rootandClaude Opus 5
5f8a308d62
Adding a collider now lives only in the Scene objects context menu, deleting a node on the Delete key and the node context menu. The e2e checks that pinned the inspector button now drive the hierarchy menu instead, including that its entry is disabled on template content and on a placed container without raising a notice. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
823 lines
68 KiB
Markdown
823 lines
68 KiB
Markdown
# Game Maker
|
||
|
||
A browser-based tool "one step before a game engine": create **assets** (scenes, cameras,
|
||
sprites), place them into scenes, tweak their properties in an inspector and press **Play** –
|
||
all in one program, all drawn inside a single WebGL canvas.
|
||
|
||
Live: <https://nockal.com/game-maker/> · Widget playground: <https://nockal.com/game-maker/?playground>
|
||
|
||
## Concepts
|
||
|
||
| Term | Meaning |
|
||
|---|---|
|
||
| **Asset** | Named thing with a type (`scene`, `camera`, `sprite`, `text`, `behavior`, `collider`, `container`, `texture`) and typed properties. Assets have **no position**. |
|
||
| **Texture** | An uploaded image. Scenes and textures are the two types that cannot be placed: a texture has no position, it is *worn* by a sprite through the ordinary property `texture`. See *Textures* below. |
|
||
| **Text** | An asset that draws a line of text (`text`, `fontSize`, `color`, `align`) – titles, HUD readouts, button labels. Its content is an ordinary property, so `Set text` (or `Set property`) changes it while playing. |
|
||
| **Enabled** | Every placeable asset has the switch `enabled` (default on). A disabled object is not drawn, does not collide and its behavior does not run – **and neither does anything parented below it**. Switching one instance off is a normal override, which makes a container a *screen*: switch it on to show it, off to hide it. `Set enabled` / `Is enabled` do it from a graph. |
|
||
| **Scene object** | An asset placed into a scene: a link to the asset + a **position** (`x`, `y`, `z`) + sparse **overrides** of the asset's properties + an optional **parent** (another object of the scene). Scenes cannot be placed. |
|
||
| **Container** | A reusable group ("prefab"): the asset holds a **template** of objects (asset link, local position, overrides, parent links) centred on its origin. Placing a container stores the container object **and nothing else** – its content is resolved from the template on every read, so a template edit reaches every instance at once. **Create container** turns the current selection into such an asset: the selected objects move into the template and the scene keeps one placed container at their centre (world positions unchanged). The template is edited in the **Container** tab (see *Editing a container*) or from an instance through **Apply to container**. |
|
||
| **Selection** | One or more scene objects. Click selects, `Ctrl`/`Shift`-click adds/removes, dragging on empty scene space draws a rubber band (objects whose position lies inside are selected). Dragging a selected object moves the whole selection; `Delete` removes it; the inspector offers **Create container** and **Remove** for several objects. |
|
||
| **Behavior** | Logic as an asset: a **node graph** plus the **variables** it declares. Placed like anything else (a diamond symbol in the scene); its parent is the **owner** the graph acts on. |
|
||
| **Run in editor** | A switch only behaviors have (default off). With it on the behavior keeps running while the project is **not** playing – and unlike Play it then edits the *saved* model: what it moves or writes is a real change, autosaved and not on the undo stack. See *Running without Play*. |
|
||
| **Collider** | A shape (box or circle) for collision detection, placed as a **child** of the object it belongs to (its *body*). Drawn as a green outline in edit mode only. |
|
||
| **Override** | A per-object value that replaces the asset's value for one property. Only changed keys are stored; the inspector paints their label gold and offers a reset (↺) and an **apply** (↑) that writes the value into the asset instead. Both appear only where the value really differs from its base – an override carrying the asset's own value is none. |
|
||
| **Default** | Every property has a schema default. Asset values that differ from it are marked gold in the inspector and can be reset (↺) the same way an override can. The asset's name in the **Assets** panel carries the same gold while any of them does (`assetDeviates`, `src/core/properties/deviation.ts` – the inspector marks the rows of that same schema, so the list cannot claim a deviation the inspector then fails to show). A behavior's variables are not in it: their default is declared on the variable itself, so the asset value cannot differ from it. |
|
||
| **Instance** | An object resolved from a placed container's template. Its **values** can be edited – position, name, property overrides – and only what actually deviates is stored, as a sparse `instanceEdits` entry on the container object keyed by the template path. Everything else keeps following the template. Its **structure** cannot: it can not be removed, re-parented or given a collider, and nothing of the scene can be parented into it. ↺ ▾ resets to the nearest base, which inside a container is the **template as the containers in between leave it**; ↑ ▾ offers **Apply to container** (write the value into the template, where every other instance still at the old value picks it up) and/or **Apply to asset** (which drops the template's override as well). With one base left the menu collapses to a plain ↺ / ↑, with none the buttons disappear. Gold marks the same thing the buttons offer. |
|
||
| **Unpack** | Writes a placed container's content into the scene as ordinary objects (hierarchy context menu, or the inspector's *Content* section). The ids survive it, so the selection does; from then on the structure is editable and the objects no longer follow the template. |
|
||
| **Edit mode** | The Scene tab draws the project model; panels, grid, gizmos and drag-to-move are active. |
|
||
| **Play mode** | The editor switches to a **runtime copy** of the project (same ids). A `World` is instantiated from its active scene (one entity per scene object, resolved properties as mutable state) and shown in the **Game** tab. Systems tick it and mirror their changes into the copy; every panel stays open and edits the copy, which the world picks up immediately. **Stop discards world and copy** – the saved model is never touched. |
|
||
|
||
**The camera defines what is rendered.** A camera asset has a view size (`width` × `height`,
|
||
default 640×360) and a `zoom`; the frame it covers in world units is `size / zoom`. The Scene
|
||
tab draws that frame as an outline. The Game tab renders only that frame – fitted into the
|
||
view with black letterboxing – and objects outside it are culled. Of several cameras the first
|
||
one in hierarchy order that is **switched on** (`enabled`, its parents included) is the active
|
||
one, so switching it off hands the view to the next; with none on the tab stays empty and says
|
||
*No active camera*. Without playing the tab previews the scene through that same camera, so it
|
||
shows what Play would show, minus the editor symbols. Play has no built-in behaviour (no input,
|
||
no movement): everything that happens is defined by behavior graphs.
|
||
|
||
**Toolbar and panels.** The toolbar holds the **Project** menu (new project, switch project,
|
||
*Delete this project…*), the project name (type to rename), the **Scene** picker for the active
|
||
scene, Undo/Redo, Play/Pause, and on the right the notice line, the save status and the frame
|
||
rate. The **Assets** panel's `+` creates an asset; right-clicking a row offers *Set as active
|
||
scene* (double-click or `Enter` does the same), *Create sprite from texture* and *Delete…*. In
|
||
**Scene objects** it offers *Select asset*, *Add collider*, *Create container*, *Unpack
|
||
container*, *Unparent*, *Expand all* / *Collapse all* and *Remove*.
|
||
|
||
**Editing while playing.** Play opens the Game tab but leaves the editor fully usable: the
|
||
Scene tab shows the live positions (symbols, gizmos and dragging included), the hierarchy and
|
||
inspector show and edit the running objects, the graph can be changed, undo/redo work on the
|
||
play session's own history. All of it happens in the runtime copy: values a behavior changes
|
||
appear as overrides (gold, ↺ resets to the asset value), objects a graph destroys vanish from
|
||
the lists, objects a graph spawns (`Spawn` node) appear in them – selectable, editable, still
|
||
only in the runtime copy –, and Esc/Stop brings back exactly what was saved. Autosave pauses
|
||
while playing.
|
||
|
||
**Pausing.** The toolbar's *Pause* button (or `Ctrl+Enter`) holds the running world: it is no
|
||
longer ticked, so behaviors, timers and collisions stand still and the world clock stops with
|
||
them. It is a sub-state of play mode, not a third mode – the runtime copy, the panels and the
|
||
keyboard behave exactly as while playing, and everything the editor can do during play it can
|
||
do during a hold. Keys and clicks that arrive while it is held are **dropped** rather than
|
||
queued, so resuming does not fire a frame's worth of input at once. Stop clears the hold, so a
|
||
paused game can never outlive its run.
|
||
|
||
**Running without Play.** A behavior switched to **Run in editor** goes on running while the
|
||
project is not playing (`src/editor/EditorRun.ts`, ticked by the Editor next to the play session).
