Hello everybody,
I plan on applying for Google's Summer of Code to work on DirectPlay4 support in wine. (This was mentioned on the ideas page, http://wiki.winehq.org/SummerOfCode). I've looked at the code currently in wine, and it looks like there is some work done, but a number of the functions exported in the corresponding dlls are stubs or partial stubs. Alot of work needs to be done to dplay to make it more compliant (or at least more functional). This would allow several games that depend on DirectPlay to work without copying dll's from a windows partition. So I intend to makes sure the IDirectPlay4 COM interface is sufficiently implemented and that it meets the requirements set forth in in the DirectPlay4 specification. If time permits, I'd like to look into the Reliable Specification for DirectPlay4, but i think implementing just the core specification will keep me busy. I've never worked on an open source project before, but I have wanted to for quite some time. I'm looking forward to contributing to a project that I've used quite a bit in the past few years. ;)
I thought I would introduce myself a bit here. I'm currently a computer engineering student at a University in the United States. I've been programming since I was about 13, and I've had all kinds of personal projects from a somewhat functional 3D game engines to a ray tracer. I was also chosen to participate on our school's team for the ACM programming competition. In short, I'm a programmer at heart.
I'm putting the final touches on my application and would greatly appreciate any thoughts or comments before I submit it through Google.
Thanks,
Matthew Canterbury
On Thursday 27 March 2008 19:50:02 Matthew Canterbury wrote:
Hello everybody,
I plan on applying for Google's Summer of Code to work on DirectPlay4 support in wine. (This was mentioned on the ideas page, http://wiki.winehq.org/SummerOfCode). I've looked at the code currently in wine, and it looks like there is some work done, but a number of the functions exported in the corresponding dlls are stubs or partial stubs. Alot of work needs to be done to dplay to make it more compliant (or at least more functional).
Currently all it does is to not crash apps trying to load it. :)
This would allow several games that depend on DirectPlay to work without copying dll's from a windows partition. So I intend to makes sure the IDirectPlay4 COM interface is sufficiently implemented and that it meets the requirements set forth in in the DirectPlay4 specification.
Good, the idea here is to finish up the COM interface and make it send the appropriate dplay messages.
If time permits, I'd like to look into the Reliable Specification for DirectPlay4, but i think implementing just the core specification will keep me busy.
He, probably not worth the effort for now. I'd focus on the core protocol. My guess is that we can get all games to work without it.
You need to think about how you want to go about implementing the protocol step by step and what game you want to be using for testing.
Have you played with the DirectPlay dissector in Wireshark already? You need to get Wireshark from SVN to get the latest, greatest version of the dissector.
Try and get some network captures of the game you want to test to see what the messages look like on the wire and how a typical dplay session looks like.
Looking forward to your application, Kai
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Kai Blin -
Matthew Canterbury