Is MonkeyX1 still being developed?
Monkey Archive Forums/Monkey Discussion/Is MonkeyX1 still being developed?
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| As the title asks is MonkeyX1 still in development, as has been stated in other posts on the forum all it would take to cause issue is Google or Apple changing some of the API's to cause a problem with Monkey. Over on the MX2 forum if there is something that isnt available on MX2 they point everyone back to MonkeyX1 so it would be a good idea to keep it working and upto date. With Google changing the advert api's and IAP stuff and Apple with its IPv6 stuff i am asking if it is still being kept an eye on to make sure everything stays working or has everything moved to MonkeyX2? |
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| Well, the Admob banner module was updated for the new SDK last year, and is working fine. I don't know about IAP or Apple. |
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| I doubt you will get an official answer here but maybe... maybe... no. Well ya, Monkey 1 works and is complete. I know it gets minor fixes but what happens when a major change in any SDK pops up I have no idea... |
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| The last Github commit for Monkey-X was on July 11th, 2016, almost 9 Months ago. I have read several times user mentioning that M.S. considers MX done. |
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| Micha, kannst mir mal ne Mail schicken an martin.leidel@... bitte? Damit ich Dich kontaktieren kann? Danke! |
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| Hi Martin, Email ist raus! |
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| Gerry Quinn, the appodeal module is being kept up to date and it is a bit better than using raw admob for $ https://github.com/appodeal/appodeal-monkeyx-demo My main wishlist for official Monkey work is a gradle project target for Android and WASM target for web. |
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| What about that bug btw Soap? I mean Mark was somehow right that there is no real r26 yet for Android? Is this bug valid? Maybe "someone" should fork Monkey and continue to maintain it. Oh well... edit: Ah well that's not that simple because only Monkey itself is open source but NOT mojo and mojo2... Even though Monkey2 is completely open source. Hm. o_O |
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| There are several ongoing forks that I'm aware of. Maybe in the future they can be merged somewhat. If Mark isn't selling Monkey anymore he should open it up so we can properly share stuff with each other because right now we have to do it privately. |
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| I know only of Mungo. Which other forks are there and what about your bug with the latest Android tools? |
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| They don't have names, they are private forks, but they exist. Many commercially successful teams using Monkey have made a fork. Seems like Mark does a bad job with dealing with pull requests for Monkey on Github so if anyone were to go through the diffs and merge in useful changes it should be someone else who is super motivated and knows the source well. The "bug" with the latest Android tools means that until Monkey gets a proper Gradle project target anyone who downloads up to date Android tools will not be able to build Android apps. They will have to download the last good version of the tools. I've tested converting a Monkey exported Ant based project to a Gradle project and it does work. Making the Gradle target is just a matter of putting the time into doing it. If Mark doesn't and no one else does I will eventually but it's not a pressing personal priority for me just yet. |
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| Thanks Soap. |
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| Considering how updates have been handled with past products (Blitz), I would assume that monkey1 will still get critical updates. Don't expect new targets or features though. @private forks Yep, I have my own handful of changes because I consider them critical. They are really just tiny changes to core modules (lang, gl). Might be a good idea to have a central place for sharing those changes? Maybe others find them helpful as well. |
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| Yes. I've asked Mark about the license status of mojo. I mean mojo2 within Monkey 2 is opens source and I see no reason why this couldn't be valid for Monkey 1 as well. Sales are probably nil anyway. If he agrees I'd create a fork, and would maintain it with your help if you like. Of course under a better name (no offense but Monkey is not a name, it's a bad joke). Why would I do that? Because Monkey 1 is still my number one choice, I made 8 games using it and want to continue to create games with it. :) I have some minor changes made by myself as well. For instance I've added timeouts for the httprequest. Regarding official updates I don't think we will get them beside minor fixes. You cannot compare that with the desktop computers where one product works over a long game period of time. This isn't true for mobiles... |
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| Mark opening the license and making way for a community version makes sense to me. It would have made more sense to have mostly done it about a year or two after Monkey's initial release and put BRL in the driving seat to manage and monetise the whole thing but that's water under the bridge. As is there seems little to lose. Mark could still keep the "official site" and keep trickle income from ads, selling tool bundles, offering support licenses or maybe splitting off high value modules as purchases if he wanted. I'm sure if a community version took donations no-one would have an issue giving a cut to Mark for consultation or whatever. |
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| Yes I see it the same way, muddy. But probably we have to wait a few years for that to happen. :/ |
