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Plan for Sam Bacsa

Name:	Sam Bacsa
Date Posted:	Sep 15, 2005
Rating:	4.5 out of 5
Public:	YES
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Blog post

Another week, another release. Delta 5 has some long-promised feature additions as well. Here's the short list:

- Fixed problem with tab switching causing exceptions
- Added pre-debug file execution
- Added conditional breakpoints
- Revamped breakpoint internals to be more efficient
- Added variable watch list
- Fixed the exit prompting to save project even when project is saved
- Added debugging controls to toolbar

Probably the most long-awaited feature is the new "pre-debug file execution". This feature allows you to run a list of programs before debugging is started. You can add batch files or EXE files to be run with parameters. Also, the Delete DSO feature has been added:

You can access this menu by going to Edit->Preferences and then clicking on On Debug Execute in the Debugger grouping of the General Preferences tab.

The second cool feature is the addition of conditional breakpoints. You can now specify some additional options for breakpoints and how they should execute. Conditional breakpoints show up orange, rather than the usual red, so that you know that those are special breakpoints.

Conditional breakpoints can be added by right-clicking on a breakpoint line and selecting Breakpoint Properties.

The final most-requested feature added is the Watched Variables listing. Watched variables are custom variables added to a listing which are queried during break mode. This is a separate listing from the usual variables view. This allows you to not only take that large variable listing and break it down to only the variables you're interested in, but also allows you to watch variables that aren't in the local scope (usually global variables or the like).

The update is available through the automatic update wizard and will be merged into the standard install package later today.

Any questions, suggestions, or comments are, of course, welcome.

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Shawn Simas (Sep 15, 2005 at 14:16 GMT)

Your a good man Sam.

Chris Labombard (Sep 15, 2005 at 14:19 GMT)

I always briefly glance your .plans....

I think I might actually take a look one of these days.

Nathan Snell (Sep 15, 2005 at 16:34 GMT)

It's awesome that you keep up the development on torqueDev. I started at delta 2 and was kind of iffy (there was a lot of lag) and tried again at delta 4.... I can't imagine not using it now :)

Btw/ is there any kind of timestamp insert thing?

Jay Barnson (Sep 15, 2005 at 17:25 GMT)

Absolutely awesome tool. I don't know how I lived without it :)

I skipped Delta 4, so maybe this was already addressed in the last release (gonna snag D5 tonight!) - but here's a couple of suggestions (beyond those made already):

#1 - A "Reload" function - better yet a detection mechanism to detect when a file has changed from it's present version. I'm in the middle of modifying GUIs right now, and some coding needs to be done on the file, but a lot of the initial placement and "noodling" takes place in the built-in Torque GUI editor (I imagine missions will have the same problem). It'd be nice to not have to close the file and load it back up again to keep it synched with the version getting modified in-game.

#2 - Tab Style (the curley-brace war!!!!)
My tab style includes the curley-braces as part of the block, and always on a separate line. I find it makes more readable code (to my eyes at least). For example:

function DoSomething(%blah)
     {
     if (%blah $= "foo")
          {
          echo("We can't do anything with foo!");
          return %blah;
          }
     echo("Doing something with "@ %blah);
     %blah = "something";
     return %blah;
     }

The automated tab functionality in TorqueDev seems to assume a more typical tab-style. It works fine inside the block itself, but it auto-untabs the final brace. It'd be nice to have a function to turn off at least the auto-untabbing on the brace, or otherwise facilitate alternate tab / brace styles.

I'm anxious to play around with the new version.

Timothy Aste (Sep 15, 2005 at 17:35 GMT)

This may be a silly question, but where can I get a copy of this? Or is it sign up only?

Dave D (Sep 15, 2005 at 17:48 GMT)

@ Tim - www.torquedev.com/
Edited on Sep 15, 2005 17:48 GMT

Nathan Snell (Sep 15, 2005 at 20:04 GMT)

Id also like the functionaltiy mentioned by Jay.

Additionally, everytime an update occurs i find that i have to rebind all my shortcut keys. Is there a way to save these or have these be carried through updates?

Sam Bacsa (Sep 15, 2005 at 20:22 GMT)

Thanks for the comments, guys.

@Jay: IIRC the editor detects modifications to text files so long as they are open. It will prompt you if you want them to be reloaded. The feature was added rather hastily and I didn't look into the possibility that there might be problems with things happening outside of the root path and the like. That being said, I am re-working that system to work a lot better. It should be up to par in the next release.

Tab style: I'll have an option to disable auto indent/outdent. :D

@Nathan: Most updates make changes to the configuration file format. As such, the serialized binary object becomes incompatible and cannot be loaded, so it gets recreated. When I finally stop making large changes to the configuration, I will store the configuration information much like I do the projects so an upgrade won't break them. I'm planning to add that as I pass it out of the delta versions -- probably a couple of more releases. Sorry for the inconvenience in the meanwhile.

Nathan Snell (Sep 16, 2005 at 05:52 GMT)

@Sam: Awesome, no worries. One thing at a time. I was wondering if the reason was something along those lines. I'm patient and willing enough to wait :)

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