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Still alive in 2012

Sorry, dear readers. Or reader, more likely. I’ve been slacking off for the last few months and now my self-guilt compels me to update.

My work on a branch of PackBSP to handle more game-engines didn’t go so well. I painted myself into some of the same “massive rewrite” corners I vowed to avoid, and then spent so long doing other things that it’s hard to pick up again. On the other hand, I think I’ve worked my way through some architectural problems, and the silver-lining of having no other code-contributors is that I don’t need to worry about backwards-compatibility very much.

Currently my interest is on the Netbeans Platform, and how I might be able to use it to streamline PackBSP and break away from the limitations of a wizard-centric interface. Actually, my daydream is to create a bunch of Netbeans plug-ins that turn the Netbeans IDE into a Source-engine-related powerhouse, but with the VIDE making a surprise return from the dead, perhaps that niche is already well on its way towards being filled.

Lastly, as a matter of interest, I temporarily fixed my video card with the “oven trick” (8 minutes at 375 Fahrenheit) but a week or two later it failed again, so I may just put it up on Craigslist as a challenge to anyone who thinks they can make it stick.

Posted in Uncategorized.


6 Responses

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  1. Sam says

    Some people are still around, and still interested in your work. Keep it up, keep your chin up.

  2. mxttie says

    I’ve got to admit, I forgot why I subscribed this blog :p
    still enjoyed the update! :) keep it going

    btw, i’ve heard mixed success with the oven trick, a friend of mine did it with his laptop and it helped for a few days/weeks but eventually it also died again..

  3. Michael Morrison says

    Surely I’m not your only reader! :/

    Regardless, I’ve been looking into getting a patched version of packbsp working as a mass Res file generator for already existing maps on a nix system. There’s around 70 gigs of maps to resolve resource files for, and the last thing I want to do is to tag them manually. Do you have any advice for moving forward?

    I will probably just run the entire project under wine to sole the “windows hllib” issue.

    * sent from a phone using a terrible browser, email attached

  4. improvements says

    Packbsp is a good tool but has issues/bugs.

    If the .bsp map has .mp3 sound files “Packbsp” will list it as “sound-name.mp3.wav”

    “Packbsp” does not understand if the .bsp has a sprite with “.spr” E.G. materials/sprites/sprite-name.spr

    The “Remove Selected” button is buged and will not always remove the item that is highlighted.

    It’s unable to auto find OB particles in the map .bsp.

  5. Darien says

    @Michael Morrison
    Well, the only reason HlLib is used is to peek inside GCF files… And maybe a shortcut to looking into the BSP as well, although that’s a lot easier.

    One thing you could do is use something like GCFScape on a Windows machine to dump listings of files from the GCFs. Copy those lists over to the target machine, and change PackBSP to instantiate your own custom AssetLocator implementation, one which doesn’t use HlLib and instead loads the lists into memory and responds based on them.

  6. Kosuki says

    PackBSP wont compile with the MP engine. If I run it on with steam on, it crashes, if I turn steam off take it to the main load up then turn on steam it works till It comes time to make the new bsp then it wont make the file I get some BS about error and GUI, IDK, If anyone can help me with this please contact me at http://www.plaguefest.com or reply here I check it daily
    Plaguefest name is Kosuki.
    Thx