No Mids for Mac...lame...

You are like one of those feline things that always lands on those things where they store their toes.

An zombie weretiger with a couple of bags to store the bits that fall off?

Nice to know. A while back I considered writing my own cross-platform builder. I fired up Mids, gave some thought to what would be involved in rewriting that program from scratch, and decided I didn't have the time nor energy to spare to do a project that size on the side. So I'm glad someone picked up that torch. I kind of doubt non-programmers who use any of the planners can appreciate the amount of time and effort that must have gone into them.

As an aside I'm curious what language/tech you're using to build the cross-platform version.

Java, mostly customized L&F of swing, and custom swing components. It's really the simplest answer for cross-platform compatibility. Unfortunately, there's nothing like WinForms' designer view, so getting everything set up is harder for me than it should have been for Midnights originally.

I'm also using a fully relational database to store the information in (Apache Derby, which is also Java-based, so there's no compatibility issues), rather than a mix of binary and flat files like current Mids' does. There's a bit of overhead, but it makes my job easier and lends itself to a redesign of the database editor which I think is really slick. Specifically, the db stores the "official" information, and then stores the changes the users makes to that information; you don't get to actually modify the database, but your additions/modifications/deletions are reflected in the program regardless. The advantages here is that updates to the program don't automatically cause conflicts with changes you've made, and the entire process of reverting a change back to the "official" values is to simply delete an edit from the db.
(Edit: For those interested in the technicalities of this process, look up Outer Join)

OSX is essentially a non-standard BSD distribution running a on top of a Microkernel (though, with the advent of x86, this may have changed to a more standard, monolithic BSD x86 kernel, I don't know, as I don't dig into OSX or OSx86 at all).

And no. Currently there are several .NET features that simply aren't supported on WINE yet.

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

OS X is still running on top of the Mach kernel, which is basically the legacy of Steve Jobs's use of it for NeXTSTEP.

So if WINE is out of the picture (and presumably also CrossOver), has anyone tried experimenting with virtualization, such as the open source VirtualBox? The acid test would be the performance level for simultaneously running the Ciderized CoH in OS X with the Mids in the virtual box of one's choice.

And if this seems excessive tinkering, please bear in mind that one of the differences between (stereotypical) Mac users and Windows users is that the former prefer a smoothly running environment for their computer - the "whole widget", so to speak - whereas the latter are interested in running particular programs above all else, e.g. specific video games.

So you're left outer joining the "Official" table to the "User Changes" table and if the "User" table value isn't null then using that?

If you need testers let me know. I'm a Java web developer as well so funky exception messages don't scare me. I use Linux in here as well so happy to do some cross-platform testing when you get to Beta (or even beforehand if you've some reason to want to).

The tables in the user_data schema also have an additional column indicating whether the row has been deleted, in which case the corresponding row in the data schema will be ignored by the program. And it'll be full outer join, because left/right outer join wouldn't give all the information needed.

Thanks for the offer. I'll keep you in mind once I start testing things with multiple people

I think whoever it is has a problem with it, because "Mids' Hero Designer" uses the posessive form of "Mids"; since his name ends in an S, the apostrophe is placed after the S, rather than before. "Mid's" implies that the original creator's name is "Mid", while "Mids'" correctly shows the name as "Mids".

Edit: Also, you're capable of removing tags that you put there

Virtualization will allow you to run Mids (or just about any Windows software barring programs with high graphics requirements or high RAM requirements) just fine - I've been running Mids on a small virtual XP Pro image via VMWare Fusion since the Mac version of CoH was released. I'd previously just had a 20 gig Boot Camp partition with XP Pro with CoH and a few other programs on, but now that it runs under OS X I had no need for the separate partition and just deleted it and installed VMWare instead (since I already had an XP Pro license). Virtualization works because you're not just tossing the program into a compatibility layer or API translator, like Cider does to allow CoH to run under OS X, but you're actually running the guest OS as if it were its own computer. Of course there's a performance hit because your computer has to run two operating systems at once and has to split system resources between the two, but if all you're looking to do is run Mids, a virtualization program should do fine. The only drawbacks to virtualization are the reduced speed, greatly reduced battery life if on a laptop, and having to pay for a copy of Windows.

@macskull, @Not Mac | XBL: macskull | Steam: macskull | Skype: macskull
"One day we all may see each other elsewhere. In Tyria, in Azeroth. We may pass each other and never know it. And that's sad. But if nothing else, we'll still have Rhode Island."

More or less.

The name of the program is "Mids' Hero Designer". If I search for Mids' or even Mids, anything tagged Mid's won't come up. For the same reason, I try to avoid tagging threads with power combinations, instead, I use my two tags to label the two separate powersets.

I've seen, on my home PC, that when you tag a thread, it tries to auto-complete for you. Maybe the same thing happens when you search. I wouldn't know; I spend the vast majority of my time on the forums on a text-only browser, meaning that fancy things like that don't work for me. I may be in the minority, but I'm surely not the only one, so I try to make sure that the right tags are used, when I use them.

As far as the "Mids' not Mid's" tag goes - it was just a humorous poke at whoever had tagged the thread; no offense was taken or intended.

And as much as I think the tagging system has the potential to be a useful searching tool, tunnel cobra eggs vs infected bacon pie and other joke tags render it all but useless.

I'll even change the tag, just for you.

I'm not sure what you're referring to here. If you mean a visual GUI designer for swing components there are a number available.

Yeah, I know that I can change my tags. In fact, I did so recently when someone educated me that "cannon characters" was actually correctly spelt "canon characters". I do make mistakes, and I am willing to correct them if I think it really matters.

And I agree that "mids'" is more correct than "mid's". Since someone felt strongly enough to go and add the more correct tag to every post with the other tag, I will now retire the old tag as well and use the new one, as well as remove my tags from the old posts. Pretty sure I wouldn't have been motivated to do this to if someone else hadn't done some of the work too, though. This seems to me to be a somewhat minor grammar point.

I suspect that not many people are using the search by tag feature from the search page. I think it's far more likely that people are reading a thread that is insteresting to them, then see the useful tag at the bottom, (as well as whatever snarky or random tags there might be), and click on it to find more threads on that topic. This is just a hunch on my part, but I really do think that that is how it is working. And if I am right, it doesn't really matter what the tag is, as long as it is recognizable as a useful tag.

Those don't help any. But I don't believe they are doing so much damage that they render the whole system useless either. If someone is in the blaster forum and they are reading a thread about someone else's radiation/fire build and want to see other posts with other builds, they're not going to have a hard time knowing that perhaps they should click on my "rad/fire" tag rather than the "tunnel snakes" or whatever nonsensical tag there might also be. And in the forums that I do keep tag, the vast number of threads are tagged by me and me alone.

I like to think that someone, somewhere is getting some use out of my little project.

EDIT: Ok, removed all the tags I had placed. There are still a half dozenish that other people had tagged that way though. This confirms in my mind the idea that I was using a pre existing tag, as I always do if I can.

Some folks feel strongly about apostrophe abuse. Personally it makes me cringe when I see plural forms with an apostrophe, and people are starting to think it's acceptable to say things like "all those guy's over there". Better to do what little part we can, especially in regards to a proper name.

Please don't rag on systems. Just don't.