ULTRA APP KIT

[Martin Harris]

Dialogue Creation Editor

This is my long term project. D4Dialogue is an application specific editor for story and dialogue creation. In one application a game designer can target a gaming experience toward the player by directly integrating storyboard dialogue with game state functions. The flexibility of the D4d  allows for branching, alternative endings and easter egg inclusion AT THE DEVELOPMENT STAGE of game design. Between this application and game code programming, story possibility can be fully explored, organised and exported into game engine code (JSON). By combining conditional code with story elements the writing process is simplified whilst also ensuring the writers intended storyline, timeline and character arc are fully referenced alongside the game play. Potential plot problems will be identified BEFORE game testing thereby releasing production time for other important design elements. The text editor allows the writer to focus on story telling and then quickly conditionalize the game elements visually from within the integrated editor.  The main screen holds a highly interactive document binder (left of screen) to quickly navigate the story (nodes), character database (lower) and properties panel (right).

Features:

Player experience focus for story design

Character database with full character arc track and trace

Conditional programming interface which highlights ease of use through the GUI

Visual referencing of data and stats making summation with large projects a breeze. 

This is what I have so far. Still working with buttons and looking in to the code for this, but is promising as I can access OpenGL in the centre window. Thanks Josh for the checkerboard code, this is the look I'm wanting to use. 

The mock up shows what I am intending to do for a main display. Other items I whish to include are a text editor, a node editor for conditional variables, a time line window, and a fully functional properties panel accessible in main (shown on the right) where popular items can be set quickly and conveniently.  The bottom panel holds the character database where individuals can thus be drag dropped into main and connected with action boards. These action boards are the main link into game state code and are the fulcrum by which events take place and outcomes are decided. 

[Josh]

Update on Steam:

• Removed Float() and Int() functions.
• Added ToFloat() and ToInt() String / WString methods.
• Widget Get/SetProgress now uses a double float value.

[Josh]

Removed the global string functions like Trim, Lower, Find, Split, since these exist as methods on the String and WString classes.

[Josh]

I am working on a new example here that shows creation of a more complex application:
https://www.ultraengine.com/learn?page=AdvancedInterface

Window::Enable() and Disable() methods are added.

FolderLocation() is changed to GetPath().

[Martin Harris]

This is great! thanks

[SlipperyBrick]

On 4/7/2021 at 1:47 PM, Martin Harris said:

Dialogue Creation Editor

This is my long term project. D4Dialogue is an application specific editor for story and dialogue creation. In one application a game designer can target a gaming experience toward the player by directly integrating storyboard dialogue with game state functions. The flexibility of the D4d  allows for branching, alternative endings and easter egg inclusion AT THE DEVELOPMENT STAGE of game design. Between this application and game code programming, story possibility can be fully explored, organised and exported into game engine code (JSON). By combining conditional code with story elements the writing process is simplified whilst also ensuring the writers intended storyline, timeline and character arc are fully referenced alongside the game play. Potential plot problems will be identified BEFORE game testing thereby releasing production time for other important design elements. The text editor allows the writer to focus on story telling and then quickly conditionalize the game elements visually from within the integrated editor.  The main screen holds a highly interactive document binder (left of screen) to quickly navigate the story (nodes), character database (lower) and properties panel (right).

Features:

Player experience focus for story design

Character database with full character arc track and trace

Conditional programming interface which highlights ease of use through the GUI

Visual referencing of data and stats making summation with large projects a breeze. 

This is what I have so far. Still working with buttons and looking in to the code for this, but is promising as I can access OpenGL in the centre window. Thanks Josh for the checkerboard code, this is the look I'm wanting to use. 

The mock up shows what I am intending to do for a main display. Other items I whish to include are a text editor, a node editor for conditional variables, a time line window, and a fully functional properties panel accessible in main (shown on the right) where popular items can be set quickly and conveniently.  The bottom panel holds the character database where individuals can thus be drag dropped into main and connected with action boards. These action boards are the main link into game state code and are the fulcrum by which events take place and outcomes are decided. 

Looks like a good contender for articy:draft. Very cool idea and would certainly help formalise the game design/requirements gathering phase of a game project ?

