Welcome, Guest. Please login or register. Did you miss your activation email?

Author Topic: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?  (Read 14061 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

BHXSpecter

  • Guest
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #15 on: July 14, 2012, 02:56:49 am »
 >:( Wow, just joined because I had a similar issue, but appears this forum is useless. Every reply seems to be insult your intelligence and then tell you to RTFM. What is the point of a forum for seeking help with SFML if you basically insult and demean the person seeking help then say RTFM? Save a lot of space on your server with this attitude as you won't need to have the forums, just plaster RTFM on every page. Though, I must thank you, with your attitude you have made me decide to go to SDL/Allegro or any other library as at least they don't insult potential users for asking questions.

Resident Biscuit, if you are just using SFML for the heck of it, I'd say lose it and find another library where the forums has fewer ass hats in it.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2012, 04:26:02 am by BHXSpecter »

eXpl0it3r

  • SFML Team
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10801
    • View Profile
    • development blog
    • Email
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #16 on: July 14, 2012, 12:30:24 pm »
>:( Wow, just joined because I had a similar issue, but appears this forum is useless. Every reply seems to be insult your intelligence and then tell you to RTFM. What is the point of a forum for seeking help with SFML if you basically insult and demean the person seeking help then say RTFM? Save a lot of space on your server with this attitude as you won't need to have the forums, just plaster RTFM on every page.
You obviously don't understand what free help is. Everyone in here helping others takes parts from it's freetime to help others. Now if someone comes a long with a problem that has an obvious error in it (draw, clear, display) then it seems like the writer hasn't taken much time to fine a solution on it's own, because if you look at any example or the documentation or the tutorials it would get clear pretty soon what the solution should be (clear, draw, display).
Only after a discussion he states that he indeed tried the other orders. This we couldn't know.
Since he then didn't correct the mistake in the first post someone else comes along and replies without reading the already given answers and replies, spots the obvious problem and points it out.

The remaining problem is, that the code example is trivial and as posted by me, should work fine. But since the code posted isn't fully complete it could still be a problem with the creation of the window or it's hardware/software related. Thus we dig into other directions.

For other threads where we advice people to read the docs or a C++ book, we're trying to get people to understand how to help them self and fix their own problems. So we help them for self-help (capacity building) and that's more important then just fixing their things (reallife example: Africa).

Though, I must thank you, with your attitude you have made me decide to go to SDL/Allegro or any other library as at least they don't insult potential users for asking questions.
Good luck by deal with ugly APIs. :)
« Last Edit: July 14, 2012, 01:10:15 pm by eXpl0it3r »
Official FAQ: https://www.sfml-dev.org/faq.php
Official Discord Server: https://discord.gg/nr4X7Fh
——————————————————————
Dev Blog: https://duerrenberger.dev/blog/

Nexus

  • SFML Team
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6286
  • Thor Developer
    • View Profile
    • Bromeon
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #17 on: July 14, 2012, 02:25:01 pm »
Though, I must thank you, with your attitude you have made me decide to go to SDL/Allegro or any other library as at least they don't insult potential users for asking questions.
Yeah, good argument for SDL/Allegro. I'm sure there's also the library developer himself who spends all his free time on answering almost every question within hours.

Seriously, if more users read the forum rules, there would be many more useful answers. Of course, if it requires four replies until a user manages to meaningfully describe his problem, you don't need to wonder about people gradually becoming annoyed.
Zloxx II: action platformer
Thor Library: particle systems, animations, dot products, ...
SFML Game Development:

BHXSpecter

  • Guest
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #18 on: July 14, 2012, 04:09:35 pm »
Quote
For other threads where we advice people to read the docs or a C++ book, we're trying to get people to understand how to help them self and fix their own problems. So we help them for self-help (capacity building) and that's more important then just fixing their things (reallife example: Africa).
That is my point, if you want them to help themselves why bother with a forum where people can ask for help? That is like customer support for a company telling you to figure it out on your own when their product breaks, you will move to another product that does the same thing. My issue is that you can help them help themselves, but it seems a lot of the replies come across as just rude and demeaning. When looking back at other posts I see the same pattern of posts that come across as rude/demeaning and makes me hesitant to post, not knowing if the question would get actual help or the rude/demeaning self help replies. Problem is that even when reading the docs you may miss it so you come here to ask a question to get RTFM as the reply. I've done this numerous times when reading docs and replies like binary's where he used bold on "every" immediately made me think of a parent scolding their kid.

