[crossfire] Importing the GTK+ editor in SVN

[Raphaël Quinet]

On Wed, 16 Jul 2008 15:40:32 -0500, Rick Tanner <leaf at real-time.com> wrote:
> A couple of questions:
> 
> At what state of completion(?) is a user HOWTO manual for the map editor?

As I said in a previous message, the current code is not very friendly
to first-time users.  Although there is a tutorial available on the
web (http://www.deliantra.net/editor_tut.html) explaining how to set
up the editor and start editing your first maps, I think that some of
these instructions should be part of the source tree.  So although that
web page provides some material that could be used as a starting point
for creating a HOWTO, there isn't one yet in the package.

> I think an install HOWTO is probably the most critical, then followed by
> ~ a "user manual" (which is very important as well.)

I agree.  Like in other free software projects, I am planning to add
two files at the top of the source tree: INSTALL (describing how to
build and install the stuff) and HACKING (giving recommendations to
whoever wants to contribute).  Currently, there is not even a README.

Note that building it is not very difficult.  Basically, you do:
  perl Makefile.PL && make && make install
You can also add PREFIX=/some/path to change the default installation
path.  But the INSTALL file should explain more than that: it should
list the dependencies and explain how to install them if they are
missing, give advice about where to install the editor, etc.  Also,
building the editor is one thing, but you also have to run it.  The
current version requires that you set the environment variable
CROSSFIRE_LIBDIR at least for the first time you start it.  This
something that I would like to change so that the initial start would
be a bit more user-friendly.

> What about official releases?
> Is there a volunteer to manage those?

Well, I guess that I will be the first volunteer.  Making a source code
release is easy.  I don't know what to do about the Windows binary
releases, though.  The Deliantra guys provide a package for Windows
users, but currently I don't have the tools for doing that myself.

-Raphaël