple physics however 2010-12-19T10:55:43 would this be a problem... ie making it harder for beginners... 2010-12-19T10:56:05 just wondering what the organizers general feeling would be? 2010-12-19T10:56:11 delt0r_: there's issues though, you need time real time data then 2010-12-19T10:56:17 if there's physics involved 2010-12-19T10:56:24 unless you want to make it based on steps again 2010-12-19T10:56:25 Oh i have worked it all out 2010-12-19T10:56:30 with integer math... 2010-12-19T10:56:50 control the round off to not be "floating point dependant" 2010-12-19T10:57:04 well defined steps per turn etc 2010-12-19T10:57:21 its just not as simple as "you can move up to 5 squares" 2010-12-19T10:58:21 By real time i really mean simultaneous turns.. Like planet wars --its how its all done with real RTS games anyway 2010-12-19T10:59:01 ants is simultaneous turns :P 2010-12-19T10:59:27 i really don't get what people mean by rts 2010-12-19T10:59:43 Dune 2 2010-12-19T10:59:49 thats the deffinition... 2010-12-19T10:59:56 the rest are clones ;) 2010-12-19T11:00:12 warcraft was a clone? oh... 2010-12-19T11:00:19 dam right... 2010-12-19T11:00:40 dune 2 was in fact the 2nd RTS game to hit the market 2010-12-19T11:00:54 but still the definitive game.. 2010-12-19T11:01:01 3 different sides 2010-12-19T11:01:11 different units in each 2010-12-19T11:01:26 you could capture sand worms and get them to do your bidding 2010-12-19T11:01:53 or run over foot solders with haversters, hear them get crushed and scream out in pain 2010-12-19T11:02:30 Sonic tanks for the win 2010-12-19T11:05:42 delt0r_: Dune 2 is a clone: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herzog_Zwei 2010-12-19T11:07:00 No--that was first (as stated above)... but dune 2 awesomeness left it so far behind that nobody care about the poor imitation on a console 2010-12-19T11:07:18 just as no one really cares about RTS on consoles to this day 2010-12-19T11:07:23 :P 2010-12-19T11:13:56 well, the rts genre has slowly evolved away from obvious square grids and fixed turn rates. when someone says rts I don't think of any game that usually runs in turns of different length up to 1 second or 5 minutes 2010-12-19T11:14:15 *** yasith has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 255 seconds) 2010-12-19T11:14:59 An RTS would be if you space simulator ran continuosly and the bots would merely throw in some new command now and then when they see fit 2010-12-19T11:15:18 antimatroid1: you should play more games :) 2010-12-19T11:15:31 yea 2010-12-19T11:15:57 like "fire button down" "fire button up" "thruster on"... 2010-12-19T11:16:03 RTS games will run at a game "turn" rate of about 5 turns per sec 2010-12-19T11:16:28 if can click 30 time before your turn is up... good for you... 2010-12-19T11:16:30 if not 2010-12-19T11:16:31 well 2010-12-19T11:17:00 i don't believe you :p. I think I get a better response time than 0-200 ms from some RTS 2010-12-19T11:17:07 but its really is just simulations turns... we you don't "time out" 2010-12-19T11:17:19 Not thats the ping 2010-12-19T11:17:25 Naktibalda: not much of a video game player :P 2010-12-19T11:17:28 its not the same thing 2010-12-19T11:17:36 video games are evil 2010-12-19T11:17:51 As someone who is coding and have worked with RTS game code bases --trust me 2010-12-19T11:18:09 delt0r_: I didn't take online games into account actually. I meant the response time on a local game when I order a unit to move 2010-12-19T11:18:11 games like Civilization and UFO have real turns, where a player has to click End turn 2010-12-19T11:18:27 Typically you cheat a bit and make local units move and trust that thing sync.. gives the feel of responsivness 2010-12-19T11:18:31 civilization one was pretty cool 2010-12-19T11:18:38 soooo much time wasted 2010-12-19T11:19:23 * Naktibalda was surprized today that B&M sells some kind of sega mega drive console for 30 pounds 2010-12-19T11:19:30 of course you can up the game turn rate to say 10 games turns per sec... but much higher is a waste of time.. try SC or SC2 and you will really see 2010-12-19T11:22:43 aren't there games that use a polygon mesh for the maps that isn't aligned in a way that you could say a unit will hit a no-walk boundary exactly at a 200ms interval? 2010-12-19T11:22:53 no 2010-12-19T11:23:18 Most really are grids... with pretty rough collison detection 2010-12-19T11:23:24 but units can use any angle to walk/drive around 2010-12-19T11:23:40 most games they really can't 2010-12-19T11:24:01 this is less so in newer games where the grid is finer than the unit size 2010-12-19T11:24:07 but its still the case 2010-12-19T11:25:20 i wont by your rts games delt0r_. They are too restricted -.- 2010-12-19T11:25:46 My game is less restrictive that anything else on the market 2010-12-19T11:25:48 I'll play Company of Heroes insteas 2010-12-19T11:26:00 Thats totally uses a grid 2010-12-19T11:26:03 bah i give up for tonight 2010-12-19T11:26:05 Oo 2010-12-19T11:26:13 if you can't see that no wonder you think other don't 2010-12-19T11:26:23 its a fine grid..to be sure 2010-12-19T11:26:29 but its a gird 2010-12-19T11:26:39 also its very small scale 2010-12-19T11:26:57 10k units np 2010-12-19T11:27:05 *** yasith has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T11:27:07 100km x 100km maps np 2010-12-19T11:27:46 http://www.restorerestartquit.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/coh.jpg <- i don't see a grid :( 2010-12-19T11:28:00 you see in there movement... 2010-12-19T11:28:35 you don't draw the bloody grid 2010-12-19T11:28:42 haha 2010-12-19T11:29:11 lol, the movement is not restricted in any way I would have noticed while playing 2010-12-19T11:29:55 well we do try to hide it... but CoH does have sloppy collision detection... so they can get away with sloppy representation... 