WEBLOGS (Archive) :: Tucan Entertainment Developers Team

Hi there, fellow Readers!

Today we'll continue our Threading series with a **special** blog-post. It's more about threading techniques apart from standard .NET Framework 'real' Threads.

I also don't want to handle code-examples, I want to talk about several techniques I am currently evaluating here at Tucan Entertainment, which may be implemented into our EXCELSIOR GameEngine in the future.

If you know the Unity3D Engine, you may know their (C# based) scripting technique 'Coroutines & Yield'. A very interesting concept. As I discovered these features for the very first time, I wondered WHY the statement is called 'yield' and how this magically works 'under the hood'. Of course, this kind of technique is very interesting for the ambitious Game-Developer ;-), so it would be great to get my fingers on such a piece of code...

Yesterday, I found the answer, looking on a IMHO very promising technique, called Iterator-based Microthreading. This technique, which is intended to run on a single(!!) Thread, embedded in our current multi-threaded environment (multiple task-oriented work-queues with schedulers, communicating across Threads via an intelligent Messaging-System) would be the icing on the cake :-D ! I am sure, we 'll implement it in the future, cause there are so many possibilities of usage, which will improve our Engine.

In addition, we are also currently evaluating Microsoft's new Parallel Extensions for the new upcoming .NET 4.0 Framework, which may also used by our Engine in the future, replacing / optimizing / supplementing some of our current techniques. I love the process of abandoning code in favor of new techniques coming available. Indeed, I hate it, really! It reminds me on our old EXCELSIOR Toolset, which we had rewritten from scratch five times :-( !

Another interesting approach are Mono's Continuations, which are so closely tied to the Runtime, that they are only available on Mono (Continuations won't run on MS .NET Framework).

I will refer to this Blog-Post later this year, when we have made decisions on our Final Engine-Design. As for now, I will leave it up to you, making the right conclusions, which technique(s) to use or to combine. Please mail me your thoughts if you'd like.

Posted at 8:37 PM

Posted at 3:11 PM

It's always funny on the Web. If it comes to Multi-Threading, there are sooo many wrong articles on the Net. Myths, rumors and wild guess can be found everywhere. I will write some blog-posts over the year, which will look behind the scenes and reveal some valuable information regarding Multi-Threading...

Don't get me wrong: I won't teach you how to write proper Multi-Threaded Applications! I'll only talk about 'borderline cases' and try to destroy some myths ;-) !

Today, we'll talk about using CheckForIllegalCrossThreadCalls = false;

Developing a Multi-Threaded Game-Engine and a Toolset for developing Games under .NET / C# is pure fun - believe me! Especially, if you want to use a C++ based Render-Engine, which should run (render) on its own Thread, but render (its output) to a managed Windows Form (or managed Control), which runs on the UI-Thread.

Just search on the Net for Multi-Threading + UI-Thread and you'll get some interesting articles as a result. Nearly every article speaks about: 'Never use a Control from a thread other than the UI-Thread (startup-thread).' - of course, it's not clever trying to use Controls from outside the UI-Thread as they ARE NOT THREAD-SAFE! Absolutely true!

(Managed) Windows Forms / Controls are single-threaded by Design, so you 'should' never access them from a Thread other they were created on (UI-Thread). 'Should' - I 've used 'should'!

I recommend to read Daniel Appleman's Book: Moving to VB .NET: Strategies, Concepts, and Code. Okay, it's 'old' and about VB.NET (not C# ;-) !), but it features an interesting chapter about .NET and Threading. These were the days (back in 2001) when the .NET Framework had been in its Beta-Test. And these were also the days of the Visual Basic coders, mainly developing Business Applications, which were easier and faster to develop using Visual Basic than C++. The VB coders could do nearly everything: accessing the WinAPI, using the MTS (huh! what's that? Microsoft Transaction Server ;-) ! ...or should I say COM+ Server? ...or better Application Server, for the younger ones among us?), etc.
But one big thing had been missing - the use of Multi-Threading! So, most of the former VB Coders eagerly awaited the release of the .NET Framework, to be able to write multi-threaded applications with VB.NET.
Mr. Appleman advises in his book to be very careful with threads and to not consider Multi-Threading as an all-purpose 'weapon' doing concurrent things (tasks) easily. You should really read it! IMHO, his 'warnings' were addressed to the 'normal' average VB Coder and were made to prevent them from using threads without the necessary understanding of what's really going on (under the hood).

Back to topic! Using the WinAPI (i.e. with C++) there are NO restrictions accessing Forms / Controls from different threads! And: using the 'old' .NET Framework 1.x, there is no such thing called 'CheckForIllegalCrossThreadCalls'! WTH has this been introduced in .NET 2.0?

