Sprint #6: Infrastructure Continues Framing TClient was completed today. Although upwards of 15 or so tasks were completed, no full stories were completed.
The primary push continues to be in the realm of software development, namely in the development of UI containers and controls that work in a manner that we want. Here is the list of containers and controls that were completed:
- Pane
- HBox
- VBox
- ScrollPane
- StackPane
- TabbedPane
- Label
- TextField
- SecureTextField
- TextPane
- PushButton
- SelectButton
- ImageRect
Software developers familiar with JavaFX should be familiar with these terms.
In addition to these UI controls, an Advanced Layout Engine (ALE) was developed so that all of these containers and controls operate under similar, predictable layout constraints. While Apple’s Cocoa platform certainly supports these types of controls, in fact: these software classes build upon Apple’s Cocoa libraries, they use their own layout system(s). Using these derived classes, a lot of template code can be hidden from the window creation and layout code and all UI objects can follow similar layout rules.
Finally, a new test harness was built within the application to test these UI controls individually and to act as a testbed to prototype window designs.
Outside of the UI work, Paul spent quite a bit of time formalizing the XML used to describe and define TOCS modules. To support that work, the bare-bones XML processor that was written to the Settings / Preferences file I/O was expanded into a full-fledged XML -> Dictionary processor capable of XPath style data searching.
In between all of this, our WWI spreadsheet was expanded to include the beginnings of a Russian 1914 order of battle.
In the Pipeline
Sprint #7 is going to expand the UI development into window controller prototyping, featuring the MapController, capable of the display and manipulation of counters on a map (already minimally tested in the StackPane test harness). Meanwhile, Paul is hard at work on building the map metadata spreadsheet for the AttM map. This metadata will provide the capability of the UI to be able to detect illegal moves on the map and trace valid supply lines and ZOC interactions, &c.
We are not simply rebuilding Vassal or Cyberboard or any of the other graphics manipulation applications. We are building the future of online wargaming.