2010-12-19T11:30:07 ie internal state != rendering state 2010-12-19T11:30:52 its the most common trick to get repsonsivness and feel while not needing the complexity underneath 2010-12-19T11:31:54 You can place the sand sacks in any angle and the units follow it's outlines iirc... when i start up windows some time again, i'll search for your grid and 200ms turns :) 2010-12-19T11:32:07 lolololololo 2010-12-19T11:32:23 what part of trick don't you understand 2010-12-19T11:32:29 read some coding tuts on this 2010-12-19T11:32:33 then you will see 2010-12-19T11:33:18 I have the theory that CoH uses an arbitary polygonal mesh for collisions and pathfinding 2010-12-19T11:33:27 nope 2010-12-19T11:33:38 unless you need a supercomputer to play 2010-12-19T11:34:23 It may use a highly simplfied mesh however... so that the distiction between grid and mesh is merly simatics 2010-12-19T11:34:26 simantics 2010-12-19T11:34:31 semantics 2010-12-19T11:35:21 full geometric algos are slow and memory intensive --CAD folks have spend a *lot* of effort on this 2010-12-19T11:35:33 we know its pretty hard 2010-12-19T11:38:07 What do you understand by full geometry? The 'hull' of a sand bag wall is no more than a 6-8 sided 2D polygon. 2010-12-19T11:38:30 and how many do you have on screen? 2010-12-19T11:38:56 how many *graphics* fps... games use simplifcations that we don't notice... and even dirty hacks 2010-12-19T11:39:17 things like z ordering so that small errors are not visable 2010-12-19T11:39:58 I am not making things up... Do you really think they calculate where each foot should really be? no its a hack that looks good enough 2010-12-19T11:40:31 This is well know in the rts 2010-12-19T11:40:41 but CoH can be a slight exception... 2010-12-19T11:41:01 Its more a squad game that real RTS in my books... i hate really small unit counts 2010-12-19T11:41:24 so the engine can be a hybrid between FPS and a rts 2010-12-19T11:41:41 so AABX that sort of thing 2010-12-19T11:41:53 I don't believe they calculate where each foot really is, Half-Life 2 did that for the striders. But I think their engine doesn't use a grid and angles and positions are floating point 2010-12-19T11:42:37 But what is on the screen is not what is used "out the back" 2010-12-19T11:43:12 there is a big difference between floating point leg position (that uses hacky IK approximations) and 2010-12-19T11:43:18 full engine fp 2010-12-19T11:43:41 but FPS can get away with more since total unit count is typlically a few dozen 2010-12-19T11:45:44 *** amstan has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T12:18:38 *** Migi32 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T12:21:33 *** mceier has quit IRC (Quit: Lost terminal) 2010-12-19T12:22:26 *** mceier has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T12:38:47 *** ulope has quit IRC (Quit: ZNC - http://znc.sourceforge.net) 2010-12-19T13:07:25 *** ebrahim has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T13:07:25 *** ebrahim has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T13:21:55 *** Migi32 has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 260 seconds) 2010-12-19T13:23:33 *** yasith has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 276 seconds) 2010-12-19T13:34:11 *** Migi32 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T13:41:27 *** tapwater has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T13:44:55 *** iNtERrUpT has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T13:46:26 *** j3camero has quit IRC (Quit: leaving) 2010-12-19T13:48:06 *** Azrathud has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T13:50:34 *** j3camero has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T13:55:40 Okay I am back from my vacation from all things contest-related. I want to start working on the next one. Anybody with me? 2010-12-19T14:00:22 how long will the contest be? will you have another vacation mid-contest? 2010-12-19T14:00:35 Impossible to tell haha. 2010-12-19T14:00:48 But yeah I got really burnt out last one. 2010-12-19T14:01:01 hmm, then I'm sorta with you. 2010-12-19T14:01:08 I had enough strength to get it out into the wild and launched, but then I was pretty much done. 2010-12-19T14:01:58 Luckily there is a much larger pool of developers since we went to open-source. That should help to reduce the ridiculous workload on people. 2010-12-19T14:02:26 I remember during Tron there were a few of us pulling all-nighters every night. It is a good thing though. 2010-12-19T14:03:29 Mathnerd314 what is your main area of interest? What do you like coding? Fave languages? Also, non-coding tasks? 2010-12-19T14:04:31 well, I was going to work on the last contest, but then I kept ignoring it and writing a new PL instead. (implemented in Haskell, my fave language other than the one I'm writing) 2010-12-19T14:05:52 PL == programming language? 2010-12-19T14:05:56 yeah. 2010-12-19T14:06:01 my main interest is probably mathematical programming languages :p 2010-12-19T14:07:10 Hmmm interesting. 2010-12-19T14:07:21 I wonder if we could do something really awesome around that with the contest. 2010-12-19T14:08:20 You could see it being fun to program a bot in some sort of declarative way (math-like) instead of procedurally. 2010-12-19T14:09:26 the problem is determining the winner 2010-12-19T14:10:34 *** Migi32 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T14:14:52 and that math tends not to have time limits ;-) 2010-12-19T14:17:25 *** delt0r___ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T14:18:43 *** delt0r_ has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T14:21:26 *** tapwater has quit IRC (Quit: tapwater) 2010-12-19T14:24:59 Well my objective today is to sketch out my interpretation of the ant battle idea. I want to implement a simple engine and a few test bots, and watch them play against each other. Then I'll post these in the forum thread about the idea. 2010-12-19T14:54:35 *** nullkuhl has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T14:55:56 *** Utkarsh has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T15:01:07 *** Utkarsh has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T15:09:45 *** Migi32 has quit IRC (Read error: Connection reset by peer) 2010-12-19T15:10:55 *** nullkuhl has quit IRC (Read error: Connection reset by peer) 2010-12-19T15:15:00 *** nullkuhl has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T15:19:31 *** Accoun has quit IRC () 2010-12-19T15:28:04 *** Migi32 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T15:29:35 *** Accoun