Re: Running Wisconsin Croquet Demo.

> > > >     I downloaded as per instructions on http://opencroquet.org/WiscWorlds/.

I see WiscWorlds installers for some operating systems, but no naked
Squeak image to download (to run, for example, on a Linux squeakvm)

This is obviously no accident, but I wonder if it is done because
running WiscWorlds on Linux is known to be impossible, or to minimise
the number of platforms to support??

I only ask because I am desperately curious to experience Croquet
collaboration over WAN (but I don't have a supported operating system,
and all the shops are shut!)

David

On Jul 20, 2006, at 5:48 PM, David Corking wrote:

>> > > >     I downloaded as per instructions on http://
>> opencroquet.org/WiscWorlds/.
>
> I see WiscWorlds installers for some operating systems, but no naked
> Squeak image to download (to run, for example, on a Linux squeakvm)
>
> This is obviously no accident, but I wonder if it is done because
> running WiscWorlds on Linux is known to be impossible, or to minimise
> the number of platforms to support??

I have one Linux box that run WiscWorlds on about half the time --  
but only as a headless participant for preserving continuity (without  
graphics or sound).  I didn't have the need for Linux on campus, nor  
the resources to support it.


 From my Jul 4, 2006, message
Subject: Re Video conferencing

>
> I only ask because I am desperately curious to experience Croquet
> collaboration over WAN (but I don't have a supported operating system,
> and all the shops are shut!)
>
> David
>

On 7/21/06, Howard Stearns <[hidden email]> wrote:
> I have one Linux box that run WiscWorlds on about half the time --
> but only as a headless participant for preserving continuity (without
> graphics or sound).

Good news.

> I didn't have the need for Linux on campus, nor
> the resources to support it.

OK

>  From my Jul 4, 2006, message
> Subject: Re Video conferencing

Sorry, I missed that thread on the squeak-dev list - thank you for
repeating it here.

> > We don't have a way to test Linux
> > opengl graphics and openal sound, and my impression is that both
> > are more buggy than I want to deal with. (In fact, openAL doesn't
> > work on the Linux box described above, and the software silently
> > catches the error and ignores sound so that I can continue using it
> > a router and headless peer.)

The spatial sound is very nice under Linux on the boat demo, for
example.  However I have experienced crackles and drop outs that are
discouraging.

I also want to try a headless router-controller-island later, so I
will dig around the squeak docs to figure out how to repeat your feat
(eventually I want to avoid using a VNC framebuffer if I can.)

> > So if you want to work with this on
> > Linux, you should really have one of Windows/Mac so you can debug
> > the graphics and sound yourself.

Do you mean that you think debugging will be easier if I run Linux and
another platform side-by-side to compare the effects?

> > And finally, as Josh notes, there is a plugin for capturing video
> > from the Web cam on Mac and another on Windows. None for Linux.

Webcam is not a showstopper for me.   I would humbly suggest that the
'bit identical' claims (by others, not you, Howard) are a little
hyperbolic.

David

There's still a lot that can wrong. When something doesn't work, you  
need to be able to isolate the problem -- to see if it's a "this  
doesn't work at all" problem, vs a "this doesn't work on Linux" problem.

On Jul 21, 2006, at 8:49 AM, David Corking wrote:

>
> Do you mean that you think debugging will be easier if I run Linux and
> another platform side-by-side to compare the effects?

David Corking wrote:
>
> I only ask because I am desperately curious to experience Croquet
> collaboration over WAN (but I don't have a supported operating system,
> and all the shops are shut!)
>

David, the Wiscworlds thing is not the only way to establish a WAN
croquet session. The basic problem is to somehow rendezvous with  
someone else.
An approach to this which my group has been working with is to use  
Jabber
IM to establish that your friends are online, and then send an XML  
encoded
postcard to them (via Jabber or some other means) to set up the  
Croquet session.
That function is built into a couple of the demo worlds, so you might  
want
to try it.

If you are interested, we can give you (and other Croquet developers)  
Jabber
accounts, and establish ad-hoc peer to peer Croquet sessions that  
way. This stuff
all works fine cross platform (Linux, Mac, Windows). Liz's main  
development
machine is Linux.


> > And finally, as Josh notes, there is a plugin for capturing video
> > from the Web cam on Mac and another on Windows. None for Linux.
>>
> Webcam is not a showstopper for me.   I would humbly suggest that the
> 'bit identical' claims (by others, not you, Howard) are a little  
> hyperbolic.

The Croquet code in squeak is bit identical. When syncing with  
another croquet world,
the bit image of the state of the computation that makes up the world  
simulation is
shipped over to the other machine and executed. If weren't bit  
identical, we could
never sync worlds.

I/O devices can be a different story. I think of OpenGL, OpenAL,  
video capture, etc.
as I/O, and where we use external-to-squeak C plugins/libraries and  
here if we are
not careful we may have libraries that are NOT bit identical, because  
they can be
written with platform-specific differences.

For instance, rather than re-inventing the wheel, we use the OpenAL  
library on
each of the platforms, but OpenAL does have some differences between  
platforms.
The way around that is to stick to the common functions of OpenAL.  
Same deal with
OpenGL. We stick to the OpenGL routines that was know will work for  
everyone.

Nobody has done a video plugin yet for Linux so... this is what could  
be called
a "developer opportunity" :-). Another developer opportunity is  
whipping the ODE
(Open Dynamics Engine) libraries into shape so that they  
deterministically compute
the same result cross platform. Where we depend on external C  
libraries, we need to
be careful that the functions we work the same.

Hi,

If you want to try out Wide-Area Network connections in Croquet, one of
the easiest ways to do it is to use the Jabber client that is available
in the Sailing and SimpleDemo Masters.  When you are using the Croquet
Jabber Client to talk to a buddy (who is also using the Croquet Jabber
Client) you are presented with a button JoinMe which will send an invite
to your buddy and then if she accepts your invite she will have a portal
to your space created.  Very easy.

If all you are lacking is a Jabber account please contact me via email
([hidden email]) and let me know the username and password you
would like to use and I'll create a Jabber account for you. Mark and I
are very interested in trying WAN connections, so if you want to play
with this add [hidden email] or [hidden email] as buddies.

Thanks!
Liz Wendland

Mark P. McCahill wrote:

Thanks for that Mark and Liz,

On 7/21/06, Liz Wendland <[hidden email]> wrote:
> Mark and I
> are very interested in trying WAN connections, so if you want to play
> with this add [hidden email] or [hidden email] as buddies.

I tried to send IM to you (Liz) out of the SimpleDemo master a week or
two ago (when you first posted an open invitation on this list.)
Unfortunately it did not work (I can't recall the details) and I
suspected firewall issues (I am behind NAT - which means that 'Join
Me' won't work either - though I am interested to see if I can respond
to a TPostcard that you send me.)

I will try again.  When I get to understand the Squeak dev tools a bit
better, I should be able to see whether my World is able to register
with a Jabber server or where the breakdown might be.

Best, David