Planetside Software Forums

Hi All!

TG2 Documentation... Why does T-U start a topic about TG2 Documentation? Isn't he one of those guys who knows everything?
The answer is neither yes or no and perhaps is rather closer to no than yes.

Reading Oshyan's reply below  and the second link made me write this long considered post:
Here's the specific message:

Quote from: Oshyan on March 10, 2012, 04:01:38 PM
On the plus side, many of the features of 2.4 are already well documented. We're improving our methodology for documenting as we go, and particular thanks go to Jo for putting in the time to well document the animation features.
- Oshyan

and
http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=14139.msg138489#msg138489 (http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=14139.msg138489#msg138489)

This topic above is just one of the most recent examples of an abundance of examples about the lack of documentation.
The equally abundant type of evasive official reply made me start this topic.
My method of making my point may not be as rock solid, as usual :) lol, but I'm trying to achieve something here by starting another discussion and I hope me posting about this at least makes people interested or curious/wonder as I'm being considered a TG2-pioneer/-die-hard-supporter here and generally don't start these type of topics out in the open.
This in itself should be a strong signal and because of the following:

Oshyan, I have spoken with you about this for, say, the past 2 years (maybe even more) and besides the many words of promiss not much has changed or happened in the field of documentation.
I reckon Jo did his fair share of work as evidenced by the function node reference and the documentation of the upcoming animation module which some of us have the privilege to see (and work with) already.

So that's the reason for starting this. Somehow, the community (these forums) and it's pioneers/alpha-testers (alpha testers forum, 2 year IM) can't seem to get the documentation being finished and delivered. This is a pretty serious problem.

To get back to the message quoted above:
I wonder why you mention the documentation of the animation module (which is not officially available yet) as an achievement here in reply to sounds of criticism (by Elipsis1).
People don't have it yet, so it's not relevant and not completely honest towards them if you'd ask me, just bait to keep people satisfied and these type of replies are very typical when people inform about the documentation process.

This software is out for almost 5,5(!!) years now and documentation is still pretty meager and can't even keep up with the pace of development (except for the documentation by Jo), which isn't rather fast as well, but that's a whole other discussion of course. That's pretty shameful in my opinion.
In the future development on TG3 will start and as things look now documentation on TG2 still won't be available then.

I think it's very fair of people to demand final documentation now after so many promising words but little acts during the existence of TG2 for >5 years.
The vast majority of topics/posts here are mostly due to lack of documentation and a significant part (of those) are complaints about the absent documentation.
I'm curious what the outcome will be of a poll asking people whether they'd like a version upgrade or a complete official documentation?

In this already lengthy post I haven't even dealt with the possible loss/lack of growth of the TG2 userbase or the potential commercial use of TG2 because of this documentation issue.
I hope others will share their thoughts/opinion here and especially Planetside on their real plans for documentation other than the usual excuses and promising words.

Cheers,
Martin

I don't have as good of a relationship with Oshyan and the Planetside staff as you do, TU.  So, I can't quite address the depths of what you are saying here to the Planetside staff.  But, I agree with this - having documentation nailed down is a strength of appeal to any software package.

That said, I believe we have a lot of information on this site - lots of files, lots of how-to, lots of open experimentation and even some documentation to help someone begin from a new user start.  I think the poignant, and even pressing, issue for you is the realistic fact that you are answering almost every user post where someone has a question here.  You are a storehouse of knowledge of TG and this is evident in how well you answer everyone and how articulate you are in your answers.  You answer new and seasoned users with as much information as is possible and usually give us more than we ask for, which is wonderful.

So...I'm thinking you are feeling this lack of documentation even more than most of us here, though others help with user questions, too, and probably feel what I'm pointing out.  I imagine if I were you, I would not want to feel that I'm the living documentation for TG and that having some good documentation and how-to manuals available are key to the prosperity of Terragen.  With this, I agree wholeheartedly.

Thanks for posting something so important to you and so helpful to the community.

Thank you Rob :)

I did not address anything specifically from my relationship with/to the Planetside staff.
I used the fact that I, but also quite some other long period/experienced users, speak with Oshyan/PS on a relatively intensive basis as an argument.
The argument that all you users here who requested for documentation for ages now plus guys like me discussing this with Planetside directly, all together, can't seem to get this issue moving.

Quote
So...I'm thinking you are feeling this lack of documentation even more than most of us here, though others help with user questions, too, and probably feel what I'm pointing out.  I imagine if I were you, I would not want to feel that I'm the living documentation for TG and that having some good documentation and how-to manuals available are key to the prosperity of Terragen.  With this, I agree wholeheartedly.

