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New features by bonch · 2012-05-11 05:43 · Score: 5, Informative · on Objective-C Comes of Age

What more surprises does this venerable language have up its sleeve?

Clang recently added literal syntax for collections and boxed numbers:

// Old way. NSArray *array = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:@"one", @"two", @"three", nil]; NSDictionary *dict = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys: @"bar", @"foo", @"post", @"first", nil]; NSNumber *num = [NSNumber numberWithInteger:42]; // New way. NSArray *array = @[ @"one", @"two", @"three" ]; NSDictionary *dict = @{ @"foo" : @"bar", @"first": @"post" }; NSNumber *num = @42;

Properties will also be synthesized by default, so you won't have to write @synthesize statements anymore, and corresponding ivars will be synthesized with an underscore prefixed name.

Objective-C is interesting to follow because it's a language that was once considered totally niche and almost completely irrelevant, but the frameworks were beloved by developers, and the language's keepers kept at it long enough for the world to see how useful the language is. It also has historical significance as the tools used for creation of the original WorldWideWeb program as well as the development of Doom and Quake. John Romero wrote about he and Carmack simultaneously editing the same map in DoomEd thanks to distributed objects.

It's still verbose and Smalltalk-ish, but the language as a whole has improved drastically since the transition to Clang. According to the mailing list, Apple has more engineers allocated to the language than ever before, and a lot of it has to do with the move away from GCC.

I hear that GCC is working toward being easier to modify, so the competition from Clang has been good for everybody, and it's all open source.

Re:And to think... by PixelScuba · 2010-12-15 06:52 · Score: 2 · on 20 Years of Commander Keen

Dangerous Dave in Copyright Infringement"

Re:Objective C could be the reason for iPhone too by mr_da3m0n · 2010-08-13 03:40 · Score: 1 · on id Software Demos Rage On iPhone, Releases Source Code For Two Games

The original doom (and I don't know how many of the others) were written on NeXT using objective C

A big [citation needed] there. Doom was written on NeXT, but not in Objective-C, in pure C. Neither NeXT nor StepStone were providing an Objective-C implementation for DOS back then (and StepStone's Objective-C wasn't compatible with Objective-C 3, which NeXT were using).

Truth. The only one who was very vocal about Objective-C back then was John Romero, who was writing all the tools and editors, and he did so in ObjC on NeXT.

The games were written in C, and the tools in Objective-C. Everything was being developed, tested and debugged on NeXT, and then ported to DOS.

Re:The missing ingredient is FUN by Anonymous Coward · 2008-05-08 11:23 · Score: 0 · on id Software Announces Doom 4

I agree completely, Mr. Romero.

And for what it's worth, I for one am completely against the hypothesis that, Samson-like, you lost your powers when you cut your hair. I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for your inability to successfully program a computer with more power than a 486. Buck up, kiddo! I mean, look at someone like Levelord, who apparently spends his days trading child porn on Freenet. You're doing better than him, right? And he doesn't cry himself to sleep every night; he's proud of the choices he's made. I think it would be cathartic for you two to grab some beers some time. Look at how much you have in common---not just the failure, but the Russian mail-order brides, the shitty blogs, the jobs writing games for TI calculators... he's your brother from a different mother, man. You can down some brewskis and laugh---it really could be worse, John. I seem to recall another shitty programmer with an overblown ego and a Russian wife who would trade anything to be in your shoes.

Re:Please educate & inform me... by astrosmash · 2007-08-28 14:39 · Score: 4, Informative · on Apple Now Selling Better Than One Laptop In Six

A question for you: What is it about OS X that makes it good for audio/video/graphic work? That's your assertion, so I assume you have at least of some reason to believe it.

