Teasing software, the question

Webteases are great, but what if you're in the mood for a slightly more immersive experience? Chat about Tease AI and other offline tease software.

Moderator: 1885

flying1
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 15
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 3:08 pm

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by flying1 »

  • Oh, you know, there are some programs for visual novels, if something as simple will be mixed with tease ai and have better interface, many different buttons, autocomplete, examples, if the interface was better, I think it could be more popular... If it is easy to write then you can port quests, visual novels, intercative books, add some nice stuff and...
  • Yea, I suppose that Tease AI also should become better looking, easy to use and have less errors in user mode. Why is it even showing errors in user mode now? It should write them in log and avoid them by switching to other string or module or pic...
  • If I were to advise :innocent: I would like not to make a new one, but to work on some app to write scripts for it or to work on bugs... There are not so many programmers here and a lot of scripts and programs, almost 1 program a person...
holaba_be
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 98
Joined: Thu Feb 16, 2017 5:53 pm

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by holaba_be »

If you want to undertake the task to write a new Tease AI (or whatever you want to call it), I applaud your effort and hope you make a great program. I don't think it matters what any of the original creators think about it (I do respect them greatly of course), but if you come up with a better result I don't see why other developers could not join in on your code later. I think most people here just want Tease AI to keep improving, in whatever form. Just don't go copying code wholesale and claim it as your own.

What will be the drive behind a new program is content. If you write an awesome tool, but no one creates the content; it will not get any attention and you will not be motivated to keep improving. So if you want to start, try to see if it is at all possible to keep the current scripts compatible with your new version, without hampering the new framework you want to create. If you can come up with a program that will run HoT and Miss Blue, you will get immediate attention from users. And then I guess it will depend on how your program evolves from there. If the script writers like the features you offer them, they might come over and we can see a real split from Tease AI, with faster and less buggy releases. I assume everyone wants the same thing here, so even if the current Tease AI code gets abandoned, I think they will be more than happy to just enjoy your software.

So by all means, go for it!
1234abc
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 22
Joined: Mon Jan 19, 2009 10:53 am

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by 1234abc »

I would like a Linux version. But a windows version running under wine would be enough for me. Just avoid windows only dependencies. For example Tease AI doesn't run under wine, because it has a dependency to the windows Text to Speech engine. So if you plan to do something like this please make it optional.

Did you consider to rewrite Tease AI in java ? It is platform independent, has many libraries and great tools such as checkstyle, findbugs and PMD. You can easily write your tests (junit tests) also.

I don't know how exprienced you are with big projects. So don't judge me if I suggest a few things. I worked on a few projects in java and the following was very helpful for me.

1. Plan your project very careful before writing any code. I would suggest making a UML diagram which shows the hierarchy of all your different classes with all methods.Make sequences for procedure calls to see if your concept is allright and not broken at some point.
Let you time with this point. The better your concept, the fewer problems you will have later.

2. If you have a working concept make an empty implementation. Which means create your different classes and with the methods names and its arguments. There are plugins for eclipse, wich will do that for you automatically if you provide them a UML diagram.

3. Now write your tests for your methods. In Java there are junit tests for that.

4. After you have your tests you can begin with the actual implementation.
magie686
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 13
Joined: Sat Aug 15, 2015 1:48 am

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by magie686 »

magie686
unfortunately I'm not familiar with Haskell. How far did you get with it?
If your not familar with Haskell/Ocaml or similar, you are probably better off sticking to a more fammiliar language.

I have a complete parser, basic control flow (@goto, @setflag, @loopAnswer/DifferentAnswer/AcceptAnser and script determined user answers), genre images, and X11 video support (there is about 1 line of platform dependent code here).
duck
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 25
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 9:17 pm
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Switch

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by duck »

flying1
I was actually thinking about creating something more general when I first started toying with the idea, but I think it would create unnecessary complexity. Even current version supports writing visual novels/books/anything to some extent, but I'm not sure if there would be an audience for it and, most importantly, if we'll have enough content writers. We'll see, if everything goes alright, maybe it will be one of the main features if people will be interested in it.

You're definitely right, a software shouldn't just crash on users and show them various error messages, it's one of the reasons I'm starting a rework. At first I was considering creating patches for the existing software, but honestly after viewing the source code, I refuse to do it after I saw 20k lines of code in some Form1.vb.

