Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

General feedback and discussion of the game.

Moderator: Forum Moderators

fattychance
Posts: 1
Joined: November 30th, 2009, 7:54 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by fattychance »

As an iPhone user currently I plan to move to Android ASAP. I would gladly shell out cash for a Wesnoth port.

Hire developers to work on this and recoup the money selling it if you want.

I am more than happy to pay for an open source project. I want to encourage the practice actually.

I hope Kyle (and the project) are rolling in money with the iPhone port.

Kyle really has done an excellent job. It's fast and smooth on my first gen ipod touch and iphone 3G which are both ~500mhz processors with 128MB of ram.

The Droid is substantially more powerful then those devices and most *new* Android phones will be too. The HTC Evo is the phone I plan to move to. 1Ghz processor, 512MB of ram.
SHROUD
Posts: 3
Joined: December 24th, 2009, 12:18 am

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by SHROUD »

now i want a cell pfone even more!!!
Kenpachi
Posts: 66
Joined: July 28th, 2009, 1:40 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by Kenpachi »

Have android, would like app. Please :)
St_Random
Posts: 1
Joined: May 7th, 2010, 3:46 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by St_Random »

CMaster wrote:Somehow I don't like the idea of a Java AI in the normal wesnoth: The AI may be time critical (in northern rebirth for example), and Java is always (much) slower than native code. Even if you have a magical just-in-time compiler with perfect optimization, you still have all those extra runtime security checks to do, so there is no way to get even near native performance. Nothing against a Java port for some phones, but please not Java for mainline.
Assembler is your choice.Good luck.

I am Java developer, so can help with port.
smaraux
Posts: 5
Joined: February 17th, 2010, 11:34 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by smaraux »

I have seen a few issues for android port of wesnoth :

Android phones represents a _really_ wide software and hardware configurations range :
- android version ranges somewehere between 1.5, 1.6, 2.0 , 2.1 , 2.2
- Screen Resolutions go from 320x160 to 640x480
- hardware cpu and memory differences are also present.

JNI might be a first approach, but the use of boost and SDL complicates the port even with this method.

NDK is (at this time of writing) really, really limited. Things such as some stl containers, and other stuff, may have to be rewritten for the project. Moreover, native code multiplies the target configurations once more (native for nexus is not compatible with G1, G1 one is compatible for nexus, but far more limited)

Port should make use of integers and fixed point a must, to insure sufficient performance (minor issue)

For this reasons, and others, I would say porting wesnoth on android would really be a matter of team development, and not a small team !

IPhone port brings some resources (graphics and layout for 320x240, texture maps, maybe global architecture if porting with massive use of JNI), but this is, IMO, only a small part of the work to be done.
AI
Developer
Posts: 2396
Joined: January 31st, 2008, 8:38 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by AI »

smaraux wrote:I have seen a few issues for android port of wesnoth :

Android phones represents a _really_ wide software and hardware configurations range :
- android version ranges somewehere between 1.5, 1.6, 2.0 , 2.1 , 2.2
- Screen Resolutions go from 320x160 to 640x480
- hardware cpu and memory differences are also present.
You can have minimum requirements for each. API level for the android version, 'normal' display size is 480x320 and the current release of the NDK can run on every ARM based device.
JNI might be a first approach, but the use of boost and SDL complicates the port even with this method.
I've read that with some effort, SDL_minimal and boost at least, successfully compile.
smaraux
Posts: 5
Joined: February 17th, 2010, 11:34 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by smaraux »

OK for resolution, 320x480 groups probably mush more than half of users, lower res. may not be really playable, and higher res could be interpolated ?

But when HTC Hero is in Android 1.5, Nexus One is 2.1 ? This is a wide range.

___

To add an entry point, I noticed Rokon may be a good base while looking at sources, but the project is almost in standby ? Or v2.0 is not fully functionnal at least now.
AI
Developer
Posts: 2396
Joined: January 31st, 2008, 8:38 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by AI »

Pick a minimum API level (based on what functionality you need) and use that. Android is backwards compatible.