If you're confused as to why some choose OS X then I would suggest doing some research into the features that made NEXTSTEP a compelling Unix Desktop and workstation in the 90s. For instance:

Why Tim Berners-Lee chose NEXTSTEP as the platform on which to develop the world's first Web Browser and Web Server.
Why id Software chose NEXTSTEP to develop their landmark Doom and Quake games for the PC.
What's compelling about NEXTSTEP/Cocoa APIs, Interface Builder, and what influence did Objective-C have on Java?
Why were Linux users so enthusiastic about NEXTSTEP-derived window managers, such as WindowMaker and AfterStep? What lead to the development of GNUStep?

That's NEXTSTEP.

Now, say you chose NEXTSTEP as the basis for your perfect operating system and desktop environment. You get to keep all of the good design decisions, throw away or refactor all of the bad design decisions, and do it without any backward compatibility restrictions. What you end up with is OS X.

But why an Apple laptop? Here's why: I can open up a bunch of SSH and X11 sessions to a remote server over wi-fi, close the lid and throw it in my back-pack, go eat lunch, come back and open the lid, and all of my remote X11 apps and sessions are still alive. OS X just works damn well on Apple's laptop hardware.

Quake by samwh · 2007-08-04 09:08 · Score: 3, Informative · on The Aftermath of QuakeCon

Well, its not Doom, but the original Quake maps were open sourced by Mr. Romero recently: http://rome.ro/2006/10/quake-map-sources-released. html

Re:Hrmm... by Ai+Olor-Wile · 2007-06-18 17:32 · Score: 2, Insightful · on Games They'd Like Us To Forget

Ah, but Romero wants you to remember Daikatana. Really. http://rome.ro/games_daikatana.htm

Re:Huh by Anonymous Coward · 2006-11-17 09:29 · Score: 0 · on Don't Forget the First Xbox

What came 1st Doom space Marine or Master Chief? http://rome.ro/images/doom/u_doom.jpg Doom Space Marine http://www.outofthedarkness.org.uk/FDWEBSITES/Dan' s%20Website/Master%20Chief.jpg Master Chief

Black & White by TheSlashFrog · 2006-07-27 02:12 · Score: 1 · on John Romero, the Man Behind the Hype

I suppose gamers are so used to weak and stereotyped game stories, that they try to apply this simplistic "good or evil" criteria to everything related to games... especially Romero. Why is it so hard to believe he can be simultaneously:

a great programmer and level designer (http://www.idsoftware.com/);
an average game designer (Daikatana); and
a really bad manager (Ion Storm).

On top of that, he's apparently a real nice guy (according to most interviewers and gamers that ever contacted him) while still keeping the biggest ego in the world (Planet Romero).

Re:Overrated by Aladrin · 2006-05-08 06:57 · Score: 4, Informative · on Jack Thompson Weighs in on Oblivion

Sorry, no, it was a female mesh with a female texture. I don't have the data here at work, but it was like 'meshes/character/femalebody.nif' and 'textures/imperial/_male/femalebody.dds' (Yes, the second path says _male, but the actual file says female.) Those are not the exact file names, but they aren't far off and both DID say female. That's hardly an accident.

The mesh was not actually used anywhere in the game.

I Googled and found the instructions to mod it yourself, without a download. I'm too lazy to change the above text.

From http://rome.ro/2006/05/oblivion-re-rated-bad-news. html:

Open 'Oblivion - Meshes.bsa'
Extract 'femaleupperbodynude.nif' to \data\meshes\characters\_male\
Rename the extracted file to 'femaleupperbody.nif'
Run the game

Romero's response by aarku · 2006-02-01 06:56 · Score: 2, Informative · on John Romero Developing a MMOG

http://rome.ro/

Blood on the walls by Stormwatch · 2005-08-09 09:02 · Score: 2, Insightful · on DooM Remix Project - The Dark Side of Phobos

A kickass DooM-inspired song, by the Manny Charlton band. Get it from John Romero's site.

