Re: Aisleriot, Klondike menu and other ideas

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On Fri, 14 Oct 2005, Callum McKenzie wrote:

> Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 17:35:01 +1300
> From: Callum McKenzie <callum physics otago ac nz>
> To: games-list gnome org
> Subject: Re: Aisleriot, Klondike menu and other ideas
>
> On Thu, 2005-10-13 at 18:25 +0100, Alan Horkan wrote:
> > Screenshot of Ubuntu featuring Aisleriot
> > http://www.linux.com/blob.pl?id=1e89022aa9ab410a42185e57032273d2
> >
> > Note the menu labelled Klondike.
> >
> > Rather than dynamically rearranging and renaming menus for every
> > application I was thinking it might be better to have a Settings menu
> > (more on that later).

> The decision to do things their current way is driven by history: we got
> rid of the preferences menu well before this was implemented. Obviously
> I'd prefer not to do another wholesale menu rearrangement, but there is
> only one obvious reason against putting these special items in a
> preferences menu: discoverability. The appearance of a strange new menu
> item makes it visually obvious that there is something to play with.
> With a preferences menu there is never any indication that there is
> something to look at.

That certainly makes a lot of sense.

I guess I'm hoping some of these options like King Only and Autoplay would
be common enough that they might be shown in all applications but greyed
out where unavailable (not implemented yet or inappropriate for the game).
It is another way of looking at the same problem I guess but maybe in my
desire for consistency I am trying to squeeze a square peg into a round
hole.

> > The game selection has a whole seperate window all to itself and it might
> > make you rethink the fairly minimal game selection menu in Aisleriot.

> Do you have a screenshot? I don't have easy access to a windows machine
> and I am interested in making the selection dialog richer.

thanks to Richard:
http://rahga.com/gnome-games/goodsol-menu.png

That system is far more complicated than what was included in my older
version.  The old version I have was deliberately stripped down as it was
included as part of a larger set of other games.  It did allow the
creating of new categories and tags/bookmarks to search against (and had
a few basic categories based on number of decks and screen size).
I am not hung up on any particular details of the system but it does
illustrate the idea of there being very many things
wish you might want to search against and the potential to do something
quite different with it in future.

(I'll try and grab some screenshots of the older version and post them
later and maybe it will give you helpful ideas.)

> My current plans are to have one-sentence description with each game and
> to group similar games.

That sounds pretty good.

> > it is an option many games could allow.  I've seen it used already in
> > aisleriot but it certainly wasn't optional.

> So are you suggesting a consolidation of the code so that similar games
> are presented as the same game with different options?

Not really no.  Things like turing off King Only could make games a lot
easier without radically changing them.

Perhaps some code consolidation could occur but if anything I'd like to
be able to present users with the appearance of more games to make
things easier to find what they are looking for (that may sound
contradictory but if they are expecting the same game by a different
name).

I mean I'd like the chance for example to implement a game I saw called
Pyramid which has virtually the same layout as used in Elevator, and is
even closer to Thirteen (except for the fancy double sided waste) and
maybe then add a variation with called King Tut which has a three card
deal (makes it harder and allows us to say we have yet another game
variation included in Aisleriot).

When I first considered the idea of implementing a new game I spent quite
a while just going through the games trying to identify if games didn't
already exist and it is a little overwhelming.

Part of the problem is it is hard to say when it is whole new game but
even so I'd like to find ways to make it easier for users who goes looking
for a game they think is called Pyramid to be able to more easily find it
or variations on it.  Improved categorisation and interlinking of the
documentation might certainly help but tackling it purely from a
documentation side (especially without search) doesn't seem like such a
good idea.

I guess what I'm trying to say is looking at another Solitaire program has
flooded me with ideas and I'm struggling to pin them down into small
managable incremental improvements I might make for Aisleriot.  I suppose
I'm hoping by mentioning them you (the developers) will reveal plans
you might have for Aisleriot and give a rough idea of where you might
see it headed because with good plans it makes it easier for people like
me to add little bits here and there.

To change the subject again another thing I was thinking about was making
Bakers Game use the same layout as Freecell.  As soon as that thought
crossed my mind I began to think if it might be easier to copy Freecell
and modify it backwards to create a more fully featured Bakers Game!?!
Flooded with ideas.  Pinning something down and actually doing it will be
a harder task.

> > Oh yeah,
> > they use greyed out Aces in the foundation slots which makes it clearer
> > and much more obvious what you are supposed to do.

> That is a neat idea, although really I think work on the drawing engine
> is going to have to wait until the cairo back-end for librsvg is stable
> - then this sort of thing will be pretty simple.

I should probably file a request/wish for that one and then try and focus
and maybe do something useful.  Maybe I'll start by finding a game which
has King Only and make it optional and go from there.

It never ceases to amaze me how easily the scope of Gnome games can be
expanded and what seems like a simple collection of games can continue to
present new challenges.

Sincerely

Alan Horkan

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