|
||
The switch is an ordinary property, so it can be set on the behavior asset and overridden per
|
||
object. What it runs is a `World` over the **saved** model, and that is the whole difference to
|
||
Play: a position or variable it changes is a real edit – it is autosaved, the panels show it, and
|
||
**undo does not take it back**. Which is why the switch is off by default and why it belongs on
|
||
behaviors that arrange or build content rather than on ones that simulate.
|
||
|
||
**Input goes to the tab you are looking at.** While the **Scene** tab is on screen the keyboard and
|
||
the mouse are the editor's – typing a name or walking the hierarchy with the arrow keys must not
|
||
steer a game at the same time. In the **Game** tab, where no key means anything to the editor, they
|
||
reach the run instead: `On key …`, `Key is down` and `On click` work there, and the tab says so in
|
||
its top-left corner. Leaving the tab (or focusing a field in it) hands the keyboard back and lets
|
||
every held key go, so nothing keeps walking with nobody pressing anything. What the run does *not*
|
||
get:
|
||
|
||
- **structural changes to the content of a placed container** – such content is resolved from the
|
||
template, not stored (see *Containers*), and the editor run must not bake it out, since that is
|
||
itself an edit. Its behaviors do run, and what they move or set is kept as an `instanceEdits`
|
||
entry on the instance; but a `Destroy` of resolved content is dropped from the running world
|
||
without being saved, and comes back the next time the world is rebuilt.
|
||
- **a second life** – only the behaviors of the **loaded** scene run, and only in edit mode; Play
|
||
stops the editor run, since that world runs every behavior anyway. An exception in a graph, or a
|
||
`Stop game` node, ends the run and puts the reason in the notice line instead of repeating it
|
||
every frame.
|
||
|
||
## Behaviors (node graphs)
|
||
|
||
A behavior asset holds a Blueprint-style graph edited in the **Graph** tab of the centre
|
||
area (the **Scene** tab shows the editable scene, the **Game** tab the running game). Ports come in two kinds: **exec** (white
|
||
arrows, control flow) and **data** (coloured circles; `number`, `boolean`, `string`,
|
||
`object`, `list`, `struct`, `any`). Event nodes start a pulse; the interpreter follows exec edges and pulls
|
||
data inputs lazily from connected outputs. Unconnected data inputs use the inline value
|
||
shown on the node and editable in the inspector.
|
||
|
||
- **Variables** are the behavior's own property schema (`BehaviorAsset.variables`): they
|
||
appear in the inspector, can be overridden per placed instance, and each running instance
|
||
gets its own mutable copy. `Get variable` / `Set variable` read and write them, and their plurals
|
||
`Get variables` / `Set variables` do the same for several at once: their settings are a *list* of
|
||
variables, one port per entry, so reading a handful is one node instead of a column of five. Those
|
||
ports are picked from the behavior's variables rather than named, they take their type from the
|
||
declaration, and renaming a variable carries them (and their edges) along. A variable is a
|
||
**number, a yes/no, a text, a list or a struct**; a list holds numbers, texts, yes/nos, colours or
|
||
**structs** (its item kind decides which widget an item gets) and is
|
||
compared by its items, never by identity – otherwise every reload would look like an override.
|
||
There is no list *of objects*: a list is stored in the project file and an object is a live
|
||
handle that no reload survives. A set of objects is a list of their names, walked with `Repeat`
|
||
and `Object by name`. A list property is shown as a button saying how many items it holds;
|
||
clicking it opens the **List** tab, which gives each item a row with the same widget the
|
||
inspector would use for that kind – for a list of structs a row is the item's fields as
|
||
labelled rows under each other. The inspector stays visible beside the tab, so what the list
|
||
belongs to is still on screen. Which list the tab shows is a `ListSlot` (asset property, object
|
||
override or node setting, plus the `field` of a struct that holds one) on the editor state,
|
||
because no tab may reach into the `Editor` to switch itself on. An **unconnected `list` input**
|
||
of a node is the same button and the same tab: its inline value lives in the very same params
|
||
bag a setting does, and the slot stops resolving the moment an edge feeds the port. What a list
|
||
variable holds is picked from its **kind mark** (`≡#`, `≡Aa`, `≡✓`, `≡◧`, `≡⊞`), which on the asset doubles
|
||
as the chooser – a click opens the menu, with no chevron, since the mark has to stay as narrow as
|
||
its column; changing it runs the declared default, the behavior's own value and every override
|
||
through the new declaration in one command. A list of structs then declares its item shape with
|
||
the same `+ Field` control a struct variable has – names and kinds only, since the values are
|
||
edited row by row in the tab. A **struct** variable is the other way round: few fields, so they fit under
|
||
each other right in the inspector. Its head row renames it and adds fields (`+ Field`), each
|
||
field row below carries its own name, its value and a remove – the port editor `Pack` already
|
||
has, one level down and with a value column – and a field may itself be a **list**, which is
|
||
the one count button that opens the tab one level deeper. Adding, renaming or removing a field reaches the
|
||
declaration, the behavior's own value **and every instance override** in one command, so no
|
||
stored value keeps a shape its declaration no longer promises. A placed instance draws every
|
||
variable, whatever its kind, with the very same rows (`buildVariable`), minus the renaming, the
|
||
kind chooser and the `+ Field` / `×` buttons: it may override the values, not declare them. A
|
||
struct's ↺ / ↑ sit on its head row, because an override covers the whole bundle rather than a
|
||
single field. All of it sits on **one column grid** with the rest of the inspector: mark (28 px),
|
||
gap and name (90 px) are exactly as wide as a plain row's label (124 px), a nested field's name gives up what
|
||
its indent takes, and names are cut with `…` rather than pushing their value out of line.
|
||
- **Owner** = parent: a placed behavior is usually parented to the object it controls
|
||
(inspector → Parent, or drag it onto that object in the hierarchy; dashed line in the
|
||
viewport). The `Owner` node returns it; `Self` returns the behavior itself; `Parent` walks up
|
||
from any object.
|
||
- **Auto-repeat on `On key down`**: two settings on the node, *Repeat after (ms)* and *Repeat
|
||
interval (ms)* – milliseconds, so both stay whole numbers. A delay of 0 leaves the node as it was – one fire per press; with a delay set, a
|
||
key that stays held fires again after it and then every interval (0 = every frame). That is the
|
||
sideways slide of a Tetris piece, or a held arrow walking a menu. The browser's own key repeat is
|
||
deliberately not used: its delay and rate are an operating-system setting, not a game's. Both
|
||
rows stay off the node body while the delay is 0, so a plain key node keeps its single line.
|
||
- **Node set** (`src/core/graph/nodes/`, one file per node): events `On start`, `On update`, `On key down/up/held`,
|
||
`On timer`, `On collision enter/stay/exit`, `On click` (the mouse pressed on the owner – anywhere when it has none), `Start` · flow `Branch`, `Sequence`, `Repeat`, `Run behavior`, `End` · data `Self`, `Owner`, `Parent`, `Object by name`, `Name of`,
|
||
`Is asset` (is this object an instance of asset X – how you tell what you collided with), `Get/Set
|
||
variable`, `Get/Set variables`, `Get/Set property`, `Get position` (local and world), `Is enabled`, literals, `Add/Subtract/Multiply/Divide`,
|
||
`Min/Max/Abs/Sqrt/Clamp`, `Floor/Ceil/Round`, `Modulo`, `Random`, `Time`, `To text`, `To number`, `Join text`,
|
||
`Substring`, `Find text`, `Equals`,
|
||
lists `List` (a constant), `Fill` (one value repeated – how an empty board is made), `Count`,
|
||
`Item at`, `Set item` (a *new* list, the one that came in is left alone), `Sub list`,
|
||
`Join lists`, `Index of`, structs `Pack`/`Expand`,
|
||
`Length`, `Distance`, `Normalize`, `Axis input` (four keys → a
|
||
normalized direction, so diagonals are not faster), `Compare`, `And/Or/Not`, `Key is down`,
|
||
`Mouse position`, `Mouse button`, `Is hovered`, `Is touching` ·
|
||
actions `Move` (dx, dy, scale, dt – connect an event's dt for per-second movement), `Set position`, `Set enabled`, `Set text`, `Spawn`
|
||
(asset setting + x/y/z, optional parent → outputs the new object), `Destroy`, `Log`, `Stop game`, `Restart game`. A node type is one file exporting a `NodeDef`
|
||
(ports, settings, `run`), listed in `nodes/index.ts`; palette, ports, validation and
|
||
inspector fields are generated from it. A port may declare a `default` for its inline value
|
||
(e.g. `Move.scale = 1`), shown on the node and in the inspector.