has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T15:37:21 *** j3camero has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 260 seconds) 2010-12-19T15:44:34 *** j3camero has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T15:48:24 j3camero: wow --another ant engine... guess the more the merrier 2010-12-19T15:56:58 *** delt0r_ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T15:58:55 *** delt0r___ has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 276 seconds) 2010-12-19T16:01:26 *** delt0r_ has quit IRC (Read error: Operation timed out) 2010-12-19T16:01:58 *** delt0r_ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:05:28 Yeah I guess writing the engine is not the hard part, so it's all good. 2010-12-19T16:05:38 ;) 2010-12-19T16:05:46 :) 2010-12-19T16:05:52 Would be nice to see a few different ideas before settling on how we want to arrange the rules of the game. 2010-12-19T16:05:53 german keyboard 2010-12-19T16:05:59 yea 2010-12-19T16:06:11 that was the idea of my engine... try different things 2010-12-19T16:06:20 not really to say... here is the thing 2010-12-19T16:06:41 Yep exactly. 2010-12-19T16:06:43 also I am now writing a space based min RTS as a suggestion as well 2010-12-19T16:06:49 Oooo 2010-12-19T16:06:53 3D or 2D? 2010-12-19T16:06:56 2D 2010-12-19T16:07:01 Cool. 2010-12-19T16:07:13 3D would be ridiculous. But somewhat fun. It could work. 2010-12-19T16:07:14 will be hard enough for beginners as is 2010-12-19T16:07:27 True. 2010-12-19T16:07:44 it incudes accleration etc.. so you would need to be able to "fly" your ships 2010-12-19T16:07:47 I am always tempted to produce really complicated games. I must remember that the target audience should be total beginners. 2010-12-19T16:07:51 could make it too hard already 2010-12-19T16:08:29 I think complicated is ok.. as long as a "starter pack" bot can still be simple 2010-12-19T16:08:46 Yes that's exactly right. 2010-12-19T16:09:20 The starter pack has to be simple, and there have to be at least three simple improvements to the starter pack that give a good boost in the rankings. 2010-12-19T16:09:46 I would agree 2010-12-19T16:09:59 Do you have any visual output from your engine? It would be neat to see something. 2010-12-19T16:10:18 My post included a simple visulizer 2010-12-19T16:10:26 this is for the ants 2010-12-19T16:10:33 Yes 2010-12-19T16:10:44 Was yours the really cool-looking javascript one? 2010-12-19T16:10:48 nope 2010-12-19T16:10:51 the java one 2010-12-19T16:11:02 I will have to revisit. 2010-12-19T16:11:09 looks like a cross word with numbers and dots 2010-12-19T16:12:50 what lang do you use? 2010-12-19T16:13:27 I like Python for this sort of thing. 2010-12-19T16:13:54 I could make some sort of GUI... 2010-12-19T16:13:59 Python is nice--quick to prototype 2010-12-19T16:14:21 but i havn't done much with python 2010-12-19T16:16:56 *** ChanServ has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:57 *** Utkarsh has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:57 *** Kingpin13 has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:57 *** Palmik has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:57 *** SmkMnstr has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:57 *** acieroid has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:57 *** greghaynes has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:58 *** pgpaskar_ has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:58 *** fgump has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:59 *** a1k0n_ has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:59 *** rabidus has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:59 *** Zannick has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:16:59 *** yellowseed has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:00 *** j3camero has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:00 *** spz has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:00 *** wh1teside_ has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:01 *** eregon has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:01 *** Rubicon-|-Cross has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:02 *** Epona has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:02 *** medrimonia has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:02 *** Posterdati has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:02 *** smellyhippy has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:03 *** CIA-36 has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:17:04 *** jmpespxoreax has quit IRC (*.net *.split) 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** j3camero has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Utkarsh has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Rubicon-|-Cross has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** rabidus has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Epona has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Kingpin13 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** fgump has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** medrimonia has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Palmik has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Posterdati has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** smellyhippy has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** CIA-36 has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** SmkMnstr has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** spz has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** a1k0n_ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** acieroid has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** Zannick has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** greghaynes has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** ChanServ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** wh1teside_ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** pgpaskar_ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** yellowseed has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** eregon has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** jmpespxoreax has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T16:21:39 *** lindbohm.freenode.net sets mode: +o ChanServ 2010-12-19T16:22:12 i don't really think that's worth it 2010-12-19T16:22:28 you'd be asking people to stop using their ide and use yours 2010-12-19T16:23:15 We wouldn't force people to use the browser-based IDE. If you wanted to code on your own machine and zip it up and upload it manually, you could still do that. I have a feeling that many people would choose the browser IDE if we did it right. 