Re: [Rails-devel] Stockmarket type aka 1825 dev?

[Stefan F. <ste...@we...>]

Hi Håkan,
as someone who started working on Rails pretty recently (after a long time of 
passive observer), I can fully understand your choice to join the Rails 
development. I think one cannot underestimate the work done especially by 
Erik (but also all the others involved9 to get the project to a state where 
it is now: One can play real 18xx with Rails without running into problems 
every minute.

As Erik got me into the loop, I feel myself urged to provide you any 
assistance you need to start contributing: Thus if you have any question with 
respect to the code, you can ask me (in addition to the others) anytime. 

I like 1825 and would love to see Rails support for it. But even if the rules 
of 1825 are not complicated, there is a substantial list of changes you have 
to consider, thus it is not the easiest task to start with. My route to 1889 
was to start with the XML files in data, then create the missing tiles and 
finally add code support for the missing rule details.

Some of the discussion with Erik on specific topics (especially regarding 
implementations details) was done off the devel list: As it took me some time 
to familiarize myself with the structure and design of Rails, I could try to 
summarize some basic ideas. So if you (or others) are interested on a short 
overview of the code structure, I am willing to write something down after 
the release of 1.1.4.

And in any case: good luck on the job market.

Stefan


On Monday 08 March 2010 13:17:07 Håkan König wrote:
> Hi there,
>
> I had a few questions about rails development in general and 1825 in
> particular. Since I'm new here and the only name I recognize among the
> current developers is Chris 'The Cat' Shaffer I'll start with a small
> introduction before I get to my questions.
>
> My name is Håkan König. I like to play 18xx and boardgames in general,
> something which has taken me to BoardgameGeek under the alias of
> hakko504. Right now I'm working as a consultant with android development
> in JAVA in an assignment about to end any day now. Unless we get a new
> customer, I will get laid off before the end of the month at which point
> I will have a lot of free time, and a need to improve my JAVA knowledge.
> As I've used the Rails app for a while to satisfy my appetite for 18xx I
> thought I'd come and see if you needed any development help here while
> at the same time expanding my knowledge in JAVA. I have downloaded the
> current repository from the CVS and started to look at the code and made
> sure it compiles in Eclipse. And then I came up with the idea of adding
> 1825 support to the app since it's the 18xx I'm mostly familiar with
> which isn't already supported or in development. I started searching in
> the archives and the only thing I could find was a small references to
> 1825, in the thread Stockmarket type where a discussion started about a
> linear stockmarket with multiple jumps. In the future I may also be
> interested in doing 1861 if 1825 turns out to be successful.
>
> So, the question I'm trying to ask is: Do you need any help? I'm
> beginner in JAVA but I have by now close to 10 years of programming
> experience from mostly C & C++, and during the last 6 months I've been
> working with JAVA on android.
> An of course, is there any interest in 1825, and has anything useful
> been done there? I can't find anything in the CVS main trunk, but Phil
> Davies posted here a while ago that he'd been looking at the
> possibility, but no specifics. I have quite a few ides but I'm not sure
> how to implement all of them. I forsee problems with supporting
> different combinations of Units/regionals/Kits (changing maps, available
> tiles, available trains, size of main bank etc.), as well as separate
> banks for players and companies.
>
> Anyway, That's me, and my interest in Rails.
> Håkan
>
> BTW, my main sourceforgeid is hakko504 as well, but that is linked to a
> slightly different emailaddress, without the .rails before the @ sign.
> Don't be confused, as long as it says @hakko.eml.cc it's me ;)