Various A-Dev-can-answer questions

[Majora]

What compilers do the devs use to compile ZC/Q?

Who are all the Devs? (off the top of my head: Dark Nation, DarkDragon, saffith, _L_, Koopa, jman2050, a-a-a-a-nd... thats it)

I notice that sometimes devs refer to "Zelda.cpp" or "Link.cpp", is ZC/Q one big source code, or various that import each other, if so, what are their names?

If you put the source code for ZC/Q into say, microsoft Word @ 12pt times new roman single spaced, how many pages would it take up?

Does each Developer do his own thing (granted, if the others agree on it) or is each devoted to a specific part?

And some more I'll ask later

[DarkDragon]

1. I personally use MSVC 2005; it's a pain to set up with Allegro but I prefer its IDE and debugger. MingW is popular with many of the other developers.
2. DN, koopa, Takuya, _L_, Saffith, Sean, and myself are the currently active developers. jman still has access to the ZC code repository, but has retired from coding.
3. ZC and ZQ are both composed of many source files. The two named are among the larger ones.
4. To a very rough approximation, ZC/ZQ combined have about 160,000 lines of code.
5. There are some features which are worked on and maintained by a specific developer, but we don't have formally assigned tasks.

[Majora]

Cool. There should be an almanac of ZC/Q somewhere woth little tidbits of info like this.

[DarkDragon]

If I recall correctly, there does exist a ZC wiki floating around somewhere on the internet.

[Din]

Awesome! ZC is getting more famous!:) :) :)

[CastChaos]

Actually, ZC is already extremely famous. I bump into its link on almost every VG forum whiches are at least slightly related to Zelda.

Anyway, I'm suprised that there are so few ZC devs... I expected at least 20 persons.

[ShadowTiger]

If I recall correctly, there does exist a ZC wiki floating around somewhere on the internet.
The PureZC-based Wiki (http://wiki.purezc.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page).

[The_Amaster]

I expected at least 20 persons.

That'd probably backfire. A large team is hard to co-ordinate. As of now, I think our dev team is really good. The current features are proof enough of that.

[koopa]

The system we have now is in any case better that when only DN and jman were developers :)

I might mention that applications to join the development team are welcome, one or two more certainly couldn't hurt.

[Majora]

I'm taking upon myself to learn C++. My plan is this:
look it up on the internet,
start with the basics,
then ZScript/ASM,
then get a guide (book),
then when I get the hang of it, move on to harder stuff.
When I've studied for about 1-3 years,I'll try to see if I know enough to be a Dev.
If not, learn more.


This plan is probably flawed.

[Dark Nation]

If you put the source code for ZC/Q into say, microsoft Word @ 12pt times new roman single spaced, how many pages would it take up?
With standard 1 inch margins, 4,419 pages. And DD was pretty close on the lines figure. The count from my most recent copy of the code comes in at 185,775 lines. And remember, this is just the part of the code that we maintain. It doesn't even take into account the other libraries we use.

[Majora]

HOLY FREAKING S**T!!! ~5k pages! (well, there are probably bigger programs out there). Actually, I was referring to the source code that makes ZC what it is (Not what it needs to function mind you, do you see what I'm getting at?)


EDIT: A few more questions:

When the Devs work on it, how does that work? Does each dev have their own copy, or is the code stored somewhere. I imagine it would work like this:

Being that the devs know a lot about computers, I would assume that the Source code is stored on some kind of private server of sorts (what with all the hacker whack-jobs these days) that is connected to the computers of the devs, and cannot be accessed via internet. When one Dev changes the code (adds stuff, etc.) the changes happen universally so that if say, _L_ on his computer adds say, drowning water (fully implements it, so that when the next build is released, it's thyere for the rest of us), when Koopa goes to add stuff, _L_'s changes are there.

I hope I'm not prying in any way, or being annoying with these questions, I'm just curious!

Do the Devs know each other in real life? just a simple "yes" "no" "some of us", I don't need to know specifics (unless you want to share that info)

[_L_]

Being that the devs know a lot about computers, I would assume that the Source code is stored on some kind of private server of sorts (what with all the hacker whack-jobs these days) that is connected to the computers of the devs, and cannot be accessed via internet. When one Dev changes the code (adds stuff, etc.) the changes happen universally so that if say, _L_ on his computer adds say, drowning water (fully implements it, so that when the next build is released, it's thyere for the rest of us), when Koopa goes to add stuff, _L_'s changes are there.

That's revision control (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revision_control). ZC uses the Subversion program for this.