[gameprogrammer] Re: Browser games

On Thu, 2005-08-11 at 09:10 -0700, Kevin Jenkins wrote:
> Thanks Bob!  I will definitely check this out in more detail.  If it 
> works that means I can support the browsers you mentioned and not have 
> to rely on ActiveX, saving me both time and trouble.

Yeah, I wish I had thought of it sooner. Keep us posted on how it works.

It would sure be great if you release the modifications you have to make
to the engine to make it work as a plugin. IIRC, you are using the
Irrlicht engine which does not require you to release any changes. But,
there were a few people who were interested in helping. 

How much did the license affect your choice? I see that CrystalSpace and
Ogre are under the LGPL, which should be fine for a plugin, but is most
likely not OK for an ActiveX control. 

                Bob Pendleton

> 
> Bob Pendleton wrote:
> > On Wed, 2005-08-10 at 21:28 -0700, Kevin Jenkins wrote:
> > 
> >>That is exactly what I'm doing right now, except that I'm using Active X 
> >>to get it running.  Can you elaborate on how to make a browser plugin?
> > 
> > 
> > A browser plugin is a piece of code that lives on the users computer and
> > is loaded by the browser to handle a specific mime type. Things like
> > Flash, Shockwave, and Acrobat are distributed as web plugins, not as
> > some kind of down loadable content. Think of a plugin as being a kind of
> > dll that is used by a browser. There is an API that is provided by the
> > browser that allows the plugin to access objects within the browser so
> > that the plugin and render over/into the browsers window.
> > 
> > The original plugin API was introduced very early on by Netscape and is
> > called the Netscape Plugin API (NPAPI). It was supported in IE for a
> > long time, I don't know if it still is.
> > 
> > There is also the idea of a helper application. You can tell the browser
> > that when it sees certain mime types it should down load the file and
> > pass them to another application. The browser then works as an
> > intermediary. It just gets the file and passes it off. 
> > 
> > If you look around in your browser you will find where you can register
> > helper applications and where you can see what plugins you have
> > installed. Where you can find that information varies from browser to
> > browser.
> > 
> > You can find a really good discussion of all of this at
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NPAPI
> > 
> > Take a look at the following for more info:
> > 
> > http://www.mozilla.org/press/mozilla-2004-06-30.html
> > http://www.mozilla.org/projects/plugins/
> > 
> > And this link seems to point to an ActiveX control that lets you host
> > NPAPI (Netscape Plugin API) on IE
> > http://www.mozilla.org/projects/plugins/plugin-host-control.html so it
> > looks like you can use the same plugins for all the Mozilla related
> > browsers, IE, and even for Opera.
> > 
> > 
> >             Bob Pendleton
> > 
> > 
> > 
> >>Bob Pendleton wrote:
> >>
> >>>This discussion has got me thinking about how to do web based games
> >>>again. Try this on for an idea and let me know if it has already been
> >>>done. 
> >>>
> >>>Take one of the open source game engines (open source 'cause you can't
> >>>do this with the proprietary ones) and modify it so that it can run as a
> >>>browser plugin and register it to handle a mime type such as
> >>>application/x-irrlicht (for exampel if the irrlicht engine was used).
> >>>The engine would have to be modified to use the network for file access
> >>>and would have to have some security mods. AFAIK each of these engines
> >>>have a file format that they use to represent a world, once you have
> >>>installed the plugin you could browse to one of those files and enter
> >>>the world. All the custom code would have to be done in a scripting
> >>>language built into the plugin. And,the browser cache can be used to
> >>>keep the games around for a while so you only have to download them
> >>>once.
> >>>
> >>>How does that sound for an interesting project?
> >>>
> >>>           Bob Pendleton
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
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