|
||
- **Ports that are not fixed by the type**: a `NodeDef` may say `declaresPorts` (the node carries
|
||
its own list, edited in the inspector) or `derivePorts` (the node works them out from its
|
||
settings and from the graph around it). `resolveDef(node, graph, lookup)` is what applies both,
|
||
so the canvas and the inspector see a definition that fits *this* node; a node whose ports are
|
||
derived reads them back off that definition, which is why `run` is handed it. `Sequence` keeps
|
||
one free output below the last connected one – connecting the spare grows it, unplugging the
|
||
bottom edge shrinks it again (keys `a`, `b`, `c`, … up to 26). `Run behavior` takes its ports
|
||
from the behavior it names, and a behavior's `Start`/`End` node declares them. Pointing a call
|
||
at a different behavior **takes the edges of the ports that go away** and gives them back on
|
||
undo: an edge on a port that no longer exists draws as nothing but survives every save, and
|
||
would come back to life once the port returns.
|
||
- **Structs**: several named values travelling as one, so a bundle needs one edge instead of one
|
||
per part. `Pack` declares its fields as inputs, `Expand` reads them back out as outputs, a
|
||
behavior port may be declared `struct` – which is how a bundle crosses a call – and a
|
||
**variable** may be one, which is how a bundle is stored. A `Pack`/`Expand` can take its fields
|
||
from a variable that already declares the shape (**From variable**, a struct variable or the item
|
||
shape of a list of structs) instead of having them typed again; that adds the fields it does not
|
||
have yet as one undo step and leaves the ones it has alone. Writing a struct variable keeps the
|
||
fields it declares: what arrives fills the ones it names, the rest stay put (`mergeStruct`), so
|
||
one node can set part of a bundle without erasing it – "the same piece, one row lower" is a
|
||
`Pack` of that one field. Depth is bounded by the *declaration*, not by convention: a list says
|
||
what its items are (`ListItemKind`, struct included), a struct field says what it holds
|
||
(`StructFieldKind`, primitives plus `list`), and the list a *field* holds takes primitives only
|
||
(`ListFieldDef`). Forbidding just that one combination is what keeps the shapes finite:
|
||
`list → struct → primitive` and `struct → list → primitive` are the two deepest a stored value
|
||
goes – exactly what `asStoredValue` lets through an untyped slot – so the deep compare and the
|
||
editor stay finite. A live entity is
|
||
an object on a data edge too, so it carries a `Symbol` brand (`ENTITY_HANDLE`) that no struct
|
||
field name can impersonate; nothing may hand a property value to `String()` (`textOf` instead),
|
||
or a struct would read as `[object Object]`. A struct port has no inline value (its parts come
|
||
from a `Pack`), and compatibility is per *kind*, not per shape – any struct fits any struct port.
|
||
- **Loops**: `Repeat` runs its `body` output a number of times, counting `index` up from 0, and
|
||
continues at `done`. Data nodes are cached for the length of one event pulse, but a loop round
|
||
drops that cache, so an expression built on `index` really changes with it. That is what makes
|
||
a graph able to work through a list: the Tetris example draws its 200 board cells that way,
|
||
`Object by name` taking the name the round put together (`"c" + index`). Two guards, not one:
|
||
a pulse may take 100 000 steps (a loop legitimately runs long), but exec edges may only nest
|
||
1000 deep – that is what catches a flow feeding back into itself before the call stack does.
|
||
- **A behavior as a node** (nesting): a behavior that has a **Start** and an **End** node can be
|
||
run as a step of another behavior's graph. Every input declared on the start node becomes an
|
||
input port of the calling node, every output declared on the end node one of its outputs; the
|
||
node is drawn under the behavior's own name, and the palette lists it there too, so a call is
|
||
one pick. Declaring a port keeps both sides in step – renaming carries the typed-in value along,
|
||
removing takes the edges hanging on it in *every* graph that calls the behavior. A call is a
|
||
**call, not an inlining**: the nested graph runs in its own pulse cache with a fresh copy of its
|
||
variable defaults, so values travel in and out through the ports and nothing else. That makes a
|
||
call repeatable and keeps a nested behavior free of hidden state – for state, use a behavior
|
||
object in the scene (see *Cross-object state* below). A behavior that would run itself raises an
|
||
error instead of looping; there is one start and one end node per behavior.
|
||
Three ways in and out of a call: **drag** a behavior out of the asset panel onto the graph and it
|
||
lands as a call where you let go; **double-click** a call node to open the graph it runs. And a
|
||
call that cannot do anything **says so on the node** – no behavior picked, the behavior deleted,
|
||
or no start node in it. The last one is the one worth naming: without a start node there is no
|
||
way in, so the call is skipped and the flow simply carries on at its `exec` output. A missing
|
||
*end* node is not a defect – a call is always synchronous, "done" is the nested flow running out,
|
||
and the end node only decides what comes back.
|
||
- **Cross-object state**: a behavior's variables *are* the properties of its object, so another
|
||
graph reads and writes them with `Object by name` → `Get property` / `Set property`. That is
|
||
how the example game keeps one coin counter for the whole run.
|
||
- **Mouse**: the Game tab feeds the pointer to the world in world units. `On click` fires for
|
||
the behavior whose owner was hit – colliders decide when there are any, otherwise the sprites
|
||
and texts of the owner and everything below it, so a button made of a box plus a label works
|
||
as one. A switched-off screen cannot swallow clicks. A behavior **without an owner** has no
|
||
shape that could be hit, so it takes every click inside the camera frame instead (the
|
||
`world x`/`world y` outputs say where) – that is the "click anywhere" listener.
|
||
- **Idiomatic movement** (the demo's "Mover", five nodes): `On update → Move(Owner, dx = Axis
|
||
input.x, dy = Axis input.y, scale = Get variable speed, dt = On update.dt)`.
|
||
- **Idiomatic platformer** (the example game's "Player"): `On update` adds `gravity · dt` to a
|
||
`vy` variable and moves the owner by `(axis.x · speed, vy)` with *Collide with solids* on;
|
||
`blocked y` while falling means standing, so `vy` goes back to 0 and `onGround` becomes true;
|
||
`On key down (Space)` sets `vy = −jumpSpeed` when `onGround`.
|
||
- **Editing**: right-click the canvas for the searchable palette, drag port → port to connect
|
||
(types are checked; a data input holds one link and is replaced), drag nodes, right-click a
|
||
node or port to delete/disconnect, `Delete` removes the selection, wheel zooms. Everything is
|
||
undoable.
|
||
- **Mouse and selection work as in the scene view.** The **middle button pans** from anywhere,
|
||
a node under the pointer included (shift-drag on empty canvas does too); the left button never
|
||
pans. Dragging on empty canvas pulls a **rubber band** instead, which selects every node it
|
||
touches – nodes are large rectangles, so touching counts, unlike the scene view's test of an
|
||
object's position. Ctrl/Shift-click adds or removes single nodes, dragging any node of a
|
||
selection moves all of them, and `Delete` removes all of them – one undo step either way.
|
||
- **Dragging an edge tells you where it would land** before you let go: the port it would connect
|
||
to wears a white ring and the line snaps to it. Dropping on a node's *body* rather than a port
|
||
takes that node's first free compatible port – or, when none is free, the last compatible one,
|
||
whose link is then replaced. A drop into empty space opens the palette filtered to the node
|
||
types this edge could reach at all, and the picked node arrives already wired; node and link go
|
||
in as **one** undo step (`core/graph/dropTarget.ts` decides all of this, the canvas only draws
|
||
it). The dangling edge stays on screen while that palette is up, so the connection being made is
|
||
still visible while its node is chosen.
|
||
- **A link can be hidden**, so a connection across the whole graph does not have to be drawn as a
|
||
line across the whole graph. Right-click a port → *Hide link*; the curve is replaced by a short
|
||
stub at each end, ending in a dot captioned with the node at the *other* end. The connection is
|
||
untouched – hiding is drawing only, and `folded` on the edge is the entire change. The curve
|
||
comes back, dimmed, **while either of its two nodes is selected**, and always while a pulse is
|
||
travelling it, so the live trace never loses its thread. Clicking a dot selects the node at the
|
||
far end, which both answers "where does this go?" and lends the curve back;
|
||
right-clicking it offers *Show link* and *Disconnect* (`editor/graph/folding.ts` holds the
|
||
visibility rule, the canvas only draws it). **A port's hidden links share one mark** – drawn per
|
||
link, several of them would stack stub, dot and caption on the very same pixels. The mark then
|
||
grows a little, is captioned `Add +2`, and one click selects *every* far end at once, which is
|
||
also what lends all of its curves back; the menu counts what it acts on (*Show 3 links*), and
|
||
does it as one undo step.