Yes, this is partially the case. Though Oshyan probably likes to use this now as being 'THE reason' for me. Which it is not.
The point is: if this glorious product wants te evolve, you need proper documentation.
Exactly like you said.

Quote
Thanks for posting something so important to you and so helpful to the community.

Thanks for your support. I must say I was (still am) quite reluctant to post this, hence I considered it for quite some time.
If this topic will be helpful to the community? Time will tell.

Hi Martin,

We're fully aware of the issues surrounding documentation. Believe it or not we're working on it right now. We have experienced some setbacks in the past which slowed things up but that's the past. The node reference has been slowly but steadily filling up over the past few months. The window reference has been expanded. Preferences and menu docs have been updated. An Input Settings reference was added. Documentation has been added for many of the new features in v2.4.

You bring up the animation module documentation. I don't think Oshyan mentioning that is being evasive at all. It represents a significant amount of work and it's important to have documentation in place so that people can quickly get up to speed with what is a significant new chunk of TG2. We could have chosen to keep it private until the 2.4 release but decided to put it up sooner (although we haven't really talked about it) because we thought people might be interested in it and it was a bit more convenient to do it that way. That's it, no conspiracy or ulterior motives. I don't think it's very fair to complain about documentation and then criticise us for having it!

The fact is that time spent documenting the animation module is also time not spent documenting the nodes, for example. That's the tradeoff we have to make though. In this case we thought it was important to hit the ground running with documentation for this and other new features in v2.4 precisely because we do know we haven't done a great job of documentation to date and we're aiming to make things better.

It's not a fast process writing the documentation. I'm in the middle of doing the Surface Layer node at the moment and it's a good many hours work. Some of the simpler nodes can take nearly as long if there's graphics needed to explain what the node does.

Believe me the documentation is a big issue for us too. We completely understand all the points you bring up. I personally find the lack of documentation frustrating as I don't know what everything does by any means and it would be great to just look it up!

Regards,

Jo

If at any point it becomes a question of, which items to finish first. I would vote for the *?* icons in the node windows to be finished first. Just from my perspective now, I think this product feature would give me the most immediate benefit.

On the other hand I would like to point out, as a new learner of 3D, that other 3D programs often have better documentation but are still harder to learn because they lack this kind of community. As Calico pointed out, you T-U and everyone else here go a long way to making up for any lack of documentation. (I'm Speaking as a student here more than anything). So yes, I would love to have some comprehensive documentation to drown in for a while, but I hope that it would never be used (some how) as a replacement for the kind of personal instruction I get from Oshyan and T-U and others. It is a simple fact (of experience) that if what I received from this community was sold at a university it would cost thousands of dollars per person, and I would still not get as much personal help from a teacher. To me, this is the overriding value of TG2.

I'm probably not adding much to the conversation here, but I can only speak from a limited point of view on this subject. I guess my (selfish nature) leads me to ask two questions:
1) Will I be able to understand the in-depth documentation T-U is talking about?
AND
2) Will having this documentation, and understanding it, help me to find work using TG2 as a professional?

Quote from: TheBadger on March 12, 2012, 09:03:50 PM
If at any point it becomes a question of, which items to finish first. I would vote for the *?* icons in the node windows to be finished first. Just from my perspective now, I think this product feature would give me the most immediate benefit.

The "?" buttons link to the node reference which we are slowly but steadily filling out.

In answer to your questions:

1) We are certainly trying to make the documentation easily understandable. Where possible we will include things like images, movies and example files to help you understand a node better. Here are some examples:

http://www.planetside.co.uk/wiki/index.php/Crater_Shader (movies from links, will change so they display inline)
http://www.planetside.co.uk/wiki/index.php/Shader_Array
http://www.planetside.co.uk/wiki/index.php/Heightfield_Clip_Vertical

Those sorts of things in addition to the text do take quite a lot of time so the emphasis will be on (hopefully) understandable text documentation with extras to follow over time.

That doesn't necessarily mean we're explaining every single thing in minute detail. There are some concepts like normals or displacement for example which are common amongst all 3D work and which you can easily find out more about by doing a web search. Down the track we may write about these things in a TG2 context but they are basics which can be found out about pretty easily and so we'll concentrate on TG2 specific things initially.

2) Perhaps, if it helps you to become a more effective TG2 user, which we hope it will. Of course your creativity and ability will play a major part in that as well.

Regards,

Jo

Side note:  Let's never forget what the world was like without TG2.  I remember TG1.  Once TG2 is actually completed and Matt says, "Now it's time to move on.", perhaps then the documentation will be readily available from a base software program without possible tweaks - this makes documenting a package much more sensible and definitely makes the work simpler.

[reading animation documentation now...heehee!!]