I assume for the same reasons as Mr. Appleman has written his chapter. To prevent the 'normal' Coder from doing dangerous things w/o having the necessary knowledge!

But I don't want you to leave w/o providing you with the 'right' knowledge of how to write Responsive UIs with Multiple Threads by Ian Griffiths. A very helpful article and you should learn from it! As for me, I would design my UIs a 'little bit different' than shown in the article ;-) ... - but, it's really okay for Business Applications!

On to CheckForIllegalCrossThreadCalls = false;

You can and SHOULD use it! REALLY! But ONLY if you KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING and ONLY in scenarios WHERE IT SEES FIT! Forget the warnings about it and that MS has only put this in for debugging purposes.

In my personal example (rendering on a Control from a different thread) it's SAFE to use, cause I know (can make sure) that the Control is not accessed from the UI-Thread, ONLY from my Rendering-Thread!

I use it in the Constructor of my Control (not Form! - ...as I only want this control to be excluded from the checks!), like:

public Render3D_Panel()
{
   CheckForIllegalCrossThreadCalls = false;
}

It's a static property.

If you think I am wrong or had gone mad ;-), just write me a mail...

Posted at 2:45 AM

Hello friends!

This year I will post more nice how-to's - today I want to talk about drawing on Controls. I often see really bad made custom controls which flickers and don't show a smooth behavior.

Normally when a Control is rendered, 2(!!) Events are fired in order: OnPaintBackground, OnPaint

First we should disable OnPaintBackground completely:

protected override void OnPaintBackground (System.Windows.Forms.PaintEventArgs pevent)
{
   //do nothing
}

Now we need to set the correct Window Styles (should be done in the Constructor of the Control):

this.SetStyle(ControlStyles.DoubleBuffer |
             ControlStyles.AllPaintingInWmPaint |
             ControlStyles.UserPaint |
             ControlStyles.Opaque, true);

If you set no Styles, your Control does the following 'under the hood':

this.OnPaintBackground();
this.OnPaint();

If you are going to use Double Buffering on, it looks like this:

this.OnPaintBackground();
this.BeginUpdate();
this.OnPaint();
this.EndUpdate();

But if you turn on the AllPaintingInWmPaint style, we 'll get our desired result:

this.BeginUpdate();
this.OnPaint();
this.EndUpdate();

Keep in mind: If you are going to use AllPaintingInWmPaint, you will get a System.ArgumentException from System.Drawing.dll from time to time, which tells you that you 've used an Invalid Parameter. Obviously a Bug! You can avoid it by NOT disposing your Graphics objects; use private class members instead, like:

private System.Drawing.Font drawFont = new System.Drawing.Font("Tahoma", 9, FontStyle.Bold);
private System.Drawing.SolidBrush drawBrush = new System.Drawing.SolidBrush(System.Drawing.Color.FromArgb(162, 173, 201));
private System.Drawing.StringFormat drawFormat = new System.Drawing.StringFormat();

[...]

private void Render3D_Panel_Paint(object sender, PaintEventArgs e)
{
    e.Graphics.DrawString("Test-Text", this.drawFont, this.drawBrush, 30.0F, 30.0F, this.drawFormat);
}

If you have any questions, just mail me ;-)

Posted at 11:45 PM

Posted at 6:49 PM

Posted at 9:51 PM

Posted at 2:30 PM

Ugh! Sorry - I am late as always! But here we go. We 'll keep our promise and start to publish the Prologue of our 1st EXCELSIOR Book (The Beginning) to the public.

NOTE: if you 'll ever plan to play EXCELSIOR, it is surely a MAJOR Spoiler to read the Books. But our Development will still last for years, so you'll hopefully have forgotten the complete plot, when the Game gets published ;-) !

Just kidding - start to read the Book, you have deserved it for waiting sooo long... - ...and keep in mind, it's ONLY the short Prologue and in GERMAN language only!

The 1st Chapter called 'The Assignment' (dt. 'Der Auftrag') will be published on 12/20/2009 right before Christmas and the 2nd Chapter called 'The Fountain' (dt. 'Der Brunnen') will be published on the last day of the year, 12/31/2009, so just START READING!

Duncan, your truly 'Santa Claus' (late as always).

EXCELSIOR - The Beginning / Prologue -> DOWNLOAD

Posted at 12:31 AM

Posted at 5:03 PM

Okay, our Frameworks for Rendering 3D Scenes, playing Sounds/Music and Support for Physics are ready ;-), so our To-Do Lists got smaller this year...

We are now about re-designing our plans for our Game-Engine, not sure about our Networking plans at the moment, but this is currently not a top priority.

BUT - we'll have something for YOU for the Holiday season... - we 'll give away the first chapters of our Black-Book Edition of 'EXCELSIOR - The Beginning' for FREE - but, in GERMAN language ONLY - sorry ;-) !