|
||
- **A node can be collapsed** to its title bar: the chevron in front of the title (it leaves the
|
||
selection alone, like the hierarchy's), or right-click → *Collapse node* / *Expand node*, which
|
||
acts on the whole selection as one undo step. Every link of one side then meets at a single
|
||
point on the title bar, and its hidden links share one mark per side. A collapsed node has no
|
||
ports to grab, so a link dropped on it goes nowhere – expand it to wire it. Like hiding a link,
|
||
this is drawing only: `collapsed` on the node is saved with the project.
|
||
- **Header bar** (the same one the Texture and Container tabs have): the behavior picker,
|
||
**Add node…** (the palette, dropping the node in the middle of the view – the right-click nobody
|
||
finds), **Fit** (which zooms out far enough to hold every node, measuring each by its own drawn
|
||
height – `editor/framing.ts`), and the size of the graph as "N nodes · M links".
|
||
- **Snap** (header checkbox, off by default): a drag drops each node it carries on the nearest
|
||
24 px grid line – the same grid the background draws. It takes effect on the next drag only, so
|
||
switching it on never shuffles a graph that is already laid out, and a node nobody drags never
|
||
moves. Every node of a selection snaps **for itself**, so dragging a group is how you line one
|
||
up; the offset is a decision about rectangles and lives with the others in `editor/framing.ts`.
|
||
- **Selection-following, not selection-bound**: selecting a behavior asset, a placed behavior
|
||
or one of its nodes shows that graph; a selection about anything else (a sprite, nothing at
|
||
all) leaves the tab on the behavior you were editing, because checking a sprite's position
|
||
must not empty your work. Only a behavior that no longer exists is dropped, and then the tab
|
||
falls back to another one – the picker is how you switch on purpose.
|
||
- **Live view**: Play always switches to the Game tab; switch to Graph while playing and
|
||
the exec edges and nodes that just ran light up – the same canvas draws editor and game, so
|
||
this costs nothing extra.
|
||
- **Runtime**: `BehaviorSystem` creates one `GraphInterpreter` per behavior entity; graphs only
|
||
touch world entities. A runaway pulse throws (see *Loops* for the two limits) and stops play
|
||
with a notice.
|
||
|
||
**Placing an asset: drag it in.** Drag a row out of the **Assets** panel and drop it on the
|
||
view – the Scene tab places into the active scene, the Container tab into the open template, so
|
||
what you see is what you fill. While the pointer is over a view, an outline shows the footprint
|
||
the object will have and a crosshair the origin it snaps to; it turns **red** when the drop would
|
||
be refused, which today means a container that would end up inside itself (`placementRejection`,
|
||
`src/core/model/placement.ts` – the same function the command runs, so the preview cannot promise
|
||
a placement the drop then denies). Picking a container up selects it, but the Container tab does
|
||
*not* follow that while a drag is in flight: the target must not swap out from under the pointer.
|
||
Dragging is the only way to place: a double-click on a scene makes it the active one, on anything
|
||
else it does nothing.
|
||
|
||
**Editor symbols are always on top.** The viewport draws scene content (sprites) in an
|
||
`objects` layer and editor symbols (camera icon, labels) in an `overlay` layer above it, so a
|
||
sprite can never hide a symbol regardless of z or hierarchy order. A viewport label keeps a
|
||
constant size on screen however far you zoom, and both kinds of them – the object names of the
|
||
Scene tab and the frame names of the Texture tab – read that size from one token
|
||
(`Theme.viewportLabelSize`); the two `viewportLabel` styles differ in colour only.
|
||
|
||
**Z-order is part of the position.** `position.z` is the draw order of a scene object: higher
|
||
`z` is drawn on top; objects with equal `z` keep their hierarchy (tree) order. It is edited in the
|
||
inspector next to X/Y, undoable like any move, and applies in edit and play mode alike.
|
||
|
||
**Hierarchy (parenting).** Every scene object may have a parent in the same scene
|
||
(`SceneObject.parentId`). Positions – including `z` – are **local to the parent**; the world
|
||
position is the sum along the chain (`src/core/model/hierarchy.ts`). Children move with their
|
||
parent and are removed with it (also when the parent's asset is deleted); undo brings the whole
|
||
subtree back. Re-parenting keeps the world position by recomputing the local one, and cycles
|
||
are rejected. In the **Scene objects** panel children are indented below their parent; drag a
|
||
row onto another row to parent it, onto the empty space below the rows (or right-click →
|
||
Unparent) to move it to the top level; the inspector offers the same as a **Parent** menu.
|
||
Dragging into the **gap** above or below a row – its outer quarter, marked with a line instead of
|
||
an outline – orders the object among *that* row's siblings rather than putting it inside, and
|
||
re-parents it on the way when the gap belongs to another parent. Since equal `z` falls back to
|
||
this order, that is also how two objects at the same depth are put in front of each other. A drag
|
||
that lands where it started changes nothing and costs no undo step.
|
||
A row's **name turns gold** when the object deviates from what it follows – its container
|
||
template, or its asset – and also when anything below it does, so a folded subtree still shows
|
||
that something inside was changed. It is the same gold the inspector paints an overridden
|
||
label in.
|
||
Rows with children **fold**: click the chevron (or press ←/→, or double-click the row) to open
|
||
and close a subtree, right-click → **Expand all** / **Collapse all** for the whole scene. A
|
||
scene opens fully collapsed – which rows are open is view state of the panel, never stored in
|
||
the project – and selecting an object anywhere (viewport, `Add collider`, `Create container`)
|
||
unfolds the way down to it and scrolls it into view, so a selection is never hidden. In
|
||
play mode entities carry the same `parent` link: moving a parent entity moves its subtree,
|
||
`Destroy` removes it. `Get position` exposes both the local and the world coordinates.
|
||
|
||
**Editor offset (scene view only).** Every scene object additionally carries an
|
||
`editorOffset` – an x/y shift of where it is *drawn, selected and dragged* in the Scene tab,
|
||
and nothing else. The game, collisions and the graph never see it; it is there to pull apart
|
||
objects that sit on top of each other, such as the stacked title/win/lose screens of a game.
|
||
It cascades like a position (offsetting a container offsets its content) and is edited in the
|
||
inspector below X/Y/Z, undoable, with ↺ back to 0. It belongs to the placed object, so
|
||
`Create container` and placing a container never carry it into the template.
|
||
|
||
## Colliders and collisions
|
||
|
||
A **collider** is an asset (`shape` box/circle, `width`/`height` or `radius`) placed like any
|
||
other object – typically as a child of the sprite it belongs to, so its position is the offset
|
||
from that *body* and it moves with it. Right-click an object in **Scene objects** → *Add
|
||
collider* to get one with one click: a box collider sized like the
|
||
sprite, parented at its centre. Colliders can be reused across objects, overridden per instance
|
||
and stacked (hitbox + hurtbox on one sprite; colliders of the same body never collide with each
|
||
other). They are editor symbols: green outlines in edit mode, invisible in play mode.
|
||
|
||
Play runs a `CollisionSystem` (`src/runtime/systems/CollisionSystem.ts`) before the behaviors:
|
||
every frame it tests all collider pairs (world positions applied; touching edges do not count)
|
||
and sorts them into *enter*, *stay* and *exit*. Detection never pushes anything apart. A
|
||
behavior receives `On collision enter/stay/exit` for the colliders of its **owner** (its
|
||
parent; itself when top-level): the outputs are `other` (the other body), `other collider`
|
||
and `collider` (the own one). `Is touching(a, b)` answers the same question on demand – an
|
||
object stands for its collider children, a collider for itself. The geometry lives in
|
||
`src/core/properties/collider.ts` so editor and runtime agree on it.