I brought up the animation system documentation because it is the first real example of "document before you release", which is what I would think is exactly what you want. It seems your take on what I said speaks more to a seeming distrust of Planetside (or me) on your part than any deception on mine, and that's a bit confusing to me considering your evident devotion (which we appreciate, of course).

In any case the animation system docs represent an intended new approach that, while not comprehensive, will nonetheless have an increasing impact on future releases. In other words major new features should be better and better documented *as soon as they become available*. Taking care of documenting old features is also being very actively worked on, as Jo mentioned, and big thanks go to him for that as he's taking significant time to do it, time which could be spend developing or doing other work.

Martin, since you've put your questions so pointedly here, I'll try to be as straight and clear as possible:

We've gone through multiple systems for the documentation and some bad decisions have been made (mostly by me) regarding how to do it. We have now found what we believe, and what is proving to be, a good system to handle documentation long-term. It addresses the major need for interlinked documentation that can be updated easily and quickly by multiple people (removing the bottleneck of a single person doing docs). It's also an expandable system, allowing us to add new features like video, etc. We feel it is a good basis on which to build.

Documentation has primarily been my responsibility and I have not attended to it nearly as much as I should have, plain and simple. Remember all those years of "There will be another Terragen (0.9) release soon!" or "TG2 final is coming!"? Matt never said those things because he wanted to lead anyone one, he really thought it would happen "any day now". He had good reason to believe that, but things happen.

I have never stated anything about the documentation that is untrue, but circumstances change, issues arise, delays occur. I could simply stay silent when these threads up, but I do care, I do want to help people and satisfy the desire for documentation, and I feel like it's my duty to respond when the question comes up. Perhaps it would be better if I just ignore them if I don't have a major documentation update to point to, but it doesn't feel right to me.

Lack of time is a significant limitation in our ability to document this software. There are 3 total staff at Planetside at this point. 2 of them are essentially full-time developers (Jo and Matt, of course). That leaves me to do most everything else, which includes marketing and PR, partnerships (e.g. Ranch), testing (I tend to test features the alpha testers don't necessarily dedicate the time to), web maintenance, and of course documentation, among others. My time is also somewhat limited because quite frankly Planetside does not currently support a full-time living salary for me (living in San Francisco, an admittedly expensive city). So I have to do other work and balance it with my TG/Planetside time.

Jo is now taking time to do documentation, and that's great, but it's time he doesn't spend on dev. We could debate and poll all day about what people want more, new features/releases or documentation. The obvious answer is both. ;)

Another big problem is that neither Jo nor I actually know the most about TG. Jo knows a lot about certain elements, and can look under the hood at the code, checking code comments and whatnot, to figure out what some things may do, but ultimately Matt knows the most, by far. So there are limits to what either Jo or I can document properly and fully. Matt's time is most at a premium because he focuses on the beating heart of TG, the rendering engine, shaders, and associated systems.

Documentation is very time consuming, especially if you want to do it well. From taking screenshots and/or video, to simply writing out clear descriptions that can be understood by people who are not already experts in computer graphics, it's tough, slow going work.

On the bright side we are currently in significant internal discussion to address the documentation issue. This has been spurred largely by Jo, and he deserves major credit for taking initiative on it, though it is of course always on all of our minds. Coming out of this discussion will be increased efforts by all on documentation. As past history has shown, committing to specifics is often unwise. The proof is after all "in the pudding". So we'll see how the pudding tastes down the road.

Finally, I suppose that, as last time, you may feel that posting your concerns in this pointed manner has spurred things along and helped the situation. I want to make clear that everything I've said above is a simple statement of fact, of prior existing reality, and is uninfluenced by this thread and the pointed way in which you've chosen to bring the subject up again. I know you feel this is "the only way to get things done", but I just don't see it. We make the efforts we can and have mostly the same goals and desires as you and the other dedicated users, we're not enemies, and being adversarial does not, in my view, help anything. Speaking only for myself, frankly this approach only discourages me.

I hope that helps answer your questions and concerns.