If we 'll receive nice comments :-) maybe we 'll publish the COMPLETE Book for FREE..!

So come back often - we 'll start with the Prelude-Chapter on 12/06/09 - right HERE!

Posted at 8:58 PM

...but this time, I have no hat at the moment *lol* - need to find one first!

I am the man on the right - name is Duncan (as you might already know)...

Dragon Age: Origins is definitely and truly the long-awaited successor to Neverwinter Nights 1 - no doubt!

I must admit, I was very sceptic at first, but now I 've the 'feeling' of true RPG playing back.

GREAT STORY - GREAT RPG - BUY IT !

Posted at 2:07 AM

Two days ago I decided to upgrade from Windows Vista Business to Windows 7 Professional. I downloaded the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor and checked my machine for compatibility issues. Needed 4 1/2 hours to 'adjust' my dev.-station (removed some drivers and programs) and to make a backup of all essential files. The Upgrade Process took another 4 hours! After booting Windows 7, I noticed some strange behavior when trying to logoff/shutdown/reboot my system. It told me that one program is still running and that I have to decide whether to shutdown the program by force or to let it finish first (which it never did!). I found out that some copy protection crap called Tages caused these issues. My favorite Game 'The Witcher' has installed this crap on my disk. After removing/re-installing Tages using the Tool on their Homepage, these issues are gone! Lucky me: just thought about doing a clean install! Microsoft had done a PERFECT job - thanx to MS for such a GREAT UPGRADE system - I am really impressed how everything is still 'alive' after such a big 'operation'! Just my 2 cents on the upgrade process - will post more on Windows 7 after some days...

Posted at 12:43 PM

Okay - what should I say..?

IT'S AMAZING - these guys at CD Projekt ROCK ;-) !!

Just enjoy the video...

Posted at 2:53 PM

Okay - it has been a long time since I 've written about Part 1 (06/06/08), but what I had proposed last year, had only worked with a Linux Kernel <= 2.6.24 so far (and not perfectly, but acceptable). As we have moved on to newer Kernels (i.e. 2.6.30), some of my proposed kernel boot params caused some strange issues, incl. a kernel boot failure on AMD Dual Core systems (Intel still works fine). Also the correct timing can only be maintained for approx. 5.2 days till it goes wild (don't ask me, WHY this happens, but it does!). So we will iron-out all issues in Part 2 for the worst-case hardware-/software-scenario one can encouter, if it comes to VMware Linux Guest OSs under Windows (especially Windows Server 2003 and above) using AMD Dual Core processors.

1. We 'll need a new Processor driver from AMD for our Windows 2003 server, directly from AMD (URL shortened with bit.ly, will re-direct to AMD): http://bit.ly/wU2xo

2. Now, we use the DualCore Optimizer from AMD: http://bit.ly/14TLWw - just install it, no other action is necessary.

3. Compile your Linux Kernel with an interrupt rate of 100Hz, set pre-empting to CONFIG_PREEMPT_NONE. And don't forget to disable all Multi-Processor stuff (SMP/HT) before compiling!

4. Add two parameters to the Kernel's Boot-Params (in your Boot-Loader): clocksource=acpi_pm elevator=noop

5. Use only 1 Processor (added to VMware config)!

6. Add the following 5 lines (via Notepad) to your VMware config file (and adjust the cpukHz according to your CPU, i.e. if you are using a AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3600+ with a CPU speed of 2 GHz, just set it to 2000000):

host.cpukHz = "2000000"
hostinfo.noTSC = "TRUE"
tools.syncTime = "TRUE"
host.TSC.noForceSync = "TRUE"
prefvmx.useRecommendedLockedMemSize = "TRUE"

7. Install the Open VM Tools on your Linux Guest OS - Source available at: http://bit.ly/RR1cV

8. Have fun - you 'll be always 'on time' ;-)

Posted at 12:41 PM

Thanks to StartCom Ltd. - You guys are great!

They are offering the cheapest certificates around and Class 1 Certs. for free!!

We are currently in the process of applying for Class 2 validation to get our highly desired code-signing certificate. We have replaced all certificates on all servers (Web, SMTP, POP3, IMAP4) with Certs. from StartCom - currently as Class 1 Certs., but as soon as we'll have passed our Class 2 validation, we'll upgrade them to Class 2, too...

Microsoft has put their Root CA to the Windows Cert. Store last month - Windows XP Users should look under optional updates for the Root CA update. Vista and above will update the certs. automatically on the first request/usage.

As it comes to our downloadable/shipping products (like fMail Tools or fMail Outlook 2007 AddIn), we have stopped releasing new versions until our new Code-Signing Cert. from StartCom arrives ;-) ! Stay tuned...