Quote
Good luck by deal with ugly APIs. :)
SFML isn't any less ugly. I've been programming for 16 years and have never seen an API that isn't ugly. Qt, Allegro, SDL, SFML, enet, Box 2d, etc all have ugly APIs and could be improved upon in one way or another. To be honest I write wrappers for every library I use so the ugliness isn't an issue. 

Quote
Yeah, good argument for SDL/Allegro. I'm sure there's also the library developer himself who spends all his free time on answering almost every question within hours.
Well in Allegro they do because several members of the community are the developers of it. Don't know about SDL but it has so many tutorials around that I've not had to ask questions on it as of yet, but I've just started learning it too so I can't predict the future in that regard. With SFML I've only seen a few sites that link back to the tutorials for 1.6 and 2.0 or others that just basically copied these tutorials and pasted them on their page.

I'll lurk around for a while and may still ask questions I'm sure :).

Nexus

  • SFML Team
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6286
  • Thor Developer
    • View Profile
    • Bromeon
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #19 on: July 14, 2012, 04:49:35 pm »
SFML isn't any less ugly. I've been programming for 16 years and have never seen an API that isn't ugly. Qt, Allegro, SDL, SFML, enet, Box 2d, etc all have ugly APIs and could be improved upon in one way or another. To be honest I write wrappers for every library I use so the ugliness isn't an issue.
What exactly is ugly in SFML? It's a real question, because I'm interested in your criterions, as I personally have only seen very few C++ libraries with such a clean API as SFML. For me, "clean" includes points like:
  • Well-structured functionality
  • Intuitive usage
  • Consistency
  • Modern C++ style
And I understand eXpl0it3r. It is already more cumbersome to program with SDL/Allegro because they are written in C, with all the corresponding drawbacks. For example, there is neither automatic memory management, nor function/operator overloading, nor default parameters.
Zloxx II: action platformer
Thor Library: particle systems, animations, dot products, ...
SFML Game Development:

Laurent

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 32504
    • View Profile
    • SFML's website
    • Email
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #20 on: July 14, 2012, 05:41:14 pm »
I understand both points of view.

It can be irritating when people obviously didn't read the documentation and tutorials. But maybe they just missed the relevant pages. Maybe they don't know what to look for because they are lost with a new API and website. In this case the best attitude is to reply with links to the relevant pages of the doc/tutorials. Expressing your irritation with RTFMs won't help anyone. And you don't have to post if it's only to be rude.

On the other side, it can be frustrating when you're a beginner to see "RTFM" or replies that imply that you're kind of stupid or lazy. But maybe you didn't take the time to write a meaningful post. If you want help, you must first read the rules, and then give as many details as possible in your post. It's really irritating to have to ask many questions in order to get the relevant information. It's also irritating to see people who don't seem to be able to do anything on their own. In my opinion, forums are meant to help people to improve their programming skills, to be able to deal with future similar errors, etc. So don't blame users that don't give a direct answer, they're just trying to help in a really meaningful way.

I'm also very interested in any comment about the ugliness of the SFML API :)
Laurent Gomila - SFML developer

ResidentBiscuit

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 11
    • View Profile
    • Email
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #21 on: July 14, 2012, 07:03:45 pm »
OK so apparently this turned into a giant mess.