|
||
|
||
**Blocking** is opt-in per movement: the `Move` node has a **Collide with solids** setting
|
||
(default off). When enabled it moves an object one axis at a time and, after each axis, pushes
|
||
its *solid* colliders back to just touch any solid collider they ran into – so the other axis
|
||
still moves and the object slides along walls. Its `blocked x` / `blocked y` outputs tell which
|
||
axes hit (always `false` with the setting off). A collider with
|
||
**Trigger (no blocking)** enabled (`isTrigger`, drawn amber instead of green) still produces
|
||
collision events but never blocks. An overlap that already exists is never resolved (no jolt
|
||
when objects start stacked or inside a wall) but also never deepened, so such an object can
|
||
always leave. A move longer than the thinnest collider involved is split into sub-steps – a
|
||
fast object cannot jump across a thin wall and end up on the other side. Colliders of the
|
||
moving object and of anything parented under it travel with it and cannot
|
||
block it. `Move` without the setting and `Set position` ignore colliders entirely.
|
||
|
||
## Textures
|
||
|
||
A sprite is a coloured box until it is given a picture. The picture is a **texture asset**,
|
||
and the sprite points at it through the ordinary property `texture` — which is the whole
|
||
design: because it is an ordinary property, instance overrides, **Apply to container**,
|
||
**Reset to asset**, undo and `Set property` work on it without a single line written for them.
|
||
One coin instance can wear a different picture than its nine siblings, and swapping a texture
|
||
at runtime is a graph node that already exists.
|
||
|
||
**Getting an image in.** **Dropping image files onto the canvas** or **Ctrl+V** pasting one
|
||
uploads it and makes the asset in one go; several files at once are imported one after another,
|
||
and a file that fails does not stop the rest.
|
||
|
||
**+ → Texture** asks a different question and so opens a different dialog: not the machine's
|
||
file system, but **every picture the server already holds**, as a grid of thumbnails. Files are
|
||
never collected (below), so a picture one project dropped is still there for the next to pick
|
||
up, and uploading the same bytes twice buys nothing. Picking one and pressing **Use image**
|
||
makes a texture asset on that file; **Upload…** is the way in for a picture the server does not
|
||
have yet, and lands in the same import as a drop. A tile captioned with an asset name is one
|
||
this project already wears – picking it selects that asset rather than making a second one.
|
||
|
||
**Where it goes.** The image is uploaded as raw bytes to `POST ?r=textures` and stored as
|
||
`data/textures/{sha256}.{ext}` — the file is named after its own content. That name buys four
|
||
things: the same picture uploaded twice is one file, a stored file can be cached forever
|
||
(a name cannot come to mean different bytes), the project document holds a short string
|
||
instead of megabytes of base64, and deleting a texture asset is undoable for free because
|
||
nothing on disk is removed. The price is that files outlive the projects that referenced them.
|
||
|
||
**Colour tints the picture.** `color` multiplies the texture, so it defaults to **white**
|
||
(= no tint) and a picture shows its own colours. Tinting is worth having: one white coin
|
||
picture becomes ten differently coloured coins, per instance, for nothing. Without a texture
|
||
`color` is simply the fill of the box, as before.
|
||
|
||
**`filter`** is the texture's only property: *Smooth* (default) or *Pixel art*, which is the
|
||
difference between crisp and mush when a small image is scaled up. Switching it needs a
|
||
`style.update()` on the texture source, not just the assignment: Pixi's `scaleMode` setter
|
||
writes the filters but leaves the style's cached resource id in place, and that id is the key
|
||
the GPU sampler is looked up under — so without it the picture only changes on a reload.
|
||
|
||
### Frames — cutting a sheet up
|
||
|
||
The **Texture tab** shows one texture with its **frames** on top: named rectangles in image
|
||
pixels. Drag on empty picture to cut one, drag it or its eight handles to adjust it, and edit
|
||
the exact numbers in the inspector; `Delete` removes the selected frame. **Slice…** cuts a
|
||
regular grid at once — you give columns and rows (not a cell size: everyone knows how many
|
||
tiles their sheet has, and deriving the cell size from the picture cannot disagree with it),
|
||
with optional offset and spacing for padded sheets, and the dialog says how many frames of
|
||
what size the numbers would produce before it commits.
|
||
|
||
A sprite then wears **a frame instead of the whole picture** — but through the *same*
|
||
property. `texture` holds either a texture id (the whole image) or a frame id, because frame
|
||
ids come from the same generator and are unique across the document. That is what keeps one
|
||
picker, one property and one set of instance overrides, and what makes every sprite written
|
||
before frames existed still mean exactly what it meant. The picker lists each sheet followed
|
||
by its frames as "Sheet / Frame", and it is searchable, because one sliced sheet adds an entry
|
||
per cell.
|
||
|
||
Frames are intrinsic data on the texture, like a scene's objects and a behavior's graph — not
|
||
properties, since nothing about them is overridable per instance. All edits go through
|
||
commands, so cutting, dragging, slicing and re-slicing are undoable, and one drag is **one**
|
||
undo step. Deleting a frame leaves the sprites pointing at it: a dangling reference draws the
|
||
plain colour and comes back by itself on undo. Deleting the whole texture counts the sprites
|
||
wearing *any* of its frames, not just the ones naming the texture directly.
|
||
|
||
**Fitting the sprite to the picture.** The *Width* and *Height* rows of a sprite carry a ↔ / ↕
|
||
button offering two things: **Fit to 64 × 48** sets that one side from the other and the picture's
|
||
proportions — the frame's rectangle when it wears a frame, the whole image otherwise — and **Set
|
||
to 64 × 48 px** puts both sides at the picture's own pixel size. Like ↺ and ↑ the button exists
|
||
only when it would do something, and follows the same rule for how many: no offer means no button,
|
||
one is a direct click, both make it the menu form ↔ ▾. So a sprite without a picture, or one
|
||
already in proportion *and* at pixel size, carries nothing. Either action is an ordinary property
|
||
write, so on an object it becomes an override, and setting both sides is still one undo step. The
|
||
proportions are compared with a relative tolerance rather than exactly — of the 40 000 picture
|
||
sizes up to 200 × 200, 3135 do not survive the round trip through a division, and an exact test
|
||
would leave the button standing after its own click. The pixel size is compared exactly, because
|
||
those two numbers are written as they are.
|
||
|
||
**A sprite straight from a texture.** Right-click a texture in the asset list → *Create sprite
|
||
from texture* makes a sprite asset that wears the whole picture at its pixel size, named after the
|
||
texture (numbered like any name clash, so `Coin` gives `Coin 2`) and selected. It is the same as creating a sprite, picking the texture and clicking *Set to
|
||
W × H px*, but in one undo step.
|
||
|
||
Rendering a frame is a texture matrix on the fill, not a Pixi sub-texture — a Graphics fill
|
||
ignores a `Texture`'s `frame` (measured, see `viewport/textureFill.ts`). One consequence is
|
||
worth having: a sheet stays **one** GPU upload however many frames of it are on screen.
|
||
|
||
**Nothing ever breaks on a missing picture.** While an image loads, and for a reference that
|
||
dangles because the texture was deleted, the sprite draws its plain colour — exactly what it
|
||
looked like before textures existed. So there is no placeholder, no flicker and no error path.
|
||
Deleting a texture warns how many sprites reference it (a texture is never *placed*, so
|
||
counting placed instances would report "unused" for a picture a dozen sprites are showing).
|
||
|
||
**Limits.** nginx caps request bodies at 1 MB, so the editor shrinks images over 2048 px per
|
||
side and re-encodes to WebP when they are still too big — but an image that already fits is
|
||
uploaded byte for byte, because re-encoding pixel art would destroy it. Anything still too
|
||
large is refused with a clear message instead of a broken upload. The server accepts PNG,
|
||
JPEG, WebP and GIF, deriving the type from the content rather than from anything the client
|
||
says, and rejects images over 8192 px per side.
|
||
|
||
## Editing a container
|
||
|
||
The **Container tab** shows one container's template with the *same* viewport the Scene tab uses –
|
||
`ContainerCanvas` subclasses `SceneViewport` and swaps nothing but which asset holds the objects,
|
||
so picking, rubber band, dragging, gizmos, labels and parent lines are not written twice. It adds a
|
||
cross at the **origin**, because that is the point the container is held by when placed: where the
|
||
content sits relative to it is the thing being authored. A template has no background of its own –
|
||
painting one would invent the scene it is not in.
|
||
|
||
The **Scene objects** panel lists whatever the visible tab edits, so in the Container tab it lists
|
||
the template, with the same drag-to-parent, context menu and folding as a scene; the inspector,
|
||
`Delete` and `Ctrl+G` work on template objects like on placed ones. None of that is a special case:
|
||
a scene asset and a container asset are both `ObjectHolder`s, and every object command takes a
|
||
`holderId` that is either one.
