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Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 09, 2016 8:26 pm
by okk
Hi, I noticed that the the stretch goals from the kick-starter campaign have been dropped from the Live-Code roadmap. I am particularly concerned about the multi-media stretch goal, I hope you remember:
"Reworked Multimedia Support: £441,000
Multi-channel sound on the platforms that don't yet have it. Upgraded Player control using latest native video libraries on all platforms (Mac, Windows, Linux, iOS and Android). Sound recording cross-platform - 'record sound' on mobile as well as desktop.
Do you think this stretch goal has been delivered, so that it is acceptable to drop it from the road-map? Will we see any control over multimedia content akin to the QTEnhanced external? Do we get at least alwaysbuffer working for the player object?
Thanks for any insights.

Oliver

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Thu Nov 10, 2016 12:43 am
by FourthWorld
AFAIK Mac and Windows have been completed, Linux completion pending completion of Infinite LiveCode.

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Thu Nov 10, 2016 2:37 am
by ClipArtGuy
FWIW, the Box2D Physics Engine goal was also met and has also been dropped from the roadmap.

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Thu Nov 10, 2016 11:11 am
by okk
For what I understand the controller for the player object is not native. It's some "home made" one, and I had some serious performance issues with it. I tried to show it in this video: https://vimeo.com/147381340, the related forum discussion is here: http://forums.livecode.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=25989 - look the last few posts. I also cannot see that the alwaysbuffer issue has been addressed, see here: http://quality.livecode.com/show_bug.cgi?id=12811 For me it is crucial to be able to draw on top of a playerobject while maintaining sort of reasonable playback. In the moment I rely on LC 6.5.2 on MacOs 10.8. to deploy my applications with functional multimedia playback. This gets increasingly difficult since I want to benefit of all the great development of LC. Another of my applications created a visual representation of the audio waveform data of a movie file. I have no idea how to do this with the current LC. So from my point of view multimedia support on macos has not been really fixed and this particular stretch goal should not be taken off the roadmap. Don't get me wrong, I am a LC enthusiast, I just purchased the Indy license as a gesture of support even I don't need the license at all. What bugs me is that the promises made in the Kickstarter campaign are kind of silently dropped without being fully delivered (imho). It would be enough for me if it says on the roadmap: okay, we have to first work on Live Code Builder, than we can come back to multimedia support or something like this.
Best
Oliver

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:05 am
by capellan
Hi ClipArtGuy,
ClipArtGuy wrote:FWIW, the Box2D Physics Engine goal was also met and has also been dropped from the roadmap.
Which LiveCode version includes Box2D? :shock:

Al

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:31 am
by ClipArtGuy
capellan wrote: Which LiveCode version includes Box2D? :shock:

Al
There isn't one, which was my point. Incorporating Box2D was a stretch goal of the original KickStarter that was met, but has since been dropped from the roadmap completely.

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 10:50 am
by richmond62
Nothing makes me feel as good as knowing I've paid for
something someone has undertaken to do, and then they don't do it.

Last Monday I got out of bed with a temperature of 38.5 C and went and taught English to kids from 9-12, 2-6.30;
because I try to honour my commitments.

I will now wait for the shouting that will start at me because I have pointed out that
there's an elephant in the room . . .

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 2:23 pm
by shaosean
I agree with you Richmond.. If they said they were going to do it when the goal was reached, then they should do it.. The follow-up post about how Linux is awaiting completion of Infinite LiveCode didn't seem to be an original factor in the stretch goal, so seems unfair to make that a stipulation now.. And good on you for going to teach even when you're feeling under the weather :)

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 12:59 am
by capellan
Richmond, I will not shout at you, but I am just going to remember:

Do not forget that most LiveCode programmers are developing business applications...
so features useful to them, gather more attention and receive immediate feedback
in this platform.

Rich Media (as the name of this subforum) are not as popular as we want or need them to be.
For example: EPS Importer v05C, a stack that imports gradients from Adobe Ilustrator files
(version 5 and 7) only have one user, besides myself. :lol:

Although you could export Adobe Ilustrator files version 5 and 7 from Corel Draw, Xara,
MS Expression, FreeHand and Adobe Ilustrator itself... simply there is no interest because
most Livecode developers are not designers. Most LiveCode developers will never use
box2d, Open Language or any other feature unrelated to their work area.

