GLBasic Road Map

[erico]

Plus let's face it Glbasic is cheap so we cannot complain about an upgrade payment

If the upgrade payment is for around the board features that I can make use of then I have no problem with that. If the upgrade payment is for mainly Android/iOS features then I cannot go for that for the reason of why should I pay for something I have no use of.

If GLB was sold in a modular way like for example a core package with other platforms available at a small cost then that would be ideal for everyone as they could just purchase what they needed or an "Ultimate" version which came with all. Implementing such a system would probably be more hassle than it is maintaining GLB at the moment 

While I do not do any mobile development I can fully understand the need to bring them both up to date from the various posts I have read on the forum as people are leaving or have left GLB purely because there are other options about which provide what they need. And judging by most of the posts they prefer GLB over the system they moved to.

If users are leaving then surely the focus should be on fixing or implementing the features that are making people go elsewhere.

With regards to the range of platforms GLB supports, the smaller ones like Cannoo/WIZ etc are pretty much solid & have been for a while so maintaining them should not waste much of kittys time (unless GLB has a major core overhaul then that might change). HTML5 I cannot comment on as it's not something that has grabbed my attention from the point of view of "Ohh I really must learn or read up on that", but I am aware it exists & plays better in some browsers than others.

I agree that a MAC ide should be done due to the amount of iOS people out there as it can only help with the development cycle on that platform, although I have not experienced the process something native has to be an improvement.

Features I would like to see are direct pixel access to the buffers & more or better sound control, both of which would more than likely cause problems on other platforms than the one I cater for which is Windows  .

Lee

It is a hard topic to debate. I agree with fuzzy on his points.

[Robert]

Every one man project dies soner or later but I really hope this will live on for a while. You could learn something else but GLB is so simple to learn and remember and yet functional that you can get something real done also.   

[MrTAToad]

It has been going for over 10 years now!

[mentalthink]

Code: (glbasic) [Select]

Every one man project dies soner or later but I really hope this will live on for a while. You could learn something else but GLB is so simple to learn and remember and yet functional that you can get something real done also.   
Well I think sometimes in this but I think this have it's less probeble than a great enterprise, on they have millions of money and some bad movement can make the enterprise in bankrupt, in example you can see, some months ago Shiva 3D, and a lot of people pay for the 2nd version... I think never will see the light.

Another thing Gernnot will be bored and make GLBasic-Turbo  , like Blitz Basic and Monkey.

[DaCarSoft]

I think GLBasic is a perfect language for beginners and people that needs to create a game/program without fight with complex languages or tools.

It is pretty because... Hey! It is BASIC! And it compiles for iOS, Android, Windows, Mac and GNU/Linux!!! It is multiplatform and you don't need to change your code!!!

I'm sure this kind of product is very hard to mantain, because of that, may be that the best roadmap could be to consolidate certain main platforms, before add new platforms to the language... the work of Gernot is impressive, but he is an only one programmer and now users/programmers have new needs that comes with each change in the OS/platforms/devices after each of these updates from big companies.

The capability of GLBasic to be extended through wrappers or inline code makes of GLBasic a real jewel for coders, but I think that the creation of wrappers to obtain certain main capabilities like Game Center, social, or iADs are starting to became more and more complex, considering the speed of changes from market, and big companies.

Sometimes you need functions that should be integrated into the language/compiler itself, if you need to fix a bug or cover a new function included (I refer, for example, to iOS 6... iOS 7... Apple and its policies and changes, etc.) and that could certainly be a "monster work" for an only one man... And people may turn crazy or impatient when this kind of problems avoid a programmer to finish/correct/publish an app.

I would not like to see GLBasic die slowly like other projects because the man behind GLB could not update the language as the tech evolves.

How to solve problems?
May be that a solution could be to open a little part of the source code that GLBasic uses to embed the OpenGL view, to let this community (us) to collaborate extending and fixing faster certain not trivial bugs or adding new features... If the platforms where this could be possible.



This is a suggestion that Gernot could think about... I hope to not hurt to Gernot or anyone because of explain my personal opinion.

[Hark0]

How to solve problems?
May be that a solution could be to open a little part of the source code that GLBasic uses to embed the OpenGL view, to let this community (us) to collaborate extending and fixing faster certain not trivial bugs or adding new features... If the platforms where this could be possible.

+1 

[spacefractal]

yep well writting post. Its was something the same thing im was thinking, also only open source that little part could do a big thing to solve some issues.

and yes even glbasic have its limits, its a still a great language.

[Falstaff]

Hello everyone.. just wanted to say that it's unfortunate but I would have to agree with all the posts suggesting that anyone developing for iOS is  better off working with other frameworks other than GLB, seeing as how the market has moved away from the paid/lite monetization model to the freemium/ads/IAP approach. I have finally just gotten approval from the App Store for my first officially released game.. and although it's exciting (well, and annoying because I can't see it in the store yet), it's also likely to be the beginning of the end of GLB for me as I look to move towards something else that is both cross-platform, and capable of delivering either ads and/or IAP. It's unfortunate that I have built up this code base over the past few years while working on this project part-time, which I was hoping to leverage for future projects, but I guess it's back to square 1 with new tech.

If we could hear anything at all about the possibility of an upcoming update which addresses the current mobile monetization trends, then I might be able to re-consider.

[Moru]

Would be interesting to see what people are actually developing for with GLBasic. Since the market share is around 13% iPhone - 80% Android it would be interesting to also see what the difference in revenue for the different sides are. Is it really more beneficial to develop for iPhone still? Is the user getting tired of being tricked into installing a game that really is just a demo until you buy something ingame? Or click the ads? I see a lot of this sort of complaints when looking around in the comments on the android store.

[spacefractal]

Freemium is the way to go, nothing more or nothing less.

How over I'm do sold much more iOS versions of Greedy Mouse than Android, which got stalled. So iOS users is more will to pay apps much more than Android users.

When looking with inapp for iOS, it's seen pretty easy, but its would property only works with iOS6 today, not iOS5? That can been a kind of a problem mightbeen....

[siatek]

spacefractal my doughter playing your game on android non stop