timestamps for events

[Mr. Wonko]

Hi,

for precise input handling it'd be nice to know when an event occured. How about adding this information to the Event class? At least optionally, with an #ifdef?

Mr. Wonko

[Nexus]

What exactly do you need the timestamp for?

[Mr. Wonko]

Example: If the forward key is pressed and released in the same frame, the player character should still be moved a little.
The Quake 3 Engine does this, I just saw it and wondered if something similar was possible with SFML.

[Xorlium]

Hmm... at what fps does your game run at??

[Mr. Wonko]

I have no running game yet. Usually you think about such things before the game is done anyway.

Eventually I'm planning to have a game/engine with all the nice features of modern games, programming-wise. That's isn't easy and it might take long to get there, or I may never achieve it at all.

Therefore I'll start with something simple (currently I'm building a Space Invaders kind of game), but the projects will be increasingly more complex while reusing code. Thus I'd like my code to be as reusable/flexible/robust as possible, which includes such things as still working at low framerates.

[Nexus]

Example: If the forward key is pressed and released in the same frame, the player character should still be moved a little.

Okay, I see. So you'd like to subtract the times and find out how far the character is moved.

I think, it's quite unlikely that the user presses the key for such a short time. If your game runs at 30 FPS (you can't go far below if you want fluent graphics), the key must stay pressed for less than 3.3 centiseconds. I can however imagine a separate input thread working at a lower framerate.

But only Laurent knows if this feature is relevant and useful enough to be integrated into SFML...

[Mr. Wonko]

I just realized that another use of this is for axis input:

Imagine someone moves an analog stick (left = -1, right = 1) from left to right within one frame. 90% of the frame are spent left, 5% on the way to the right, 5% right. If you only look at the current position you'll get a value of 1, but if you take into account all the places and the time spent there you get -1*0.9+1*0.05 = -0.85.

This could be important at lower framerates, I don't know... I'd like to take it into account anyway.

[Laurent]

This is not a feature, this is a solution to a problem. And I don't like solving problems before they actually exist for real

[Mr. Wonko]

This is not a feature, this is a solution to a problem. And I don't like solving problems before they actually exist for real

So you're saying a problem shouldn't be avoided until it's encountered? Isn't it a little too late by then?

But thanks, you just made input handling so much easier for me

I'll tell you if the problem starts existing for real one day.

[Laurent]

So you're saying a problem shouldn't be avoided until it's encountered?

I say that a solution shouldn't be found to a non-existing problem. I agree that what you describe may be a problem, but I'm not sure it will.

[Xorlium]

It may only be a problem if you can move your finger and press and release a key faster than in 1/30th of a second (and that's a pretty low frame rate. Usually framerate will be about 500 fps). I don't think that's physically possible.

[Spodi]

I don't see this being much of a SFML issue, rather an issue with your design. If you want input to be handled faster than your frame rate, run the input in a separate thread.

If you have a game without thread-safe input handling, grab it in a separate thread, add your own time stamp, lock a shared queue, enqueue the event(s), then let the main thread dequeue and handle.

Throwing in a timestamp for every event would just be a lot of overhead for the vast majority of users who won't need it.

[Xorlium]

Why is everyone suggesting weird alternatives to an utterly non-existent problem? Try pressing a key/moving a joystick 30 times in one second. Can you do it? No? I rest my case.

[Spodi]

Try pressing a key/moving a joystick 30 times in one second. Can you do it? No? I rest my case.

Not really a relevant point, though. For games with either very high keypress rates (RTSes) or twitch-based games (FPSes), high resolution input is important. If you grab input once a frame, your input response rate is only that of your game loop. Normally, about 60 times a second (assuming vsync or fixed/capped update rates), but for slower machines, its lower. So its not "pressing a key 30 times a second", its pressing a key and releasing in fractions of a second, and that is completely possible, especially when the times the input took place align poorly with the current step in the game loop.

For most people and in most cases, no, it won't be noticeable. But not noticing doesn't mean it doesn't make a difference. Taking into consideration small aspects like these can, and do, contribute quite a lot of the playability of a game.

So yes, it is a completely valid point, but not one that should be added to SFML since most won't utilize it (making use of "fractional input" requires special design considerations) and most also won't need such high input resolution.

[Mr. Wonko]

Throwing in a timestamp for every event would just be a lot of overhead for the vast majority of users who won't need it.

Which is why I suggested making it optional using an #ifdef.

(and that's a pretty low frame rate. Usually framerate will be about 500 fps)

I don't know what kind of supercomputer you have, but in most games my fps aren't even close to 500. A couple of sprites, sure. But a more complex 3D game? (Which is what I'm ultimately aiming for, like I said.) Nope.

For games with either very high keypress rates (RTSes) or twitch-based games (FPSes), high resolution input is important.

This.

If you have a game without thread-safe input handling, grab it in a separate thread, add your own time stamp, lock a shared queue, enqueue the event(s), then let the main thread dequeue and handle.

That would be a possible workaround, thanks.

So yes, it is a completely valid point, but not one that should be added to SFML since most won't utilize it (making use of "fractional input" requires special design considerations) and most also won't need such high input resolution.

I can understand that. Well, there's nothing keeping me from adding it to SFML myself, right?


Unfortunately this is something that has to be designed from the very beginning, but won't be noticed until the very end... I'm only thinking theoretically here, since it'll be another couple of months/years before I'll have a game where this might make a difference. (I'm planning to keep the Input Handling though, which is why I'm thinking about it now.)


Anyway it's good to discuss stuff before adding it, thanks for all the thoughts so far.


Mr. Wonko