Re:no more TLDs, please by Stormwatch · 2005-03-31 08:21 · Score: 1 · on Government Finishes Internet Study -- 7 years late

There is one good use for the ".ro" extension, actually...

rome.ro

(yes, that Romero)

Correction on doom version history. by zokum · 2004-11-23 18:28 · Score: 1 · on Dual Video Cards Return

Actually, it was removed in 1.2 i think. It's a feature that was only present in versions around 0.98-0.99 to 1.1 or so. Lee Killough's page at http://www.rome.ro/lee_killough/versions/index.htm l even has a way to get 1.1 doom. I've been thinking about doing some dosbox-experimenting with this version. Imagine plaing 3-monitor doom!

I wonder, is doom the first example of a multi-monitor game. Has to be the first fps to have such a feature. (yes, i know, we're talking about 2 extra networked pcs used as dumb terminals, but at the time, noone had the cpu for rendering the gameworld three times.)

Re:Call me stupid, but.... by Anonymous Coward · 2004-10-19 03:43 · Score: 1, Interesting · on 10 Years of OpenStep

You can see some pictures of how NeXT systems were used during the development of Doom and Quake at John Romero's site (here and here)

Midway got it all wrong by nobodyman · 2004-02-27 17:39 · Score: 2, Insightful · on Midway Announces New Mortal Kombat, Romero-Helmed Gauntlet

A simple mistake, they thought they were getting John Carmack. Seriously, though... you have to wonder about a company that pins their hopes of a financial turnaround on a guy who blew $30 million on a Quake1 total conversion that arrived 2 years late.

And it doesn't seem like Romero is any less flakey, he just got married to some 18 year old Romanian chick that he met on the internet. So, erm... I guess Stevie is available.

PROXYCONN WILL AMAZE YOU! by lpontiac · 2004-02-27 14:49 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Midway Announces New Mortal Kombat, Romero-Helmed Gauntlet

(mirrored from John Romero's homepage in case it's /.'ed)

Wow, they were not lying about this one. There's a company called Proxyconn that promises DSL speed over a 56k dialup line. AND IT WORKS!! I downloaded and installed the software expecting the usual lackluster performance and a quick uninstall immediately following my test....but wow am I impressed!

In the status bar area is a Proxyconn icon that will tell you the effective speed you're getting - right this second, mine is saying "broadband". Heh. Usually it says 150k or more. You simply must see this to believe it - in fact, if you already have DSL, try Proxyconn for Broadband so you can surf the net at T1 speeds!

Another great feature of Proxyconn is that it totally kills all bannerads and popups before they ever get to your computer. The way Proxyconn works is that your computer is constantly logged into their servers and when you send any HTTP requests, it will send it your way extremely compressed and faster than just going over the net normally. Their site explains all the technical details of how they achieve this amazing speed so I won't go into it here suffice to say that the speed is REAL.

Oh, and Proxyconn also speeds up your EMAIL! You just have to try this to believe it.

Re:I have a solution by WWWWolf · 2003-09-02 19:36 · Score: 1 · on Spammer Hangout's Membership Roster Left Exposed

Nah. I'd rather use the chainsaw from the original Doom.

Ask if they still haven't returned it to its owner. I'm sure they understand that this is a very noble cause. =)

John Romero by fredrikj · 2003-06-13 12:12 · Score: 4, Informative · on 25 Dumbest Moments In Gaming Concluded

long-haired FPS designer

Damnit, get your facts right! John Romero cut his hair! (scroll down)

Blood on the Wall by katalyst · 2002-12-19 22:58 · Score: 3, Interesting · on Doom Archive Reopened

When you do something different, it doesn't have to be special of perfect, because it is different. And that is what Doom did. It may not have been the most creative game around, but it had way to many "firsts" to disregard. Doom is STILL making waves. You will find it on your GBA, and now on mobile phones (the new Nokias)!!! That speaks a lot for its popularity.
Meanwhile, I'm surprised that only ONE post refered to the song.. aka.. blood on the wall. It has been sung my an ex-Nazareth group member.. and that AGAIN says a lot for the popularity of the game. It's a gr8 song, better than lotsa the **** that plays these days....