It's an article on how to write code more effectively in MMF. Didn't spellcheck or anything, so there might be holes. Hope it helps someone
BTW, let me know if whether articles in PDF formats are clearer than in TDC format.
Edited by Muz
Disclaimer: Any sarcasm in my posts will not be mentioned as that would ruin the purpose. It is assumed that the reader is intelligent enough to tell the difference between what is sarcasm and what is not.
i much prefer it as a pdf, for two reasons. it's easier to read and you can keep it on your machine for future reference. for those of you who are about to say copy and paste into word. why??? the article is already in a format that i can use and am comfortable with.
the other good thing about it being in pdf format is the ability to inlcude a picture in the article without having to host the picture somewhere and then link it in. i think we should have articles submitted in a variety of formats such as .doc, .pdf, .rtf, .txt (i suppose) and you should be able to view them all directly on this site.
I would never read them. PDFs are meant for printed documents, and are very cumbersome. Takes much longer to get around them than it should and most all computers I've owned have some sort of issue with launching them. Like now, my computer launches an extra empty Adobe Reader window that often hides its exit button on top of other applications' exit buttons. I often click the wrong one. I hate Adobe reader.
/rant
In answer to your why question: Because to some, word documents are easier to handle. Actually, the best way is in the TDC articles page. That way you don't have to worry about any format!
Originally Posted by Ricky I disagree with you on optimizing Muz. When porting to flash, if you want your game to be playable, you have to optimize the hell out of it.
Yeah, it's a fine balance. You always have to find a balance between having buggy, hard to understand code and an efficient one; it depends strongly on what you're trying to do. If you don't need to optimize, don't. Most of the slow stuff in MMF comes from things like huge objects or excessive particle use and stuff. If you're optimizing code, you should like write comments about what the optimization does, or a design doc on it so it doesn't get confusing later.
PDFs are better than word files for reading. When writing articles in doc/odt format, you have people complaining that they can't read one or the other. PDF is the ideal, and it formats it neatly too, letting me write things like 2^2 without the ugly ^. But yeah, it probably looks much nicer when printed, not so for reading.
Anyway, it's only like 80% finished, because I'm lazy. Was thinking of posting an example pseudocode and block diagram of my game, but since it's mostly done, I just posted what I got so far instead of dumping it. When (if) I finish the PDF version 100%, I'll post a txt version and a TDC article version too
Disclaimer: Any sarcasm in my posts will not be mentioned as that would ruin the purpose. It is assumed that the reader is intelligent enough to tell the difference between what is sarcasm and what is not.
Originally Posted by OldManClayton I would never read them. PDFs are meant for printed documents, and are very cumbersome. Takes much longer to get around them than it should and most all computers I've owned have some sort of issue with launching them. Like now, my computer launches an extra empty Adobe Reader window that often hides its exit button on top of other applications' exit buttons. I often click the wrong one. I hate Adobe reader.
/rant
In answer to your why question: Because to some, word documents are easier to handle. Actually, the best way is in the TDC articles page. That way you don't have to worry about any format!
I heartily recommend Foxit PDF reader.
Muz, your code layout is fine except the small dot character you used isn't on most keyboards and thus I suggest using * instead.
I find it amusing that the file extension has drawn more attention than the article has... how else does one submit their typesetted article? I know some boards support and render LaTeX for you, which is extremely useful if you want to write any sort of mathematics (which is a frequent topic in articles). I agree with OMC about adobe reader though, it's far too bloated and I always have trouble launching it. I suggest you use one of the free and less bloated alternatives. I wouldn't discourage PDFs in general.
Originally Posted by Bibin I heartily recommend Foxit PDF reader.
It says Muz's PDF is corrupted. My in-browser reader actually managed to open easily this time, but it was still irritating to use. I'm slowly scrolling through huge pages with lots of empty space to read something that would be much smaller and quicker and easier on the eyes if pasted in a doc file or TDC article.
Blah, I'll quit complaining. The article: The part about multitasking was interesting, because I don't typically multitask when I'm coding. (Or at least, I don't notice that I do) I'll be looking things up on the internet like nuts when I write a paper, but I don't often sidetrack with coding until I'm fed up and quitting for the day. Maybe it's because I know I'll completely forget my entire train of coding thought if I don't finish what I'm making.
...took like months to figure out. And after actually sitting down and bothering to draw a block diagram, it took only like 2 weeks to code, test, and run. The arrows were the most important part, couldn't see how they interact with each other without them.
Comments would be sort of like what that block diagram shows. I'd have like 6 lines of code to say, calculate the block size, then write "Calculate block size here". Comments are just labels, MMF puts most of what the code does in English anyway.
Disclaimer: Any sarcasm in my posts will not be mentioned as that would ruin the purpose. It is assumed that the reader is intelligent enough to tell the difference between what is sarcasm and what is not.
Nice article, especially the point 1, where you point the wrong things I do.
Anyway, since you asked, no problem with pdfs, as long as you dont clutter it with tons of images and it goes like a 10mb pdf, 'cause (at least for me), Firefox freezes while downloading/trying to show the pdf.
Nice article in pdf format for future reference, saved it somewhere on my disk. Layout is clean, just like code should be and after that do some optimizations with good comments. Actually the article and code have some thing in common like the previous thing I mentioned and the fact that including pictures and maintaining a good layout is difficult. Publishing articles in ebook format would probably be best, reflowing text with pictures on the right spot
Copy and paste indeed is a nifty method for creating unwanted features in your code.
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Edited by Muz
My in-browser reader actually managed to open easily this time, but it was still irritating to use. I'm slowly scrolling through huge pages with lots of empty space to read something that would be much smaller and quicker and easier on the eyes if pasted in a doc file or TDC article. 
Maybe it's because I know I'll completely forget my entire train of coding thought if I don't finish what I'm making.
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