Star's Guide to OpenMW [WiP]

[lgromanowski]

Before I jump into touching any code, I decided that, while the D to C++ conversion is still going on, I should make some documentation to help myself as well as new and prospective coders or content folk that would join or help. The best thing to do is to provide for a wide range of skills and experience.

The wiki is still very young, and...well...someone's got to contribute, so what I thought was this:

Make a document, focusing on different perspectives, that describes for new and existing contributors to OpenMW's content or code, what the heck it is they are working with and how it works so they can easily make changes. I want someone to be able to look at my guide, look at \openmw\, and say "Okay, THAT. THERE. Let's roll."

As I'm going through this, If anyone has any suggestions, suggestions for revisions (or corrections! ^_^!) I'd appreciate it.

I'm also working on a dummy's guide, from beginning to coding, a developer's guide on installing, config, and building and using OpenMW.

First, please, read the whole wiki.
Most of the thing you are mentioning are already present.

First, please, read the whole wiki.
Most of the thing you are mentioning are already present.

As I've previously said, I've been looking at the wiki. The Wiki even mentions it's not intended for certain things and while it may have similar information, it just doesn't cover what I think needs to be covered. Instead of fighting for revisions to current and future entries to the wiki that others may not want, I'd much rather make my own guide, post it, and if it's good enough for the wiki it'll be added.

So, while some info may be present, it's not presented well enough, and is still largely incomplete, in addition for not being for beginners and requiring reading and experience in many other places. I'm not sure who's been writing, but I'm confident they'd rather be working than explaining. I don't have a problem explaining, I don't have a problem teaching.

If I were to add everything to the wiki myself I'm sure I'd be stepping on everyone's toes. I don't want to invalidate what they want or what they've already made, but I also don't think they are going to accommodate the things I feel are needed for myself and maybe even others.

You bring up a valid point, but I think my guide will be superior. If it is, maybe I'll be allowed to throw it up there, because I can't just make whatever entries there I want just because I don't think the current wiki meets my needs, right? This is why I posted first - I have this concern, and I have something that could really help people get into the project that doesn't require expertise or experience. I think this could be valuable to everyone if it was done correctly.

You're intention to provide documentation is welcome.

I don't understand, do you plan to create a standalone document (in which format? pdf word) or some new wiki pages and update existing ones. The second solution seems to be better for the project and for you because you'll have to do the job only once. Moreover, it could motivate other people to help you enhance the pages you are creating by giving you new ideas not seen at startup.

Instead of fighting for revisions to current and future entries to the wiki that others may not want, I'd much rather make my own guide, post it, and if it's good enough for the wiki it'll be added.

It's the goal of a wiki : finding the best compromise between authors, to create the most accurate/helpful document as possible.

Improve the existent content, instead of splitting the wiki in two : beginners, and geeks.

If I were to add everything to the wiki myself I'm sure I'd be stepping on everyone's toes. I don't want to invalidate what they want or what they've already made, but I also don't think they are going to accommodate the things I feel are needed for myself and maybe even others.

It's the goal of a wiki : Confronting the point of view of different persons, with different visions, different ideas, ...

You're intention to provide documentation is welcome.

I don't understand, do you plan to create a standalone document (in which format? pdf word) or some new wiki pages and update existing ones. The second solution seems to be better for the project and for you because you'll have to do the job only once. Moreover, it could motivate other people to help you enhance the pages you are creating by giving you new ideas not seen at startup.

Well, my current drafts are simply notepad (yeah, hardcore.), but yes, I'd settle for an HTML guide or start making wiki articles myself. Just have to learn a little of wiki's markup (I know, I'm so noob, despite liking Uncyclopedia) while writing.

I'm sure once you see where I'm going with this, you might see what I see: it'll pull people in and keep them thinking.

Instead of fighting for revisions to current and future entries to the wiki that others may not want, I'd much rather make my own guide, post it, and if it's good enough for the wiki it'll be added.

It's the goal of a wiki : finding the best compromise between authors, to create the most accurate/helpful document as possible.

Improve the existent content, instead of splitting the wiki in two : beginners, and geeks.

If I were to add everything to the wiki myself I'm sure I'd be stepping on everyone's toes. I don't want to invalidate what they want or what they've already made, but I also don't think they are going to accommodate the things I feel are needed for myself and maybe even others.

It's the goal of a wiki : Confronting the point of view of different persons, with different visions, different ideas, ...

If that's okay with everyone, I'm ready to go to town on it...

I'm not really touching code until I can't find something I can work on myself or until I understand the whole thing from top to bottom, sso this is kinda my thing until then.

If that's okay with everyone, I'm ready to go to town on it...

I'm not really touching code until I can't find something I can work on myself or until I understand the whole thing from top to bottom, sso this is kinda my thing until then.

Sounds great, go for it! Good documentation is something we can never get enough of. Feel free to write it directly into the wiki if you want to, will probably save you some reediting work later but that's up to you.

Sounds great, go for it! Good documentation is something we can never get enough of. Feel free to write it directly into the wiki if you want to, will probably save you some reediting work later but that's up to you.

Cool beans. I'll probably start on that within the week and start outlining the wiki page for it.

