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Author Topic: questions and ideas regarding the C++ rewrite comments  (Read 13393 times)

September 20, 2010, 05:58:05 AM
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Hi there,

first of all let me say that I am extremely impressed by BridgeCommand, I am myself pretty familiar with the naval/maritime environment due to my professional background, I find BridgeCommand really very impressive and also pretty promising. I am even more impressed due to the fact that BC has apparently been written in some BASIC dialect!?

I think an open source ship simulator can have a VERY  promising future, especially in the educational/training and professional sector.

My question  is, I was reading in another thread that there are possibly plans to rewrite BridgeCommand in C++ at some point ?

In due course I am planning on re-writing Bridge Command in C++ and an open source 3D engine, both as Blitz3D is a commercial closed source program, and its restriction to DirectX 7 is becoming somewhat limiting. In the mean time I'm developing as far as I can with Blitz3D.


Is this still the case?
I understand the reasoning behind favoring C++ over BASIC, and I also see a larger number of potential contributors if BC were to be rewritten in C++. So, overall from a development point of view I completely share your sentiments.

Which open source 3D engines have you considered so far? Have you looked into OpenSceneGraph (OpenGL)?
What is your opinion on OpenSceneGraph? As far as I know it has built-in support for multiple screens and windows, too.

However, personally I would consider yet another option - not just a specific C++ 3D library, but a more efficient approach:
Have you considered re-implementing BridgeCommand on top of any other open source simulators that are written in C++? That would seem like much less work, and also a much more tangible task. You could sort of "piggy-back" BridgeCommand onto another open source simulator, sort of like a "Mod" (e.g. counterstrike is a mod for half life).

This approach would seem to me like a "win/win situation", because I guess it should be much easier to adapt a car, train (or flight) simulator to support naval vessels than rewriting a cross platform simulation completely from scratch, especially for anyone who is already familiar with C++

Have you done any research regarding C++ based open source simulators that could be used as the foundation for a re-implementation of BridgeCommand in C++ ? Personally, I find the whole thought of re-implementing a program like BridgeCommand pretty daunting.

I am more and more thinking that this would be the right thing to do, because one would get so many things "for free", i.e. a scenery engine, weather support, a community, an actively maintained project and so much more.

BridgeCommand would then mostly boil down to being a custom modification of an existing program. So any C++ work necessary, would mostly end up being patches for an existing project, instead of a completely new project.

I guess most of the artwork could be reused, just by importing/converting the 3D models and textures.

Please let me know what you think


regards

- rodriguez
« Last Edit: September 20, 2010, 06:00:25 AM by rodriguez »

September 22, 2010, 10:06:32 PM
Reply #1
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I believe that this could be a very good approach. I will definitely consider the option seriously when I decide to commit to re-programming the simulator, on whatever base. One option may be the Delta3D engine, which could be a good starting point (http://www.delta3d.org/).

However, for the moment I have decided to focus my efforts on improving Bridge Command in it's current form, in particular developing the radar simulation, and improving the simulation areas available, as well as the associated charts and navigational data. I think that working from the existing base is the best option for providing a high quality simulation environment at the current time, avoiding the inevitable delay involved in a re-write of any kind.

When I was seriously considering a re-write, it appeared that future versions of Windows might not support versions of Bridge Command written in Blitz3D, but with the release of Windows 7, I have found that the simulator runs well on both the 32 and 64 bit versions. This has given me confidence that work on the current version will be valuable into the foreseeable future.
« Last Edit: September 22, 2010, 10:08:24 PM by forum_admin »

April 21, 2014, 11:17:01 AM
Reply #2
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I have an interesting idea! Use the same base as flightgear! or even suggest that the C++ implementation to be part of flight gear . For Flightgear have already some areas in the simulation scenarios that can be used for sea start and landing of air planes (in FG simulator to clarify) that have potons/hulls adapted for that. Basic hydrodynamic is already their (to some extent) and it has of curse aerodynamics simulation. Flight gear 3 whit some World scenery 2 uses Global water depth map
http://www.flightgear.org/info/a-preview-of-features-for-flightgear-3-0/

http://wiki.flightgear.org/Ground_Traffic_Simulation_Resources
Interesting indeed and I do think that ship simulation is closer to Flight simulation than road and track simulation even if car models al ready available for flight gear.
« Last Edit: April 21, 2014, 11:25:54 AM by j85 »