MAJOR UPDATE: Feature Refactor - [merged]

[benloh]

Merges dev-bl/feat-simplify -> dev-next

THIS WILL BREAK SCRIPTS!

In order to simplify student use of features, we are converting most common feature calls to featProp references. Because these include some fundamental changes to the way Features are structured, we are not supporting backward-compatibility -- there's too much room for inadvertent interactions and we want to actively remove the old methods.

Costume

• setCostume -- needs to be converted to featProp <agent>.Costume.costumeName setTo <file>. setCostume has been removed.

• setGlow -- needs to be converted to featProp <agent>.Costume.glow setTo <seconds>. setGlow has been removed.

• Sizing and Scaling -- sizing and scaling is now done through the Costume feature -- you no longer need to use Physics. New properties:

  • size
  • width
  • height
  • scale
  • scaleY
  • flipX
  • flipY

• colorize -- Most colorizing properties and methods are now only available as "expert" options (meaning they're faded by default in the wizard).

Physics

• Sizing and Scaling -- Costume sizing is now all done through the Costume feature properties. Any references to the following Physics properties and methods should now use Costume's properties (size, width, height, scale, scaleY) instead:

  Props

  • radius => no Costume equivalent as it's only a physics body feature. Use agent.Physics.bodyRadius
  • width => use agent.Costume.width
  • height => use agent.Costume.height
  • scale => use agent.Costume.scale
  • scaleY => use agent.Costume.scaleY

  Methods

  • setSize => use featProp agent.Costume.width and featProp agent.Costume.height
  • setWidth => use featProp agent.Costume.width
  • setHeight => use featProp agent.Costume.height

• physics bodyWidth bodyHeight bodyRadius -- Physics by default uses the Costume size and scale to determine touches: whenever you set the costume size and scale, the private physics _body* parameters will be updated. The _body* properties are used by default when calculating touches. If you need physics to use a different body size, you can override the Costume sizes by setting the user-accessible bodyWidth bodyHeight bodyRadius properties. IF these are set, the system will use these values instead of the Costume values. These are considered "expert" properties and most users will never touch these.

• Physics no longer has any user-accessible methods. The methods that are in the system are mostly used by the Touches feature via private calls. We can make these methods user-accessible again if necessary (e.g. intersects).

Movement

• setMovementType -- has been removed.

  • All setMovementType calls should be replaced by movementType property setting:

  • featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo wander

  • featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo stop

  • featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo goLocation

  • featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo setLocation

  • featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo jitter

  • Additional parameters can be set for the movement type, e.g.

  • featProp agent.Movement.distance setTo 5 will set the wander and goLocation speed

  • featProp agent.Movement.targetX setTo 100
    featProp agent.Movement.targetY setTo 100

    will set the location for setLocation and goLocation

  • featProp agent.Movement.jitterDistance setTo 10 will set how violently to jitter

• queueLocation -- still works, but consider replacing the featCalls with a property setting:

  • featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo goLocation

• wanderUntilInside -- in refactoring the other movement methods, we had to redo this one too. This call should be replaced with:

  • featProp agent.Movement.targetCharacterType setTo 'Tree'
    featProp agent.Movement.movementType setTo wanderUntilAgent

• The other seek and random position methods remain featCalls due to their complexity.

• Some example GEMSCRIPT to use for testing

  featProp Character1.Movement.distance setTo 10
  // wander
  // featProp Character1.Movement.movementType setTo 'wander'
  // featProp Character1.Movement.movementType setTo 'edgetoedge'
  // edgeToEdge
  // featProp Character1.Movement.bounceAngle setTo 34
  // featProp Character1.Movement.direction setToRnd 0 180
  // goLocation
  // featProp Character1.Movement.movementType setTo 'golocation'
  // featProp Character1.Movement.targetX setToRnd -300 300
  // featProp Character1.Movement.targetY setToRnd -300 300
  // jitter
  // featProp Character1.Movement.movementType setTo 'jitter'
  // wanderUntilAgent
  // featProp Character1.Movement.movementType setTo 'wanderUntilAgent'
  // featProp Character1.Movement.targetCharacterType setTo 'Tree'
  // setLocation
  // featProp Character1.Movement.movementType setTo 'setLocation'
  // featProp Character1.Movement.targetX setToRnd -300 300
  // featProp Character1.Movement.targetY setToRnd -300 300

Population

The Population feature has a small set of commonly used props and methods, and a larger set of expert props and methods. We're leaving these alone for the most part. A rewrite would be rather involved and deeply affect Moth scripts. The simple solution is to move most props and methods to the faded "expert" selection and leave a few of the more common props and methods more visible.

Improved student support will mostly be in Script Cookbook and Script Reference rewrites.

Vision

The whole Vision feature is an advanced feature. We'll move it to the faded expert section and leave the props and methods.

Cursor

The Cursor feature is also an advanced feature. We could make a case that it should not appear and be editable at all, but Cursor itself needs to be visible so students can enable it as a feature. The Cursor feature wizard-editable has no properties or methods.

Under the Hood

featProp error management

Because of the changes to feature methods and properties, it's easy to end up with bad scripts. Currently the system is blindly catching errors to enable users to still load and update bad projects, but the error catching is not providing very useful feedback. So featProp has some temporary error management to better report problem lines, e.g. if there is a reference to a non-existent feature property.

[benloh]

added 5 commits

• 28783b60 - feat-simplify: Don't re-add global property if it's already been set.
• 7d95d280 - feat-simplifiy: Uncomment `try...catch` for SimPlaces for better error reporting.
• fea288fa - feat-simplify: Clean up Movement feature (remove unused...
• f8ff4e54 - feat-simplify: Set 'expert' Population feature props and methods.
• c872954c - feat-simplify: Vision is considered an advanced feature.

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[benloh]

added 1 commit

• 391d43f8 - feat-simplifiy: Add more expert Costume methods

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[benloh]

marked this merge request as ready

[benloh]

@jdanish I think this is ready for testing/conversion.

[benloh]

added 2 commits

• db91eb85 - feat-simplify: Retain aspect ration when using `size`
• 849a93f6 - feat-simplify: Only plot graph if graphValue or graphGlobalValue has been set.

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[benloh]

added 3 commits

• 26254202 - feat-simplify: Fix edgeToEdge code. Bug: after bounce when x or y is 0, the agent stops moving.
• 6afdcca7 - feat-simplify: Throw error if Touches target does not have Physics
• f45cc2b9 - feat-simplify: Convert common Movement methods to props.

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[benloh]

@jdanish I've pushed the Movement prop fixes up too. Please see Movement in the main merge text for details.

[benloh]

added 3 commits

• 9e5665ff - feat-simplify: Cancel seek when changing movementTypes
• 084d95a0 - feat-simplify: Turn off debugging
• b73e37b1 - feat-simplify: Add global framerate SIM_TICKS_PER_SEC constant.

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[benloh]

added 2 commits

• f8fa54a2 - 1 commit from branch dev-next
• 9ae505f0 - Merge branch 'dev-next' into dev-bl/feat-simplify

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[benloh]

added 1 commit

• eb7b4091 - feat-simplify: Movement now respects agent.x and agent.y. Fixes problem where...

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[benloh]

added 1 commit

• b6944c56 - feat-simplify: Physics bodyWidth/Height should always be positive when...

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[benloh]

Touches Fix

Touches were failing to register when costumes were flipped via scale because the calculated body width / height ended up as a negative value. This should now be fixed.

[benloh]

mentioned in commit db8bc42b7111d42462a77ece495b8538e107d1ce