Richmond, Livecode needs more inventive users, (as Dan Shafer calls them) and
to contribute toward this goal, I am creating an Introductory Programming Course
that hopefully will drive many new users to this platform. 8)

Al

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 2:13 am
by ClipArtGuy
capellan wrote:Most LiveCode developers will never use
box2d, Open Language or any other feature unrelated to their work area.

This may be the case, but it does that make it okay to completely drop them from the roadmap despite the funding for those specific stretch goals being met?

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 8:26 am
by richmond62
Do not forget that most LiveCode programmers are developing business applications...
I have not forgotten that fact.

I develop programs that are not business applications and am not really interested in
additional Rich Media stuff that was promised in the Kickstarter as vis-a-vis graphics
Livecode has had me satisfied ever since version 4.5 (version 4.0 was distorting some GIF
images rather badly), and vis-a-vis Unicode access since version 7.0.

And, frankly, my Master's degree thesis with a prototype agent-led interface which I developed in Livecode 1.1.1
was graphically just fine (the problems, such as they were, lay in how to implement extensibility).

I am "pushing that button" not out of any particular self-interest beyond the fact that I
contributed to the Kickstarter on the understanding that those goals and stretch-goals
were not just "fluff to reel the punters in".

It is, of course, possible that some of those stretch-goals have, subsequently, proven
either unattainable or more trouble than they are worth, and if Livecode would make
some sort of public announcement to that end that would be reasonable, rather than
just quietly letting things drop in the face of those of us who don't have the ADS
associated with a lot of people who cannot go to the toilet without at least
3 internet enabled devices attached to their bodies.

I don't think dropping certain "promises" from the Kickstarter is the "end of the world",
and I don't think anyone needs to get overly "hoity-toity" about it.

What annoys me slightly is how Livecode does this sort of thing; silently. It does
seem a bit "off", and a "sorry" with a spot of justification, might go a long way
to make things a bit more "Community".

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 2:19 pm
by shaosean
In the words of Master Shake, "I got your money b*tch!" Guess LiveCode will just do whatever they want to do now, so long as they do a few of the things they promised, people will be happy and then they can add more "features you can fund" to get more money and then they can start tying old features to the new features, so if the new features aren't funded you aren't getting the old features that you've already funded.. Sounds like sound business practice to me - maybe they hired Martin Shkreli ;-)

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 5:56 pm
by FourthWorld
Presumption about other people's intentions can make for fun posts in a user-to-user support forum, but are unlikely to yield a useful result in terms of actually getting what you want.

What did the folks at LiveCode Ltd. say when you wrote them about this?

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 10:11 pm
by richmond62
Presumption about other people's intentions can make for fun posts in a user-to-user support forum
True, and the abusive, rude ones can have other "interesting effects".

But presumption about other people's intentions is very common if other people almost
never reveal what their intentions are.

People often indulge in this activity when they feel frustrated or frozen out. This can be
exacerbated when the people who don't reveal their intentions use emotive terms such as "Community"
in a way which suggests something that doesn't seem that forthcoming.

This evening I had a parents' meeting (wine, juice) and explained to the parents of
children I teach what I intended to teach their children until the end of May next year.

They all told me how good they felt that I informed them as they felt that the
"normal" schools their children attend have teachers who just do what how and when they want and never
inform the parents of the children.

I tend to have these meeting about once every six weeks.

Re: Stretch Goal Kickstarter - Multimedia

Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2016 10:55 pm
by FourthWorld
richmond62 wrote:
Presumption about other people's intentions can make for fun posts in a user-to-user support forum
True, and the abusive, rude ones can have other "interesting effects".

But presumption about other people's intentions is very common if other people almost
never reveal what their intentions are.
Kevin's discussed the Kickstarter goals many times, most notably here:
https://livecode.com/trevor-devore-inte ... -livecode/

The green-highlighted section may be especially interesting, listing deliverables from that project. There have also been other features delivered since then that were not funded by the Kickstarter campaign as well, such as interoperability support on Android via intents, and many more.

But I don't believe the box2d feature was addressed there, and given how strongly you wrote about it here it seemed reasonable to ask:

What did the folks at LiveCode Ltd. say when you wrote them about this?