There are already some basic tools to help with finding bugs in scripts and writing new ones, but I'm afraid it's just not enough considering the state the existing software is in.

holaba_be
thanks! That's pretty much the plan :)

1234abc
I'm considering using Electron framework for the UI, so in combination with .NET Core you wouldn't need wine or anything, it would just run natively. We'll see how that goes. I'm not really that fluent in Java to be honest. It's similar enough to c#, so I could possibly help with the development if there was some existing project written in it, but I'm not sure about starting one basically from scratch. .NET Core runs on Linux, Mac and Windows natively and I've been a C# programmer professionally for about 9 years, so I think that would be the easiest way.

magie686
yeah.. I think I could find a way to utilize that code of yours, but it would involve me studying a whole new language and would slow me down. Why you didn't develop your port further? :)
User avatar
VanHellsing
Explorer At Heart
Explorer At Heart
Posts: 150
Joined: Mon Apr 12, 2010 10:07 am
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Switch

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by VanHellsing »

Don't forget that many people stopped using Tease AI, because it's so unpredictable in the worst possible way. I don't think there has been even 1 personality free of crashes or game breaking bugs, it's like a lottery. When you must stop "in the middle of the action" and start the whole session from the beginning again (sometimes even multiple sessions in a row), most people get frustrated so much, they don't want to use it ever again. Especially when many of them just want to use the program and either don't care about fixing the bugs by themselves, or don't even know how to do it.

I'm sure my opinion is unpopular on this forum, some may say it's selfish or rude, but the fact is, there are only 2 options - either someone starts rewriting it completely, without whining about feelings, respect to others etc., or the whole program is going to die like many other projects in the past. 1885 disappeared without a word 2 times already, so you can't wait for his decision every time, or even worse, abandon implementing ideas and changes because he came back for another 2-3 weeks after which, he disappears for another year. He said, if someone wants to take over the project, do it, but all I see is "wait X months", "he wouldn't like this or that", unfortunately, if there really is such a huge coding mess, someone has to either rewrite it completely or start writing a new, separate project and let Tease AI die slowly because imagined feelings and respect are more important than doing something with 1885's "legacy". You can always invite him to the new dev team when/if he comes back.
duck
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 25
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 9:17 pm
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Switch

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by duck »

A little update:

I'm afraid I won't be able to support multiple platforms that soon. I've explored several options today, but it was either too slow, too early in development or just way too unrealistic (I'd have to learn new languages etc.). I'll write the core logic in .NET Core though, so if there will be some multi-platform USABLE gui available, I could still do it in the future.
At the moment I'm trying few things to figure out how to develop this project the best. Wondering how to tackle situation about current syntax and stuff like that.

VanHellsing
I know, a complete rewrite is the only maintainable solution in my opinion. It would be a shame to let this project die completely.
magie686
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 13
Joined: Sat Aug 15, 2015 1:48 am

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by magie686 »

@duck

I originally started to avoid needing to open a windows VM to run teaseai. Once I got bored with the content, I didn't see any reason to continue. If content picks up again, I might continue (or try your port under wine), but right now, it just doesn't seem worth the effort to me.

Unfourtuantly, I decided to be lazy in writing my parser, so I don't have a CFG to give you. However, I do think what I have is better than the string-primitive soup that is in the original teaseai. Unfourtuantly, the string-primitive soup of teaseai means that there are a lot of corner cases to be compatible with.

I attached my parser if you care to look at it. I am not sure how readable it would be to someone without experience with ML like languages. I would suggest at least looking at the comments, I think I described most of the corner cases I ran into.
Attachments
Parser.hs.zip
(3.78 KiB) Downloaded 59 times
duck
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 25
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 9:17 pm
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Switch

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by duck »

magie686
Thanks! I'll look into it.
Ldroamer
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 50
Joined: Sat May 11, 2013 2:56 pm

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by Ldroamer »

If your going to re-write it from scratch one feature I would and I think a few others would like is the ability to create e-stim based teases. Essentially what this means is that for stroking and edging sessions audio files are played and the program starts and stops them as required by the domme. You can do this with Tease AI by playing an audio file and then when it comes time to stop playback by playing a null or empty audio file. Some e-stim devices can be directly controlled by a computer but since there isn't really any standard interface I think that it would be too much work for probably too few users. If the program supported plugins perhaps some enterprising user might write to support a particular device.

I have been able to pretty much modify the Miss Blue and wicked tease personalities to work with an audio based estim device (there are some glitches that I haven't ironed out) and I have created quite a few Teaseme scripts that work that way as well.

But bottom line for e-stim play is the ability to start and stop audio files as required. The playing of random files would be good too.

The attraction of this for me is that you can create teases where you can simulate the domme doing things too you directly rather than ordering you to do things to yourself. With a bit of creativity you can have a fairly involving experience. You have to like e-stim though and not everybody does.