Interpolation isn't necessary. Wesnoth could already scale to different resolutions and with gui2, it works better than before.
User avatar
Aethaeryn
Translator
Posts: 1554
Joined: September 15th, 2007, 10:21 pm
Location: Baltimore, Maryland, USA

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by Aethaeryn »

Does it need to reach everyone? Just ignore the older versions, especially 1.5.

Eventually everyone will upgrade off of those versions or, if carriers are way too slow, in two years after device introduction no one will be using it. Why spend a lot of effort to expand reach to something that's not going to be used too often in the long run? You don't need to reach everyone using an "Android" device, only most people. And the biggest target should probably be the high-end phones. Today's high-end phones are next year's mid-ranged phones and it will probably take a while to port it properly.
Aethaeryn (User Page)
Wiki Moderator (wiki)
Latin Translator [wiki=Latin Translation](wiki)[/wiki]
Maintainer of Thunderstone Era (wiki) and Aethaeryn's Maps [wiki=Aethaeryn's Maps](wiki)[/wiki]
Haruhi
Posts: 3
Joined: June 17th, 2010, 11:16 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android?

Post by Haruhi »

Aethaeryn wrote:Does it need to reach everyone? Just ignore the older versions, especially 1.5.

Eventually everyone will upgrade off of those versions or, if carriers are way too slow, in two years after device introduction no one will be using it. Why spend a lot of effort to expand reach to something that's not going to be used too often in the long run? You don't need to reach everyone using an "Android" device, only most people. And the biggest target should probably be the high-end phones. Today's high-end phones are next year's mid-ranged phones and it will probably take a while to port it properly.
Well I'm not a developer, but I think you has better to port to Froyo. As Aethaeryn sasy, with all the true, Android has a really quick develop so when you get something stable to be released then Froyo theres here to be used. Also Froyo fix the size of install about being too big with 200-300 since Froyo has the ability to install on SD from OS. Also the JIT compiler will make you get a little improvement, but if Iphone has this specs and works, android probably works. I dont know much about android but from far I read the program can change the resolution if you want to do it, same concept like running an Iphone app on ipad. And here http://android-developers.blogspot.com/ ... quick.html is a post in oficial android developers blog. As I read, I see one man could port Quake (he didnt do it user friendly xD) and some notes in his blog http://grammerjack.blogspot.com/2009/10 ... droid.html It could help about it. Hope all the info in that post help you about thinking about making Battle for Wesnoth on Android. Oh and 2 things I forgot. The SDK and all things about developing for Froyo are in developers page. And the second one is my really bad english. Sorry If I failed in writing it the way its meant to be write.
aielman
Posts: 1
Joined: July 31st, 2010, 3:49 am

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android

Post by aielman »

Did anyone notice this??

http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news ... ev-kit.ars

I just got a droid and can't WAIT to play wesnoth on it :-) This sounds like the droid might be on the right track :-)
AI
Developer
Posts: 2396
Joined: January 31st, 2008, 8:38 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android

Post by AI »

Yes, we were discussing it earlier in the thread.
Haruhi
Posts: 3
Joined: June 17th, 2010, 11:16 pm

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android

Post by Haruhi »

In the second link I posted earlier, it was quite successfully to port quake. Obviously the biggest part is C, while quite less code is in Java, so I think is not impossible to have the IA of Wesnoth in C. Since today Android phones has power to even run an PS1 emulators is not a matter of power anymore (well if you want to support even the Dream and the Magic...) Also for high mem reqs you have the native app2sd (I don't know if you can install automatically on SD or only by user request) And now it's the time when I blame myself for not being able to learn to code. Greetings!
redcloud
Posts: 4
Joined: September 8th, 2008, 9:29 am

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android

Post by redcloud »

Hello, I'm interested to port wesnoth to J2SE + OpenGL support. It would be great to setup a working team focused on TDD development.
redcloud
Posts: 4
Joined: September 8th, 2008, 9:29 am

Re: Java developers interested in porting Wesnoth to Android

Post by redcloud »

Post Reply