2010-12-19T16:23:46 It would be the most useful for people who are total beginners. 2010-12-19T16:24:21 Instead of asking them to figure out how to set up a development environment on their computer (non-trivial for a beginner), they would have the option to "click here to start coding" 2010-12-19T16:37:46 maybe 2010-12-19T16:44:28 *** fgump has quit IRC (Quit: Leaving) 2010-12-19T16:57:16 j3camero: what do you think about the other version of ants with home bases? :P 2010-12-19T16:57:32 j3camero: also, you should put something on the main site about aiGameDev 2010-12-19T17:00:56 thatd be pretty awesome 2010-12-19T17:01:07 if there was something set up 2010-12-19T17:01:10 http://marco-leise.homedns.org/antgui/v2/ 2010-12-19T17:01:12 :P 2010-12-19T17:01:34 this is pretty cool 2010-12-19T17:01:54 if you get an ant onto their base, you win, and you don't actually see the whole map at the start 2010-12-19T17:02:02 its like their all zerg 2010-12-19T17:02:08 what happens if they zerg rush 2010-12-19T17:02:20 then you have to defend 2010-12-19T17:02:47 I love that visualizer. 2010-12-19T17:02:58 so do i, thank frontier 2010-12-19T17:03:15 Whoever made that should become the visualizer guru for the next contest. I remember making a note of the forum name of the guy who made it. 2010-12-19T17:03:18 Frontier, yes. 2010-12-19T17:03:36 delt0r was very helpful last contest gui wise 2010-12-19T17:03:48 Yes indeed. 2010-12-19T17:03:57 gui == 3 letters, visualiser ~= 1 billion letters 2010-12-19T17:04:00 use the shorter one :P 2010-12-19T17:04:46 *** j3camero has quit IRC (Quit: leaving) 2010-12-19T17:09:25 80% cpu 2010-12-19T17:09:26 .____. 2010-12-19T17:09:33 is there a way to get this to burn less intel juice 2010-12-19T17:09:47 is that the antwars thing? 2010-12-19T17:09:49 yes 2010-12-19T17:09:58 don't think so, the engine i wrote for it is even worse 2010-12-19T17:10:07 lol :] 2010-12-19T17:13:07 http://pastebin.com/HKqtiP0h 2010-12-19T17:13:12 that is my current specification of the game 2010-12-19T17:16:07 *** ebrahim has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T17:22:35 the comments here make my day, ha! :) good night 2010-12-19T17:23:06 *** Frontier has left #aichallenge 2010-12-19T18:08:28 mmm... has anyone even tried mine? :( 2010-12-19T18:08:32 * delt0r_ feels sad 2010-12-19T18:09:39 delt0r_: i played around with it :) 2010-12-19T18:10:37 * delt0r_ feels better 2010-12-19T18:11:25 how's the new game coming? 2010-12-19T18:11:30 nice 2010-12-19T18:11:33 its cool 2010-12-19T18:11:43 its unfortunatly not so simple 2010-12-19T18:11:52 i don't see that as a bad thing :P 2010-12-19T18:11:53 I should simplifiy it 2010-12-19T18:12:05 well its the units thing 2010-12-19T18:12:12 I have 4 unit types already 2010-12-19T18:12:18 should stick with one 2010-12-19T18:12:22 or 2 2010-12-19T18:12:26 then 3 2010-12-19T18:12:31 etc 2010-12-19T18:12:31 hmmm, i kind of like the idea of harder and harder games 2010-12-19T18:12:45 Well i don't want starter packs to be too hard 2010-12-19T18:13:03 complex is fine... but a basic bot should be easy 2010-12-19T18:13:27 but "flying" a ship is not that easy.. (well its not that hard either...) 2010-12-19T18:13:39 shouldn't be that hard for people 2010-12-19T18:13:39 turn, move, stop shoot 2010-12-19T18:13:51 thinking of beginers 2010-12-19T18:14:56 do you have to stop to shoot or just stop turning? 2010-12-19T18:15:17 no--well not for fighters... just easier for a control loop 2010-12-19T18:15:47 warp guns (aka arty ) needs to have zero speed to fire 2010-12-19T18:16:43 there is a wild card "unit" id which means the unit will fire at the nearest thing 2010-12-19T18:23:09 *** choas has quit IRC (Quit: leaving) 2010-12-19T18:36:37 *** Palmik has quit IRC (Read error: Connection reset by peer) 2010-12-19T18:38:46 *** iNtERrUpT has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T18:44:46 *** nullkuhl has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T18:53:20 *** nullkuhl has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T18:58:17 *** nullkuhl has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T18:59:18 *** nullkuhl has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T19:44:44 *** j3camero has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T19:46:12 *** mceier has quit IRC (Quit: leaving) 2010-12-19T19:50:47 *** Tobu has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T19:51:23 *** Kingpin13 has quit IRC (Quit: You're a kitty!) 2010-12-19T19:52:15 *** Naktibalda has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T20:26:27 *** sigh has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T20:33:11 *** Azrathud has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T20:43:14 *** amstan has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T20:43:14 *** ChanServ sets mode: +o amstan 2010-12-19T21:07:40 *** yasith has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T21:14:52 *** yasith has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 240 seconds) 2010-12-19T21:16:43 *** amriedle has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T21:27:25 *** yasith has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T21:27:25 *** amriedle has quit IRC (Quit: Lost terminal) 2010-12-19T21:30:05 *** Epona has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 264 seconds) 2010-12-19T21:55:22 j3camero: are you actually writing an ant engine? 