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AppGameKit Classic Chat / 1.08b12 retrocompatibility issues (compiler and player8 with 1.076

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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 25th May 2013 15:57
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2 issues found:
1) when trying to broadcast via wi-fi an app with AppGameKit 1.076 on a device with 1.08 player downloaded by Google Play, the player repeats the "receive process" without stopping. After 100% bytecode is received, the process starts again and never ends.
2) AppGameKit 1.08b12 does not compile sources written with 1.076. All of my apps do not compile. This is the line that gives the error:

I have used this coding style in many apps, so this is a big issue.
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Mobiius
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Posted: 25th May 2013 16:24
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Due to a change, 1.08 is not compatible with earlier versions.
Quote: "Fixed crash with OpenToWrite when using the overwrite parameter
- Due to the above fix the 106 and 107 compilers are no longer compatible with the 108 player"

App Game Kit 108 Beta 12

Quote: "global dim ..."

You don't need to type global dim. Arrays are global by default.

Quote: "menuName$[7] as string"

You don't need to double declare data types by using the $ and appending 'as string'. Use one or the other.

I live for video games! (And beers, and football, and cars!)
See what I live for here: [url]http:\\www.TeamDefiant.co.uk[/url]
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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 25th May 2013 19:40
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Quote: "Quote: "global dim ..."
You don't need to type global dim. Arrays are global by default.

Quote: "menuName$[7] as string"
You don't need to double declare data types by using the $ and appending 'as string'. Use one or the other.
"

This is not the problem. Maybe a better coding style, but my apps have compiled and worked very well with the above syntax since beginning 2012
In any removing the global and string type declaration simply shifts the error from one type another.

This is what I use in my ReadMusic app:

and this is the error:
Quote: "only numerical and string literals can be used to initialise a variable declaration at line xxx"


Any idea?
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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 25th May 2013 20:08
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This is what the online help says:

This is one of my declaration:

and the error is the same:
Quote: "only numerical and string literals can be used to initialise a variable declaration at line xxx"

This is definitely a bug. Probably when fall-backing to old compiler, they have lost array declaration statement. That is importance of regression testing!
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xCept
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Posted: 25th May 2013 20:35
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This is a known issue with 108 betas and was accepted by Paul in January. Maybe he overlooked it or it's a more difficult problem to fix, but here's the issue.

https://code.google.com/p/agk/issues/detail?id=468

To broadcast a 1076 app to the AppGameKit Player, you'd have to have a build of the player from before beta 12. If you compile them yourself you can give them a different identifier/name so you can have both the 1076 compatible player and the 10812 player on the same device. (Maybe someone else like AL from the forum still has the other APK players archived they could post).
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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 25th May 2013 21:34
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This is a very serious issue and should be fixes asap.
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Marl
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Posted: 25th May 2013 22:56
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Quote: "Quote: "only numerical and string literals can be used to initialise a variable declaration at line xxx""

Don't know if it's related but I get s similar error defining constants if there is a tab character and a space character in the line.

No problem with tab, no problem with space - use both and it errors.

To be more accurate - I got this on the last Beta, have not tried on the current.
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Ancient Lady
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Posted: 25th May 2013 23:41
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Quote: "Maybe someone else like AL from the forum still has the other APK players archived they could post"

No. And you couldn't install them side by side since they exactly the same package name. Which is why I try to build my own so that there are multiple package names (and displayed names).

Cheers,
Ancient Lady
AGK Community Tester and AppGameKit Master
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AgentSam
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Posted: 26th May 2013 17:21
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Marl wrote:
Quote: "Don't know if it's related but I get s similar error defining constants if there is a tab character and a space character in the line.
No problem with tab, no problem with space - use both and it errors.
To be more accurate - I got this on the last Beta, have not tried on the current. "


I think that's a pretty good catch. Definately a problem in how the compiler parses the source. (The AppGameKit compiler sucks!)

Have you reported this problem on the AGK Issues list?

If not, please do.

Cheers,
AgentSam
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AgentSam
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Posted: 26th May 2013 17:31
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MarcoBruti wrote:
Quote: "AGK 1.08b12 does not compile sources written with 1.076. All of my apps do not compile. This is the line that gives the error:
global dim menuName$[7] as string = [ "","play","load","high","credits","options","exit" ]"


I've run into the same problem, and I'm just as pissed about it as you are.

This problem is also closely related to a number of similar issues which have already been reported (and partially fixed in some cases).

