first impressions: I really like OpenComputers.
reasons:
1)
it's open source.
this is always a win for me. not because i'm a "freetard" that wants everything for nothing, but because i fervently believe that knowledge should not and must not be closed for [literally] the sake of the future of humanity [unlikely to be applicable in this context, but the principle stands]. i respect someone's right to keep their knowledge closed, but i'll always chose an open source product first given a choice, as it allows knowledge to propagate to the rest of society. "products" can be sold, but the knowledge to make them should always be free [in all senses of the word]
2)
its OS.
from simple things like how it recognises a .lua extension as an executable without the extension - thus making off-line editors able to recognise the filetype and do syntax highlighting for you - to its file structure methodology/POSIX-ness/ OS tailoring.
3)
the modular nature/cost.
sure CC is cheap to build and run - and i do like that for all the obvious reasons - but OC just feels like you've actually built a computer, and built your own computer. some may say it's
too expensive, but since all the recipes are configurable - that's up to the user/server admin.
4)
the oppm software repository system.
simple, thoughtful, damn useful. sure it's good to learn how to do a task yourself, but that shouldn't conflict with the need for a good repository. just because there's a library in the town doesn't mean we don't learn how to write.
5)
the robots.
they look cool, and [contentious issue warning] they need training.
wilcomega, on 27 July 2014 - 07:20 PM, said:
things i hate:
- the robots, its the worst, i mean like come on, a leveling system, its electronics ffs, if you want it to be better you make it better, you dont "train" a piece of pure logic
... i won't presume to know how much robotics experience you have wilcomega, but i've been building and programming them IRL for years...
all robots need training... i'd say 90% of something like ASIMO is training, not coding.
sure, there's logic in there, but the logic is there to build eigenvalues and fuzzy logic - those values are learnt with hours of training. even simple PID control of something like a robot arm takes a lot of tweaking, not of the logic, but of the K values going into the PID system.
training robots is a very real thing - i think the way they've implemented it within the realms of minecraft is a really nice touch. at least they didn't do
this.
)
6)
persistence.
persistence is useful. yup, i've written some cunning "stateless" systems which remove the need for persistence, but if you're not designing a stateless system, you need persistence, you either need to invent a state machine, or you download one... either way you still had to do design pattern boilerplate for the Nth time.
sure, the OC persistence might break in edge cases, but in those cases i'll shrug and reset my state. the most tedious part of non-persistence is the "oh, i've just walked across a chunk boundary due to distraction/ getting something, and lost all my work" derp, and it's lovely to not have to worry about that.
anyone that thinks
lack of persistence should be a feature which we have to work around [to show how clever and inventive we are] can give themselves a star in their report book to show their offspring in years to come ... the rest of us can get on with doing the things we need persistence for.
7)
they look cool.
OC's look and feel is to CC as Alienware is to IBM PC XT. i'm a big fan of bauhaus/form-follows-function design, so i've nothing against CC's look per se.... but it is fundamentally a box, or a yellow box [ coloured turtles aside, which are a welcome addition ] ... and as said by other folks: freaking holograms, voxel programmable holograms with pallet swapping [and therefore animation] capabilities.
we're a fickle lot, but we're also an artistic lot when it comes down to it... having things look nice/cool is a must-have in 99% of cases. most CC computers i build, i hide the edges with microblock strips and panels just to make them less "brutal" [ in the "
brutalist" design philosophy ] the pulsing network switches and disassemblers/assemblers etc of OC, i want to show-off.
so, problems i've had with OC? to be honest, i haven't experienced any so far, but i've only used it for a day or two...
... all this might sound like i now spit on CC, nothing could be further from the truth. i love CC... but then I also love my 80s Sinclair Spectrum which i have in a draw at home... i love my 80s Acorn BBC Master system for doing music on... but i don't use the former, and rarely use the latter anymore, not because i don't love them, but because there's now machines which will do it better, and on my first few day's experience an OC computer is simpler and nicer to use.
do i think that OC is a rip-off of CC? not in the slightest... sure, it's lua, but lua is ubiquitous for in-game scripting engines... [sure, as another poster said they could have used something like scheme to make it stand out... but even though i know both languages, i'd rather use lua than scheme] and other than that, the only similarity i can see is in the robots, but they're certainly not a "copy" any more than one could say a modern-day car is a copy of a model-T, sure they both have 4 wheels, seats, a steering mechanism and an engine... but how else should you design a car when the general design pattern is a standard. [ aside: if you want to see an actual rip-off, compare NedoComputers to RedPowerControl - i bet Elo' is shouting a bit at that one, far more than dan should at OC - however the difference there is that NedoComputers is badly implemented]
do i think that OC is "the end" of CC? well, i'd say it's certainly a warning shot across its bows... the simplicity of the CC recipes is now a feature more than it needs to be, i.e. it means that people can chose CC for simple packs, or OC for more survivalist/ hardcore packs.... but i'm not sure that's a good thing for CC. there's no way that making CC recipes more complicated
now will help that at all, that horse has already gone. the only way i can see CC being as important in future modpacks is for dan to come up with something revolutionary... however, i do think that CC is "feature complete" - barring persistence... and all the other features i can think of, the OC guys have also gotten there first.