|
||
|
||
**Header bar**: the container picker (searchable), **Fit** (frames the content, origin always
|
||
included) and the size of the template as "N objects". Placing needs no button of its own: an
|
||
asset dragged from the panel onto this view goes into the template, and a container dragged onto
|
||
its own template is refused while it hovers rather than at the drop.
|
||
Like the Graph tab it follows the selection without being bound to it – the container asset, one of
|
||
its placed copies or one of its template objects shows it, anything else leaves the tab on what you
|
||
were editing, and only a deleted container makes it fall back to another one. Selecting a template
|
||
*object* also switches to the tab, the rule a graph node and a texture frame already follow: it
|
||
exists in no other view. Selecting the asset itself does not.
|
||
|
||
Placing a container anywhere creates **one** object. Its content is never copied: `resolveObjects`
|
||
(`src/core/model/instance.ts`) weaves the template in whenever the holder is read, one level per
|
||
nesting step, and the resolved objects get derived ids – `<instance id>~<template id>`, joined by
|
||
`/` for a container inside a container. That is what the hierarchy lists, what the viewport draws
|
||
and what a command addresses. A container that reaches this one, directly or through another, is
|
||
still refused – that cycle would resolve forever.
|
||
|
||
So **editing a template changes every instance**, structure included: add, delete or re-parent a
|
||
template object and every placed container shows it immediately. What an instance may deviate in
|
||
is values, and only per slot: an override key, one position axis, the name. Those live in
|
||
`instanceEdits` on the container object and are dropped again the moment the value matches its
|
||
base, which is what keeps "untouched follows, touched keeps" exact without any bookkeeping. That
|
||
base is the template **with the edits of every container in between woven in** (`InstanceTarget.base`):
|
||
inside nested containers the innermost template is not what a value falls back to, so comparing
|
||
against it would drop an edit that does deviate – and the value would jump to the value of the
|
||
container in between.
|
||
|
||
The other direction is therefore just as small: **Apply to container** writes the value into the
|
||
template and drops the edit, **Reset to container** drops the edit alone.
|
||
|
||
Two places do spell the content out. **Unpack** does it on purpose – the objects become ordinary
|
||
ones and stop following. And **play mode bakes** every placed container into stored objects, in
|
||
the throwaway copy of the model, because a running behavior may destroy one of them and a resolved
|
||
object has nowhere to remember that. Both keep the derived ids, so the selection and a check script
|
||
survive them. A world built **without** baking (the editor run, `WorldOptions.bakeContainers`) runs
|
||
that content all the same and writes through `objectRef` into the instance edits; only a removal
|
||
has nowhere to go there.
|
||
|
||
## Screens without scene switching
|
||
|
||
A **screen** (title, win, lose, a pause overlay) is just a container whose `enabled` is
|
||
switched on and off. It keeps working while it is off in one important way: `Object by name`
|
||
still finds it, so a graph can switch it back on. A behavior inside a disabled screen has no
|
||
interpreter yet – it gets one, and its `On start`, the moment the screen is switched on, which
|
||
makes "the screen initialises itself when shown" the default. Its variables survive being
|
||
switched off and on again. A switched-off object is hidden in the Scene tab as well, so the
|
||
editor shows what the game shows – selected, it keeps a faint outline, so where it sits is still
|
||
visible, but it cannot be dragged. It stays listed in the hierarchy panel, which is where it is
|
||
selected and switched back on.
|
||
|
||
`Restart game` throws the run away and starts the scene again from the saved model – what the
|
||
"Play again" buttons of the example game do.
|
||
|
||
## Stack
|
||
|
||
- **PixiJS v8** – rendering and pointer events. No game engine; runtime systems live in `src/runtime/`.
|
||
`main.ts` creates the WebGL context itself with `desynchronized`, which Pixi has no option for:
|
||
frames skip the compositor queue, so the UI keeps up with the pointer (click to picture measured
|
||
72–77 ms before, 16–18 ms after). The price is possible tearing while things move fast;
|
||
`?vsync` falls back to Pixi's own context. A browser without the mode simply ignores it.
|
||
- **Own canvas widget toolkit** (`src/ui/`) – panels, buttons, lists, text/number/color fields,
|
||
popups. The only lasting DOM element is a hidden `<input>` used as a keyboard bridge (IME,
|
||
mobile keyboard, clipboard) while a canvas text field is focused; *Upload…* adds a short-lived
|
||
file input.
|
||
Double-clicks are counted in `clicks.ts`, not read off the event: Pixi only puts a click count
|
||
on the `click` it synthesises and leaves `detail` at 0 on `pointerdown`, so every press handler
|
||
that trusted `e.detail` never saw a second click. Presses are counted per key rather than per
|
||
widget, because a list rebuilds its rows when the first click changes the selection.
|
||
Menus read as lists: entries are left-aligned and scroll once they pass 320 px instead of
|
||
running off the screen. A menu that grows with the project – the parent picker lists every
|
||
object of the scene – is opened with `{ searchable: true }`, which puts a filter box above
|
||
the entries (Enter takes the first match). A field that opens a menu is a `Dropdown`: value
|
||
flush left, chevron drawn flush right rather than written into the label.
|
||
Every label that can be wider than its control is cut with an ellipsis (`truncate` in
|
||
`Label.ts`, shared by `Label`, `ListRow` and `Button`). A `Button` keeps the full text and
|
||
measures from it – only what is drawn is shortened – and a subclass that puts something else
|
||
inside the control takes its room off `labelSlot()`, so a long value is cut rather than run
|
||
underneath the chevron. Given a `width`, a button is exactly that wide and truncates instead:
|
||
the tab-bar buttons and the Graph, Texture and Container pickers keep their size whatever they
|
||
show.
|
||
The padding is an inset rather than a claim, so a 24 px icon button spends it on the glyph
|
||
instead of truncating it away; a button that switches between label forms (`↺` and `↺ ▾`) asks
|
||
for `minWidth` and grows. `__gm.textOverflows()` guards the whole class of bug: it reports any
|
||
visible text drawn wider than the widget owning it, `__gm.labelsDropped()` guards the other
|
||
direction – a button too narrow to draw any of its label – and the `pickerWidth()` of
|
||
`__gm.graph` / `__gm.texture` / `__gm.container` catch a picker that resizes itself around its
|
||
content (e2e step 14).
|
||
- **Vite + TypeScript**, **Vitest** for core, toolkit and editor logic.
|
||
- **PHP 8** JSON API (`api/`) storing one JSON file per project in `data/projects/`, with
|
||
atomic writes and an integer revision that rejects stale saves (HTTP 409).
|
||
|
||
## Layout
|
||
|
||
```
|
||
web/index.html Vite source page (dev) index.html built page (generated, served)
|
||
src/core/model/ Project (object holders), Asset, SceneObject, hierarchy, walk (generic parent/child walks), instance (container content resolved from its template), usages (where an asset is used), container (the cycle guard), placement (what may be dropped where)
|
||
src/core/properties/ PropertySchema, resolve (the only override merge), deviation (what is gold), collider/camera/bounds geometry, aspect, enabled, editorRun
|
||
src/core/commands/ undoable commands, CommandStack, SetBagValueCommand base, require.ts (validated lookups, and what an instance may not change), naming.ts
|
||
src/core/graph/ graph model, NodeRegistry/NodeContext/values, interpreter, dropTarget, nested (behaviors as nodes),
|
||
variablePorts, keyRepeat; nodes/{events,flow,data,action,variable}/<Name>.ts
|
||
src/core/store/ serialize (untrusted JSON → Project), http (one API call), HttpProjectStore
|
||
src/runtime/ World, Entity, System interface, Input tracker, CollisionSystem, BehaviorSystem
|
||
src/ui/ widget toolkit (generic, knows nothing about assets)
|
||
src/viewport/ view (transforms), items (what to draw), symbols (how to draw it),
|
||
textureFill, TextureLibrary – no editor concepts, so tests reach it freely
|
||
src/editor/ App → Editor (layout + ticker), PlaySession (the run), ProjectSession (load/create),
|
||
EditorRun (run in editor), state, actions, shortcuts, debugHook, autosave, textureImport,
|
||
framing (fit/marquee/snap maths), AssetTabEditor (the shared shell of the three asset tabs)
|
||
src/editor/viewport/ WorldViewport base + SceneViewport/GameViewport – editing tools, hence not in src/viewport/
|
||
src/editor/inspector/ Inspector panel, field factory, previewHandlers (scrub → preview → command), valueSpecs
|
||
(where a value lives – shared with the List tab),
|
||
one section per selection kind (asset/object/node/frame), variableRows (one row shape for
|
||
every variable), portSection, aspectAction, objectQueries/vectorRows/parentRow
|
||
src/editor/panels/ AssetPanel, HierarchyPanel, Toolbar
|
||
src/editor/graph/ GraphEditor (header + picker), GraphCanvas, EdgeLayer (curves and fold marks), graphMenus,
|
||
NodeView, NodePalette + paletteEntries, folding (hidden links, collapsed nodes)
|
||
src/editor/container/ ContainerEditor (header + picker), ContainerCanvas (a SceneViewport on a template)
|
||
src/editor/texture/ TextureEditor (header + picker), TextureCanvas (picture + frames), SliceDialog, sheetView (the grid maths),
|
||
ImagePicker + imageGrid (the "+ → Texture" dialog)
|
||
src/editor/list/ ListEditor (a row per item), slot (which list is being edited, and how it is written back)
|
||
api/ PHP backend data/projects/ persisted projects
|
||
tests/ Vitest unit tests tools/ seed-*, e2e (steps in tools/e2e/, rig in tools/e2e/lib/), smoke-*, lib/, remote/
|
||
```
|
||
|
||
The toolbar's right edge shows the frame rate (frames counted over a 0.5 s window, updated
|
||
twice a second) in edit and play mode alike; `__gm.fps()` exposes the same number to tests.