What I find most annoying about these issues is - that they never get completely fixed - the issues keep resurfacing again and again.
(For that I blame the lousy AppGameKit compiler, the worst of it's kind.)

If you take a look at THIS post, you'll find a list of related issues (although the list isn't complete).

My suggestion is, post a new report on the AGK issues list for this issue specifically!

Cheers,
AgentSam
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AgentSam
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Posted: 26th May 2013 17:33
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Also notice THIS POST by RickV.

It seems to indicate that the TGC developer team will be onto the Compiler bug fixes as a top priority.

Which is GREAT! Can't wait for them to squash these compiler bugs.

Cheers,
AgentSam
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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 26th May 2013 17:56
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AgentSam,
I have learnt that you are a very experienced, skilled and wise programmer, but in my little own I have spent 1 year of my leisure time in 2012, writing and publishing 7 apps (yes, like 7UP drink), doing a lot of experience, so investing time and hoping to find a way to amuse myself and earn some pennies. BTW, I was not the first, but among the firsts to publish something for AGK. Now the situation is:
- the platform, after so much time, is not stable at all from the point of view of compiler bugs
- as in all software projects mentioned in sw engineering books, TGC fixes one issue and two more are added at each developing lifecycle.
- the editor is still very poor, no debugger at all. BTW, the debugger of Dark Basic is one the worst all around, I hope that the AppGameKit one will be better, if it will come...
- promises of language improvements remain...promises.
- APK is still produced in a very cumbersome way.
- bugs with sound system, I have been told that they have been solved after a lot of releases, I had to put a menu at the start of my game to exclude music.
I am very pragmatical and I take my responsibility to say that, as is, no serious developer, that wants to concentrate on the product and not on finding workaround for the bugs, can choose AppGameKit for commercial purpose.
No serious software would use a product that does not maintain retro-compatibility of source code and does not have bug fixed in predictable time
The idea to "open-source" some part of the IDE, in my opinion, is not so good: how long will we have to wait from "open-source developers" to get some addition feature, bug fix or refinement?
If the objective of TGC is to keep the product a library for Tier-2 and that'all, OK, it may be a choice, but the audience will be restricted furtherly, nowadays the number of developers is very low.
The power of AppGameKit is, as I told 1000 times, the Basic language, and all of us started with that. It is perfect to do prototypes and commercial products. If you want to optimize further, you can shift to Tier-2, but that is your choice. If your product acquires some interest in the market, you can think to make it better by creating a Tier-2 version.
So, for what concerns myself, let's see what will happen next.
The success and the survival of the product will depend on how TGC will approach the described issues, that are substantial in order thousands of developers adopt the platform.
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AgentSam
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Posted: 26th May 2013 22:16
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"I have learnt that you are a very experienced, skilled and wise programmer" o_O

I wasn't quite sure how to take that, I think it might have contained a bit of sarcasm,
especially since I don't make a fuss about any of my published or unpublished apps.

But, I completely agree with the rest of what you said! Well, except perhaps about
the part of Basic being perfect for commercial products. Which it really isn't in the
long run - and definately not the AppGameKit basic in it's current state with very poor UDT
support, a complete lack of strict typing, various parser issues, etc.

But still, I'd like to see the AppGameKit basic improved. I agree that it's very nice for quick
prototyping, and obviously very important as a first language for people who are
new to programming.

Facing forward, and hoping the TGC team can turn AppGameKit into a stable and reliable
development tool.

Cheers,
AgentSam
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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 27th May 2013 00:43
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Quote: "I wasn't quite sure how to take that, I think it might have contained a bit of sarcasm,
especially since I don't make a fuss about any of my published or unpublished apps."

No sarcasm at all! I have read your comments about new beta12 release, and many other posts and comment of yours, and I have guessed that you are very experienced and skilled, I suppose that your main job is or has been programming of course (and, BTW, this forum is not about cooking), so I added...programmer. Maybe you are project manager, project leader, software architect, system engineer, etc...but anyway you are an expert for sure. Maybe programmer is too reductive.
About BASIC as language for commercial products, I think that we are right and wrong at the same time.
I do not see the BASIC language as a language only to do prototype. Many BASIC-based languages (e.g. Visual Basic or Dark Basic itself) have been used to develop commercial products...but at the current stage AppGameKit Basic is not adequate at all to product something really commercial, because of lack of the many things you mentioned (debugger, poor UDT and function return values support, debugger, serious parser errors, bugs not fixed).
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MarcoBruti
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Posted: 3rd Jun 2013 17:56
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any news about compiler fixes?
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