Still Developing this program?

[Burnf]

I'm not seeing any movement in this forum or the card gen. Is this program dead? Is anyone collecting WWK HQ images? Is anyone going to release a WWK update? Why wont my decks load in MWS from deckbuilder in Windows 7 64bit?

I'd really like to try out the new cards, but I don't know how to modify this program. Why is it so silent? A new set JUST came out..

[Huggybaby]

I'm not seeing any movement in this forum or the card gen. Is this program dead?

No.

Is anyone collecting WWK HQ images?

Why don't you check the HQ Pics topic? What does this forum have to do with HQ Pics?

Is anyone going to release a WWK update?

For what program?

Why wont my decks load in MWS from deckbuilder in Windows 7 64bit?

I don't know, Is that a question for the MWS forum, or is it a Microsoft support issue for Windows 7, or Windows 7 64 bit?

I'd really like to try out the new cards, but I don't know how to modify this program.

There is plenty of documentation, have you read it? Have you considered that Snacko has other things to do?

Why is it so silent? A new set JUST came out..

That's right, it JUST came out, that should answer most of your questions.

[Burnf]

The full card list was out just under two weeks ago. When I said just, I didn't mean an hour ago. I meant within this month. The response across all the forums has been lethargic at best.

The issue with MWS isn't that it can't load decks. It can. The issue is that the deckbuilder, when I use the mws plugin, doesn't load the deck in. There's something wrong with the deckbuilder. I was giving info about my operating system because I thought it was pertinent information.

I did get off track a bit, because there seems to be no movement on WWK in the last week and a half for any of the forums, other than OPT. I posted a comment asking if the cardgen or deckbuilder could build in some functionality like what OPT has for getting sets from gatherer.. oddly that disappeared.

Is there documentation on how to parse an entire set, because there isn't even an MWS library update out there for WWK yet?

[Huggybaby]

I understand your frustration. Unfortunately though, too many people have come to rely on too few for too long.

The issue is that the deckbuilder, when I use the mws plugin, doesn't load the deck in. There's something wrong with the deckbuilder.

That's a legitimate question that deserves to stand on its own, but you reduced your chances of having it addressed when you threw it in with your other complaints.

Snacko kept supporting the deck builder and card generator after the original developer (Nate) quit doing so, and I'm thankful he keeps these apps alive. There is nothing stopping anyone else from picking up the mantle.

I know for a fact that bugging Snacko won't speed things up or make the situation better. What we need is another developer; the code is not a secret and its development by another is not roadblocked in any way. In the meantime updates will be released when he can get around to them, period.

We have one guy who buys a whole set of cards and scans them (PresetM), and he often pays a premium because he doesn't live in America. If it takes him a year to get the set, then it will take a year, and there are always LQ pics from gatherer and elsewhere in the meantime. If we want an HQ set sooner, then someone else needs to step up to the plate and spend their own money and scan them with a decent scanner. This situation has existed for a couple of years now. If we don't have the set it's because there is no interest or too much complacency or both. I guess Worldwake isn't getting anyone excited enough to buy it, even though there are only 145 cards in it. I'm well aware of posts in the other forums. I read them every damn time a new set comes out. "Where are the HQ pics". It's like some folks have never heard of Google and Slightlymagic is some well-kept secret.

Regarding MWS, I know it has problems. But the solution to that must lie at magi-soft, not here. I quit trying to support it when it became clear that the developers themselves no longer support it. We never tried to support MWS when we were MWSData, and certainly not now when we don't have MWS in our name. We used to have a nice group of people over at magi-soft who would answer these same questions over an over, but the forum owner killed that and never fixed it, too bad.

I can hardly freaking wait until OPT becomes viable.

So, the solution to ALL your frustrations is more participation by OTHERS, not more participation by the folks who are giving their all right now.

We lost a week or so of posts by everyone, not just you, due to a hard drive failure and then a subsequent mistake by our hoster. There was no malicious intent, and that question has been answered elsewhere on this forum too.

[Burnf]

Thanks.
I like responses like the last one that explain things a bit. The ones that tear apart every sentence a person makes drives me nuts.

