[Freeciv-Dev] Re: More improved game starting version 4

[Jason Short <vze2zq63@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Daniel L Speyer wrote:

> The next version is available at
> ftp://ftp.freeciv.org/freeciv/incoming/conndlg4.patch
>
> It fixes cmdlevel for both new and loaded games (I hope) and eliminates
> all the gtk warnings.  It's also generally cleaned up.
>
> Please download, test and comment!
It tests out fine.  I'm not much for GTK programming, so you'll be 
better off getting a real GUI person to review it.
The only issue I see is that the server is started up right after the 
client launches, rather than after a new game/game load is requested. 
This means it runs even if you don't use it.

This patch will be of most use to the beginning user.  As such, there 
are a few server commands that it is most important to have a GUI for:
- Creating an AI player, or perhaps setting the aifill.  I'd suggest a 
"Create AI" button, with a popup to select the name (or just a random 
name?).
- Changing the AI difficulty.  Perhaps a button that says "easy" and 
when you click on it it'll toggle between "easy" "normal" and "hard" 
(sending the appropriate message to the server, of course).
- Listing players.  A "list players" button that just sends /list would 
be fine.
I'd also suggest that after some of the other GUI people have looked at 
this, that it go in ASAP.  It'd be nice to implement the "correct" 
solution (with proper meta-communication between server and client), but 
that's a long-term goal.  For now, having this functionality is far more 
important than making sure it uses the correct implementation.
I think for now, it's not necessary to interpret data coming back from 
the server.  It is sufficient to just provide buttons for sending the 
data, and allowing the player to interpret the results sent back from 
the server.
But, I'd do think it'd be better to send requests to the server over the 
chatline (i.e. /start), rather than by piping them to the server.  This 
allows the user to get feedback on the commands (for instance, "/start: 
Cannot start the game: it is already running."), and it shouldn't take 
much time to switch over.  It's also (part of) the "correct" long-term 
solution.
jason