Posted at 6:31 PM

We have added MySQL support to our new TE DBv2 API for the Windows and the Linux platform and we will soon provide support for Oracle databases on both platforms, too.

As we started fMail back in 2007 we designed our APIs to build and run on the Windows and Linux platform. But as the project advanced some APIs were broken on Linux, especially some DB APIs and the support for SSL/TLS streams. With our new DBv2 system we have corrected the Linux issues, but it will take a long time till all fMail APIs will use our new DBv2.

I am sure we will be able to correct the SSL/TLS issues on Linux, too. I am eagerly awaiting the day when fMail will be back on Linux :-) !

Posted at 2:09 AM

We have finished our first implementation of our new Database v2 API, which will replace our old DBv1 API soon. We are also evaluating the possibility to update our existing projects with the new API. Any new/upcoming TE project will use the new Database stuff to save development time when working with Databases. More infos soon...

Posted at 7:57 PM

Just read Chris Smith's completely unique view about F#.

Quote: "If you’ve ever written a .NET application and found yourself fighting against the language to get your idea expressed, then perhaps F# is what you’ve been looking for."

Hmm - I would say: "If you’ve ever written a .NET application and found yourself fighting against C# to get your idea expressed, then perhaps you should consider quit programming. To help us all make the world more bug-free! Thank you!" ;-)

BTW: you should read Chris' article - if you have any interesting thoughts about F#, I would like to hear from you...

Posted at 2:16 PM

http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=279508

BIND - the DNS-Server - had a very nasty Bug...

Posted at 12:14 PM

It's really amazing how buggy software is these days...

It all started with http://support.microsoft.com/kb/972890, continued with http://support.microsoft.com/kb/973472, made me angry with http://blog.mozilla.com/security/2009/07/14/critical-javascript-vulnerability-in-firefox-35/, made me cry reading this: http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2009-2479, escalated with http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa09-03.html, and finally makes me sad reading this: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms09-jul-ans.mspx.

WTH is there no better QA ?

Posted at 11:48 AM

Hi Folks!

We have made a few Polo-Shirts for our fMail Fans out there...

They will be available for ordering on our new fMail WebSite soon.

If anyone of you can't wait, plz mail to info@tucan-entertainment.com with the Subject-Line: "fMail Shirt" and I will send you payment information where to send your Euro 25,- to (plus Euro 5,90 for S&H in Germany, worldwide S&H fees on request).

And don't forget to include your Size, we have shirts in S, M, L, XL, XXL, XXXL, XXXXL and XXXXXL available.

Posted at 5:49 PM

...just wanna let you know that we have created an fMail Twitter Account: http://twitter.com/fMail_eu

fMail related News will be posted there in the future AND, of course, on fMail's new Home at http://www.f-mail.eu/ when f-Mail.eu is completed.

Posted at 2:00 PM

Okay - we have not accepted another Team Member since 2004, so this may come as a little surprise to the world...

I have granted permission to S.K. Nine to apply as a new Tucan Team Member.

We have assigned a complete fMail Sub-Project to him, which we 'll keep secret till its completion. S.K. Nine will be accepted as a Regular Team Member with the permission to apply for Core Team Membership dependent on the success of the assigned project.

On behalf of the Tucan Entertainment Developers Team, I would like to...

WELCOME S.K. Nine !

Posted at 9:33 PM

Hi there, Folks!

I'm sorry that I have been absent for so long, so I don't know where to start...

The last weeks have been extremely busy. I didn't find some time to keep you updated, but if you had followed me on Twitter, you should have catched up with some news at least...

Our fMail Publisher has formed a strategic alliance with ISN (note: you should know ISN, if you have read this blog the last years) to improve hosting and support for fMail services.

fMail is out to the public for almost 15(!!) months now! We have published 8 major updates/upgrades for fMail since then and are currently about to release another one soon...

We'll start a new 'home' on the Net for fMail products and services in the next weeks, so plz watch my Blog for the 'big' announcement.

The last 3 weekends were cruel. I had no time for myself, so I am eager to see the next weekend coming along...

I know, I have promised to blog more frequently in the past, so it doesn't make sense, to state this another time... - just let's hope that I'll make this come true in the future... - so long!

Posted at 3:53 PM

We have now added support for Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2 to fMail. In addition, we have added support for Virus scanning on these systems and on Vista. We have improved the creation of Virus Notifications and have found a Bug in Outlook 2007 :).

We are currently about to improve the NDRs for local-to-local delivery (external NDRs are not necessary as we only accept the right Mails ;) ). The Out-Of-Office Replies will feature a time-based expiration soon.

PLUS many other improvements - will be named on release.

Posted at 5:07 PM