[Freeciv-Dev] Ruleset Development Was: Development Strategies

[Josh Cogliati <jjc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Dec 03, 2001 at 09:01:51PM +0100, Raimar Falke wrote:
> So you say that the reason that freeciv doesn't have more rulesets is
> the way flags are handled? I disagree. But we booth don't know and
> will never know.
> 
>       Raimar

About a 6 months ago I wanted to add a few buildings to freeciv (or
make a new ruleset with a few new buildings.)  So I read the header of
buildings.ruleset and started making a few changes.  Then I added a
building.  Then I tried to run freeciv.  Boom.  Freeciv wouldn't run
with one extra building in the ruleset.  So I decided that since I was
a programmer I just needed to find the variable or constant that
controlled the number of buildings and increase it.  Then I saw the
code.  Practically every interesting thing that is done with buildings
is hard coded.  Try undefining OLD_IMPR_TYPE_ENUM and see how much of
freeciv doesn't compile.

If freeciv actually implemented everything that was in the rulesets I
guarantee that there would be more rulesets. (Oh, and I have looked at 
the impr-gen patch that the AC people have.  That doesn't cut it since
it does not get rid of OLD_IMPR_TYPE_ENUM)  Freeciv does not need to be 
reimplemented, it needs to actually implement everything it claims to.
Reimplementing freeciv's 130k of code is a major project.  Adding the 
1-5k of code that is needed to implement the rulesets should be much more
doable.

-- 
Josh Cogliati
jjc@xxxxxxxxx
This message created in Linux, the choice of a GNU generation.