daftpython: Python

Showing posts with label Python. Show all posts

Tuesday, 7 August 2012

Minecraft Screenshot Viewer in wxPython - A Preview

There's a lot of Minecraft going on in this house! The boys all love it and come up with some creative designs for houses, statues, machines and roller-coasters. Minecraft has a built in feature for taking screenshots 'F2' and I encourage them to do this if they have made something. Eventually we will make a slideshow video of them.

But there is no easy way to view the screenshots in the game and it is a bit 'hidden' under .minecraft so what a great excuse for a wxPython program. Not quite ready for the prime-time (needs Linux tested at least) but my eldest was impressed by the demo of it and is keen to get it installed on the main family PC.

Here's a screenshot until I get some SVN sorted out:

Ideas for features welcome - leave a comment!

Sunday, 8 July 2012

Python Tools For Visual Studio

Day to day I use Visual Studio for ASP.net and CSharp. It is okay-ish. I used to like Visual Studio then around version 6/7 it went rather multipurpose/multilanguage and lessened the experience. Nowadays it needs a lot of horsepower and big expensive plugins like Resharper to keep up.

I have kept the monster of Visual Studio off my ageing Vista era laptop for some time. Sharp Develop is an FOSS IDE that fills that gap nicely. Microsoft do offer Express versions which are good but they are rather frustrating if you have used the full versions!

Anyway Microsoft also produce Python Tools for Visual Studio which can be run on top of the free Visual Studio Shell. PTVS is also free and open source. It supports various versions of Python - not just IronPython (I am currently using it for PyGame with CPython 2.6.6). The code completion is pretty good and, surprisingly, it is not too resource demanding on my ol' Dell Inspiron 1501! It has a long list of features including refactoring, debugging, Django, REPL. Also comes with some extras for Excel and the Xbox Kinect.

I jump around editors quite a lot but I think will hang around PTVS for a good while.

Saturday, 30 June 2012

Rediscovering Python and PyGame

After quite a long break, I find myself back into Python - specifically for PyGame projects. The day job is .Net centred and I've been dabbling in 6809 assembler, Android and HTML5 for personal development. I have been trying a few new technologies for various GFX programs but few have come close to the RAD, features and fun of Python with PyGame.

I have had some fun with HTML5 especially with the canvas - sadly the drawing primitives are not all there yet. Hate how slow HTML progresses so not holding my breath for a better canvas for a long time. True Python doesn't run in the browser but it is cross platform, free and fairly easy to install (more on that later).

PyWeek

Taking part in PyWeek again was a challenge but great fun and I came up with a game that met a good few of my goals:

I have received some great feedback this time around. There are many required game play tweaks (an area I sadly did not have time for during the competition). Better mapping, goal feedback and more interesting terrain.

Lessons Learned in no particular order:

Not having sound is something people WILL notice.
The motto 'Keep it simple and complete' is an excellent strategy.
Even small animation and movement pay off. The feel of the game is improved so much.
Keeping classes small helps - never a problem that a bit of code was too small.
Don't leave all on screen controls until the end!
Write the User instructions and revisit them at the end.
Getting the IDE, libraries, tools etc chosen and installed in advance allows for a quicker start. Should maybe include packaging, installer for next time.
Some bits and pieces of Python (3) I did not know yet.
Small custom tools can save lots of time.

Would I do another one? Yes. Always fun and educational. I have tweaked the game a little since release but I feel I would get more from trying something different rather than writing a sequel! It was designed to be ported to HTML5 so next time I want to do something in the browser realm...

Versioning

One thing that came up during the judging of the PyWeek entry was the problems of versions. Not just an issue for the competition - I was only able to feedback on half the games I could have after wrestling with various versions of libraries and non-standard module set up. In the .Net world NuGet is rather good. Hopefully Python 4 will include a single common way to set up extra libraries on all systems.

Future

Currently working on a 2 player Cowboy game with input from my eldest son. Blog post on that one soon :-) Think it will be called '8bit Cowboy Goldrush'. Yee-ha!