2010-12-19T21:56:03 i would expect if you do and an ant game was to be used then that would likely be an engine to release to people later, so it would probably be worth discussing with people what they want first 2010-12-19T21:56:19 particularly delt0r and i have two different incompatible specifications 2010-12-19T21:56:30 both have nice features that just don't go together 2010-12-19T21:57:15 j3camero: so.. i do wanna work on tron 2010-12-19T21:57:26 s/tron/next engine wtf is wrong with me, lol 2010-12-19T21:57:38 j3camero: and i wanna program more 2010-12-19T21:57:50 j3camero: also.. i hate toronto, found a place 2010-12-19T21:58:05 j3camero: issue is that i'm going on vacation till 4th jan 2010-12-19T21:58:05 amstan: have you finished exams? 2010-12-19T21:58:12 antimatroid1: tomorrow the last 2010-12-19T21:58:14 then florida 2010-12-19T21:58:17 good luck :) 2010-12-19T21:58:30 also, i expect most people will be busy over the next week or two as well 2010-12-19T22:00:43 I am already here :-) 2010-12-19T22:00:49 Just wasn't paying attention. 2010-12-19T22:00:56 j3camero: yep.. np 2010-12-19T22:01:00 j3camero: i saw you went on here 2010-12-19T22:02:10 antimatroid1: I am not working on the "final engine" today, no. Just adding yet another engine to the brainstorming mix. 2010-12-19T22:03:31 I like the ants concept in general though. 2010-12-19T22:03:48 I think it could produce visualizations that are fun to watch. 2010-12-19T22:07:11 j3camero: my current engine sucks balls, so anything else would be good for the moment 2010-12-19T22:08:42 j3camero: http://codepad.org/c1zcUthc map gen 2010-12-19T22:09:05 there is a sample map at the bottom, the numbers at the top are the dimensions (square board) and locations of home bases 2010-12-19T22:09:30 http://pastebin.com/EV2q7cYb and that's the specification my engine etc. uses 2010-12-19T22:09:46 it would be good if you could at least use the format for passing strings to Frontiers visualiser 2010-12-19T22:11:18 amstan, j3camero: did either of you play future cop lapd on playsation? 2010-12-19T22:11:28 *** amriedle has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T22:11:40 antimatroid1: you have to rephrase 2010-12-19T22:11:45 Nope never played that. 2010-12-19T22:11:47 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2rPuRDtL_s 2010-12-19T22:11:59 I never had a playstation *cry* 2010-12-19T22:11:59 this is what my ant specification seems like to me 2010-12-19T22:12:57 your childhood was only ruined if you never has a snes 2010-12-19T22:13:58 That game looks sweet. 2010-12-19T22:14:26 there's a trial on download.com that lets you play skycaptain on precint assault mode 2010-12-19T22:14:36 i downlaoded it yesterday ;) 2010-12-19T22:15:19 *** nullkuhl has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 276 seconds) 2010-12-19T22:15:56 Seems like ana elegant spec. That is good. We can't get too complicated. 2010-12-19T22:16:13 i put some thought into that 2010-12-19T22:16:34 one issue is when killing an ant, whether an ant moving onto that square should get the ants harvest before it is dropped 2010-12-19T22:16:41 i think they should, but it's harder to process 2010-12-19T22:16:51 killing an ant from a fight* 2010-12-19T22:18:01 *** delt0r___ has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T22:18:14 i like the map generator, with the edges wrapped (equivalent to playing the game on the surface of a torus) then every non-wall square is reachable 2010-12-19T22:18:30 and you have no idea where their base might be at the start of the game 2010-12-19T22:18:46 well, other than it's within the given dimensions somewhere 2010-12-19T22:19:44 *** delt0r_ has quit IRC (Ping timeout: 260 seconds) 2010-12-19T22:24:11 *** Migi32 has quit IRC (Remote host closed the connection) 2010-12-19T22:25:09 some people seem to be in favour of the engine just ignoring invalid moves, but i kind of like being told when i fuck up 2010-12-19T22:28:04 j3camero: i even have something for you to put in the strategy guide :P 2010-12-19T22:28:27 antimatroid1: ooo strategy guide 2010-12-19T22:28:40 It would be better than the advanced strategy guide I posted last time for sure :-) 2010-12-19T22:28:51 j3camero: anyway.. don't start without me!!! 2010-12-19T22:29:12 atm i have the starter bot allocate each square a direction home, starting with 'X', then when an ant moves into a square, if direction home is X it sets it to go back into the square they just came from, that way any bot knows a (very inefficient) path home 2010-12-19T22:29:34 an update (but still inefficient) would be to have the bot update the direction if it's current path from home is shorter than the previous one 2010-12-19T22:30:07 realistically, people just want to paint the grid with where they can get, but i don't really want to put that in the starter bot, removes some of the fun 2010-12-19T22:31:01 if you paint from all sources at once with a queue, you also get shortest turns for any bot to reach a square 2010-12-19T22:31:07 sources == ants 2010-12-19T22:31:12 amstan: you got it man. Don't worry there will be tons to work on anyways haha. 2010-12-19T22:31:16 any == a 2010-12-19T22:31:37 j3camero: oh.. another thing.. keep the protocol json 2010-12-19T22:31:43 amstan: I worked all day today at a coffee shop relatively near where you said you'd be working. It's a good spot for cranking out code. 2010-12-19T22:31:44 j3camero: it'll make it easier for us in the future 2010-12-19T22:32:02 amstan: where are you living next term? 2010-12-19T22:32:39 see gtalk for my place+workplace 2010-12-19T22:33:12 j3camero: i'm going to say it one more time, i really think you should put something on the planetwars website about aiGameDev, they've been handing out a lot of normally costly memberships to their site in the forums 2010-12-19T22:33:15 :) 2010-12-19T22:33:33 j3camero: that too, they're rather dissapoint 2010-12-19T22:34:28 by the looks or it people are quite impressed with the site too 2010-12-19T22:34:38 That is good. 2010-12-19T22:34:42 and you may encourage other people to offer money/prizes 2010-12-19T22:35:47 i might also suggest sticking their name up on the next contests website without even requiring them offer a prize, although i suspect they may do the same thing again if they generate enough interest from it 2010-12-19T22:37:26 antimatroid1: maybe you can be the next me! 2010-12-19T22:37:27 It's very nice what he is doing, yes. I