For the images, I'm kind of shocked that there isn't even a subject up for trying to collect the images. Last prerelease I didn't have a scanner, so I couldn't help out. This time around I missed the prerelease because of family stuff, otherwise I would chip in now that I do have a scanner. It seems odd that no one has started the HQ forum topic for WWK.

I keep my hopes up that Cockatrice, OPT or Daring apprentice gets going. OPT I don't think is open source, so I'm hoping a little more for the other two. They need program support for networking, though. My dream is to have this program and the HQ Cardgen integrated into a Cockatrice or Daring Apprentice open source project. I love the deckbuilder and the cardgen. We need a better program than MWS. It would also be nice if some support for an MSE type program was in there, so that players could make their own cards and games.

[Huggybaby]

If anyone popped up and said "Here are Worldwake scans" and they were usable, we would use them. I don't know, some sets just don't generate much interest and it's hard to predict. We count on PresetM but we like to up sets ASAP and in that regard we are no different from any other enthusiasts in the community.

I don't see the generator being integrated into other apps for various reasons though there's nothing in the way. What I'd like to see is a graphical frontend. We had a cool frontend for it but Harry Pitfall quit updating it.

Adding Deckbuilder support for different programs is another matter. All you have to do is ask Snacko and provide an example of the required format. Most programs use Apprentice or MWS formats, but for those that don't he can usually knock out an update pretty quick. Plugins are also doable, but most devs seem to like doing things from scratch. That's up to them but I don't think there's a better deckbuilder out there.

[jendave]

FWIW, I have been working on making Deckbuilder work better on Macs and Linux. I have gotten it to work like a Mac app i.e. it is a single icon and the menu bar works properly. I still have to get the CardGen plugin to work correctly.

From a coding perspective, I made major changes to the build system (Ant -> Maven) and checked it into SVN. I would be more than happy to contribute to coding Deckbuilder, but since these are pretty fundamental changes, I would like to hear what Snacko thinks.

[Snacko]

I've used maven and it's a very nice tool to manage your project dependencies and whole build/release cycle.
Personally I don't care what building system you use as I mostly use simple eclipse export functionality as I don't need to have jdk on the machine. As long as it's possible to build without having maven, it's all good. If it's not then depending how useful it is in this case I'll consider making it a dependency.
Internally I use git, so it shouldn't be a problem to sync whatever changes you got.

New base I suppose will be available before the next set is out as I'm busy

The MWS plugin doesn't work, and for me it never has (MWSPlay can't open any decks ever), so I always considered it as "maybe it works for someone out there".

[jendave]

Snacko, would you be ok if I created a Google project and checked in the code there? That way there would be a common place to grab the code.

[Snacko]

Sure, depending how fast WotC manages to take it down as Google is US based and patents apply to google code and sourceforge.

[jendave]

ok. maybe not then.

What about other projects, such as Forge and such? They use Sourceforge. As long as they avoid using the phrases "Magic" and "MTG" they have been allowed to exist. I know that progs that allow people to play Magic are scrutinized much more closely.

[Burnf]

Any way of collaborating with the MSE group to get it working with deckbuilder and cardgen?

[Snacko]

MSE has a different ideology, it's designed to make your own sets and not copy existing cards. That's the reason they don't distribute magic symbols nor database and never will.

[Strainer]

Thanks.
I keep my hopes up that Cockatrice, OPT or Daring apprentice gets going. OPT I don't think is open source, so I'm hoping a little more for the other two. They need program support for networking, though. My dream is to have this program and the HQ Cardgen integrated into a Cockatrice or Daring Apprentice open source project. I love the deckbuilder and the cardgen. We need a better program than MWS. It would also be nice if some support for an MSE type program was in there, so that players could make their own cards and games.

OPT is by far the most advanced of the programs you mentioned. The reason why OPT isn't open source is simple: To prevent the creaton of cheat utilities. OPT already supports everything MWS does (you can use Nate's Deck Builder for OPT deck files), but also does support Draft, Sealed and Momir. Just take a look at http://www.slightlymagic.net/wiki/Online_PlayTable_-_OPT and convince yourself.

[Burnf]

The OPT support hasn't been melded into the main program yet, has it? What about the autoupdate from Oracle? Any way to incorporate that?