[iDoc]

ANyone have any lock changing Dungeon Seige's resolutions beyond what is provided by the game? I'd like to be able to play in 1440x900 on my powerbook - but can't figure out how to do it.

[a2daj]

There's an ini file that you can edit but it doesn't work out very well. Any res I tried that wasn't part of the 3 listed ones would result in weird cursor behavior. Anywhere I clicked would be off and to the right by about an inch on my powerbook. With the native 1280x854 hacked into the ini file I still got blackboarders but the everything looked to be drawn at the native resolution.

[iDoc]

Where is the file and how dis you change it? I thought I knew what to do but everything I tried just launched the game instead...

[a2daj]

Ooops. Check the Document folder in your home directory. There should be a Dungeon Siege related folder in there that contains your saved games and the ini file.

[Guy Incognito 2]

Originally posted by a2daj:
Ooops. Check the Document folder in your home directory. There should be a Dungeon Siege related folder in there that contains your saved games and the ini file.

The Dungeon Siege related files are in the Documents folder? Good god!

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Guy Incognito 2:

The Dungeon Siege related files are in the Documents folder? Good god!

Weren't you bitching not so long ago about games writing data outside of the user's hierarchy? The Documents folder is the perfect place to store saved games in order to be multi-user friendly on OSX.

[Guy Incognito 2]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:
Weren't you bitching not so long ago about games writing data outside of the user's hierarchy? The Documents folder is the perfect place to store saved games in order to be multi-user friendly on OSX.

Hello!? "~/Library/Application Support". Only all the very cool OS X developers use the App Support folder. Get with it man! Follow the guidelines.

Documents go into the Documents folder. Movies go into the Movies folder. Music goes into the Music folder. Picture go into the Pictures folder.

Files that support an app, *gasp*, go into the App Support folder! Wow!

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Guy Incognito 2:
Files that support an app, *gasp*, go into the App Support folder! Wow!

Saved games clearly are more appropriate in the Documents folder than in the App Support folder. They certainly don't support the app except by the most liberal of definitions.

[Guy Incognito 2]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:
Saved games clearly are more appropriate in the Documents folder than in the App Support folder. They certainly don't support the app except by the most liberal of definitions.

Ohhh...cleaaarly.

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Guy Incognito 2:
Ohhh...cleaaarly.

When you save a file in your favorite text editor, do you want it to automatically default to the "Application Support" folder? Probably not.

There is Apple documentation as to the purposes of these folders:

Read about the purpose of the Documents folder here:

http://developer.apple.com/techpubs/...section_3.html

and the Application Support folder here:

http://developer.apple.com/techpubs/...section_4.html

[Guy Incognito 2]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Brad Oliver:
When you save a file in your favorite text editor, do you want it to automatically default to the "Application Support" folder? Probably not.
[quote]

No I wouldn't...because those are documents.

There is Apple documentation as to the purposes of these folders:

Read about the purpose of the Documents folder here:

http://developer.apple.com/techpubs/...section_3.html

and the Application Support folder here:

http://developer.apple.com/techpubs/...section_4.html

Hmm...sounds pretty vague to me. Can you point out what made you decide to use the Document folder instead of the of the App Support folder.

The App Support section does mention something about the misuse of storing 'user data files' inside App Support which completely boggles my mind since Address Book puts 'user data files' in App Support, and so does a whole bunch of other Apple and 3rd party apps.

So what exactly are 'user data files'.

But then again, the App Support section says this: "The Library directory is a special directory used to store application-specific and system-specific resources." And I really think Dungeon Siege save files are "application-specific ressources". You can't take a Dungeon Siege save file and open in say Freedom Force. On the other hand, you can take a saved .rtf or .txt file and open it in many different apps. Documents are mostly app-unspecific...Save files usually are app-specific.