am appreciative. However I'm kind of nervous dealing with the guy. He got pretty angry with me when I didn't get back to him quickly enough around the time I was starting my new job. That was my bad of course, I should have got back to him more quickly. But he got so angry that I just didn't feel like dealing with him anymore. That being said, I appreciate what he has done and I think it would be great to keep on c 2010-12-19T22:37:35 amstan: not a chance sorry :P 2010-12-19T22:37:39 i want to keep competing 2010-12-19T22:37:51 antimatroid1: aww.. 2010-12-19T22:38:11 j3camero: oh lol, well, he is our first voluntary sponsor 2010-12-19T22:38:30 perhaps i should talk to him, try to appologize 2010-12-19T22:38:35 j3camero: to be fair, i think he waited a while before getting angry, i probably would have responded similarly 2010-12-19T22:38:55 i just need to know the protocol in this situations, so i can act in your behalf 2010-12-19T22:42:04 *** Azrathud has joined #aichallenge 2010-12-19T22:42:08 Yeah I dropped the ball with him. I feel bad about it. 2010-12-19T22:43:09 send me his email if you want me to try to communicate with him 2010-12-19T22:43:49 I think we should just let it be for now. 2010-12-19T22:44:49 ok 2010-12-19T22:45:09 There is an organizational problem here as well. Dealing with sponsors or any other activity that involves spending money or receiving money for the contest still has to go through me. I have managed to eliminate myself as a leadership chokepoint in most of the technical areas, but I'm still a bottleneck when it comes to sponsors and money matters. 2010-12-19T22:45:48 I really want to register a not-for-profit corporation or something to act as the purse of the contest. That would be a lot more flexible. 2010-12-19T22:46:56 you need to find an army of amstans 2010-12-19T22:47:00 i'm pretty sure he's sick of it 2010-12-19T22:47:18 who is sick of what? 2010-12-19T22:47:30 being a people person 2010-12-19T22:47:32 lol 2010-12-19T22:47:32 amstan and the boringness of the stuff he does 2010-12-19T22:47:42 i wanna code already 2010-12-19T22:47:49 Yeah, we have had that conversation a few times. 2010-12-19T22:48:19 Yeah man when you start your next work term we'll hole up at the coffee shop after work and hammer out some code. :-) 2010-12-19T22:48:30 sounds good 2010-12-19T22:48:41 oh man.. can't wait 2010-12-19T22:49:27 i may have at least 2 other people likely to put a serious effort in next time where i live 2010-12-19T22:49:34 I think that the community is getting big enough at this point that we can enlist a bunch of mods from amongst the contestants themselves to act as information-disseminators. 2010-12-19T22:50:02 antimatroid1: do you mean as contestants or as staff? We could still use all the help we can get. 2010-12-19T22:50:13 contestants :P 2010-12-19T22:50:36 i don't mind doing something like that for you, but like stated a million times previously, anything that renders me ineligible to compete and i'm not willing 2010-12-19T22:51:05 antimatroid1: i don't think there is anything, we're always going to relaxing the rules more and more from what i see 2010-12-19T22:52:06 what is a must is very clear game specifications, i don't mind generality, but it must be clear and the end game must not be a subset of what was defined to be allowed 2010-12-19T22:52:10 amstan has done a great job though. I see a lot of projects where the community gets really frustrated because they have trouble getting any information. Think about the frustration due to ambiguity in the rules last contest, times 100. amstan has realy been the driving force behind preventing that. He is always keeping the forums up to date so everybody knows what's going on mostly. 2010-12-19T22:52:48 yeah, all kudos to amstan, a lot of what he gets stuck doing is just tedious work, some of which really needs to be automated 2010-12-19T22:53:08 yes, agreed. 2010-12-19T22:53:34 if there was an army of people doing it instead of just him, it wouldn't be so bad on ech person either 2010-12-19T22:53:35 thanks 2010-12-19T22:53:47 amstan: :) 2010-12-19T22:53:54 well, the thing is.. this can be anyone, including contestants 2010-12-19T22:54:02 For sure. 2010-12-19T22:54:04 they don't need to be disqualified in order to do this 2010-12-19T22:54:12 antimatroid1: that's what i meant by you helping 2010-12-19T22:54:28 i'm not sure contestants should be able to edit other peoples profiles etc. 2010-12-19T22:55:40 no.. not that 2010-12-19T22:55:46 that should be the automated parts 2010-12-19T22:55:56 i mean being a community person 2010-12-19T22:56:09 I think thats true now amstan. We can have the contestants themselves stepping up into leadership roles. The whole project is much more open now than it used to be. We will still have to be careful to be extremely clear about the difference between contestants and staff though. Very clear. We would look really stupid if somebody who appears to be an "insider" or "more than an ordinary contestant" wins the top prize. 2010-12-19T22:56:38 we need to get a wiki, and write all that in there 2010-12-19T22:57:04 More than just writing it down though, it needs to be inherently obvious. 2010-12-19T22:57:25 Like, forum mods need to be marked as "contestant" or something. 2010-12-19T22:57:55 i actually didn't look in the forums much this contest 2010-12-19T22:57:58 we also need to listen less to people like usernam 2010-12-19T22:58:04 they're not the average.. 2010-12-19T22:58:13 what did usernam say? 2010-12-19T22:58:14 Did anyone ever listen to him? :-) 2010-12-19T22:58:14 and i don't think they're taken seriously by the average 2010-12-19T22:58:24 j3camero: no, i was just affraid that they did 2010-12-19T22:58:25 but no 2010-12-19T22:58:29 I see what you're saying amstan 2010-12-19T22:59:12 it doesn't seem that there's a problem with people differentiating between insiders and contestants 2010-12-19T22:59:19 but the problem is people not getting enough info 2010-12-19T22:59:26 so i think we have to be more relaxed 2010-12-19T22:59:35 more clear* 2010-12-19T22:59:46 clarity is what people are unanimously asking for 2010-12-19T22:59:54 yeah 2010-12-19T22:59:57 generality is fine, just not fuzzy 2010-12-19T23:00:19 i also think that centralizing that info, having only one place for it, would make it clearer 2010-12-19T23:00:29 I don't think there is an issue differentiating between insiders and contestants, either 2010-12-19T23:00:31 Nevertheless, the contest is starting to get some press from people who are more than just bloggers. Therefore we need to take steps to be as transparent and open as possible. All it takes is one headline that says "contest administrator takes first prize in own contest". 