- Oshyan

Well!
I see the argument here from both sides and can sympathize with Oshyan and Jo to a degree, having to work with such a limited number of staff (down from 4 to 3 now I believe), but as a customer and almost daily user of TG now for well over ten years, I do think the lack of pertinent documentation is lamentable. If Planetside intends to be a major player in the CG world (and I know it does) you simply have got to expand and take on more staff. For years now you have struggled on with less than a handful of staff and the impression is one of a hobbyist/part-time application, albeit an incredibly good one, that is just too slow in development (including documentation) to be taken on as a serious contender to the big boys.
In my view your whole strategy needs to be reconsidered. Just where are you up to in development? You've had alpha testers now for many years, and once every eighteen months or so we get an update to a product that is still in production after 5 years in this incarnation! (don't get me going on the 5 years before).
Are we yet to have beta testers? and when can we realistically expect to see TG3? I know you guys don't like making predictions (given your track record), but you do give the impression of extreme caution with regards to future dates and the number and frequency of updates. And before you berate me I do know the consequences of releasing  buggy software, but again it's all down to the issue of insufficient staff and not being able to cope with the demands of development, marketing, documentation etc.on a scale that keeps the customers satisfied.
Given your dips into the "professional world" such as the Paramount logo venture and numerous other uses of TG in movies, surely it must be possible to secure enough financial support for more staff?
Sorry to sound so negative but these things need to be said. The quality of the software is so good, it's such a pity that the rest of the package is spoiling the overall experience.

Hi Kevin,

TG2 is not still in production as such. It has been a final, proper release all round since v2.3 when the Mac version came out of beta and the Windows version was considered final prior to that. TG2 is of course still a work in progress but only in the way that all software being actively is.

The alpha testers are really a combination of alpha and beta testers. We don't do betas anymore as such. Alpha testers get access to new features which are very early in development but by the time a public release comes around we are confident that new additions since the last release are working as best they can. Some additions have a basic level of functionality which will be expanded upon in coming releases because if we waited to include everything we wanted to there'd never be new releases.

We do actually have v2.4 coming out shortly. We're aiming to get v2.5 out more quickly than previous releases and that will round out some of the new stuff to be introduced in v2.4 and also add a few new things. Then we'll be concentrating on TG3.

Regards,

Jo

Thanks Jo for your quick response.
Would be nice to get the Boss on here with regards to expansion etc. ;D

Hi Kevin,

We definitely have plans for the future but those are sensitive business information and it's not appropriate to discuss them in a public forum. Obviously we are a smaller player going up against one dominant player in particular but we are in it for the long haul and Planetside is not a hobby for us. I'm having a hard time trying to remember when exactly using TG was a hobby for me, well over 12 years now anyway! Funnily enough around that time I did work for a competitor getting their Mac version up and running but despite a big talented team in several locations around the world, significant investment by the founders and eventually VC funding that product seems to have been essentially defunct for some time. We're still here and are not planning on going away. It's true we aren't quite where we want to be but we're determined to get there.

I think this discussion has pretty much run it's course, from our perspective anyway. We do respect people's opinions but there is nothing here new to us, believe me.

Regards,

Jo

Whatever you guys at planetside do: Don't ever stop making terragen :) :) :)

I'm SOOO addicted!

Martin.

On that other thread you said "This is what you get when you release software in 2006 and after almost 6 years"

On the Modus Operadi thread I actually started posting a message with those EXACT same words. Then I just abandoned it, seeing it as pointless.

Just another point here.

"In this already lengthy post I haven't even dealt with the possible loss/lack of growth of the TG2 userbase or the potential commercial use of TG2 because of this documentation issue."

I think is is actually a huge key issue. I understand the difficulties because it does take time to write documentation but at some time priorities need to allow for it.

Agreed.  But, it sounds like Oshyan and Jo are agreeing with this as something each are ready to do.  Or are they lying?  Just time to get our posies out of our pockets - I'm counting on what Oshyan says and I believe Jo.  But, that acknowledged, I actually expect to see something useful come out of this.  Otherwise, I'll begin to believe that most of what we're doing as consumers is a BETA service for a larger picture:  contract work for major movie companies and advertisers, while we are simply testing the software's functionality while we minions are just having fun.  If that ever could be true, I have always believed it is not (except the fun part  ;D ). 

I trust you Matt and Oshyan and Jo.  And I love this software.

Quote from: efflux on March 13, 2012, 03:45:44 PM
Just another point here.

"In this already lengthy post I haven't even dealt with the possible loss/lack of growth of the TG2 userbase or the potential commercial use of TG2 because of this documentation issue."

I think is is actually a huge key issue. I understand the difficulties because it does take time to write documentation but at some time priorities need to allow for it.

Quote from: Oshyan on March 13, 2012, 03:51:26 AM
I brought up the animation system documentation because it is the first real example of "document before you release", which is what I would think is exactly what you want. It seems your take on what I said speaks more to a seeming distrust of Planetside (or me) on your part than any deception on mine, and that's a bit confusing to me considering your evident devotion (which we appreciate, of course).

Quote
In any case the animation system docs represent an intended new approach that, while not comprehensive, will nonetheless have an increasing impact on future releases. In other words major new features should be better and better documented *as soon as they become available*. Taking care of documenting old features is also being very actively worked on, as Jo mentioned, and big thanks go to him for that as he's taking significant time to do it, time which could be spend developing or doing other work.

