Construct and Android

hi yall.

First off. For those not in chat that day. I'm not really Constructing anymore. I've abandoned my uberproject I was working on, although it was coming along nicely, because I realized that my fulltime job sucks all my time and soul away, and it'll take at least another year to finish it the way I'd want to, and I'd hoped to release something sooner than that. I still check the boards from time to time, and I plan to watch and participate in C2 as it develops.

I've been learning how to program Android Apps for phones like the Nexus One and the Motorola Droid, which required learning Java. If not for Construct making the rewards for learning to code so immediate and..er...rewarding, I wouldn't have realized my potential as a coder as quickly, or had the confidence to just dive into a new language so unflinchingly. For anyone considering learning to develop for android, btw it's a very well designed API, with beautifully thorough integration with an IDE called Eclipse. And though it involves straight coding, and not a lovely interface like construct, it's also pretty easy to make cool stuff happen, so you have graphics reacting to touch on a screen after a day or so of reading up on Android (assuming you've already learned Java).

I have a little bit of practice left, so I can learn to get information from the sensors and accelerometer, and just practice in general, so I'm not switching back and forth to tutorials, websites, and books as frequently, and then I plan to develop apps at a nonstop stupefying pace...

Main reason for this thread though is, I wanted to share with my Construct buddies: All roads lead back to Construct. after I've got all the basics down, I'm going to be using construct to write a visual level editor that'll output to Java code, to speed up my future android game devving process. And since I'm also learning how to use Box2D in Android, I may attempt to integrate a physics editor/testbed. In short, Construct is badass, and it's usefulness is farreaching.

Thanks for the post I'm glad you've seen your potential as a programmer - you've come up with some really impressive stuff in Construct. One of the goals of Construct is to teach logic and help interested people move on to coding, so I'm glad it's succeeding in that.

We're designing C2 with an even more extensible architecture. The aim is to allow third party developers to write runtimes for new platforms. Perhaps that's something you'd be interested in?

That would be great, having construct in other platforms. Just you can scratch iPhone of the list, thanks to the change of Section 3.3.1, not allowing anything without coding in Objective C, C or C++.

But anyway for Android, why don't you try Flash? Oh wait, it's too expensive, starting with 700$ :O

lucid,

You plug-in contributions were awesome. Can you leave the construct creators your code so they can be included as part of future releases? Especially your strangely named "s" plugin.

That way you can be part of the force here forever.

Thanks for the post I'm glad you've seen your potential as a programmer - you've come up with some really impressive stuff in Construct. One of the goals of Construct is to teach logic and help interested people move on to coding, so I'm glad it's succeeding in that.

Thank you. And yes, learning C++ is so much more fun and interesting to learn, when you can make something neat happen while you're learning. Making programs that keep a list of student names and grades from a fictional classroom, is something you'd typically be doing reading a textbook, and learning about arrays. Being able to move graphics around the screen, or implement a feature you're actually going to use is a much easier lesson to sit down to.

We're designing C2 with an even more extensible architecture. The aim is to allow third party developers to write runtimes for new platforms. Perhaps that's something you'd be interested in?

Once I'm knowledgeable enough on Android, that is definitely something I would be interested in, if no one beats me to it:)

I didn't hold out much hope, but I searched for the Construct of Android development, and it doesn't exist yet. That would be a dream come true.

Sensor.On touch,

move sprite to Touch.x,Touch.y

Sensor.On Change in Orientation;

set sprite.angle to phone.y-axis

oh my God...

That would be great, having construct in other platforms. Just you can scratch iPhone of the list, thanks to the change of Section 3.3.1, not allowing anything without coding in Objective C, C or C++.

I thought so originally, but I think it might not be as bad as it sounded, did you read Jobs' open letter released yesterday. It seems like alot of that has to do with Flash. I what t(he)y are trying to avoid is something that is created to be run on Flash or some other type of interpreting runtime. Personally, if I'm able to make an Android module for construct, it will probably be something that outputs java files in a project folder hierarchy that could be loaded by Eclipse, and compiled there after the android eclipse plugin generates it's own files. I think that making a program that outputs to objective C is fine. There is a program called Titanium that supposedly let's you write applications that can be exported to PC,Android, and iphone by from a single project you create as you would a webpage with html, CSS, and javascript, that can be exported to native code on all platforms. The say that there have already been apps approved under the new rules.

But anyway for Android, why don't you try Flash? Oh wait, it's too expensive, starting with 700$ :O

I don't think flash works on it yet, plus the java needed for android is pretty straightforward, I think it would have taken me longer to learn ActionScript

lucid,

You plug-in contributions were awesome. Can you leave the construct creators your code so they can be included as part of future releases? Especially your strangely named "s" plugin.

That way you can be part of the force here forever.

I used to think things should be made part of the official construct build, but I guess, it's no different than having a list where people can download them, they're no less integrated than the official plugins afterall. But if anyone does want the source code to any of them, PM me, though I warn you the SpriteFont code is one of the ugliest abominations ever spawned, and..kindof embarassing

I'll also try to upload my last version of 's' in plugin form in the near future as well

I'll also try to upload my last version of 's' in plugin form in the near future as well

I take your word on it

Since my first

{"t", "somesupercoolmegacomplicatedstructurewithsubstructuresleadingaroundtheworldandbackandstillbeaccessiblesoeasily"}

I can't imagine Construct without 's'. Please try to make sure that it at least will run with future changes in Construct (and when you are doing so, why not quickly add inheritance?

I thought so originally, but I think it might not be as bad as it sounded, did you read Jobs' open letter released yesterday. It seems like alot of that has to do with Flash.

Yes, after reading a little more and reading the open letter, I know they want to stop Flash, so that Adobe wouldn't dominate the App Store. I would've liked to programm with Flash for the iPhone, but oh well, maybe in the future, Construct will work with the iPhone. Till then, off to learning C#.... or C++. I don't know.