So the idea of a new project is one that I would personally support and would use so long as I can create and/or modify esistin teases to work with estim. As I say all that really requires is the ability to start and stop audio files at the appropriate time during the tease.

Good luck with your project and I look forward to seeing it when it is ready.
Daragorn
Explorer At Heart
Explorer At Heart
Posts: 556
Joined: Fri Nov 06, 2015 1:16 pm
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Submissive

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by Daragorn »

VanHellsing wrote: Thu Nov 16, 2017 9:31 pm Don't forget that many people stopped using Tease AI, because it's so unpredictable in the worst possible way. I don't think there has been even 1 personality free of crashes or game breaking bugs, it's like a lottery. When you must stop "in the middle of the action" and start the whole session from the beginning again (sometimes even multiple sessions in a row), most people get frustrated so much, they don't want to use it ever again. Especially when many of them just want to use the program and either don't care about fixing the bugs by themselves, or don't even know how to do it.
That would be more a problem of the personality you use than of teaseAI itself. For example, spicy was extremely bugged and hardly (sadly) useable unless you put a lot of work on fixing the bugs yourself....but if you have a well done personality, i never had a crash due to teaseAI itself since a lot of months.
I use teaseAI a lot (previously with a modified personality, currently since a month or so with miss blue) and i never have a session crash or break, honestly....so, on that, i definitely disagree with you.
No new program will be ever be able to stop that from happening....the best thing you could hope for would be having more "safenets" that teaseAI currently have (those have been slowly introduced by me in the last 5-6 patches and cover up most problems) to prevent a session from blocking due to a script error....but even in those cases, the solution would be for the program to skip to a link/module/taunt when it finds an error...yes it wouldn't stop the session but, anyway, it would still ruin the immersion and ruin the "mood".
The only solution to script related bugs is having the scripter do them correctly :lol: , but no program can do that for them :-)
User avatar
VanHellsing
Explorer At Heart
Explorer At Heart
Posts: 150
Joined: Mon Apr 12, 2010 10:07 am
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Switch

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by VanHellsing »

Daragorn wrote: Sat Nov 18, 2017 12:29 amThat would be more a problem of the personality you use than of teaseAI itself. For example, spicy was extremely bugged and hardly (sadly) useable unless you put a lot of work on fixing the bugs yourself....but if you have a well done personality, i never had a crash due to teaseAI itself since a lot of months.
I use teaseAI a lot (previously with a modified personality, currently since a month or so with miss blue) and i never have a session crash or break, honestly....so, on that, i definitely disagree with you.
No new program will be ever be able to stop that from happening....the best thing you could hope for would be having more "safenets" that teaseAI currently have (those have been slowly introduced by me in the last 5-6 patches and cover up most problems) to prevent a session from blocking due to a script error....but even in those cases, the solution would be for the program to skip to a link/module/taunt when it finds an error...yes it wouldn't stop the session but, anyway, it would still ruin the immersion and ruin the "mood".
The only solution to script related bugs is having the scripter do them correctly :lol: , but no program can do that for them :-)
Sometimes personalities are getting too complicated because of lack of functions in the program itself and it isn't easy to add new functions. Nobody is adding new functions to the program, because people who can do it, are focused on repairing bugs, so those who want to create personalities, have to bypass lack of functions by writing overcomplicated scripts. This creates more opportunities for bugs and mistakes in code.
Daragorn
Explorer At Heart
Explorer At Heart
Posts: 556
Joined: Fri Nov 06, 2015 1:16 pm
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Submissive

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by Daragorn »

VanHellsing wrote: Sat Nov 18, 2017 4:54 pm Sometimes personalities are getting too complicated because of lack of functions in the program itself and it isn't easy to add new functions. Nobody is adding new functions to the program, because people who can do it, are focused on repairing bugs, so those who want to create personalities, have to bypass lack of functions by writing overcomplicated scripts. This creates more opportunities for bugs and mistakes in code.
Could you give me examples of what functions are lacking right now? cause, actually, there have been quite a lot of functions added in the last months (callreturns, useage of vocabs in response files, random teases domme, improved mood system, custom mods, multiple flags command, etc etc, just to name a few) and, honestly, we didn't even know what else could possibly be added (i mean realistically added....asking for stuff like remote controls, learning AI and things like that are definitely out of our league...but for realistic new functions? i don't see what could be missing, really...).

