I guess the Terminator warned us this time would be coming. Today I committed some of the new features in Parsek to KDE server. You can find a link to the repo here. Give it a try and let me know if you have any problems. Quickly after starting, you will realize this is still very much a work in progress. I guess I underestimated the complexities of building a game client and have failed to deliver all the originally planned features. I see the work done for GSOC as big step in the evolution of Parsek and it will allow me to continue developing Parsek into a premier Thousand Parsec client. Once the coming soon features described below are ready, I will be uploading the GSOC changes to the Thousand Parsec git repositories as well.

Current Features
Users can now connect to game servers, select games, join, and later disconnect cleanly.
A status manager responds to events from the protocol library.
A corresponding status widget displays connection status, server information, and game information.
A clock displays the time until end of turn (EOT) events.
A logger widget provides debugging and error messages. The logger is a implemented with a filterable model.
Users can view the game universe with the object viewer. The object viewer, tied to an object model, provides basic information about selected objects.

Bugs and Quirks
There remains several unresolved bugs that still need work.
1) The object viewer does not display the last modified time in proper format.
2) The object viewer does not correctly read the object type.
3) The EOT clock could be formatted in hh:mm:ss instead of just seconds.

Undelivered Feature Status
Starmap: The starmap is still a work in progress. The starmap will be tied to the object model. Basic drawing is functioning but still need to implement game object coordinate readings.
Messages: The basic backbone for the message system will be similar to the logger. This will be added later this week. The protocol functionality for messages is not yet implemented, but Parsek will be ready for message support.
Orders: As mentioned during the midterm report, this feature was removed from the project scope. I will start working on this after the object system is fully functioning.

Coming Soon
There are somethings not included in the current build. I will be adding these features over the next few days after a little more testing and proper integration. This includes a more robust object model with support for object parameters including resources. The object viewer interface will also be further improved to provide a better user experience. The object model behind the object viewer will be expanded with abstract type implementation and also work with orders, players, designs, and resources. In addition, a player viewer will added shortly. This will provide a display of the game’s player and later allow the user to send a message or read information about selected players. The chat system will be integrated with the logger and both will allow for filtering and sorting.

The next major feature coming soon is an overhauled main interface. The default dock widget system is ugly and the advantages it provides are minimal. This is a game, not an IDE, so I see little need to provide a fully modifiable window. The new main interface will display the game widgets in an organized and effective manner while working with low resolution displays. The target is to have Parsek function well on 800×600 displays. There will also be a splash window at the start which will allow user to connect to games. The connection manager will also include an account manager. A simple custom button interface will replace the traditional application menu.

Future Visions
Future plans include completion of the message system and the order system. I also plan on configuring Parsek to watch for changes in real time and display updates asynchronously instead of downloading all objects at each EOT. I will spend time working on the protocol library to complete support of some the important features still missing. I will try to complete my failed efforts to get the protocol library functioning on Windows by providing supporting network implementation. After the interface overhaul, I hope to extend Parsek to provide support for 3D graphics.

Screenshots

Parsek’s object tree is now functioning. There is still a lot of work to do to clean it up, make it look nice etc but the overall functionality is now there and works. I’ll be adding a seperate widget that popups when a selection is made in the tree and displays the object’s full information, instead of trying to embed it all in the tree’s columns.

Have a look at the screenshot! The tree hierachy matches tpclient-pywx with the exception that lone objects who’s parent are the galaxy (after they have left a system) are all listed at the bottom, instead of underneath their old parent system.

Yay! So I’ll be adding more features to this as well as hopefully getting the starmap in place (now that I know the information from the data model is loaded correctly) in the next few days. Once all the bugs are fixed in the object tree, I’ll add it to the KDE svn branch.

Parsek’s clock is now functional, cleaned up, and integrated with the program’s status bar. There’s still an odd bug I’m trying to resolve that occurs when I spawn a dialog box which somehow resets the clock when it (the dialog) is dismissed. Strange problem but otherwise, the clock is working fine. It is also accurate when compared to tpclient-wx. The status widget is also now functioning thanks to Lee and some fixes in the protocol library. Parsek can reads the server and game information and displays it in a simple widget. Below is a screenshot of the status and clock functionality. There’s still some issues that need to be fixed.

I’m also configuring the “game” selection widget which will spawn after connecting to a server. This will provide the user with a list of all available games on the server and allow the user to select which one to join. While most servers currently only run a single game “tp”, this will be an important feature for the future when servers are running multiple game instances. I have some ideas beyond the basic pulldown/list menu selection for the game chooser which I will try to elaborate on. The idea is to have an overview of each available game displayed and allow the user to scroll through them in a nice manner, similar to Cover Flow on iTunes/iPhone. For the time being however, it will be a simple dropdown menu! Keep it simple until it works! The account creation features of Parsek are also non-existent at the moment as well. I’ll be adding this shortly. In the mean time, I’m also working on the object display features, as I discussed in my last post. Still more to come there as I’m hoping to have that online ASAP as well.

An updated build has been posted to KDE SVN here. Please try it out. Right now many features are disable and it simply acts as a test of the log, the status widget, and the clock. Try building it and connecting to demo1.thousandparsec.net with guest/guest. Note that you have to actually click the Connect button in the connection dialog – the enter key hasn’t been configured yet!

Read that little status bar! Finally connected!

Just fixed that bug. Yes, as you can read from the status bar, it is finally connected. (Yes I know there’s nothing else in the app, the widgets haven’t been loaded.)