2010-12-19T23:00:43 for example, no one made a fuss with antimatroid being the writer of the new maps 2010-12-19T23:00:51 regardless of whether they liked the change :P 2010-12-19T23:00:57 i'm slightly biased on my preference towards these games, but i think the best thing the separates this contest from the other ai ones is the simultaneous game play 2010-12-19T23:01:00 sigh: only usernam, lol 2010-12-19T23:01:09 it's gives much cooler fast paced games 2010-12-19T23:01:13 :) 2010-12-19T23:01:16 ants is sort of in the middle 2010-12-19T23:01:31 sigh: some people made comments 2010-12-19T23:01:41 but they usually shut up when it was pointed out they could inspect the code 2010-12-19T23:01:42 i agree, stuff is fun when it's more fast paced 2010-12-19T23:01:59 it gives* aha 2010-12-19T23:02:25 yeah... perhaps it needs to be more clear that the code is available, and where it is 2010-12-19T23:02:42 Agreed yep. 2010-12-19T23:02:43 chuck a copy of all files on the start pack page 2010-12-19T23:02:43 sigh: i can take care of that 2010-12-19T23:02:43 simple 2010-12-19T23:02:57 or a link at least 2010-12-19T23:03:02 j3camero: i do believe a move to github will benefit us a lot 2010-12-19T23:03:11 given this is a contest for programmers, I would put the link in the sidebar on the main page 2010-12-19T23:03:28 Yeah I think we should start out on github this time. That seemed to be pretty unanimous. 2010-12-19T23:03:40 no complaints here on that one :p 2010-12-19T23:03:41 sigh: yeah that's what I want to do. 2010-12-19T23:03:46 j3camero: another issue is the naming.. 2010-12-19T23:04:00 j3camero: we should really decide ai challenge vs ai-contest or whatever other names 2010-12-19T23:04:34 well, you've already got the ai-contest domain... I suggest you don't change that :P 2010-12-19T23:04:36 ai-contest.com is fairly well known now and easy to remember 2010-12-19T23:04:36 My idea around moving to open source was to blur the line between competitors and admins as much as possible. Ideally, the contest would be 100% run by the contestants themselves. We actually came pretty close to that this time around, with Janzert and danielvf doing so much work. 2010-12-19T23:05:02 there needs to be a very distinct line between administrator and contestant 2010-12-19T23:05:16 Yeah there does have to be that line. 2010-12-19T23:05:16 not so much between contributers/contestants 2010-12-19T23:05:44 well, what I've been lead to understand is that only people not allowed to enter are those who have root access to the servers 2010-12-19T23:05:53 sigh: yes 2010-12-19T23:05:56 Pretty much. 2010-12-19T23:06:04 that's pretty clear, then 2010-12-19T23:06:06 sigh: or any kind of admin accounts 2010-12-19T23:06:08 which would be admins yes? 2010-12-19T23:06:13 antimatroid1: yes 2010-12-19T23:06:20 hence my comment :) 2010-12-19T23:06:24 Anybody who might reasonably be perceived to be an "official" or "insider", or who has an unfair advantage. 2010-12-19T23:06:34 what is an insider? 2010-12-19T23:06:42 i couldn't be more of an insider for ants the game 2010-12-19T23:06:52 Soembody who can speak on behalf of the contest, like amstan, as well. 2010-12-19T23:07:15 You are right antimatroid1, guess we'll have to disqualify you! :-P 2010-12-19T23:07:23 :P 2010-12-19T23:07:33 we just have to be careful about the media, that's all 2010-12-19T23:07:54 No but that idea behind open sourcing was to let the contestants still compete, and also be involved in choosing and designing the game. 2010-12-19T23:07:56 *** Rubicon-|-Cross has quit IRC (Quit: Leaving) 2010-12-19T23:07:59 i like the idea of every game being on a new map in future contests 2010-12-19T23:08:40 depends on the game :P 2010-12-19T23:08:47 antimatroid1: +1 2010-12-19T23:08:52 yes, tron no, planet wars yes 2010-12-19T23:09:00 with ants so far i would say yes 2010-12-19T23:09:01 antimatroid1: it would help map distribution too 2010-12-19T23:09:07 amstan: I think I will choose to be very paranoid about transparency in the future, as I have been in the past. We really don't want somebody to make a credible accusation that the chosen winner is illegitimate. That would be terrible. 2010-12-19T23:09:12 antimatroid1: include generator git hash, and seed 2010-12-19T23:09:56 j3camero: what do you mean? 2010-12-19T23:10:16 there should be no reasonable argument that the winner was able to influence the outcome 2010-12-19T23:10:27 i'm probably starting to tread on thin ice there atm 2010-12-19T23:10:41 i can't be involved in the actual selection of the final game specs 2010-12-19T23:10:48 the ones i have are just how i think it could work 2010-12-19T23:11:29 unfairly influence* 2010-12-19T23:11:50 any contribution from a contestant needs to be approved by others for example, which is currently happening 2010-12-19T23:11:52 We want the contestants to step up into leadership roles to develop the community further. However, there's a danger that a contestant could become a de facto spokesman for the contest. This is a good thing I think, except that it looks dumb if this person goes on to win the contest. That would be like me winning the contest. It would just look dumb. 2010-12-19T23:12:39 antimatroid1: I think you're quite safe now. Don't sweat it. 2010-12-19T23:13:00 i know, but it's getting towards the line of what should and shouldn't be allowed from a contestant 2010-12-19T23:13:14 i wouldn't do it if i thought i would get deemed ineligible 2010-12-19T23:13:49 I think that designing the game and even writing the game engine itself is well within safe territory. I wouldn't sweat it. 2010-12-19T23:14:26 anyway, i'm off to get something for lunch 2010-12-19T23:14:41 Now if you were posting the final game choice in the forums under the Announcements topic, and your forum name was highlighted in a special color and such, then you would be getting close. 