Do I understand correctly that my >2 year old suggestion on the alpha forums to document "as you develop" is now being effectuated?

So, next time when someone complains development is slow you're saying it's because of documentation and if someone complains about documentation it's because of development?
Come on.

Quote
We've gone through multiple systems for the documentation and some bad decisions have been made (mostly by me) regarding how to do it. We have now found what we believe, and what is proving to be, a good system to handle documentation long-term. It addresses the major need for interlinked documentation that can be updated easily and quickly by multiple people (removing the bottleneck of a single person doing docs). It's also an expandable system, allowing us to add new features like video, etc. We feel it is a good basis on which to build.

What system are you talking about? If you want to convince us and give us a general feeling of that things are getting right I think you should be less "vague" and more to the point.

As a starter usually a good system is writing it all down (needs to be done anyway) and then PDF. Has that been done? Everything is documented and only needs to be ported to this yet unnamed documentation system?

Quote
Documentation has primarily been my responsibility and I have not attended to it nearly as much as I should have, plain and simple. Remember all those years of "There will be another Terragen (0.9) release soon!" or "TG2 final is coming!"? Matt never said those things because he wanted to lead anyone one, he really thought it would happen "any day now". He had good reason to believe that, but things happen.

I appreciate you admit you have your part in this documentation misery, but I don't feel you should feel that guilty. Unless things are indeed written up completely/PDF and only need to be ported, but somehow I'm unfortunately so sure that that's not the case?

Quote
I have never stated anything about the documentation that is untrue, but circumstances change, issues arise, delays occur. I could simply stay silent when these threads up, but I do care, I do want to help people and satisfy the desire for documentation, and I feel like it's my duty to respond when the question comes up. Perhaps it would be better if I just ignore them if I don't have a major documentation update to point to, but it doesn't feel right to me.

Absolutely true that you have never said anything untrue and that's not sarcastic. However, what is a little bit sarcastic is; what's not true about saying for years on that you're working on it and that it has planetside's 'attention' ;) I say those things to my boss too, but actually only when I feel like doing something I like better. See?

I again appreciate your honesty and the fact that you do care and feel it is your duty.
If you don't feel right about it, why not try to fix it?
This redirects us to the line above. You do feel uncomfortable by it, yet you have the decency to respond to it, which I find one of your strongest personal assets.
However, for years the message has been the same like I pointed out above.

Quote
Lack of time is a significant limitation in our ability to document this software. There are 3 total staff at Planetside at this point. 2 of them are essentially full-time developers (Jo and Matt, of course). That leaves me to do most everything else, which includes marketing and PR, partnerships (e.g. Ranch), testing (I tend to test features the alpha testers don't necessarily dedicate the time to), web maintenance, and of course documentation, among others. My time is also somewhat limited because quite frankly Planetside does not currently support a full-time living salary for me (living in San Francisco, an admittedly expensive city). So I have to do other work and balance it with my TG/Planetside time.

I know about Planetside's resources. This comes up everytime and like I pointed out in my starting post I was hoping to see other arguments than the regular "resources excuse" etc.
As you can read here below it has to do with a business model and ideas how to approach planning these actions of development/documentation/TG2 promotion by feature film work by Matt. With right/careful planning and discipline you can develop and document along. That's easier said than done, but if it doesn't work then it's one of those 2 things disturbing the process.

Quote
Jo is now taking time to do documentation, and that's great, but it's time he doesn't spend on dev. We could debate and poll all day about what people want more, new features/releases or documentation. The obvious answer is both. ;)

I've answered to that already above. Circular argumentation.
About the poll: you should have understood the message I gave by saying that. Of course I'm not going to start a poll, duh :)

Below I can read that after internal debate Jo decided "to do it" and this rather comes to me it has been a choice because of the lack of progress in documentation which wasn't his responsibility initially.
So I'm not sure where you're really going by saying this.

Quote
Another big problem is that neither Jo nor I actually know the most about TG. Jo knows a lot about certain elements, and can look under the hood at the code, checking code comments and whatnot, to figure out what some things may do, but ultimately Matt knows the most, by far. So there are limits to what either Jo or I can document properly and fully. Matt's time is most at a premium because he focuses on the beating heart of TG, the rendering engine, shaders, and associated systems.

Quote
Documentation is very time consuming, especially if you want to do it well. From taking screenshots and/or video, to simply writing out clear descriptions that can be understood by people who are not already experts in computer graphics, it's tough, slow going work.

Yeah I happened to make a couple of tutorial and 4000+ messages in the past 6 years with an on average hour a day or so online.
If I'd bundle it into a book it would be pretty thick, almost as thick as a regular manual ;)

Yes it's tough and slow work, but with planning/dedication/discipline like I pointed out before you can write/do a LOT in 6 years.

