Release ZeroBrane Studio

[edgex004]

Yesterday I finished packaging ZeroBrane Studio into a PND. Testing would be appreciated if this interests anyone.
It reminds me a lot of Geany, which has always been my favorite IDE for working on the Pandora.

The thing that I wanted to accomplish with ZeroBrane was to set up an IDE on the Pandora that integrates a little more seamlessly with LÖVE. So far, I've found it to be as good or better than my previous setup using Geany with some custom run commands to launch my game. The only thing I'm missing right now is a shortcut to pull/push my git repo, which I will see if I can add later in the config files.

There seems to be very good syntax highlighting and function help boxes that are specific for LÖVE or any of the other supported frameworks. I'll be hopefully getting to work with that more in the coming weeks.

There is support for Lua scripting with other engines such as MOAI. If anyone gets MOAI running on the Pandora, I can include this as well.

One nice surprise so far is that the full screen mode is really unobtrusive. All toolbars besides the tabs go away in fullscreen mode, which is great for the small screen size of the Pandora.

Release notes:
1.30.0.03:
-Fix PXML package id that caused the program to not start. Delete the old PND before downloading the new version, as this new version will not overwrite the old one.
1.30.0.02:
-Add better icon, update PXML with developer website, update description.
1.30.0.01:
-Initial release
-Known issues:
1. glshim is being initialized, which could cause issues with newer drivers and windowed views. No problems identified so far.
2. LÖVE version was taken from a PND that ptitseb noted does not work well with CC Pandoras. Testing on a CC Pandora would be appreciated. Future versions could include a script to switch between LÖVE versions.
3. PND has many permissions errors on FAT formatted SD cards. Not sure how to fix yet.

PND can be found here.

 

[Magic Sam]

Hi all

@edgex004 : I'm sorry to report your PND didn't start on my end (Rebirth unit, latest SuperZaxxon release installed, SGX driver 4.10).

There were no signs of SD activity at all, and no logs were created in /tmp, which is weird...

Cheers, Magic Sam

 

[edgex004]

Hmm... that is too bad. Any chance you could try launching with pun_run.sh and see if it returns anything?

EDIT: Never mind. I think the space in the PND file name is causing issues. Will fix now. Odd, because I didn't put a space in the PND name when I created it. The filename used when it is downloaded must be taken from the PXML somehow.

@Magic Sam Until I can figure it out, you should be able to fix locally by removing the space from the PND file name.

EDIT2: I'm uploading a fixed package now. It may show up as a new program on the repo, as I changed the package id. You will probably need to delete the old PND and re-download rather than being able to simply "upgrade" in PNDmanager.
[doublepost=1469660109,1469649372][/doublepost]Alright that fixed it. Just tested on a new card and it seems to work now. Simply delete the old PND and download again.

 

[Magic Sam]

Hi @edgex004 !

Confirmed, it's working now. The interface is clean and responsive, it looks like a nice IDE indeed

Cheers, Magic Sam

 

[edgex004]

Thanks for testing!

At the moment, I think I'm going to try and include a build of LÖVE that can be launched in windowed mode. I'm not sure how usable a lot of the tools are when LÖVE has to be run in framebuffer mode.

@notaz or @ptitSeb, is it possible to have a shortcut to "minimize" a program using the full screen framebuffer?

 

[ptitSeb]

@edgex004 : can you rephrase, I didn't understood the question.

Also, have a build of Löve that works on windowed will be tricky. Löve use SDL, and SDL tends to hang (wait indefinetly for something) if GL is not in FB mode (X11 issue somewhere, never found where precisely).

 

[edgex004]

I guess I'm wondering if you can:

1. Start an application in FB mode.
2. Pause that application and switch back to desktop/X11 (while the paused application runs in the background).
3. Then resume the application.

I guess my understanding was that there were a number of framebuffer "layers". One is used by X, one is used by games in FB mode. I'm wondering how to switch back to the desktop framebuffer while leaving the game running on the second FB mode layer

 

[edgex004]

Well, as it turns out, what I was hoping for already exists in a fashion. @ptitSeb , your port of Löve doesn't completely take input away from the desktop.

Even though Löve is running in fullscreen mode, I can set a breakpoint in Zerobrane and launch my game. When the breakpoint is hit I can use openbox's keyboard shortcuts (ctrl+arrow keys) to switch from the Löve window to the Zerobrane window and inspect the current state of all my variables, then I can continue the game running and switch back to the Löve window until my next breakpoint is hit.

Stepping into the program seems to work fine as well.

This is really everything I was hoping for. I'm very excited to see it working.

Your tools/ports have done all the heavy lifting so far, ptitSeb. Thank you very much again for everything you've brought to the community.

 

[ptitSeb]

Live debugging of a Löve game on the Pandora? That sounds nice

 

[edgex004]

Yeah I'm excited. I think the next step will be including a script that allows the user to choose between different versions of Löve. I haven't gotten feedback from anyone with a CC Pandora yet, but I'm assuming the current version won't work for them.

 

[Robzed]

@edgex004 Thanks for this port of ZeroBrane Studio, and also including Löve. I'm a bit of a fan of ZBS after didn't get on with Eclipse LDT on my main machine - and ZBS has been very productive for me for Lua. (Been using command line for most work until now when on my Pandora). (For everyone else, for those that don't know: Paul the original developer is very active, responsive and has added may features requested by users on the mailing list - not connected, just a happy user!)

I also have been using Löve 2D for a while to prototype things quickly, so that it good

One question: Got two dialogs on launch and quit: "Failed to set temporary file permsissions" (error 1: operation not permitted). I guess it would be happier in the ext4 partition, rather than the FAT partition?

 

[edgex004]

@Robzed

Yep those are due to running on a FAT formatted card. Move it to an ext partition and it should run without error. I have been able to reproduce, but haven't figured out a fix. I have seen similar issues be corrected on other PNDs so I'll see if I can do the same at some point.

Glad you like it. I sent my thanks over to Paul, and plan to send a donation his way as well. I've been a very happy user so far.