hello2k1 - the comments are right. Once MS publishes information the NDA is not prohibiting you to say so :-)

Now, going back through all the info I got over official sources I can tell you quite a bit about:

SQL Server 2003
VS.NET .next (hm, ok, correct the name here IS under NDA, right folks?
Exchange Server 2003

and a lot of other technologies. Some of the infos I could tell you are not exactly "common knowledge", but I still could tell you about them without violating the NDA, because at one point in it''s history MS has said something about it.

One example? On the last teched (the ppt files are public or have been publi for some time) MS posted some sample code3 of how stored procedures in the SQL Server 2003 might look like when written in C#.

Now, that puts a lot of info into your hands :-)

Still it is pretty delicate to say real things - I mean, besides the DirectX 9.0 beta (which is highly public in that people KNOW about it) ms constantly has some nice internal tests going on, and then you really have to be carefull and keep your mouth shut :-)


Regards

Thomas Tomiczek
THONA Consulting Ltd.
(Microsoft MVP C#/.NET)

quote:Original post by torquel
2D is very nice for creating clean nice, classical games. Perhapes many of you just forgot your roots as children or something and no longer appreciate 2D? heh. (flame time right?)

Don''t confuse 2D as a format/genre/design with "blitting" as a drawing mechanism.

I''m finishing up a project that is 90% 2D on an enormous (~13ftx6ft) 3200x1200 video wall. It''s almost entirely 2D, but written entirely in D3D. Texture operations and pixel shaders give me a very high degree over global changes in color and design. Quick changes to constants and/or textures can drastically change the overall look and feel. I''ve done a lot with DirectDraw types of blitting, but the "3D way" is much more flexible.

2D as a style is great, but there is no reason that the implementation of that style needs to be confined to blits. Even if there was such as thing as DD8 or DD9, I''d still recommend the 3D way.

I heard it said that there would be majoy reengineering in DX10... Can someone shed some light on this?

Mindgamez Entertainment

CrazedGenius, I am curious to see your game.. just to see what you can do with it? If you can please contact me via aim, name constylulu. Thanks

Unfortunately, I can''t share much info/screenshots because it''s not a game as much as a very large browsing tool for our internal information. You know how James Bond and similar movies all have those graphically rich wall sized displays showing eye candy of maps and info? It''s essentially like that, but it''s a lot more real and not quite as cool.

The screen is physically ~13ftx6ft and is fed by a single dual output 4600 at 3200x1200. I''m using a lot of texture and blending tricks as much for flexibility as performance. The effects are fairly modular so that I can alter effects by swapping out fairly small and easy pieces (textures and/or shaders and/or constants). The short answer is that the same app done with DirectDraw would have been much harder, even though the app is heavily 2D. There have been points about texture size limits. Limits exist, especially on older cards, but I''m drawing an enormous screen with a handful of very small textures. The trick is to use small textures in big ways.

quote:Original post by torquel
When I say there is no documentation, I mean in the .chm file. I cannot find anything on DirectDraw in it. I can understand if they stop supporting it ok, but at least I would like to see the documentation still there? Maybe it is there and I just dont see it, I dont know. All I see is Direct Graphics.

The DirectX8 documentation does not have it because it is not a DirectX8 component. The DirectX7 SDK is still available. I believe it''s also online at MSDN.

quote:As for 3D being the way to go, I totally agree, but when you are one person developing a game, creating a 3D game thats even decent takes an immense ammount of time. 2D is very nice for creating clean nice, classical games. Perhapes many of you just forgot your roots as children or something and no longer appreciate 2D? heh. (flame time right?)

I appreciate 2D and in fact my current projects all use a 2D viewpoint. I''m doing them in D3D though and I wouldn''t go back to DirectDraw.

The cases where DirectDraw is better than D3D are very few (not considering the issue of supporting old video cards, DD is a clear win there). A worms-like game where there is a lot of pixel manipulation may be one of the few places where DD is a win. Though to be honest I haven''t spent any time trying to map the process to D3D, with a bit of effort it might work quite well.

Stay Casual,

Ken
Drunken Hyena