Documentation

International board Development
#12

Wow. That was fast. :slight_smile:

Two minor things need to be updated:

  • for Home, you need to remove the “or bottom” description
  • you can remove “Selection dialog can be closed with Enter key” from the list. That existed in H3 as well. It was a mistake from my part in the above post (I removed it now).
#13

It’s fast if you use the right tools. LaTeX does the entire formatting automagically, I need only to add text and a few tags.

WinShell, open-source LaTeX editor
Wikibooks manual explains all common functions.
Miktex is a program used to manage packages, covering pretty everything from quantum physics to bottle labels.

#14

Any new functionalities to describe? I’m gonna update manual, at least by bumping version to 0.8.

#15

If you have a bit of time, can you also update the topics on CH/HC? At CH it’s still mentioned about “Upcoming release 0.76 (1st January)”.

#16

Manual updated with some new info as well as FAQ (finally!).

#17

[size=75]A couple of details (mostly cosmetic, so can wait for the next release to correct):

  1. Indroduction
  • paragraph 1: is it just me, or there are 2 spaces between “HoMM3:” and “WoG”?
  • paragraph 2: “VCMI is a fan-made…”
  1. Installation
  • “VCMI requires full Heroes of Might and Magic 3” - and optionally you could even add between brackets “SoD, Complete or Platinum”, because I think just RoE or AB won’t do it (perhaps not for VCMI, but I’m not sure if WoG installation would be allowed). Though perhaps that’s what you meant by “full”.
  1. New resolutions
  • 1336x768 to be replaced by 1366x768. Plus you can add an asterisk next to it and a foot-note, mentioning that this resolution presents issues in combination with old video cards
  • Stack Queue is visible regardless of the resolution, just differently, so perhaps the part about it can be rephrased
  1. Release notes
  • “Monster has been enabled” - I guess it should be “Monster area of control…”
  • “Online game, random map generator as well as some other parts of the game” perhaps replaced by “Online multiplayer, RMG, Tutorial, High Score & Credits”
  1. Credits
  • Maybe we should have somewhere a list with the devs & testers. Pointing the reader to the board is not exactly “Credits”. Or we should just use another title there i/o Credits.

PS: I seem to have pretty lousy technical skills. I installed WinShell, but I couldn’t figure out how to use it to edit the pdf, to try the changes myself. :blush:

Oh, and an unrelated heads-up: The 0.81 link on page 3 of the VCMI tread on CH is pointing to the 3rd post in the topic i/o the original (#4714 i/o #4712).[/size]

#18

You can’t. PDF is compiled (rendered?) file and it contains info about all packages used to create it. There is no way to revert this process.

I will update the file as soon a spossible.

#19

I prepared doxygen documentation in Wiki style, hopefully now it can be more useful.

New file replaced the old one:
Clicky

#20

I just though of something else we could put in the manual : H3 known bugs which were never fixed in NWC’s add-ons/patches, but not “copied” in VCMI. :slight_smile:

I think we had a couple of these, though the only one I can recall now is boats not corresponding to alignments if bought from the town shipyard. This crossed my mind now because I just found another H3 bug (mentioned in my note to Mantis #370), which we might end up correcting as well.

No need to put this in the manual until we have a decent list, but I wanted to write this down before I forget about it. Maybe I’ll update this post if I remember of other examples (and feel free to point them out if you can think of any).

#21

Manual updated to version 0.9 with new fetaures.
dc93.4shared.com/img/135714811/d0214227/vcmimanual.pdf

I’d like to geyt some feedback on main menu background customization (couldn’t make it work properly). Also, on installation notes for multiple supported systems.

In general, list of supported systems would be handy.

#22

4shared asks for registration. Maybe reupload it somewhere else?

English language files - I think that VCMI should work with localized data as well. At least Russian works fine for several releases.

What about GUI?
Console way is disabled due to high res main menu.

Editing files? That’s too complex :slight_smile:
Unpack this into game directory (won’t work with 0.89)
dl.dropbox.com/u/22372764/vcmi/ … w-menu.zip
I’ve changed format of of config/mainmenu.json a bit so old package does not works with trunk.

On Linux-based systems ALL data files can be placed in ~/.vcmi directory (one of new FS features)
And it is not “home directory”. Home is /home/username/, shortcut is “~”.
BTW - check for typos (“sysems”)

Logging:
On Linux-based logs are in ~/.vcmi directory, no crash dump

Regarding systems from TODO list:
Linux - OK, compiled packages for Debian\Ubuntu and possibly Fedora (if beegee is still around)
Mac OS - can be compiled AFAIK
Android - …
Haiku - Still 0.86. Probably not maintained. haikuware.com/directory/view-det … -magic-iii
Maemo - 800x480
FreeBSD - no success so far.

EDIT
Forgot about this:
Starting from 0.90 VCMI can be installed on H3 + Era setups

#23

I suggest including the documentation source (LaTeX) in the svn tree. This way everything is in one place and accessible. Another thing that should be included are the main-menu graphics and configs. I think everything should be in svn.
Also, are there sources available for the new graphics? I mean native files of the program used for editing. Preferably any such sources should also be in svn.

#24

Awesome news :smiley:
Manual is now avaliable in Dropbox.

#25

I think that uploading latex source somewhere (svn\wiki\whatever) is a good idea - manual still have several issues, mostly in Linux-specific sections.

#26

Uploaded it to svn :slight_smile:

#27

Thanks :).

#28

In the pdf manual. There are 2 ways described for changing resolution. Both misleading imo.

Instead I found and used the provided in-game menu.

Same case for full screen.

#29

Some suggestions for the manual (some already posted in the 0.89d thread), a couple related to the above post on the misleading info for Resolutions & Fullscreen, as well as few others:

High resolutions

  1. We also support 1280x800 now
  2. I’d change “Switching resolution may not only change visible area of map, but also alters some interface features such as Stack Queue.” with “Higher resolutions not only increase the visible are of the map, but also make room for enhanced interface items such as full size version of the new Stack Queue”.
  3. I’d also change “Use interactive ”settings” menu when in game” and the reference to the outdated Settings.txt to the following:

Fullscreen
4. Should be separated from the High resolutions chapter. Either moved just below, or under Minor improvements or New controls.
5. The whole text should change to something like:

  1. Page 6 is almost empty, chapter 4 starting after a page break, which is a bit inconsistent with the rest of the chapters which didn’t require page break before. I’d remove the page break.

  2. There are two enhancements to the Town Screen in VCMI, which could be added either under Minor improvements or under New controls:

#30

Not sure if I updated the manual since last changes made by Ivan. Anyway, it’s now avaliable in the repository
vcmi.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroo … manual.tex

I also think about sharing manual folder on Dropbox so anyone could upload updated version. Dropbox also allows us to use some graphics etc, unlike SVN.

#31

I’m not sure if it’s a browser thing, but if I access the link you gave, I get the manual in text format which is neither user-friendly to read, nor editable so I can make changes in it myself…

Or do you mean I can use that to copy into Wordpad, make the changes, and send it back to you for update?