Quote
It can be irritating when people obviously didn't read the documentation and tutorials

Well, I did actually read the documentation and ended up reading every relevant tutorial. Nowhere does it have anything relating to my problem. They all assumed that there wouldn't be a problem with something so simple.

Quote
It's also irritating to see people who don't seem to be able to do anything on their own.

I actually usually don't even questions, but thanks for the assumption. Once again, I came here and asked when I pretty sure the problem had nothing to do with my code. And it didnt, considering it worked just fine on my Linux VM.

Anyway, this thread has completely turned me off from this entire library. I will not be recommending this to anyway, and I will be dropping the library myself.

Grimshaw

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 631
  • Nephilim SDK
    • View Profile
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #22 on: July 14, 2012, 08:12:53 pm »
Relax guys, it is always a pain the ass when a working sample doesn't run as expected..

It is already hard to grasp a new API concepts, let alone when there is something wrong with your system..

SFML comes with a great API and functionality, and also the community is decent. Don't judge everyone by such a petty detail..

The guy who made the topic could have elaborated a little more, without a doubt, and of course the answer is of corresponding quality(of course it didn't need to be a little condescending..)

Anyway, lets focus on solving his problem... That's what matters.. Not rage-comments that don't make technical sense, like API ugliness... Cmon..

Nexus

  • SFML Team
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6286
  • Thor Developer
    • View Profile
    • Bromeon
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #23 on: July 14, 2012, 08:14:31 pm »
ResidentBiscuit, I believe you misunderstood Laurent. He didn't say you did neither read the docs nor do something on your own, rather that it might be irritating if people do so (that is, a general statement). And in the sentences you omitted in the quote, he further explained what he meant.
Zloxx II: action platformer
Thor Library: particle systems, animations, dot products, ...
SFML Game Development:

Laurent

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 32504
    • View Profile
    • SFML's website
    • Email
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #24 on: July 14, 2012, 08:39:42 pm »
Quote
Well, I did actually read the documentation and ended up reading every relevant tutorial. Nowhere does it have anything relating to my problem. They all assumed that there wouldn't be a problem with something so simple.
Like Nexus said, don't take it for yourself, that wasn't targeted to anyone in particular. Don't play the victim too much :P
But since you mention it, the doc and tutorials do have the solution. Both the main page of the doc and the "getting started" tutorials have a minimal code sample that shows how to clear/draw/display in the right order. Of course this applies only to the beginning of the discussion, after you said that you tried other combinations it became a different problem.

Quote
Once again, I came here and asked when I pretty sure the problem had nothing to do with my code. And it didnt, considering it worked just fine on my Linux VM.
Of course but you should have made it clear in your first post. All that people saw at the beginning was this totally obvious error, and thus focused on that. And again, my statement was not about you.

Quote
Anyway, this thread has completely turned me off from this entire library. I will not be recommending this to anyway, and I will be dropping the library myself.
That's your choice, but I think it's a very bad reason. It implies that you choose your tools according to your feelings, instead of the usual technical details (design of the API, documentation/tutorials, features, ...). And because you didn't like a single user's posts doesn't mean that SFML is a bad library. Although I'm the administrator, I can't control what every user says on the forum.

By the way, I tried to be helpful and asked you a question, you never answered.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2012, 08:42:41 pm by Laurent »
Laurent Gomila - SFML developer

Grimshaw

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 631
  • Nephilim SDK
    • View Profile
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #25 on: July 15, 2012, 04:08:12 am »
Quoting Laurent, and this is why this IS the library to use without a doubt. Where do we get more people like this? :)

Cheers

Laurent

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 32504
    • View Profile
    • SFML's website
    • Email
Re: Are shapes even drawable in 2.0...?
« Reply #26 on: July 15, 2012, 09:27:17 am »
I moved the "ugliness" discussion to a new thread.

http://en.sfml-dev.org/forums/index.php?topic=8544.0
Laurent Gomila - SFML developer