Quote
On the bright side we are currently in significant internal discussion to address the documentation issue. This has been spurred largely by Jo, and he deserves major credit for taking initiative on it, though it is of course always on all of our minds. Coming out of this discussion will be increased efforts by all on documentation. As past history has shown, committing to specifics is often unwise. The proof is after all "in the pudding". So we'll see how the pudding tastes down the road.

Here you go again. Seriously, you should consider stopping with spoon-feeding these messages to people by making promisses again and again and again or by giving people only an impression things are moving. History shows that the outcome is otherwise.

Quote
Finally, I suppose that, as last time, you may feel that posting your concerns in this pointed manner has spurred things along and helped the situation. I want to make clear that everything I've said above is a simple statement of fact, of prior existing reality, and is uninfluenced by this thread and the pointed way in which you've chosen to bring the subject up again. I know you feel this is "the only way to get things done", but I just don't see it. We make the efforts we can and have mostly the same goals and desires as you and the other dedicated users, we're not enemies, and being adversarial does not, in my view, help anything. Speaking only for myself, frankly this approach only discourages me.

I hope that helps answer your questions and concerns.

- Oshyan

Thanks Oshyan.
Unfortunately it seems that the people of this forum, including the more dedicated openly communicating ones can't get to you guys at Planetside as evidenced by you saying

Quote"I want to make clear that everything I've said above is a simple statement of fact, of prior existing reality, and is uninfluenced by this thread and the pointed way in which you've chosen to bring the subject up again".

Basically this means we can think/say whatever we all want in what way we want, nothing will change.
And you're complaining this makes Planetside look bad, what I'm doing here?

All the users here have tried EVERYTHING and in ANY WAY in the last 6 years.
The first time here I start a long considered message about it here, and although you may not like it how I do it, it's definitely not again ;)

I find this conclusion really disappointing.
Please everyone help me understanding the last quote in any other way than what I'm thinking now, thank you! :)

Cheers,
Martin

Quote from: efflux on March 13, 2012, 03:17:11 PM
Martin.

On that other thread you said "This is what you get when you release software in 2006 and after almost 6 years"

On the Modus Operadi thread I actually started posting a message with those EXACT same words. Then I just abandoned it, seeing it as pointless.

See my previous post. So I found too. This is really bad. However, I'm told to believe I'm seeing it all wrong :(

Quote from: efflux on March 13, 2012, 03:45:44 PM
Just another point here.

"In this already lengthy post I haven't even dealt with the possible loss/lack of growth of the TG2 userbase or the potential commercial use of TG2 because of this documentation issue."

I think is is actually a huge key issue. I understand the difficulties because it does take time to write documentation but at some time priorities need to allow for it.

I still won't deal with it. Although I have reasons to, because I'm now being held responsible for possible financial consequences because of this thread.
In Dutch we have a saying "bord voor je kop" which translates to something like being very short-sighted.

Quote from: calico on March 13, 2012, 04:17:14 PM
Agreed.  But, it sounds like Oshyan and Jo are agreeing with this as something each are ready to do.  Or are they lying?  Just time to get our posies out of our pockets - I'm counting on what Oshyan says and I believe Jo.  But, that acknowledged, I actually expect to see something useful come out of this.  Otherwise, I'll begin to believe that most of what we're doing as consumers is a BETA service for a larger picture:  contract work for major movie companies and advertisers, while we are simply testing the software's functionality while we minions are just having fun.  If that ever could be true, I have always believed it is not (except the fun part  ;D ). 

I trust you Matt and Oshyan and Jo.  And I love this software.

I trust them too, let that not be a mistake.

However, you have upright reasons to think and definitely say the things you've just stated.
For the last 6 years, in practice, the situation has been as you described; We have delivered funds for a private toy for feature film production with potential of being a complete product, some day.

I like it that you say that as it has not been the first time I've heared someone saying that to me, so despite I do trust them it's still uncomfortable knowing that others feel like that too. It should be of concern to them or make them feel uncomfortable people feel like this.

Thanks for sharing Rob.

QuoteWe have delivered funds for a private toy for feature film production with potential of being a complete product, some day.

So much rancour Martin, I'm surprised and a little disappointed.

I don't like to chime in on threads like these, but really, I've been following this since this morning and it's just getting out of hand.

I've been a terragen user in a professional capacity for some years now and use many 3d packages. The accusation above is so far from the mark that I felt compelled to respond.

