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Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Sun Aug 22, 2010 11:55 pm
by joe_rogers_11155
reepblue wrote:You would expect the Source SDK to be the best tools to use, but its just patches over patches. A patch to fix one issue causes another issue so they patch it with a patch that fixes that issue but screws something else up, etc.


this and the random crash upon clicking an entity really bug me to death too. i work on hammer for many hours a day sometimes and good god is it frustrating to encounter a random CTD with not a single warning or explanation.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 12:23 am
by reepblue
joe_rogers_11155 wrote:this and the random crash upon clicking an entity really bug me to death too. i work on hammer for many hours a day sometimes and good god is it frustrating to encounter a random CTD with not a single warning or explanation.


Yeah and its awesome that the auto-save screws up my display for a while so I have to turn it off. I save often and reboot after 15 or so mins so the compiler does not crash. And I also use a batch compiler because when I use the "-both" tag in vrad, it fails to compile HDR. But that might be due to Windows 7 since I had that issue ever since I switched. In a nutshell, Hammer is getting more and more like garbage. I only do most of my mapping for Portal so when Portal 2 roles around I'll be using tools for that more often then the Source SDK.

But do you guys realize how updated they keep the Left 4 Dead 2 and Alien Swarm tools updated? The updates for tools and game happen together at once, and I never had one of those tools break on me. They should treat the Source SDK the same. The reason why the tools did not work in the end of April/start of May is because the tools where set to work with Source 15 and the games were on Source 14 but Team Fortress 2 (which was using Source 15 before the rest of the Orange Box was.) Then 2 WEEKS later, they updated the SDK which I think Half-Life 2 EP2 and TF2 would work while Portal had to wait for its engine update so it can play on Macs.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 9:47 am
by Saxon
I'm all for requesting Hammer to be made open source too.

It would be reasonable to argue that Hammer is so old that it doesn't offer any corporate competitive advantage over competing level editors - however making it open source would potentially see it brought up to the standards of other level editors. This would benefit not only the modding community, but may also be beneficial to Valve too.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 2:26 pm
by PiMuRho
Well, Hammer is just a text editor, right? Its only output is VMF files. Aside from some libraries used to read the GCFs and display the models/textures etc, there's nothing there that couldn't safely be open-sourced.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 2:49 pm
by Plague
PiMuRho wrote:Well, Hammer is just a text editor, right? Its only output is VMF files. Aside from some libraries used to read the GCFs and display the models/textures etc, there's nothing there that couldn't safely be open-sourced.


Except for Valve's own software becoming unsellable...

Open Sourcing is out of the question in the case of a tool that can be licensed. It simply is not a good business deal.
Hammer is a map editor that when you License the Source Engine, I'm sure you get the code for.

It would be anti-Business to give that same code out to the public in an Open Source format.
And worse is they would have to find a Open Source license that fits their needs, otherwise people could make money off of their own software.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 4:23 pm
by Saxon
Plague wrote:
PiMuRho wrote:Well, Hammer is just a text editor, right? Its only output is VMF files. Aside from some libraries used to read the GCFs and display the models/textures etc, there's nothing there that couldn't safely be open-sourced.


Except for Valve's own software becoming unsellable...

Open Sourcing is out of the question in the case of a tool that can be licensed. It simply is not a good business deal.
Hammer is a map editor that when you License the Source Engine, I'm sure you get the code for.

It would be anti-Business to give that same code out to the public in an Open Source format.
And worse is they would have to find a Open Source license that fits their needs, otherwise people could make money off of their own software.


I don't see why anyone would want to license Hammer in its present state though. Anyway, income from licensing should primarily be derived from the game engine itself, I don't see how people will "make money" at the expense of Valve if Hammer were open source.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 4:55 pm
by Plague
Saxon wrote:I don't see why anyone would want to license Hammer in its present state though. Anyway, income from licensing should primarily be derived from the game engine itself, I don't see how people will "make money" at the expense of Valve if Hammer were open source.



As a Source Engine licensee you probably get a lot of code in relation to the tools.
It is important because if Valve did not do so you would be constrained by their software.

Also, depending on the type of Open Source License, It could potentially allow people the freedom to resell it.
Here, http://www.opensource.org/licenses/category
For instance here is the MIT License.
Notice it lets you basically do whatever you want so long as you include the text SOMEWHERE in the project.
This could include making a major competing Source Engine level editor.
Open Source Initiative OSI - The MIT License:Licensing

The MIT License

Copyright (c) <year> <copyright holders>

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
THE SOFTWARE.



Lastly, We must all understand that the tools for Source are directly attached to it.
Code inside of Hammer is related to Source Engine Code, SDK Tools are run "in-Engine" (Particle/Commentary).
So giving this away would also require modifications to make sure the primary Engine code, The same code they don't want you to have for free, is hidden.

