Imagedata row order

[Jeanne A. E. DeVoto]

At 2:29 PM +1200 7/26/2006, Richard Gaskin wrote:
>Jeanne A. E. DeVoto wrote:
>>  It looks like the IDE sets the default paintCompression
>>  to PNG instead of RLE, so I suspect it will actually be
>>  PNG unless you're using a standalone.
>
>Is this user-settable in the IDE?

No, although I suppose one could put a script to reset it into a 
plugin and change the default that way automatically on startup.

>If not, what is the benefit of concealing the engine's true behavior?

No idea. Maybe there was a thought about ensuring backward 
compatibility with the MetaCard or other IDEs, or backward 
compatibility with existing code that relied on the engine's behavior 
for use in standalones.

But I have noticed a tendency to put some settings and functionality 
into the IDE that I would think better in the engine itself - perhaps 
going back to the habits developed during the period that RunRev 
didn't own the engine.

>Introducing differences between the engine's native behavior and the 
>IDE's modifications of that should be done only with great care, and 
>ideally with user-settable preferences which draw attention to these 
>anomalies.
>
>Differences between runtime and development make it harder to 
>diagnose problem runtime problems from within the development 
>environment, raising development costs unnecessarily.

I tend to agree with this general principle. Occasionally there may 
be a price to be paid in compatibility with existing code - that is, 
a developer might have to make a change to existing code before 
compiling a standalone with a new engine, as noted above - but I 
think it ends up better for everyone overall if behavior using the 
raw engine is as close as practical to the behavior with the IDE.
-- 
jeanne a. e. devoto ~ revolution at jaedworks.com
http://www.jaedworks.com