|
||
|
||
Rules that keep it organised: `core/` imports nothing from other layers; `ui/` never sees
|
||
assets; position exists only on scene objects; overrides are merged in exactly one place
|
||
(`core/properties/resolve.ts`); the inspector is generated from `PropertySchema` – a new
|
||
property is one schema line; a new node is one file **plus a row in the table in
|
||
`tests/core/node-catalog.test.ts`**, which fails if a node has no case. Comments state contracts
|
||
and reasons, not what the code does: a `/** */` on every export whose name does not say it all,
|
||
`//` only for a decision or gotcha.
|
||
|
||
## Development
|
||
|
||
Node 22 is required (`/usr/bin/node`, in the default PATH).
|
||
|
||
```bash
|
||
npm install
|
||
npm run dev # http://localhost:5175/game-maker/dist/ – API calls are proxied to production
|
||
npm test # unit tests (core, editor, ui, viewport)
|
||
npm run typecheck
|
||
npm run lint # ESLint (type-aware for src and tests); lint:fix for the fixable half
|
||
npm run format # Prettier over the repo, minus what .prettierignore lists
|
||
npm run check # typecheck + lint + format:check + tests, what CI would run
|
||
./check.sh # the same, ending in `=== CHECK EXIT n ===`: piped into `tail` npm's exit
|
||
# code is lost (tail's is reported), so a red run reads as green
|
||
npm run build # writes dist/ and regenerates index.html
|
||
export GM_REMOTE=user@host # optional: run the browser elsewhere; see below
|
||
node tools/seed-e2e.mjs && node tools/e2e.mjs # 537 editor checks, screenshots in /tmp/gm-e2e-*.png
|
||
GM_STEPS=20 node tools/e2e.mjs # or 1-12, or 6,20 – a subset while working on one step
|
||
./e2e.sh start [GM_STEPS] # the same run detached, see below
|
||
./e2e.sh status # live progress, or the last run's result
|
||
node tools/seed-jumprun.mjs && node tools/smoke-jumprun.mjs # 24 checks: the example game, played end to end
|
||
node tools/seed-tetris.mjs && node tools/smoke-tetris.mjs # 19 checks: the Tetris example, played end to end
|
||
```
|
||
|
||
**A run needs a working GPU.** An idle editor page keeps rendering a picture that never changes, and
|
||
in software that is ruinous: measured here on an idle page over 20 s, software WebGL costs **373% of
|
||
a core at 8 fps**, the same page on the Intel HD 630 via ANGLE/Vulkan costs **69% at 56 fps**. The
|
||
full suite takes about four minutes that way. `tools/lib/browser.mjs` therefore always asks for the GPU and has
|
||
**no software fallback** – on a host without one, chromium should fail loudly rather than melt the
|
||
machine down. (`--use-angle=gl` and `--use-gl=egl` measure cheaper still, but get no WebGL context at
|
||
all, so the app never renders.)
|
||
|
||
**Run it here by default.** With the GPU in use the full suite costs about four minutes and roughly 0.8 of the
|
||
four cores of this box (60% renderer, 18% GPU process, load ~1.0), which it carries fine. While one
|
||
step is being worked on, `GM_STEPS` keeps a run to seconds – take the whole suite before a commit,
|
||
or when a change touches drawing, the widget toolkit or anything else every step sees.
|
||
|
||
**`./e2e.sh start` runs the suite detached**, in a transient `game-maker-e2e.service`, and returns at
|
||
once; output goes to `logs/e2e-<date>_<time>.log` (gitignored) and ends in `=== E2E EXIT n ===`.
|
||
Backgrounding it from a shell instead is not enough – four runs in a row died mid-suite with no
|
||
closing line, because the whole process group is killed when the calling shell exits (`nohup` only
|
||
covers SIGHUP, and `/proc/vmstat` confirmed `oom_kill 0`, so it was never memory). The unit outlives
|
||
its caller. It takes the same `GM_STEPS` argument, refuses to start a second run over a live one, and
|
||
`systemctl stop game-maker-e2e.service` ends it.
|
||
|
||
**`./e2e.sh status`** reports the live run (elapsed, PASS/FAIL so far, the check it is on) or, when
|
||
nothing is running, the newest log's result plus its FAIL lines. A log without a closing line is
|
||
reported as `ABORTED`, not as its PASS count: a run that was cut short is not a result.
|
||
|
||
**`GM_REMOTE=user@host` moves the browser to another machine** – `tools/lib/browser.mjs` starts it
|
||
over SSH and forwards its CDP port back to `127.0.0.1`, so the harness itself is unchanged. The
|
||
checks load the public base URL, so the remote side needs only a browser and internet: no repo, no
|
||
node. Setup is an SSH key (`GM_REMOTE_KEY`, default `~/.ssh/gm-win.key`). Measured against a Windows
|
||
desktop with an RTX 4070: **the full suite in ~130 s and 24 smoke checks in 16 s, with this machine
|
||
idle** (0.4 s of CPU for the whole smoke run, load average 0.04). Worth setting while the box is
|
||
busy with something else; it is not required, and an unreachable host is no reason to skip a run.
|
||
|
||
`tools/remote/gm-browser.ps1` is copied over on every run, and getting the browser to die with the
|
||
run took three tries, because two obvious leashes do not hold on Windows:
|
||
|
||
- **stdin is not a signal.** Only the first chunk a caller writes ever reaches the remote command,
|
||
so a heartbeat over stdin is indistinguishable from a dead caller – it killed a run at check 44.
|
||
- **A dropped connection does not kill the remote command.** Windows OpenSSH leaves it running;
|
||
measured, six orphaned `chrome.exe` survived a SIGKILLed tunnel.
|
||
|
||
What holds is the CDP port: while a run is under way the forwarded connection is established, and it
|
||
closes the moment the run or the tunnel dies. The launcher watches for that with .NET rather than
|
||
`Get-NetTCPConnection` – that one goes through WMI, which is denied to a non-admin account, and its
|
||
broken CIM session took a browser down mid-run. A job object with `KILL_ON_JOB_CLOSE` catches the
|
||
rest, and a 30-minute cap bounds anything still unforeseen. Measured: the browser survives 80 s of an
|
||
idle held connection and is gone 44 s after the local node process is killed with `-9`.
|
||
|
||
**Prettier owns the formatting** (110 columns, single quotes, `.prettierrc.json`); Markdown is
|
||
excluded because it pads table cells to equal width. ESLint therefore only ever means "this is a
|
||
mistake", never "this looks different": `eslint-config-prettier` switches every stylistic rule
|
||
off, and what is left is type-aware – unnecessary conditions, floating promises, duplicate
|
||
imports, base-to-string. Where a rule fires on something deliberate, the disable comment states
|
||
why (the `Log` node's `console.log`, a guard against untyped test hooks).