Nice, don't forget there are a lot of valuable help on the online help of Mediawiki, which helps a lot for editing/creating pages.

Nice, don't forget there are a lot of valuable help on the online help of Mediawiki, which helps a lot for editing/creating pages.

Cool! Thanks.

Not sure if I should make the new wiki page "Star's Guide to OpenMW" and ask to have it be protected for the time being or "Guide to OpenMW" and let her loose as I work on it.

Then again, it may be too early to start forming descriptions on parts of OpenMW that are still in the works - maybe I should wait for something to be finished or revised?

Hi,

Perhaps you can put on the wiki a very early draft of the table of contents or sort of plan you are thinking of. Then ask the forum if there are ideas or part of it you can start to write.

Hope this help.

Hi,

Perhaps you can put on the wiki a very early draft of the table of contents or sort of plan you are thinking of. Then ask the forum if there are ideas or part of it you can start to write.

Hope this help.

Yeah, I'll probably do a mix of both.

BTW: Love Claymore. Such a shame it takes so long to translate.

http://openmw.org/wiki/index.php?title= ... _to_OpenMW

okay...it's up. This is what I had in mind.

Hi,

Ough such a page! If you fill it, it could be a complete system description, a nice idea to have so much things in one place. Perhaps when you'll write it, it will be better displayed if splitted in several pages.

Claymore is a nice anime, I saw the series by mistake, a very good surprise!

Hi,

Ough such a page! If you fill it, it could be a complete system description, a nice idea to have so much things in one place. Perhaps when you'll write it, it will be better displayed if splitted in several pages.

Claymore is a nice anime, I saw the series by mistake, a very good surprise!

Thanks. I don't mind splitting it up when the time comes.

There's a lot in there that I don't know how it works (how ESMs work, BSA, so on), so I'd love some input when it comes to those things.

BTW: The manga is very good. The anime is getting a slight remake/sequel in fall or spring.

Very nice! Btw don't forget to link it from the front page at some point so it doesn't get lost in the sea of wiki pages

Star-Demon, if you think it is appropriate, please feel free to collapse the information on this page...

http://openmw.org/wiki/index.php?title= ... chitecture

...into your new page and delete the above page. I added that page and it seems (to me) to overlap in purpose with what you're trying to do.

Star-Demon, one more quick question:

I know you said you'd like to "protect" the page until you do more work on it. What about minor edits? Do you want others to hold off on those or can those be made?

Specifically, for whatever irrational reason, I have a pet peeve about OGRE being referred to as OGRE3D (the name of the website is ogre3d and the name of the engine is OGRE ). Do you mind minor corrections like that?

Star-Demon, if you think it is appropriate, please feel free to collapse the information on this page...

http://openmw.org/wiki/index.php?title= ... chitecture

...into your new page and delete the above page. I added that page and it seems (to me) to overlap in purpose with what you're trying to do.

If that's okay with you, then sure - I'm not really sure, looking at that, that it's entirely redundant, but I'll try to integrate what you've got up so far.

On the minor edits/ protected thing: That's okay - If you want to put up an explanation there, feel free - but it's likely I might edit it down to match my style or to clarify - obviously I can't know everything about the project (Abstraction!), so this is as much a team effort because I need your input and perspective to really make this thing do what I'd like it to do.

As well, there's always a talk page for each wiki entry. Feel free to use it. Zini already brought some things up and I took care of them.

@OGRE3D: Whatever the proper name actually is. It's the same situation with blender. Is in Blender or Blender3d? hehe.

Classes begin for me next week, so I'm trying to push this week to set myself up for casual work during my bored spots.

I made some changes, but accidentally overdid/redid the NOT ogre3D change while I was working on my Giant edit. it's fixed.

I explained what I learned about some things, and I think within the week I'm going to start some threads asking some fairly involved questions about different systems.

*sigh*...Well, anyways, slowly making progress on this thing. Soon I'll have to start grilling you guys on certain parts of the program. Take your time responding, because I want very clear and practical sense made out of what's been coded.

I'll probably start that in a week or so, but things are starting to get busy, so in between now and a break we'll all be better served by establishing proper goals...Mine is something resembling regular updating and structuring my own tasks.

Recently updated some parts, so go take a look.

Some minor updates today.

I need to ask for two things:

First - I need some links or some thoughts on ESM and ESP files. While we have some info on ESMs, if there's any reference similar to the BSA one, I could really use that, because one of the things I need in my guide is to explain very clearly how they both work and inform the reader of how Morrowind uses references and alters records.

Second, I want to write something extra for the community about best practices in making mods, and I need input regarding some DOs and DON'Ts, good practices and such things when making any mod, large or small.

@Newbies and Casuals:
I have not abandoned you!

Slow does not equal unmoving! Principally, Real life slows me down, but I am definitely thinking up many changes and many additions to the guide!

The code changes a lot, and a lot of changes must be discovered! Then, slowly, the full and usable descriptions shall come.

Stay tuned!

Well, now that I can look at recent changes and pull them regularly, I've added and will be adding stuff to the wiki. I'll probably also include more instructions on github, vim, and other technical procedures.