2010-12-19T23:15:30 especially if that game choice was "best impersonation of antimatrioid" 2010-12-19T23:15:31 afaik he's only playing with the problem 2010-12-19T23:15:35 we might use his research 2010-12-19T23:15:48 Anyways. amstan I am going to keep dicking around with the ants game. It looks promising as a concept. We'll have to nail down some specific variant of the ants idea of course. In any case, we will lay down some serious code in January. 2010-12-19T23:15:59 cool 2010-12-19T23:16:28 I was look at Django some more. 2010-12-19T23:16:50 j3camero: the alternative to my own does a half decent job at approximating each ant as a single process 2010-12-19T23:16:54 good stuff eh? 2010-12-19T23:16:56 but it's incompatible with the home base idea 2010-12-19T23:17:18 I really like the i18n and l10n features. We might finally be able to offer the website in Russian, Polish, German, Spanish, French, etc. I'm sure we could find community members to help us with translation (you and I could do the french and romanian to get things started) 2010-12-19T23:17:34 it passes each ant relative information about what is around it, but if you have a home base you can just coordinate everything to that 2010-12-19T23:18:05 we need to find accoun a wife too 2010-12-19T23:18:14 antimatroid1: as a practical matter, I don't think we can do "one process per ant". It seems like that's just too many processes. 2010-12-19T23:19:03 also makes the games longer, because the first phase of the game is synchronising with freindly ants 2010-12-19T23:19:07 j3camero: that's the point, all ants go in one process, but each ant gets passed relative information about what is around it, so if two ants are outside each others view, for all you know they could be right near each other or opposite sides of the map 2010-12-19T23:19:27 there is another option with ants moving onto the same square 2010-12-19T23:19:37 ohhhhh 2010-12-19T23:19:40 interesting 2010-12-19T23:19:52 i fuse and fight them to get one resulting ant, delt0r has those moves just not counting 2010-12-19T23:19:59 so the engine hides information about whats in between the ants, or their positions relative to one another 2010-12-19T23:20:08 yes 2010-12-19T23:20:14 I missed that 2010-12-19T23:20:25 each version ants have a view radius, so you can't see the whole map at the start 2010-12-19T23:20:39 Yeah mine too 2010-12-19T23:21:18 are you using that visualiser string format? that would probably make frontiers life a lot easier 2010-12-19T23:21:21 or at least something like it 2010-12-19T23:21:39 I haven't got that far yet. 2010-12-19T23:21:44 Will keep it in mind though. 2010-12-19T23:21:53 Is it XML or JSON or somesuch? 2010-12-19T23:21:57 don't worry so much about the bot input/output format, but it would be nice to be passed parameters at the start and given three seconds to set up, and also be sent "finish" instead of "go" when the game is over 2010-12-19T23:22:04 oh yeah, it's just text atm 2010-12-19T23:22:15 i think he had json set up though, talk to Frontier when you're working it out :) 2010-12-19T23:22:32 kk 2010-12-19T23:22:42 I was just playing with it today. 2010-12-19T23:22:44 cause that visualiser is awesome 2010-12-19T23:22:51 It really is 2010-12-19T23:22:51 j3camero: we should try to keep it json, it would be nicer for the tools 2010-12-19T23:23:07 and for adding any new stuff later 2010-12-19T23:23:10 like turn count 2010-12-19T23:23:20 Why not XML? Isn't it more widely supported and such? 2010-12-19T23:23:36 too much overhead 2010-12-19T23:23:42 As in, more languages have XML parsing ability in their default libraries. 2010-12-19T23:23:42 * antimatroid1 likes just plain input/output :( 2010-12-19T23:23:58 json is the same, python does it just fine 2010-12-19T23:24:02 js is native.. 2010-12-19T23:24:10 others have them too 2010-12-19T23:24:40 i think it's been checked that any languages seen used so far will have a json library available 2010-12-19T23:24:47 We could have a serious problem if people using windows have to go and install all kinds of 3rd party libraries just to get the starter package to work though. 2010-12-19T23:24:52 not sure whether all will be compatible with current server set up, but that's meant to change anyway 2010-12-19T23:25:15 Ideally the starter packages would be self-contained 2010-12-19T23:25:26 that's my issue, i like the bots being self contained 2010-12-19T23:25:35 Yeah. 2010-12-19T23:25:40 and it's really easy for me to handle input atm thanks to stringstreams 2010-12-19T23:25:52 not so much when i tried to handle input/output with processes 2010-12-19T23:26:05 I mean, if we use XML or JSON then people would need to install the correct libraries to get the C++ starter package to work. That would be annoying. 2010-12-19T23:26:32 would it be worth using json for everything but passing to and from bots? 2010-12-19T23:26:46 I dont really care that much. 2010-12-19T23:27:01 most people have seemed fine with the idea of json though 2010-12-19T23:27:08 so i don't mind that much 2010-12-19T23:27:12 Yep. 2010-12-19T23:27:17 JSON is pretty sweet. 2010-12-19T23:28:00 Okay I'm gonna hit the sack. Work tomorrow. 2010-12-19T23:28:11 Gotta make the financial markets ever more efficient. 2010-12-19T23:30:00 Oh is Marvin Minsky still alive? 2010-12-19T23:31:45 lol 2010-12-19T23:46:38 *** amriedle has quit IRC (Quit: Lost terminal) 2010-12-19T23:47:34 typical tasmanian weather 2010-12-19T23:47:47 blue sky up until i go outside to ride somewhere at which point it pours on me 2010-12-19T23:48:50 j3camero: what do you think about ants getting relative information vs home bases? 2010-12-19T23:49:14 i tend to agree with sigh, i think it will just add a component to the start where people race to see where/who everyone is 2010-12-19T23:59:12 oh, that map gen i posted before may put the home bases within each persons view, i was trying to generate maps where the stupid bot would get near enough for fights to occur