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[NW_Kohaku]

And after that it goes Open-source (given that toady did die on oldage) and someone else like Baughn and small group of enthusiasts takes the hat.

Btw. thanks toady for the scamps picks he has grown up very well. He kinda reminds me of the cat i head some years ago. *sheds a tear*

Yeah, I have an American Shorthair that looks similar, but has a tail, and a white underbelly and "gloves" on her paws.  She's an old cat, now, though, (17!) and has an arthritic hip and moves around even less than her lazy bones used to move.  She basically just acts as a hot water bottle in bed, now, and only gets up to go to the food dish and litterbox and occasionally rowls for attention. 

[superradish]

What's the timeline for adding a better mouse interface? The goblin camp UI comes to mind... MS-paint style wall creation and right click to bring up most menus. It's very slick, really. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mm-dPes5NgE

Thanks for everything!

[Cruxador]

What's the timeline for adding a better mouse interface? The goblin camp UI comes to mind... MS-paint style wall creation and right click to bring up most menus. It's very slick, really. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mm-dPes5NgE

Thanks for everything!

That's presentation arc stuff. It's essentially last in line, as including it earlier would make other additions harder. In other words, not for years. There's no specific timeline, though.

[NW_Kohaku]

That's presentation arc stuff. It's essentially last in line, as including it earlier would make other additions harder. In other words, not for years. There's no specific timeline, though.

I get to use the exact same quote and general message twice in one day...

"The stocks screen and likely the unit list" are scheduled to get reworked soon, but I doubt a comprehensive interface overhaul will ever happen.  It's just too entrenched at this point.

Interface is not something that cripples the game or the ability to expand it, it's something that fundamentally changes the way in which the game is viewed from even a fundamental philosophical standpoint, player and developer alike.  What is easily presented to the player determines what is important to the game overall.  You can't pretend like it's just some superficial gloss, it's what determines what the player has the ability to do in the game, and because of that, what can go and can't go in the game for want of ability to represent it. 

Interface changes are what enable expansions of the game, not something that prevents them. To dismiss interface requests as "bottom of the list" or unimportant until everything else in the game is done is simply an invalid argument.

... That said, I'm not exactly holding my breath for mouse-based interface.

[Untelligent]

Interface changes are what enable expansions of the game, not something that prevents them. To dismiss interface requests as "bottom of the list" or unimportant until everything else in the game is done is simply an invalid argument.

The argument isn't really that they're less important than other stuff, so much that making an time-consuming interface update for a feature that's going to be scrapped and reworked within a year or two makes it less appealing to do, and so DF's interface doesn't get as many updates as people would like.

That's not to say we don't get interface updates when there's a pressing need for it. I seem to recall the trade depot menu used to be more convoluted. And then there's the mass construct/forbid/dump stuff.

[Cruxador]

That's presentation arc stuff. It's essentially last in line, as including it earlier would make other additions harder. In other words, not for years. There's no specific timeline, though.

I get to use the exact same quote and general message twice in one day...

"The stocks screen and likely the unit list" are scheduled to get reworked soon, but I doubt a comprehensive interface overhaul will ever happen.  It's just too entrenched at this point.

Interface is not something that cripples the game or the ability to expand it, it's something that fundamentally changes the way in which the game is viewed from even a fundamental philosophical standpoint, player and developer alike.  What is easily presented to the player determines what is important to the game overall.  You can't pretend like it's just some superficial gloss, it's what determines what the player has the ability to do in the game, and because of that, what can go and can't go in the game for want of ability to represent it. 

Interface changes are what enable expansions of the game, not something that prevents them. To dismiss interface requests as "bottom of the list" or unimportant until everything else in the game is done is simply an invalid argument.

... That said, I'm not exactly holding my breath for mouse-based interface.

That is true in some respects - I'd think that the game will remain 2d, tile-based, and top down, for example. Despite all the visualizers that have existed, I don't imagine dwarf fortress will ever natively exist in 3d.

But adding the mouse stuff seen in Goblin Camp should mostly be feasible.

[superradish]

Nothing about that goblin camp interface would even touch anything about the game or make it unchangeable. The difference in programming between 'press this key to make this happen' and 'click here to make this happen' is so superficial it's hardly worth mentioning. You can already click spots to dig, and change the volume with the mouse. Same concept.

[kiffer.geo]

Nothing about that goblin camp interface would even touch anything about the game or make it unchangeable. The difference in programming between 'press this key to make this happen' and 'click here to make this happen' is so superficial it's hardly worth mentioning. You can already click spots to dig, and change the volume with the mouse. Same concept.

... Making a load of context menues isn't the hardest thing in the world but is harder than listening for keypresses and reacting... But more importantly than how difficult it is to do... it takes a lot of time and testing, and every time a new thing is added it adds to the update work load... and spending time on a half assed update that will be gutted out anyway is a little wasteful...
List orders, sorting and keyboard layout would do more to clean up the interface than a nice set of clicky mouse options...
No one thinks that the interface doesn't need work...

[zwei]

Nothing about that goblin camp interface would even touch anything about the game or make it unchangeable. The difference in programming between 'press this key to make this happen' and 'click here to make this happen' is so superficial it's hardly worth mentioning. You can already click spots to dig, and change the volume with the mouse. Same concept.

