Recommended Procedures for SCI Game Programming Coordinators

Subject:	Recommended Procedures for SCI Game Programming Coordinators
Date:	Monday January 30, 1989
From:	Pablo Ghenis for SCI Development Group
To:	Scott Murphy
	Corey Cole
	Chris Iden
	Warren Schwader
	All Game Programming Coordinators
cc:	Ken Williams
	Rick Cavin
	Dale Carlson
	All SCI programmers

As we approach the release date for some products currently under development, we can expect a greater potential for conflict among the following equally worthy goals:

• To fix system bugs or shortcomings and provide enhancements in order to facilitate further game development.

• To isolate game developers from system instabilities while the above goal is being met by the system developers.

The Programming Coordinators for each game can avoid disruptions in their projects by taking the following steps:

1. Create an isolated system directory for each project and load a stable copy of the system into it. Also create a backup for it and a directory for executables.

Example: >md \games\ice\system
>md \games\ice\system\old
>md \games\ice\tools

1. Make sure that all "where" files are written in terms of s: instead of \games\sci\system. Everyone's autoexec.bat file should contain the line "set sinclude=s:"

1. To save a version of tools such as the compilers and interpreter, just copy them to your project's tool directory.

1. To give your project's tools precedence over the main version, type in a line like the following one, which should be appended to all project members' autoexec.bat files:

pushpath g:\games\ice\tools

1. To freeze a version of the system for your project, type in a line like the following one:

pushsys \games\sci\system \games\ice\system \games\ice\system\old

This action might require the game to be rebuilt.

Everyone working on the project should have s: mapped to the project's system directory. This can be done by editing the user login file using SYSCON on the net, or by appending to autoexec.bat a line like the following one:

map s:=g:\games\ice\system

1. If the above step is determined to be premature, it can be undone by typing a line like the following one:

savesys \games\ice\system\old \games\ice\system

This action might require the game to be rebuilt.

1. Software updates should be performed and tested by the project coordinator at times that will not hurt the team's productivity, with enough time to rebuild, test and even revert and rebuild again if needed.

While the SCI development team will carefully test all system changes to avoid introducing problems, its very flexibility makes it impossible to test all cases. It will be the responsibility of each project's coordinator to follow the above (or equivalent) procedures.

I have provided the push*.bat and save*.bat files mentioned above to facilitate this task; they are available in x:\public\tools. We strongly recommend that all projects update to the current system version as quickly as possible, since the purpose of system changes is to correct bugs and provide significant enhancements.