|
||
|
||
Each script writes to its own project (`tools/lib/projects.mjs`): the **fixture** project is
|
||
rewritten by every e2e run, the **jump-run** and **tetris** projects by their seeders. The
|
||
**playground** project is the author's own and is maintained in the editor – every tool refuses
|
||
to touch it.
|
||
|
||
The e2e run is a list of steps in `tools/e2e/` (hierarchy, inspector, play, assets, drawing,
|
||
graph, parenting, colliders, containers, text/enabled, menus, textures, frames, overflow, aspect,
|
||
container tab, run-in-editor, pause, nested behaviors, key repeat, list tab, struct variable,
|
||
variable nodes) that build on each other's
|
||
scene state and share the CDP driver in `tools/lib/harness.mjs` – `press`, `undo`, `play`,
|
||
`object(id)`, `world()`, `mutate(js)` and friends, so a check reads like the interaction it
|
||
exercises.
|
||
|
||
`GM_STEPS=20`, `GM_STEPS=1-12` or `GM_STEPS=6,20` runs a subset – seconds instead of minutes
|
||
while one step is being written. Because a step lives off what the earlier ones left behind, a
|
||
subset that skips a prerequisite fails on purpose; take `1-N` when in doubt.
|
||
|
||
**The example game** (`tools/seed-jumprun.mjs`, project *Jump and Run*) is a complete little
|
||
platformer built only from assets, containers and graphs: a title screen with a clickable Start
|
||
button, a level of boxes with ten coins, gravity and jumping, a 30-second clock in the HUD, and
|
||
a win / lose screen with "Play again". A coin is a container of its own (sprite plus trigger
|
||
collider) placed ten times inside the level container – nested containers resolve through both levels,
|
||
and picking one up destroys the container, not just the sprite the collider reported. `tools/smoke-jumprun.mjs` plays it in a headless browser
|
||
(start, jump, collect, win, restart, lose) – it is the regression test for everything screens,
|
||
text, mouse and platformer physics need.
|
||
|
||
**The second example** (`tools/seed-tetris.mjs`, project *Tetris*) is the same idea with data
|
||
instead of physics. The board is a **list of 200 numbers**, one per cell – `-1` for empty,
|
||
otherwise the shape that came to rest there. A cell is `Item at(grid, row · 10 + column)`, a
|
||
landing is `Set item`, and clearing a full line is an empty row joined in front of everything
|
||
above and below it. What the player sees is a pool of objects the graphs address by name –
|
||
`c0…c199` for the well, `p0…p3` for the piece that is falling – so nothing is spawned or
|
||
destroyed while playing. Every frame tries exactly **one** move (turning beats moving beats
|
||
falling), which is why the game needs only a single "does it fit?" test instead of one per key.
|
||
|
||
What is *not* loose numbers is the piece. `piece` and the candidate `next` are **structs** of
|
||
shape/rot/x/y, and the shape table is a **list of `{x, y}` cells** – so `Next move` hands back a
|
||
whole candidate for `Fits` to judge and the master to accept in one write, rather than three
|
||
parallel variables copied back and forth, and each strand packs only the field it changes
|
||
(`mergeStruct` keeps the rest). Reading a cell is `((shape · 4 + rot) · 4 + corner)` into that
|
||
list instead of the same index doubled and read twice.
|
||
|
||
Where a step needs several variables at once, one `Get variables` / `Set variables` stands for the
|
||
lot: the call to `Next move` has **one node at each side** of it rather than five, and the master
|
||
graph is **44 nodes / 64 edges** where the same game in single nodes was 69 / 76. Inside `Next
|
||
move` each strand writes its whole answer – the candidate, what kind of move it was and the wish
|
||
it used up – in one node rather than three to five, which is **30 nodes** against 40. Two things
|
||
bound how far such a node may reach: a data node answers once per pulse and keeps that answer, so
|
||
a `Get variables` must not straddle a write of one of its variables (which is why the board is
|
||
read a second time after the lines were cleared), and a `Set variables` reads all its inputs
|
||
before it writes any, so none of them may come from a variable it writes.
|
||
|
||
It is **ten behaviors**, not one graph. `Tetris` owns the state and does none of the work: each
|
||
step of a frame is a behavior of its own, called as a node – `Spawn piece`, `Next move`, `Fits`,
|
||
`Draw piece`, `Lock piece`, `Clear lines`, `Show lines`, `Draw board`, with `Piece cell` (where
|
||
one of the four cells of a piece sits) used by two of them. None of them holds state: what they
|
||
need arrives through their inputs and every answer leaves through their outputs, which is what
|
||
lets `Fits` answer for turning, moving and falling alike, and `Piece cell` serve the fit test
|
||
and the drawing instead of being the same twenty nodes twice. What is left in
|
||
the master graph is the order the steps run in and which variable each answer lands in – it holds
|
||
no loop and no list access of its own, which `tools/smoke-tetris.mjs` checks. That script plays
|
||
the game in a headless browser (fall, move, turn, drop, land, clear a line, fill the well) – it
|
||
is the regression test for loops, lists and behaviors used as nodes.
|
||
|
||
The workspace folder itself is what nginx serves, so `npm run build` is the deployment.
|
||
|
||
## API
|
||
|
||
All routes go through `api/index.php?r=…` (the site's nginx does not pass `PATH_INFO`).
|
||
|
||
| Method | Route | Body → Result |
|
||
|---|---|---|
|
||
| GET | `projects` | `[{id,name,revision,updatedAt}]` |
|
||
| POST | `projects` | `{name}` → project document (201) |
|
||
| GET | `projects/{id}` | `{id,name,revision,updatedAt,project}` |
|
||
| PUT | `projects/{id}` | `{revision, project}` → `{revision,updatedAt}` or **409** `{error,revision}` when stale |
|
||
| DELETE | `projects/{id}` | 204 |
|
||
| GET | `textures` | `[{file,width,height,bytes,updatedAt}]` – what the image picker offers |
|
||
| POST | `textures` | **raw image bytes** → `{file,width,height,bytes}` (201) |
|
||
| DELETE | `textures/{file}` | 204 |
|
||
|
||
Uploads send the bytes as the body rather than `multipart/form-data`: no boundary parsing in
|
||
PHP, and PHP's `upload_max_filesize` (2 MB) never applies — only `post_max_size`. The API has its
|
||
own caps behind nginx's: 8 MB per request, 4 MB per image (413). The stored
|
||
files are served statically from `data/textures/`, so reading an image never runs PHP.
|
||
|
||
There is no authentication yet; `data/` is world-readable. Both are phase-2 topics.
|
||
|
||
## Keyboard
|
||
|
||
`Ctrl+Z` / `Ctrl+Shift+Z` / `Ctrl+Y` undo/redo (`Cmd` works wherever `Ctrl` does) · `Delete` or
|
||
`Backspace` remove the selection (objects, nodes, frames; an asset asks first) · `Ctrl+G` create
|
||
container from the selection · `Ctrl+Enter` play, and pause/resume while playing · `Esc` stop ·
|
||
`Ctrl+V` import an image from
|
||
the clipboard as a texture (ignored while a text field has focus) · `Tab` / `Shift+Tab` cycle fields · lists: `↑`/`↓` move,
|
||
`←`/`→` fold, `Enter` activates · number
|
||
fields: drag to scrub (`Shift` ×10, `Alt` ×0.1, snapping to the grid of that increment, so a
|
||
step-1 field lands on whole numbers), `↑`/`↓` step, shown with three decimals (`ui/math.ts`,
|
||
`NUMBER_DECIMALS`) so a fractional value never reads as a whole number — except where the
|
||
value is integral by nature (frame rectangles, the slice dialog, a camera's view size, font
|
||
size, the key-repeat milliseconds), which set
|
||
`NumberField`'s `decimals: 0` and show plain whole numbers · viewport: wheel zooms,
|
||
middle-drag or `Shift`+drag pans, drag on empty space rubber-bands, `Ctrl`/`Shift`-click toggles an
|
||
object in the selection (hierarchy rows too).
|
||
|
||
## Not yet
|
||
|
||
Several scenes in one run (a `Load scene` node – screens are containers
|
||
today), sound, auth, touch-optimised layout, graph comments/groups. A frame is always stretched to
|
||
the sprite's `width` × `height`: no animation (nothing steps through a sheet's frames yet) and no
|
||
nine-slice. Slicing cuts a regular grid only — no detection of where the sprites actually
|
||
sit on the sheet. Unreferenced image files are never collected – deliberately, since the image
|
||
picker offers them again; nothing deletes a stored image except `DELETE ?r=textures/{file}`.
|