Frankly, I don't care what you do...but the convention so far is that if a game handles the saved games in-game and by "in-game" I'm talking about limited 'save slots' (like Freedom Force, Fallout, SNES9x, etc.) that don't allow the same freedom of saving anywhere, then you should probably use the App Support folder.

If Dungeon Siege allows for saving games anywhere...then the Docs folder should probably be used.

[Guy Incognito 2]

If my last post wasn't very clear, I'm essentially saying that if the game uses in-game methods to store and retreive save files and/or creates save files with specific name formats and in a specific location on the hard drive both of which should not be tampered with (ie renamed or moved), then it's best if these files are buried inside the App Support folder away from the users eyes and hands so he/she can't break anything.

If, on the other hand, the games can be saved the same way documents can be saved, and the save file doesn't need to follow specific name formats or be stored in a specific location, then these save files can be stored in the Documents folder since these files are manipulable like documents.

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Guy Incognito 2:
If my last post wasn't very clear, I'm essentially saying that if the game uses in-game methods to store and retreive save files and/or creates save files with specific name formats and in a specific location on the hard drive both of which should not be tampered with (ie renamed or moved), then it's best if these files are buried inside the App Support folder away from the users eyes and hands so he/she can't break anything.

I see it differently. If the user has control over when he/she saves the data, and if there's a reasonable expectation that they would want to get at that data outside of the app, then the Documents folder seems appropriate. Consider a case where you'd want to e-mail or transfer your saved games to another computer, or load a PC saved game on the Mac. The game also stores screenshots and a few other doo-dads in the Documents folder - items which are also created at the user's demand or are appropriate for the user to want to access and/or edit. In this regard, I would consider the behavior of most of the OSX Quake 3 ports to be wrong since they put files that users have shown a desire to get at (and which are created as requested by the user) in App Support.

Using Apple's apps as an example, Address Book does not allow the user to save and load various databases, so the data is stuck in App Support. iChat, on the other hand, allows the user to save and load chat log files (which appear to be proprietary), and as such puts them in the Documents folder.

[Jansar]

I always believed that Apple's intention for creating the documents folder was to store application documents so that they're easily accessible. I have some friends that found it confusing when application documents were in the same folder as their typed documents, so in order to solve that problem I created a "real documents" folder for those.

[Guy Incognito 2]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:
I see it differently. If the user has control over when he/she saves the data, and if there's a reasonable expectation that they would want to get at that data outside of the app, then the Documents folder seems appropriate. Consider a case where you'd want to e-mail or transfer your saved games to another computer, or load a PC saved game on the Mac. The game also stores screenshots and a few other doo-dads in the Documents folder - items which are also created at the user's demand or are appropriate for the user to want to access and/or edit. In this regard, I would consider the behavior of most of the OSX Quake 3 ports to be wrong since they put files that users have shown a desire to get at (and which are created as requested by the user) in App Support.

Using Apple's apps as an example, Address Book does not allow the user to save and load various databases, so the data is stuck in App Support. iChat, on the other hand, allows the user to save and load chat log files (which appear to be proprietary), and as such puts them in the Documents folder.

But answer me this...how are the Dungeon Siege save game files? If they've got weird names and a strict naming format and aren't easily manipulable by a newbie, these files probably shouldn't be in the Documents folder.

How many newbies will start swapping in and out PC saved game files, honestly?

Only the hardcore players will probably do this, and clicking the Library folder and App Support folder isn't going to be a difficult task for those guys. They know what they're doing (or they know more than the non-computer-savvy people). And even then...I don't know many people that engage in that type of deal regularly.

BTW, that's a bold move...accusing all the developers that used the App Support folder as being wrong. AFAIK, you're one of the very few developers that uses the Documents folder in that way.

The screenshots can go in Docs, IMO. Or better yet...the desktop like normal screenshots. Unless these are not screenshots per se?

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Guy Incognito 2:
How many newbies will start swapping in and out PC saved game files, honestly?