Edit:
Thought i would clarify on Hammer being related to Engine code.
Rather it is related to the Compile tools and I'm sure other hidden bits that they would like us to not have for free.
My words stand for the "in-engine" tools.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 6:11 pm
by Varsity
Plague wrote:[releasing the source code needed to create new in-game tools] would require elements of the Engine code.


Are you a programmer? Do you have any reasoning for that? The tools compile to standalone DLLs, and we already have some headers for them (which may actually provide everything we need already, I don't know). Over and above that Valve provide source for the mathutils, tier1 and vgui2 engine DLLs in the SDK already, not to mention 23 different command-line tools.

Plague wrote:Lastly, We must all understand that the tools for Source are directly attached to it.


There is actually very little in common between Source and Hammer, to the best of our knowledge. What little functionality it does share comes through engine libraries that would not need to be opened. The rest - most obviously the rendering path - is totally different.

The fact that Hammer is so different is why the future is the in-game tools of course, making pondering its future pointless. :P

Plague wrote:Rather it is related to the Compile tools and I'm sure other hidden bits that they would like us to not have for free.


We have source code to all three map compile tools.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 6:24 pm
by joe_rogers_11155
Varsity wrote:The fact that Hammer is so different is why the future is the in-game tools of course, making pondering its future pointless. :P


Can you elaborate on "the future is the in-game tools" please?

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 8:13 pm
by Plague
When I say "in-engine" or "in-game" I am talking about the extended tools (or whatever).

And no I am no programmer, And you are right.
It is not a amazing as I make it out.

But my point still stands, Valve needs these things for business dealings.
No matter how few people do license it.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 8:14 pm
by city14
Microbrush can save as a VMF...

So why don't we just ask shrinker to work on a compiling tool. With enough work I'm sure you could also make your own tool that is exactly what people want...

THINK ABOUT IT

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 9:05 pm
by Ark11
We need mod support for Source 2009!!!!!!!!??!!?!!!!!?!

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 9:11 pm
by windlab
Plague wrote:
Saxon wrote:I don't see why anyone would want to license Hammer in its present state though. Anyway, income from licensing should primarily be derived from the game engine itself, I don't see how people will "make money" at the expense of Valve if Hammer were open source.


As a Source Engine licensee you probably get a lot of code in relation to the tools.
It is important because if Valve did not do so you would be constrained by their software.

Also, depending on the type of Open Source License, It could potentially allow people the freedom to resell it.
Here, http://www.opensource.org/licenses/category
For instance here is the MIT License.
Notice it lets you basically do whatever you want so long as you include the text SOMEWHERE in the project.
This could include making a major competing Source Engine level editor.
Open Source Initiative OSI - The MIT License:Licensing
...


Lastly, We must all understand that the tools for Source are directly attached to it.
Code inside of Hammer is related to Source Engine Code, SDK Tools are run "in-Engine" (Particle/Commentary).
So giving this away would also require modifications to make sure the primary Engine code, The same code they don't want you to have for free, is hidden.

Edit:
Thought I would clarify on Hammer being related to Engine code.
Rather it is related to the Compile tools and I'm sure other hidden bits that they would like us to not have for free.
My words stand for the "in-engine" tools.

I think we've already confirmed that Valve is not gaining an edge over its competition via Hammer - that's partly why we're running this petition after all.

Also, it's possible to license in such a way that all derivative software must share the same license, this meaning that though someone could conceivably sell a Hammer derivative, it would be possible to copy all code improvements straight back into the main trunk of the Hammer codebase, making the whole concept rather pointless.

This is why RedHat, a major Linux developer focusses on doing what the open-source community cannot: providing phone support, classes and virtual Linux training and helping big businesses make the switch to (Red Hat) Linux.

Besides that, who other than Valve, Valve software licensees and Modders use Valve software? If someone develops a better Hammer and sells it, Valve can hardly stand to lose in any scenario.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 10:36 pm
by Plague
Please, by all means pick out an Open Source license that does such a thing.
That MIT license does that, but permits you to sell and modify at will.

This is probably your best bet, http://www.opensource.org/licenses/cddl1.php
Under a contributer license which can apply to the public source code.

But chances are Valve still will not open up a product that can be sold. Bad Business is Bad Business, Linux is a different story. (you know... being an OS and all...)

Plus Valve probably does not care as much since most of their cash is coming from their games and Steam.
And think about this, maybe we are doing all this for nothing.
Maybe Valve is sitting in their building working on new licenses and better tools, as such is why we see this behavior of not giving us a true fix to the SDK.

If this is true, then they might as well not even respond to us.

Re: Source Modding Community SDK Petition

PostPosted: Tue Aug 24, 2010 1:11 am
by Dionysos
Strictly speaking Linux isnt a different story just because it's an OS, open source is open source. Also, Valve isn't selling Hammer and the SDK tools. Licensing the engine is of course a different matter.

This is all futile of course since nothing will ever change, at all. (Isn't this some kind of natural law?)