Every software package has it's failings, this is new science, and nothing is perfect, I could also point towards the failings of many others for poor documentation.
But the truth is, as most any artist using these tools every day will tell you, we have to learn mostly for ourselves, it's only through usage and experimentation that we learn truly learn to utilise the tools we have to their best ability.

As a professional user, I am completely happy with the direction the software is heading, and am confident that with time, it will also become a more rounded product, even though it is already a fully functioning tool used daily in many production houses.

This thread should be buried and consigned to a deep pit, it smacks of bitterness and saddens me that a user such as yourself deems it fit to take such steps, when from everything I've read, Planetside staff have been nothing but open and honest regarding all these issues. I'm not just trying to play devils advocate here, the team here have been above and beyond all the other developers I've worked with when it comes to support.

I'll shut my mouth now.

Chris

Quote from: Tangled-Universe on March 13, 2012, 05:21:19 PM

I trust them too, let that not be a mistake.

Quote from: calicoI know.  I can see it and especially have seen a devotion to making this software better and you have given us all great support.

Quote from: Tangled-Universe on March 13, 2012, 05:21:19 PM
However, you have upright reasons to think and definitely say the things you've just stated.
For the last 6 years, in practice, the situation has been as you described; We have delivered funds for a private toy for feature film production with potential of being a complete product, some day.

Quote from: calicoI hope this is beyond what I'm seeing and just isn't so.  I can see it partially so - great to have this used in large production environments.  But, I really didn't pay money for that to be so for just Planetside.  If that were the case, I would have thought about it prior to paying.

Quote from: Tangled-Universe on March 13, 2012, 05:21:19 PM
I like it that you say that as it has not been the first time I've heared someone saying that to me, so despite I do trust them it's still uncomfortable knowing that others feel like that too. It should be of concern to them or make them feel uncomfortable people feel like this.

Quote from: calicoIt's sort of scary to me.  Not just uncomfortable.  But, then again, I don't know what people have been doing with their time and it really isn't my responsibility to tell them how to use their time.  I see similarities among smaller companies - documentation and advertisement are very challenging areas.  I've always hoped Planetside staff thought about us, too, as being part of a bigger family and I'll continue to believe this until I see something contrary in the assertions today about how we will have good documentation.  Let's go by what people do, as always.

Quote from: Tangled-Universe on March 13, 2012, 05:21:19 PM
Thanks for sharing Rob.

Quote from: calicoTU, I hope it works for you.  As always, I like how we can talk about things rather than fester bad vibes.

@Chris, I just don't like how you are addressing TU.

Besides, unless you have spent the hours TU has coming here to help new and old users with as many issues, then how can you not see how disappointing that is to hear someone say, "It's in the wash." and never see anything come of it?  That's disappointing, regardless of even the best of intentions and the greatest of dedication.  Hope you can see the point.

This is why I really hate these threads, everything gets out of hand.

I am not trying to attack Martin, on any level, and he knows full well that I respect his contributions and his art.

I am merely giving my own perspective, especially on the point to which I was quoting.

Like I said, more than anything it just saddens me.

I have no bad feelings whatsoever, for planetside, the software, for anyone in this community. I feel I got much more than I paid for, something vary rare in the world today.

T-U Listen!
You obviously love this product and this community! That is the only reason you can become so concerned about any issues you see. You obviously feel very vested in the progress of things. But it sounds like you are giving up, and that would be a shame after so many years. I have to say that even though I am not at your user level I feel very strongly about the software and what I think it will help me to do, so I share much of your passion. I think most people here do, just look at what elipsis1 wrote in this thread, and he has only been here for a week or two.

I think that you should take a breath, and talk to Oshyan in privet. It is completely understandable to me, how things can get so hot so fast. This is not just software! its a chance for a lot of people do with their lives what they always wanted.  Fix things with your friends! It has taken a long time to get the software this far, it will take longer still. But a long time is better than never! Believe me, there are many things that I always wanted and know I will never get. But seeing the things you want in the software seems like just a mater of time, even if its a long time.

I think that this thread should be closed soon, it is not going the way I thought it would at the start.

Thanks Chris. Me too.  Trying to help.  Hope I can.

Quote from: chris_x422 on March 13, 2012, 06:28:04 PM
This is why I really hate these threads, everything gets out of hand.

I am not trying to attack Martin, on any level, and he knows full well that I respect his contributions and his art.

I am merely giving my own perspective, especially on the point to which I was quoting.

Like I said, more than anything it just saddens me.

Quote from: TheBadger on March 13, 2012, 06:45:38 PM
so I share much of your passion. I think most people here do, just look at what elipsis1 wrote in this thread, and he has only been here for a week or two.

Passion is a powerful emotion.  Passion for something can often be accompanied with a lot of emotions that we do not consider "good."