... Making a load of context menues isn't the hardest thing in the world but is harder than listening for keypresses and reacting... But more importantly than how difficult it is to do... it takes a lot of time and testing, and every time a new thing is added it adds to the update work load... and spending time on a half assed update that will be gutted out anyway is a little wasteful...
List orders, sorting and keyboard layout would do more to clean up the interface than a nice set of clicky mouse options...
No one thinks that the interface doesn't need work...

While i agree on the fact that lists sorts, and searches would benefit more than goblin camp style stuff, lets think in terms of framework: Properly done ui "component" can be reused, saving works and helping user at same time.

There are, however, other thing that can help out user interface: for example, when all workshops get rawified (which i guess is going to be quite hard), workshop ui improvements will be easier to pull off.

[NW_Kohaku]

I guess I just don't see any advantage to using the mouse.  I mean, I look at those goblin camp demos, and just see someone with a system that forces me to hunt through a context menu every time when it's so much easier to just mash "bCwkkkkk7774" than to try to find the proper spots on the screen to click.

A first person game would have obvious use for a mouse - that has analogue look and movement style.  Having an analogue input makes it much easier to interact with the game.  The big push in this, however, seems to be to add click-and-drag to map viewing... 

I mean, really, you want click-and-drag?! Why would you ever want click-and-drag scrolling when you have keypress scrolling already?  Click-and-drag scrolling is the bane of ease of control, especially in any game that might possibly have lag, where it still thinks you're holding down the mouse button while you're flicking the mouse back up to grab again, and it sends your screen flying in the opposite direction you want it to.  And you know this is going to be a problem with Dwarf Fortress, don't even kid yourselves. 

A sensible all-keyboard interface is the ideal in a setup like DF has.  Let's just work on getting a revised set of keys and menus that gives the player a more streamlined and intuitive set of controls, rather than gluing in some of the worst interface aspects from the rest of computing.

[TolyK]

> The time frame for the release is <7 days
> Just started a new fortress hours before the announcement

EVERY SINGLE TIME

Same thing here.
wait.

> The time frame for the release is <7 days
> Just started a new fortress hours before the announcement

> The time frame for the release is <7 days

release is <7 days

FUCK YEAH!!!
*****

I guess I just don't see any advantage to using the mouse.  I mean, I look at those goblin camp demos, and just see someone with a system that forces me to hunt through a context menu every time when it's so much easier to just mash "bCwlllll7774" than to try to find the proper spots on the screen to click. indubitably.

A first person game would have obvious use for a mouse - that has analogue look and movement style.  Having an analogue input makes it much easier to interact with the game.  The big push in this, however, seems to be to add click-and-drag to map viewing... 

I mean, really, you want click-and-drag?! hell no! Why would you ever want click-and-drag scrolling when you have keypress scrolling already?  Click-and-drag scrolling is the bane of ease of control, especially in any game that might possibly have lag, where it still thinks you're holding down the mouse button while you're flicking the mouse back up to grab again, and it sends your screen flying in the opposite direction you want it to.  And you know this is going to be a problem with Dwarf Fortress, don't even kid yourselves. in*insert little kid picture here*

A sensible all-keyboard interface is the ideal in a setup like DF has.  Let's just work on getting a revised set of keys and menus that gives the player a more streamlined and intuitive set of controls, rather than gluing in some of the worst interface aspects from the rest of computing.

Agreed.
Basically, "I Want the Z key to bring stocks everywhere, X to expand lists, U for units, K for looking, and so on." Sensible I think.

[Jiri Petru]

Interface =/= mouse =/= graphics. (EDIT: =/= Goblin Camp)

Every single time someone cries for a better interface, it quickly evolves into a pro mouse - vs. mouse fight. It's just a strawman. Forget about the mouse. Even re-organizing the horrible gumbo of menus, commands and underlying systems (the mishmash of workshops, zones, rooms, designations) so that they'd have at least some sanity would help users immensely and wouldn't make further developments any slower.

[G-Flex]

Why is everyone flipping their lids over this Goblin Camp GUI as if it's the savior of this game? I don't get it. You cannot adequately account for DF's feature set using context menus, especially considering how many things aren't context-sensitive in the first place. Yes, context menus can be a good idea, but Goblin Camp didn't invent them, and the game would need a whole lot more than just that. I really, really don't get why people keep harping on about this really specific other game's GUI just because it has some fundamental feature that plenty of other games have, and that, even if it's suitable for DF, couldn't constitute nearly all of DF's interface anyway. Oh wait, yes, I do get it; it's because people judge things based on first impressions without considering the implications or analyzing it in any way.

[KillerClowns]

Well, I did use DF as an example of extremely bad UI design for one of my classes.  Short version: the all-keyboard thing isn't really the problem, as Dungeon Crawl will attest.  It's more about access of information -- the wiki and Dwarf Therapist are necessary extensions of the UI at present.  Throw in some tutorials, some explanations for buildings, the ability to add descriptions to plants as one does with animals, and Dwarf Therapist's UI features, and you're off to a good start.

[Mel_Vixen]

I am with G-flex here and seriously Therapist and Co. might be usefull but they arent needed at all to play the game.