Re: Pipmaze 0.2

[Aidan G. <wgs...@ih...>]

Christian Walther wrote:
> Aidan Gauland wrote:
>> You should be able to just put the file "cmd.rb" in the same  
>> directory as
>> "pipmaze.rb".
> 
> Right, that worked (the file was in /Library/Ruby/Gems/1.8/gems/ 
> cmd-0.7.2/lib/cmd.rb).
> 
> When I ran "ruby pipmaze.rb 15 12", it stopped because I don't have a  
> command-line version of POV-Ray installed. So I manually rendered the  
> images. Your maze.ini file doesn't include an image size, is that  
> intentional?

Yes, but on my installation of POV-Ray, it uses a default value in this case. 
  Did it not on yours?

> I used 512x512. Then I moved the partially-generated  
> Pipmak project out of the way and ran
>    Maze> yload maze.yaml
>    Maze> pipmak
> That produced a differently incomplete Pipmak project: the images were  
> there now, but all the node.lua and main.lua files were empty. I  
> combined the two projects into a working one by taking the "images"  
> folder from the second and the rest from the first.

That really weird.  I couldn't reproduce this (don't you just hate that? :( ). 
  I guess this one will have to remain mysterious, until someone can figure 
out what triggers this.

> Exploring the maze in Pipmak works well, only the exit mark is a bit  
> inconspicuous - I missed it on my first exhaustive way through the  
> maze, I only noticed it when I went straight there using the ASCII  
> map. Perhaps the exit node could be distinguished somehow in the POV- 
> Ray scene already, so that it is also recognizable from neighboring  
> nodes?

Ok, added that to the development repository.

> Your maze generation algorithm is good, it seems to generate more  
> straight passages and less one-unit-long dead-ends than in the totally  
> random mazes I used to get when I dabbled in maze generation algorithms.

Actually, I didn't come up with it myself, I just came up with the 
implementation.  I found the algorithm (written in pseudo-code) at...
http://www.mazeworks.com/mazegen/mazetut/index.htm

> Next step - more interesting walls than polished marble cuboids?  
> Hedges? Randomized wall heights so that you can see other parts of the  
> maze from some locations?

I'll have to think about this.  I like the idea of being able to see other 
parts of the maze from some locations, without being able to see how to get there.