However, when these emotions do manifest themselves, it is important to remember their source.

We all here love Terragen2.  (I sure do)

My passion for Terragen causes me to be impatient.  I don't know what something does, and I don't want to wait or spend hours searching the forum, so I have been posting a lot of questions.  You guys have been very patient with my impatience, and have been helpful and courteous.

Now some other's passion may cause them to wonder how many times they will have to answer these same questions?  I think the issue there is that perhaps they could be moving deeper into TG2, but instead of others to talk "deep stuff" with, most of the time there are newbies like me asking about shaders and node placement.  

Not totally sure, but regardless, passion drives us, and with that passion comes human emotion.

This is not a bad thing, we need to all realize this and try to unify.

Ok, enough "deep thoughts with jack handy."

I surely hope my questions were not the source of all this.  :-\

I cannot think of a better feeling, than to know that your favorite software is still under active development.

Apple and Logic Pro 9 are a prime example of this.  Also, I liked mojoworld a lot, but when it came time to make this purchase, I went with planetside because I knew it was actively being developed.

I'm glad to be here, glad to have terragen, thankful for your replies, glad that support does respond on my questions as well, and just glad that I chose this route.

So, here I am a lot of words later, just ready to keep learning, documentation would help, but I won't let it stop me.  I have gotten to know some great artists by interacting on this forum, and I am glad for it.

Ok, now off to explore and render :)

Hi everyone,

I'm going to lock this thread after posting this. It's not productive and it's not doing anyone any favours. I just want to address some points which I think are important though.

With regards to documentation, some time back Oshyan put a lot of work into building up a documentation base using a commercial application. This was what we were going to use to do all our documentation for things like the nodes. Unfortunately it essentially melted down - the application couldn't handle all the data. Even with help from the developers it was hard to retrieve much of use. It ended up being a bit of disaster but no one was to know. We'd tested the application and it seemed like the best option at the time. That was a setback. Eventually he was able to migrate some information out as the basis for the wiki we are using now.

The wiki is our new system and what we are going to be using for documentation. We will also be following a policy of documenting new features as they're finalised. An example of this is the animation module documentation mentioned above. With the animation module documentation my aim was to get the basics down so that people can read it and understand how things are supposed to work, the specifics of our take on animation. I've also tried to flesh that out with more general information that frankly will be familiar to anyone who's done animation with other apps before. If we were only concerned with CG studio users I wouldn't have bothered but I know there are a lot of other users who are interested in animation and hopefully it will help them get up to speed more quickly. It's certainly not comprehensive and there is more work to do on it, but it's a reasonable start.

We are also going to be steadily documenting nodes. Every week will see the node reference filling out more. We do need to strike a balance between documentation and other tasks, it's really not feasible to drop everything else and just do documentation even though we do feel it is very important.

Documentation has been an ongoing concern for us for a long time. We thoroughly understand all the issues brought up in this thread. Nothing about this thread has changed where we are are headed with documentation because we were already taking steps to improve the situation. It has certainly emphasised that it's very important for people but you'll just have to take me at my word that we already fully appreciate that.

Finally I would like to address the idea that TG2 is some sort of private toy that and we're using consumers as testers and a subsidy for high end work. Nothing could be further from the truth. Really. It's no secret Matt does work for studios on some projects, such as with the Paramount logo work. That's a benefit for the studio but it's also a benefit for Planetside and believe it or not all other users as well. TG2 as it stands is a high end tool. Working in that environment means TG2 gets improvements for those situations that benefit other high end users but these are also often things that benefit all users. A number of fixes and improvements have come as a result of that. There are also new features which get added that can be useful to everyone.

Of course Matt is one developer, I am the other. I can tell you I have never worked for a studio directly. I have only occasionally made changes for a studio project and those were all incorporated into the public version anyway. All my work is aimed at all users, but that's not saying much because so is Matt's. A lot of what I do is aimed at making TG2 easier to use. While I am interested in the CG side of things my particular interest is GIS and that sort of visualisation work. I have been too busy generally to really give rein to that but I am working on some stuff for v2.5 that is the basis for expanded capabilities in that area. I know it will also make doing things with real world data easier for other users too though, and it could also be the basis for some other non-GIS things.

The "private toy" theory has no basis in reality. Some people may perceive that it's the case and that's unfortunate, but I really don't think anything we've done should give that impression.

In some ways part of the problem is that TG2 is a pretty high end tool. We could document it to the nth degree and many people would still find it hard to get to grips with. They wouldn't want to read all the docs for a start! That's not an excuse about the state of the documentation BTW. We have always had the goal of a more approachable version in addition to the high end version and it's something we're slowly working towards, but that's a side issue in this discussion.

Regards,

Jo