One of the things that I had to put off until later was this latest version of the DM. Aside from a lot of minor changes, I've added a section on console commands and switches, and the tutorials section has been completely rewritten.

After you download the zip, let me know what you think of the new tutorials. The link to the download page is the first link in my signature.

Enjoy.

------------------
Author of the JK DataMaster, Parsec, Scribe, and the EditPlus Cog Files.

[This message has been edited by SaberMaster (edited March 11, 2004).]

Looking good.

/Edward

Hey it's great so see that you're still partially with us SM

I'm downloading as I type and I'll have a peruse through over the weekend and post back here soon as I'm done

Also just one question - what's happening about updates/modifications for (future releases of ?) the DataMaster? Will you still be around with us, or is work occupying too much time?

Either way, t'is good to see you back in the Massassi fold - keep up the excellent work

-Jackpot

------------------
"lucky_jackpot is the smily god..." - gothicX

"Life is mostly froth and bubble,
But two things stand in stone,
Kindness in another's trouble,
Courage in your own"
("Ye Wearie Wayfarer" - by Adam Lindsay Gordon)

I'll be around for a while yet to make corrections to the DM when needed, but I won't be able to do anything large-scale.

At one point, I was seriously thinking of adding a template section, but that would require a few months to research. If there's demand after I finish the classes I'm taking now, then I might get around to that. Don't expect anything though...


Given how much time I've put into Cog already, I can never leave completely.

------------------
Author of the JK DataMaster, Parsec, Scribe, and the EditPlus Cog Files.

I knew youd come crawling back.

------------------
The future is here, and all bets are off.

Awesome.

------------------
I am Darth Slaw.
The Dark Lord of the Sith,
And part of the Nightfire mod team

So how about some feedback on those tutorials?

------------------
Author of the JK DataMaster, Parsec, Scribe, and the EditPlus Cog Files.

Ok, I downloaded it and took a pick at the tutorials. Well, I tried to, anyway. The javascript you used for the menu doesnt work in some browsers..

I switched to Firefox, and I noticed something else... You dont have any 'next' or 'previous' buttons. This is bad. That means the reader has to go back up to the menu and select the next page...

------------------
The future is here, and all bets are off.

There's no javascript used for the tutorial pages, just frames and CSS. It works perfectly in Opera, Firebird, and IE. The whole popups vs frames option for the verb pages uses javascript heavily, but even that works just fine. Could you post a screenshot or something?

The reason there's no next/previous links is because the menu is always there, but I could go in and add a few links...

But what about the actual writing? Is it too much too fast? Does it flow well enough? Is it not long enough? I'm kind of blind in writing this, so I want your opinions.



------------------
Author of the JK DataMaster, Parsec, Scribe, and the EditPlus Cog Files.

[This message has been edited by SaberMaster (edited March 16, 2004).]

Impressive - most impressive

I think the new tutorials are more informative than the previous ones, which is obviously a plus for new/fresh-to-jk coggers

The way the tutors are arranged as well, providing editing information in the form of templates and how cog interacts with inventory items in JK's "items.dat" file is bound to be useful for new editors that are curious about expanding their knowledge - heck - I learnt something about the priority order of loading resources

In chapter 2 of the tutorials, I couldn't help but wryly smile when I noticed the same phrase you used when you reviewed the WoW patch - "butchered the cog language" . As for this section on the whole, I believe it provides the essential basics and concepts that coggers need to master before they can produce any work of "substance", so I applaud you for your efforts in attempting to convey the basics to beginners - some "beginner's articles" are written from an "advanced" outlook with no thought as to their intended audience (the author forgetting that they too, were once a beginner), but fortunately this is not the case with these tutors; they are clear, systematic and well documented. This can only be a bonus for editors who wish to learn cog

In chapter 3, I felt that one thing that could be ammended would be a bit more information about timers included in the threads section. Otherwise, I must say that the details of the topics covered are exceptionally good - on a personal note, I'd never thought of writing a client and server side cog-script in one central file; for me, I found this information enlightening and thought-provoking (the latter being "why didn't I think of doing that?" - it just never crossed my mind, so I took something away from that tutorial session too

Somewhere in the abyss of my room, I've got a piece of paper with a few JK cog verbs on it that I found hadn't been documented in the previous release of the DataMaster. If we (the jk editing community) find anything, would you be interested in doing any improvements, or is the DataMaster a project you wish to finally conclude?

Overall, there's more than plenty of useful (some may say "necessary", if you truly have a passion for COG) information included in this version of the DataMaster, some of which may have been covered before, but it's good to finally have one centralised "reference book" that answers both general editing as well as specific cog related queries.

Well that's just my two pennies worth - keep up the excellent work SM

-Jackpot

------------------
"lucky_jackpot is the smily god..." - gothicX

"Life is mostly froth and bubble,
But two things stand in stone,
Kindness in another's trouble,
Courage in your own"
("Ye Wearie Wayfarer" - by Adam Lindsay Gordon)

Thanks, Jackpot.

If you've still got that verb info, go ahead and post it or email me. I do want to finalize the DM, but I'll still update it.

------------------
Author of the JK DataMaster, Parsec, Scribe, and the EditPlus Cog Files.

I've always found DataMaster to be an invaluable resource. The only thing I'd like to see in the tutorials is the porting of Hideki's tutorials. (if he allows it)

It may be helpful to have certain "sorely needed" cog pages, such as GBK's TCS cogs. People are always looking for them.

Great work as always.

------------------
-There are easier things in life than finding a good woman, like nailing Jello to a tree, for instance

-Tazz

Oh, yeah, the tutorials are great. I read through the second chapter. I'm also using the grapple cog in the tutorial, since it's more efficient than the previous one I was using. Had I had access to this when I made Scorpion, I wouldn't have butchered the thing with pulling the enemy via two cogs. (It worked, but it was very sloppy coding on my part).
And I like the console/prompt command lists, too.

------------------
I am Darth Slaw.
The Dark Lord of the Sith,
And part of the Nightfire mod team

Brilliant. Unfortunatly, I never finished the TVTCS. The RVTCS, however, has been finished for a long time. You can find it here.

(If you dont know the difference between the two, dont bother asking. I grew tired of explaining them a *long* time ago.)

------------------
The future is here, and all bets are off.