The Plunge . . .

Hey folks . . . I just wanted to give you fair warning that this username will be the source of multiple stupid questions, but like many of you I’ve investigated everything from Torque to Irrlicht, and this really seems to suit my style . . . also it feels really “Underground” so that’s cool too.

I also figure this is the best way to get my “chops” back up by learning Python.

Question 1). I know PanDE is still “in the works” but I really like the Eclipse interface, and I may be dabbling in C++ as well. Is anyone else using Eclipse or what do you recommend?

I am learning Python at the same time (which seems – at the outset – not too difficult), and picked up Sean Riley’s book on Game Programming with Python . . . "

Question 2) Anyone else use this engine to both fulfill their gaming jones and learn the language??

hehe… Question 2: Well, thats at least me… I am bothering already some of the staff ppl while translating the docs into german… and there are couple of questions :smiley:
There are three major aspects of doing that:

  • a german doc for the engine
  • personal experience with Python and Panda3D for later programming work (there is a game in my mind that doesn’t stop flooding me with ideas and sorts of stuff like this)
  • well, some of my questions may look weird if you take a look at them apart of the translation content (because they may be simple) - but that way I can bother the staff a bit more :wink: :smiley: - nah, just joking…

Question 1: For my needs there is “idle” still good enough for development and some testing.(Debian) May be this will change as soon as I am going to get into serious programming action (when the manual is finished (so I guess “never” :laughing: ))

Regards, Bigfoot29

Nice to know I’m not alone.

For what it’s worth . . . I spent most of the day trying to configure Eclipse and PanDE . . . I will say this.

Nothing beats a silly little text editor and READING THE MANUAL!!

Question 3) What is with the extra ppython when executing commands? when normally all I need is python xxx.py ???

In that case I would try to execute python like you said… you might be impressed, but it wouldn’t work because the python executable IS called by using “ppython”. (that for reading the manual g)

Regards, Bigfoot29

“ppython” is our name for a special executable that (a) invokes the appropriate version of Python, if you have more than one installed, and (b) sets up the paths properly so that Python can successfully import the Panda libraries. It stands for “Panda Python”.

It would be possible to set up Python and Panda so that you can just invoke python directly, but usually it’s easiest just to use ppython.

David

I found it quite easy to compile Panda3D under Linux and to use the installed version of Python. I made some notes to the documentation under compiling on Linux from source.

This way you can use say Boa Constructor or Spe, or anything else you would normally use for Python development.

nice. Thx… never worked with python before so I thought ppython is the normal executable but as you said already, when python is also installed, you can launch python and ppython and it are two different versions… may be that was one of the reasons why some (external) networking things did not work when calling ppython (modules missing I guess :smiley:)

Regards, Bigfoot29

Totally up and running in Eclipse now. I like the console aspect of it.

Thanks for PanDE!! Now if I can actually learn to code I will be fine.

:slight_smile:

<Watch this space for thoroughly “freshman” efforts>