Imho, it would be much more useful to create some kind of program that helps in writing scripts (like auto-corrections of commdand syntax errors and things like that, which are what most of the time causes bugs in the scripts) than having another program doing the same things that teaseAI already does....but that's just my opinion, so if he wants to go for it i have no problem at all, obviously.
As i said earlier, though, i really fear that if the new program is not retro-compatible with the scripts we have for teaseAI, there will be very little content for it even if it comes out (it took like 2 years to have 2-3 complex personality for teaseAI since there are not so many scripters out there it seems, so i doubt it will take less than that to have the same amount of content for the new program).
The problem is that, if it is retro-compatible, probably it means that it uses the same scripting/commands of teaseAI (unless he is really really good at programming and manages to come out with some kind of auto-converter, which i fear is highly unlikely to be doable)), which would, in the end, gets us back to the same problem....bugged scripts
duck
Explorer
Explorer
Posts: 25
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 9:17 pm
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight
I am a: Switch

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by duck »

So, I've been doing some research and going through various scripts...
I think one of the biggest problems with TeaseAI is nicely seen in a script like this:
@NullResponse @Flag(FirstDungeon) @Goto(Base)
@NullResponse @SetFlag(FirstDungeon)
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Welcome to the dungeon #SubName
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Here you complete punishments given to you by your #DomHonorific
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP A punishment usually lasts 20-30 minutes
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Punishments are here to deter you from poor behaviour
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Punishments wont be fun, they wont include pain
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP You wont love them and thats the purphase
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Dont forget that!
(Base)
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP #SlaveName @If[Punishment]<[1]Then(NoPunishments)
@Variable[Punishment]>[1] @SystemMessage #VANC #VANP You have @ShowVar[Punishment] punishments pending
@Variable[Punishment]=[1] @SystemMessage #VANC #VANP You have one punishment pending
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Do you wish to do a punishment?
[yes] @SystemMessage #VANC #VANP #Good @Goto(Punishment)
[no] @SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Okay then @Goto(End)
@DifferentAnswer @SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Yes or no?
(Punishment)
@NullResponse @Goto(1)
(1)
@NullResponse @CallReturn(CR\Dungeon\P1.txt)
@NullResponse @Goto(Base)
(NoPunishments)
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP You have 0 punishments pending
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP Good boy
@End
(End)
@End
@SystemMessage #VANC #VANP
It's not readable, it's not maintainable and, most definitely, it's not easy to write. No wonder not many people write content for Tease AI, because most people would probably just go mad. To be honest, after seeing the state of the source of code and after seeing scripts like this, I can't help but wonder - how it's even possible the software even runs?

Rewriting the code to be 100% compatible with existing scripts wouldn't help much in terms of dealing with bugs. Sure, I can make sure the software doesn't crash like it does now, but the scripts will be still buggy and problematic to deal with. To help with that, I'd have to either create a VERY complex editor or simply find a way to make scripts easier to write.

I think it's not only that there are few content creators, but those who would be interested are probably scared away by scripts like this. We're left with like 2-3 people. Writing personalities currently takes way too much time and people see the creator doesn't really have the time for maintaining the project. It's not the first time he disappeared without a trace and I'd bet it's not the last time either.

Combined all factors together, I think it would be a shame to let this die altogether. Currently I'm working on a complete rewrite and rethinking all possibilities. I'll let you guys know when I have something usable, so you can give me some feedback on it.

Ldroamer
that sounds interesting. I think implementing the ability to start/pause/stop an audio track should be a part of a software like this. I'm not that sure about support for e-stim devices, especially not if there isn't some unified API to work with, but I think that should be doable as well, as long as there would be enough interest for it.

Daragorn
yes, that is true. Rewriting the software without any help with writing the actual content wouldn't help much.
User avatar
avatarbr
Experimentor
Experimentor
Posts: 1185
Joined: Fri Aug 18, 2006 3:33 am
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Straight

Re: Teasing software, the question

Post by avatarbr »

To be fair, you can write a plain text and have a TeaseAI script. With a few basic commands (@Goto, @Wait, @Edge, etc), you can have a small "webtease" inside TeaseAI.

Of course when we go deeper, these codes start to appear, but again, to be fair, if you remove the @SystemMessage (This is just to not show the domme typing) and the #Vocabulay codes from this example, it's not that complex to read, if you is already familiar with the code.

Like I said, we really don't have to many people writing scripts, even simple ones. We have a topic for people write just scenarios, and I would be happy to convert those in more complex scripts.

But I agree, TeaseAI structure can be a little complex for the first time you look at it. Modules, Links, taunts, flags, variables, etc...You can get lost until you understand what happens there.
Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 41 guests