The D2X-W32 project has a new name!

D2X-XL - Descent II update for modern systems with many new features and enhanced graphics. Home Page

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Diedel
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The D2X-W32 project has a new name!

Post by Diedel »

As my Linux port has made great progress and I am already having a working Linux version, I have decided to change the name of my D2X-W32 to D2X-XL (eXtra Large ;)) to reflect the broader scope of the project as well as the rich feature set and completeness of the software, far exceeding all other D2X versions around.

Aus-RED-5 has made this beautiful new logo for me: :)

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Kirby
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Post by Kirby »

I would of suggested D2-tuX, but good enough :D
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Diedel
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Post by Diedel »

It's not just a Linux project, it's Win32 too. And 'tuX' is far too geekish. Like all of Linux. Working with Linux is a mess. :P
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Sirius
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Post by Sirius »

Word Diedel. Linux is a neat concept, but the implementation annoys me.
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Post by Diedel »

I had needed someone to help me to get the whole automake/autoconf/configure aria to run, although I had all the files from the original D2X 0.2.5.

I tried to use a Visual Studio like IDE named KDevelop, and neither did store my project info, nor was it able to create a working project leading to a compiled executable. I was told to download the most recent version to fix this, but the software update manager of YaST didn't offer me any update ... and I didn't want to spend a lot of time to find the download and possibly compile and install everything, given my Linux noobness.

It took me a whole day to figure how to write FindFirstFile and FindNextFile functions. Linux documentations suck. Either they just tell you the obvious (standard API docs), or they are chock full of info you don't need and take hours to chew through. No useful examples, no detailled hints on what environments certain API/Kernel functions expect, or how they work in detail. Trial and error, trial and error, trial and error. I have yet to see a practical reason for Linux fans to be so fond of it.

Don't take me wrong: In principle, I am for open software and for Linux. As a windows user, you just meet some Linux guy looking down on you so often, and I am just asking myself right now: Where do they take any practical justification for that?

For me, an OS is a tool, and a tool has to work and make life easier for me. Nothing more, nothing less. I find all the flame wars around MS Windows vs. Linux simply idiotic.
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Post by TechPro »

Diedel wrote:For me, an OS is a tool, and a tool has to work and make life easier for me. Nothing more, nothing less. I find all the flame wars around MS Windows vs. Linux simply idiotic.
Word! :)
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Post by Sirius »

...that's exactly what I mean.

The fact that programmers can find Linux such a pain - you don't have to be computer illiterate or anything - speaks volumes about how well it was designed. It's not that working in it is difficult - it just wastes countless hours when you find something you don't know - because the documentation ain't going to help you much.

When you need to break out Google every 15 minutes to get through a process, you know there's something wrong.
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Post by Diedel »

I don't think that design is the basic problem - I think it's the nature of Open Source. The whole stuff isn't money-driven, so there's no pressure to make it as attractive and easy to use as possible. It's an ideologic project for a good part, and that means that a lot of ppl create Linux content that are less concerned with providing easy access to it than with defending their view points.

I tried to use tar to freshen up files in an archive (there is a windowed archive manager, but it is extremely simple). The tar man page listed a whole screen of options with short, often cryptic explanations and not a single example for the most common cases. Well ... I didn't have another hour to find a useful tar documentation, so I stuck with the minimalistic archive manager ... but things like that just suck.
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Post by fliptw »

tar is also older than most of the people on this board.

There is a reason why O'Reily books sell.
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