How important are libre development tools to you?
Posted: 07 Dec 2014, 05:08
I've been wondering how imporatant the use of free (as in freedom) development tools are to the average aspiring game developer here. I see many instances of projects that settle for a kind of theoretical support of free software tools but in practice a number of non-free programs are really driving the project forward. Inadiquite support of Blender is a good example. Many open source game engines import assets via COLLADA but Blender does not support exporting animation data within COLLADA (at least last time I checked). I would argue that a game that depends on animated models but is using COLLADA is making a questionable compromise. I think it's similarly problematic to use cmake to generate Visual Studio project files when MinGW is a viable option.
What I worry about is how these sorts of decisions can change the makeup of a project's contributers to the point that directions are taken that work against the free tools. There ought to be a network effect where every free software project elevates several others. So, for myself, I put the similarly strict requirements on the tools I use as the code I link with. Since so few libraries and tools put the same priority on this as I do I've had to do a lot more things myself from scratch. I've started working on a graphics/game engine with a tight integration with OpenGL, Blender, and various GNU software. It's been fun but time consuming. Since so many engine projects die out I've taken a highly modular approach to development to the point that the components can at least be used even if the project dies out (see https://github.com/nnesse). I would be interested in working with anyone who is interested in low level tech and willing to take the more difficult road of only building on software with clear libre pedigree's.
What I worry about is how these sorts of decisions can change the makeup of a project's contributers to the point that directions are taken that work against the free tools. There ought to be a network effect where every free software project elevates several others. So, for myself, I put the similarly strict requirements on the tools I use as the code I link with. Since so few libraries and tools put the same priority on this as I do I've had to do a lot more things myself from scratch. I've started working on a graphics/game engine with a tight integration with OpenGL, Blender, and various GNU software. It's been fun but time consuming. Since so many engine projects die out I've taken a highly modular approach to development to the point that the components can at least be used even if the project dies out (see https://github.com/nnesse). I would be interested in working with anyone who is interested in low level tech and willing to take the more difficult road of only building on software with clear libre pedigree's.