It may seem like a detour, but I can assure you that it’s directly related to my #30DaysOfWriting for MonoGame: Code Camps.
Game programming requires tools beyond the compiler. I set out to create a suite of cross-platform tools collectively called Fanny Pack.
Fanny Pack is a suite of tools that I developed for my game programming students. There are certainly better products out there, but I wanted my students to have access to free tools and, more importantly, access to the source code for those tools. I also didn’t want the tools to look like poop that was designed in the 80’s.
Everything runs in your browser. The technology that drives Fanny Pack is vanilla HTML5 and JavaScript. That means that you can use the app from any operating system, using any modern web browser. You don’t have to be an administrator on your computer. You don’t have to worry about updates.
There is no server component to FannyPack. Assets are loaded into your browser from your local file system. Project files are loaded from and saved to your computer. Published resources are generated on and saved to your computer. Your data is never transmitted to the server. I don’t need to see it, and I don’t need to pay for dedicated servers that churn through data or bandwidth for that data to travel to and from those servers.
So, Fanny Pack is a worthy project on its own, but I’m incorporating those tools into the book’s text along with other tips to create and publish cross-platform games at little or no cost.
Don’t worry, I’ll be plugging away at the chapter texts in no time. I’m not going to give up on my little project on the second day!
– Joe
P.S. If you’d like to show your support, I’d appreciate a follow on Twitter or Facebook. And don’t forget that while you’re waiting for the new book to hit the printing press, you can check out my 2015 pun book, Fauxcabulary.