[Martin Harris]

 Possibly not a contender, however, I do hope to make a text focused application which is more like scrivener with additional node based editing found in most applications today. My C++ skills are a little rusty, ( I stopped coding in 2000 and now learning the in-between) but I hope to have something like a working app. It is also a great way for me to get into openGL and learn leadweerks ultra app. Unfortunately my time on this project is limited (writing a game for release to alpha soon) but will be adding ideas here and there when possible. Fortunately I am a trained artist so will also have the opportunity to add in some cool looking features to play on the idea of visual / text play story creation. 

[Martin Harris]

3 hours ago, Josh said:

I am working on a new example here that shows creation of a more complex application:
https://www.ultraengine.com/learn?page=AdvancedInterface

Window::Enable() and Disable() methods are added.

FolderLocation() is changed to GetPath().

How do you add in the emogi, when I compile in visual studio in my own code I just get ?? instead of the icon. Do I need to add an extension and how do I add in my own Icons from .svg? Sorry, I'm still a novice.

[Josh]

Just now, Martin Harris said:

How do you add in the emogi, when I compile in visual studio in my own code I just get ?? instead of the icon. Do I need to add an extension and how do I add in my own Icons from .svg? Sorry, I'm still a novice.

Does the icon appear in your source code file when you paste it in?

[Martin Harris]

2 minutes ago, Josh said:

Does the icon appear in your source code file when you paste it in?

yes, it appears in visual studio as do emojis from windows. It asked me if I wanted to convert the unicode, and i clicked on yes, but the compiler didn't show the icon

I'm going to compile your example and see what happens

 

[Martin Harris]

5 minutes ago, Josh said:

Does the icon appear in your source code file when you paste it in?

Your application compiled ok, so there is something in the code I wrote or a setting I need to look at.

 

[Josh]

Put an "L" at the front of your string like this:

L"Here is a wide string"

[Martin Harris]

Oh, that's so simple, thank you.

[Martin Harris]

Emoji's are working ok so will use these. I have linked up the toggle to give a grid onto the openGL screen. This can be toggled on and off with the tool button.

[Josh]

This tutorial has become quite extensive and covers many different topics:
https://www.ultraengine.com/learn/CPP/AdvancedInterface

[Josh]

I added a video that goes through the whole written tutorial and explains everything:

 

[Martin Harris]

Thanks Josh

[Josh]

The standalone installer for version 1.0.1 is now available in your purchases.

[qcrocknet]

https://gamefromscratch.com/ultra-app-kit-released/

Good site to have this mentioned ?. He also mentioned it in his discord.

Hope one day you have an alternative to C++ (Lua, i know you mentioned it, or maybe .NET?)

Very interesting stuff.

[Josh]

Let's see what the sales do. If they are nice then maybe Lua and C# support are next.

[qcrocknet]

18 minutes ago, Josh said:

Let's see what the sales do. If they are nice then maybe Lua and C# support are next.

Makes sense. I would personally pay more for this. I paid $250 for .NET component that added extra UI widgets for Winforms, $300+ for an audio component as an example ... I know these days many people expect things to be cheap. I get you need a ROI for your work.

[Josh]

App is now live on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1512210/Ultra_App_Kit/

Your reviews are appreciated! 

[SlipperyBrick]

Congrats on the release. Keep up the great work Josh!

I'm praying to GUI Jesus every night that we will get the ability for custom fonts in UAK. In return, I've promised a good deed. To stop my cat from s***ing in my neighbours garden.

[CodeChomper]

I too am begging to be able to change the font of UAK. I was playing around making a bill app and wanted to display more info in a ListBox. Ok I thought this would be easy and made a formatted toString() function for my Bill object. The string formatting doesn't work because the font isn't a monospaced font. So the 90 char width I give for the bill description is different pixel widths depending on the content of the description.

Without the ability to change the font UAK uses does anyone have another solution to my ListBox problem? I am guessing I will have to make my Widget to hold rows of bills that are made up of separate Labels for Description, Due Date, Amount, and Paid booleans? 

Here are the bills added to the ListBox

 

Here are the same bills printed in a monospaced font in the console

[Josh]

@CodeChomper In your situation I would recommend a custom widget:
https://www.ultraengine.com/learn/CPP/CustomWidgets