Best way to grow community?

#1

Heaps seems like it has the potential to be a really great open-source game framework. I think that, like Haxe in general though, it has a community problem. What’s the best way to try and grow interest here? Some things I’ve seen in the past that work:

  • Documentation Jams — Godot has done some of these recently and it really improves external optics into what the thing actually does as well as helps people who can’t necessarily contribute to the engine core be able to contribute to the project
  • More/Better Tutorials — I was surprised in @ncannasse’s recent talk how approachable he made Heaps seem. Right now looking at the site it feels like it’s something incredibly powerful but maybe arcane, but that talk made it seem so easy/simple. Doing better tutorials here I think would help.
  • Defining who Heaps is for — I think an issue I see with Heaps right now is that it’s unclear who the target audience is for the engine. Dead Cells and Northgaard are big games by indie standards. Is the intention to only enable those people? Or can Heaps be used for “tiny” games? If I don’t have a project as big as the aforementioned games I don’t know if Heaps makes sense for me over something that feels “smaller” like HaxeFlixel or HaxePunk. Really stating the scope of what can and/or should be made with Heaps would be nice.

Anybody else have any other ideas? Would love to see this thing take off and see some adoption.

#2

Just looking at other posts on the forum, I saw @Beeblerox’s link to the Russian Haxe site which has a great Heaps tutorial! I think translating something like this to English would be great. What would be the best place for something like this?

#3

Hi @bacon

Regarding documentation I have recently made some efforts in that direction. You can read the latest version on https://github.com/heapsio/heaps/wiki , in particular https://github.com/HeapsIO/heaps/wiki/Hello-World which is a complete “getting started” tutorial

More documentation can be contributed by submitting :

#4

Okay cool. Do you consider full tutorials in scope for items that could be contributed to the wiki docs or should those items go elsewhere?

#5

For full tutorials on specific topics “How to do XYZ” then I think they should be hosted somewhere else. If they are done in Markdown they might get integrated into the Heaps.io website later :wink:

#6

Well, I have, for instance, spent some time trying to understand the camera and the camera controller, as well as the coordinate system (which, as many other engines/frameworks, ignores the axis nomenclature even though it respects the handiness). I plan (no ETA) to make a video about it; not a tutorial, but more like exploring code and using diagrams or schemes to explain a few features. The code is rarely commented (no offense meant) and some methods can be cryptic at first.
I guess community needs and contributions would eventually make enough documentation besides the API and “Getting Started” in the wiki

#7

I think to this point, @FlorianBT could you start a thread maybe on the forum of places where you feel like learning examples are lacking? That way other people could contribute through either tutorials or PRs to the wiki to flesh out those areas.

I think again the Godot Documentation Sprints were a pretty successful structure for this and they did wonders for Godot’s docs. I’d be down to help try to flesh things out but I don’t know if I know exactly where to start.

#8

I currently have other things on my plate, but I’ll definitely create a thread for this @bacon.
Doc jam’s are new to me, but it could do wonders indeed.

#9

I’m wishing to contribute to documentation, my English isn’t good enough, but i’ll try :slight_smile:

#10

Don’t let that stop you – I’m happy to review documentation PRs to help with English. Mention me @jcward on github.