[Chicken-users] Chicken and Cocos2Dx on Google Play!

[Kristian Lein-Mathisen]

Dear Chickeners,

I have been playing around with Chicken, Chipmunk and Cocos2Dx for a while, and I've finally got a demo up and running on Android. I've published it on Google Play in the "Libraries and Demos" category so you guys can test it!

Check it out: Scheme REPL with Cocos2Dx

The demo features a truck which you can drive back and forth, clumb up hills and fall down. Not very exciting, but I do actually catch myself playing it when I don't know what I should be coding on! The cool part is that there's a Chicken REPL behind the scenes.  You can connect to the REPL directly from your laptop if your phone is on the same WiFi, or use USB. Try Settings->Wireless Networks->Wifi Settings-> [Menu]->Advanced when looking for you phone's IP.

With netcat (or Emacs, with nc [ip] [port] as your Scheme interpreter), you could try:

> $ nc [phone ip] [port]
> Alternatively, you could use USB with adb and forward:
> $ adb forward tcp:1234 tcp:1234
> $ nc localhost 1234
> Once you see the REPL prompt @>, you can play around:
>
> ;; 'import' chipmunk bindings
> (use chickmunk)
> ;; where is the player?
> (body-get-pos truck)
>
> ;; redefine game-loop to pause game unless you're touching the screen
> (define (*update*)
>   (if *touch-down* (space-step space (/ 1 120))))
> ;; now let's give the truck a gentle push
> (body-set-ang-vel wf -20)
> ;; now touch the screen to watch it drift off
> ;; restart the app to revert your changes
> (exit)
>
> ;; You can also manipulate the physics-world:
> ;; Drop a ball from the sky
> (space-add space
>   `(body ((pos (320 700)))
>     (circle (density 0.001)
>     (friction 1)
>     (radius 10))))
> ;; Add a gentle but slippery slope
> (space-add space
>   `(body ((static 1))
>     (segment (friction 0.1)
>     (endpoints ((250 500)
>     (800 550))))))
>
> ;; type this to see the touch-down state:
> *touch-down*
> ;; it should be #f when your finger is off the screen, and touch-coordinates otherwise. evaluate it while holding the screen to try it out!

If you have an Android phone, it'd appreciate if you took the time to check it out. I am particularly interested if the app won't start at all, and perhaps what framerate you're getting (very bottom-left). I know there is a memory leak somewhere (thanks Alaric!), but otherwise I hope things should be running fairly smoothly.

Cheers!

Kris