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| >no offense but Monkey is not a name, it's a bad joke repeating it a zillion times ain't gonna make it true, Xaron, but good luck with marketing a fork of a language without any of the mindshare benefit from the languages it's derived from. I'd think maybe certain people in here would consider something with the words "blitz" or "basic" in it will get traction but no, that's not what the actual issue is. The community just seems too insular and I hardly see any talk of this language "in the wild" in the places where it needs to be marketed to get any traction at all. It has nothing to do with the name :p I'm afraid the only projects which have a financial interest in keeping Monkey alive don't seem to have any interest in the community, either, so any source they're likely to maintain is going to remain closed as well. Whether anyone has both the skill, personal incentive and the willpower to maintain a community fork the way Brucey does for Max remains to be seen. The window of opportunity to "catch" a living, vibrant community is unfortunately passing, and it would probably require a concerted (ie: commercial) effort to re-invigorate. Re-branding essentially does nothing to change this except hasten the passing without the aforementioned backing. |
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| One option would be to make it completely free, but have a required credit "Made with Monkey get at Monkey-x.com" as a splash screen. Then pay a small fee (what Monkey costs at the moment) to remove it. That way it's open, and there is still a path to monetize + market for free. |
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| @Nobuyuki: I don't want to do marketing for another language, I just do not want to let this one die. I always have the impression that Mark has an aversion against making money, I cannot understand so many decisions. Monkey is still superior to many other solutions out there and yet almost unknown. I've spoke with Mark, Monkey 1 license is going to stay the way it is so there is no way of maintaining mojo public. I think that's one reason why there are so many private forks and I can imagine that there were quite some offers to include changes into the main branch but unfortunately as far as I see it, Mark is quite reluctant to integrate anything that's not made by him. |
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| He may also be trying to keep a pathway open for the replacement of Monkey with Monkey 2 when that's done. Soap, I just use banners at the moment, but I'll definitely take a look at Appodeal soon. |
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| No way. Monkey 2 will be replaced by Monkey 3 for sure at some point. And I don't blame him for that. Creating languages is what he can do best. I wish he would have kind of a partner with some ear in the community and some marketing skills... It's awesome how such a genius product like Monkey (and BB3D, BlitzMax before) can end in such a nowhere. |
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| Unfortunately there are many languages sitting by the wayside in the journey to Monkey 2 land. I still say Max had the most potential but sadly left now to rot. |
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| >Monkey 1 license is going to stay the way it is so there is no way of maintaining mojo public Pity. Also probably short-sighted as it means if anyone gets motivated enough to "rescue" Monkey they'll be forced to circumvent BRL to do it. Ironically, one route might be to use Monkey 2 to generate open licence native mojo libraries. |
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| The monkey-x license still earns revenue that puts food on Mark's table. The situation with Android is that for now you can't use the most recent SDK. I would expect that a new gradle based monkey-x Android target will be published shortly and that like BlitzMax and Blitz3D the product will continue to be supported in a professional and IMHO most satisfactory manner. |
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| skid that sounds all fine. And I'd be more than happy if that is true. Actually I don't need new features, I just need the commitment that Monkey 1 will be maintained and fixed within the next years. |
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| That's good news and I look forward to the new target. What support is max getting may I ask? |
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| @skid : Thanks for confirming this. :-D I've thrown my eggs in the Monkey 2 basket, because of the many great modern language features, but I still have Monkey 1 projects that I need to maintain, hopefully for some years to come :-) I too am quite happy with Mark's modus vivendi, although I do get the problem with fragmentation. |
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| I have been doing a bit of thinking about this issue, and talked with Mark some last weekend. He actually gave me a ballpark figure for a deal he would be happy with so I gathered he does seriously consider third party stewardship of MonkeyX as a good thing. What that would take? Who knows. My confused feelings on the topic are here as well as an invitation for those with serious interest: http://nitrologic.blogspot.co.nz/2017/04/evolutionary-pathways-for-language.html |
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| Wow, awesome. Sent you a mail Simon. :) |
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| Quick translation: you (and Mark) are looking for some 'investor' to buy out MonkeyX IP and grant it a future development/maintenance. Seriously, I don't know if there are online solutions like Kickstart/Patreon for a 'collective/crowd sourced-buy-out'... it will be an interesting thing - once every single elements of the contract is defined. |
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| Are there any news? |
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| I think there may be 3 of us including you martin. I am keen on being paid to work on it so think we should consider a commercial MonkeyGL venture with a paid up license to Mark for the mojo2 component. Also, Mark reports license sales are up for monkey-x this month. |
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| Thanks skid! :) So when we talking about "sales" for Monkey 1. What number we're talking about? 5 per month? 10? I guess that number would define kind of a buy out. |
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| Well, if you are interested, I might be interested in providing additional modules, tools, examples and demos as a hired guy or royalty based arrangement to anybody who ends up buying and selling Monkey x. |
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| I am keen on being paid to work on it so think we should consider a commercial MonkeyGL venture with a paid up license to Mark for the mojo2 component. Also, Mark reports license sales are up for monkey-x this month. Would the MonkeyGL be compatible with current monkey? Also would it have 3d? :) |
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