There's quite a large and active third-party community for Dungeon Siege.

BTW, that's a bold move...accusing all the developers that used the App Support folder as being wrong. AFAIK, you're one of the very few developers that uses the Documents folder in that way.

I certainly didn't accuse all developers, and I'm not immune from my criticism either, having done the same thing for Jedi Knight 2. You can disagree all you want, but I still maintain that the best and most intuitive place for saved game files is in the Documents folder.

Furthermore, so long as Apple does (and recommends) doing things a certain way (as I provided with the iChat example) I don't feel any great pangs of guilt. In the end, it's really not all that important so long as it's somewhere in your home directory.

[Guy Incognito 2]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:

...it's really not all that important so long as it's somewhere in your home directory.

Hmm...yeah. That's the most important point.

[Gul Banana]

Personally what I'd like the distinction to be is this: The Documents folder is for things that the user not only creates but also chooses where to put. Ie, it's entirely user-controlled. The Application Support folder is for anything that an application (or game) creates in some set hierarchy. My main reason for this is aesthetic; I don't feel comfortable using my Documents if there are things in it that I can't change, reorganise, or rename - it feels like the one place on the hard drive that's immune to OS X's love of imposing specific (sensible, admittedly) hierarchies upon the user. Therefore, I really dislike it when applications override that. When given the choice of where to save a saved game file (an increasingly rare thing these days) I generally do put it in ~/Documents/Saved Games.. but I don't like sorting things by application rather than function. So I don't like the idea of
Documents/Dungeon Siege
Documents/Microsoft Office
Documents/iTunes (as there used to be)
etc.

I know my point of view is not that well supported by Apple's guidelines, but it is, to some extent, by what they do.. they store user-immutable data in Library somewhere.

[Guy Incognito 2]

Originally posted by Gul Banana:
Personally what I'd like the distinction to be is this: The Documents folder is for things that the user not only creates but also chooses where to put. Ie, it's entirely user-controlled. The Application Support folder is for anything that an application (or game) creates in some set hierarchy. My main reason for this is aesthetic; I don't feel comfortable using my Documents if there are things in it that I can't change, reorganise, or rename - it feels like the one place on the hard drive that's immune to OS X's love of imposing specific (sensible, admittedly) hierarchies upon the user. Therefore, I really dislike it when applications override that. When given the choice of where to save a saved game file (an increasingly rare thing these days) I generally do put it in ~/Documents/Saved Games.. but I don't like sorting things by application rather than function. So I don't like the idea of
Documents/Dungeon Siege
Documents/Microsoft Office
Documents/iTunes (as there used to be)
etc.

I know my point of view is not that well supported by Apple's guidelines, but it is, to some extent, by what they do.. they store user-immutable data in Library somewhere.

That's a bit how I feel too. The stuff that shouldn't be messed with for fear of breaking 'support' should not be in the Docs folder. But Brad is the dev and he gets the final word on this.

I still prefer the way Omni and a few other devs do it: the App Support for save game files that shouldn't be moved around freely.

Heck...I don't even use the Docs folder.

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Guy Incognito 2:
That's a bit how I feel too. The stuff that shouldn't be messed with for fear of breaking 'support' should not be in the Docs folder.

I'm not aware of a way you can break Dungeon Siege by futzing with the stuff in Documents. If you have an example, mention it.

[roders]

Can we get bakc to the Screen res thing, on my PB12" when running on an external monitor, I can hack the .ini to give me 1280X1024 (well it worked once anyhow) but there was a large portion of the gaming area of screen, as if only 1024X768 of the game was shown onscreen, the hud was also not present (or off screen).
If you did the port Brad, can you tell us wht the screen Res limit, as I bet on the PC the game goes higher.

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by roders:
If you did the port Brad, can you tell us wht the screen Res limit, as I bet on the PC the game goes higher.

John Butler and Phil Sulak did the port. I don't have any insight as to what's going on there.