PlayMaker Feedback > Feature Requests

Variable Editor and Variables Exporter/Importer suggestions

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Fat Pug Studio:
Hi,

first of all i'd like to say that i started using Playmaker 1,5 years ago with some small previous programming knowledge in Java and i made a huge progress in that time. With progress comes further knowledge and the need to do stuff faster and simpler, which is the goal for all of us. Sure, i've got a lot more to learn as you have seen on the forums, but some things really started to hinder the progress.

I'm satisfied with global variables editor, though it can be tedious to work in it. How can i be satisfied if it's tedious to work with? Well, the principle is good, it is fast, but there are simply too many variables in use in any decent project to handle them in the editor. I've got about 800 global variables (for now), editing them in a meaningful manner is not viable without exporting and importing from a spreadsheet.

Easy Save (and Game Data Editor too) does a great job in exporting globals to a comma delimited file which can be easily manipulated in any spreadsheet software. Unfortunately, there's no way of reimporting it, so the export is only good for analysis purposes and you have to do any variable modification inside the engine. Easy Save 3 will probably have csv importer as far as i have seen, but i don't see why wouldn't Playmaker have such a feature natively? All the globals are saved in playmakerglobals anyway, just not delimited.

There's also been a discussion on "local global" variables (which can be seen between different FSM's on same object) but i see that discussion is from 2012., and though that would make things harder for rookies i think that would definitely cut the amount of work and number of variables needed later on in the development.

Another thing that i find a bit problematic are local variables. I don't think it would be easy or fast to make it possible, but viewing and editing those OUTSIDE the FSM with a pointer to the object they're attached to would be an enormous time saver. As of now, going from FSM to FSM is really time consuming.

With all that and some workflow stuff like grouping states it could became the ultimate all-in-one powerhouse.

djaydino:
Hi,
Wow! 800 globals?
that's a lot.
Can't you have them in arrays (or parts of them)?

You should actually try to avoid using globals as they are easier to be hacked.

Fat Pug Studio:
I probably can, but as you probably remembered from the topics, i grasped arrays and hashtables in Playmaker not so long ago. This is my first bigger project so it's probably kind of messy and can be done a lot better. The thing is, it's easier for me to keep stuff in global variables which are exportable, quickly editable through editor and easily replaced in FSM by dragging and dropping then adding an another element to array/hashtable and then calling it from there every time i want to test something out.

As for hacking, it's not like i'm making a multimillion dollar MMO :)

jeanfabre:
Hi,

 ouch... I strongly advice you to cut down on the global variable usage, a typical sane project, may have 2 3 global variables top, above 10 you should use a dedicated MetaData Fsm hosting just local variables and have other fsm getting that value using getFsmXXX()

above 20 and when you realize there is a pattern, use ArrayMaker or similar. and have a global variable to the gameobject hosting these values, that's fine.

 Bye,

 Jean

Fat Pug Studio:
It was easier for me in the beginning to do it like that, i will have a dedicated FSM with variables, as you said. But for now, they're a lot easier to manipulate that way.

Are there any technical drawbacks in using so many globals, or it's only for safety sake?

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