[DGD] Fatal error when no user object returned

[bart at wotf.org]

On Tue, 5 Jun 2018 20:00:06 -0700, Dread Quixadhal wrote
> I guess the question is what role DGD is supposed to perform.
> 
> Is it a mini-operating system or virtual machine, meant for use by 
> professionals?  Or is it a tool to help people create games and 
> applications where they might lack the experience or discipline to 
> simply code them in their native environment, using their native tools?

I'd argue there is a lot of grey area between those 2 extremes.

> 
> If the person running any given server is supposed to be a 
> professional whose skill level is appropriate for running a 
> professional level service, then an unforgiving adherence to the API 
> is exactly the correct approach, since they should know better and 
> shouldn’t touch things the don’t fully understand.
> 
> If, on the other hand, you are trying to attract non-programmers to 
> the genre and give them a platform to experiment on, a certain 
> amount of leniency is probably appropriate.

First of all, the general thought that a beginners platform should be somewhat
nice and forgiving for experimentation sounds good, and I am quite on board
with regards to that idea in general. However, DGD on its own is not such a
platform for very obvious reasons (it is like a java vm without any kind of
jre or a PC with a bios but no OS installed, a tool for which you first need
to create an object library which in this case requires skills similar to
those needed for writing a small OS). Together with an appropriate object
library it can certainly be used for creating such a platform.

However, when it comes to breaking the low level api, leniency is not the
right approach, it merely means that problems will kinda kinda kinda stay
below the surface and this still unexperienced coder will learn habits which
are going to hurt. Its much better to learn the right thing the first time
around instead of having to relearn what you thought was working perfectly
fine many years later, and the more deeply embedded in a system the code in
question is, the more important this becomes.

DGD with an object library can be a very interesting learning platform, and
one that can, depending on the object library, be used by relatively
unexperienced coders to create a game or such.

But the object library, especially the low level part of it (/kernel) is
something you really only should work on when you are a very experienced
coder, unless you can deal with breakage and use that for learning. Its not
something to attempt on a runtime state that you care about unless you very
carefully tested it in some unimportant environment first.

You see, there are many ways in which you can simply lock yourself out when
messing with low level code, especially when it is connection related code,
and hence even very experienced coders should still test any such changes on
an unimportant test instance first.

Bart
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