Then how come there are often newbies here who DO have MingW installed, but have problems installing Allegro? You're not going to tell me they ALL get it with Dev-C++, are you?
Downloading isn't hard, it's what comes after it.

If we're dropping dos, we can write out the full name of allegro, I think.

Marcello

Then again, Windows 95 is (and has been for a long time) officially depreciated.

When the developers of a product say "don't use this product," that should say something.

[appended]

My tupence ha’peny - (sorry for the sideways direction)

Many new game programmers start with Allegro and then switch to SDL

This, to me, makes API issues trivial in comparison to AllegGL integration. The most important thing has got to be keeping programmers that face the choice of a steep learning curve with OpenGL+Allegro&AllegGL or a seemingly equally steep learning curve with OpenGL+SGL.

I can see it myself from that perspective at the moment since that's about where I'm up to now, I know I need to progress by using OpenGL and my perception is that it would be just as easy to choose SDL over Allegro+AllegGL.

I wont though because :-
I believe people here who say that there is little or no technical advantage.
I don't want the only game library that's good for beginners to die.
Although everyone is saying how dated Allegro is I think it's a strong advantage that my game can run ok (latest unreleased version anyway) under linux on an oldish pentium 333 Mhz PC with NO 3D acceleration either under X or on the framebuffer whereas Chromium and others run only under X and badly on the same machine (thanks knoppix). There's still alot of these machines about.

It doesn't bother me if the DOS drivers are scrapped and the focus be on OpenGL but (daft question) - you're still keeping the other drivers right ?, if not and you end up ripping out everything that makes it good for beginners then wont you be left with SDL?

Are there any completed quality games that use AllegGL ?, it's be nice to see it working well and if there isn't one it'd be worth porting either an OpenGL or SDL game just to avoid the vs threads.

There have been a few threads about using AllegGL for 2D games has anyone got any source for this or do I really need to go through all the NeHe tutorials etc?...

it's great that there is renewed interest in developing allegro 5 again IMHO the important thing is :-

need to integrate allegGL > need to make allegro more attractive == TRUE

casts maturing spell on AllegGL

breaths again

good to here, I'd like to help but I think I'd be out of my depth, I'm close to v1 now of my game, I'll see after that.

Blah blah blah.
I've read quite a number of good ideas. A good start. But in the end all of these ideas are worth no more than the few kilobytes of space taken up on an 80 gig hard drive. (Or perhaps a a few KB on a <$1 DVD.)

It only matters where the rubber meets the road: Actual work (eg coding). Otherwise all we have is a disorganized wishlist. A w*t dream.

Pointing fingers and nominating people isn't getting anywhere either.

If you have the time commitment (e.g. months spending nights and weekends) and the discipline (e.g. no slacking or vaporware), step up to the plate with other people with the same passion and bandwidth, form a team, make some goals, and get it done. I don't care if you have little programming experience. You could learn. You could help with smaller programming tasks. You can do all the non-programming grunt work.

And you don't even have to listen to anyone. Now granted if you want to maximize the number of people interested in your finished project, you might want to listen... But those who do the work get to decide. Add Tandy support? fine. Program in Cobol? fine. Dump Linux? fine. It's your project.

I'm sure the Allegro community will cheer you on (assuming you in keeping in the spirit of the original Allegro library). And if you get enough steam, you might even get more help along the way. Myself, since I'm not going to contribute much, if anything to the Allegro 5 base and since no one working on Allegro 5 asked, no big wishlist from me.

Right now, all we have is Allegro V: Final Fantasy.

Plucky: The problem is that if we start coding before we know what the hell we're making, it will all me wasted effort. Design and coordinate first, code later.

So, I was wondering, does anyone know of any good, FREE programs that we could use to handle inhertiance diagrams for this whole deal? We need to get a design document going so we can see what exactly we are going to do.

Haven't we already established that most people do not want to delve into the mailing list? I for one fear it like the plague. I would MUCH rather like an open discussion forum.

Seriously, mailing lists are annoying and outdated.

The problem with mailing lists is not only are they annoying as all heck, they have the tendency to be so unreadable, so unintuitive, you spend more time looking for infromation that getting the information you want! Allegro.cc's forums should provide a sufficient medium for us to coordinate with, coupled with email, of course.

The core team decides what the decision making structure is. And there is a difference between coding/system decision-making and leading/driving. There's no point head-hunting for a leader or decision-maker without this core team in place. Those who will do the work decide on their own decision-making structure.

The core team decides what the goals are. Not us in the peanut gallery. Imagine the whole US congress trying to write a law rather than by a small committee. Also imagine the whole adult population of the US crying out ideas for a law in a public forum. How long would such a process take?

Form the team first. Make sure all the roles are identified. Fomr a decision-making structure. Make sure we have the skills to make progress. Make some goals. Then start on a design document and/or wish list, et cetera.

I'd contribute what I can (though I'm not terribly great), I just don't know what I should contribute. And I'm not exactly sure what areas of Allegro I could really help with. If someone would just tell me what to do, I could probably do it. But I have no clue where to start.

I guess I should just spent some hours going through all the future proposals, and coding what I can. If any of it turns out to be useful to the codebase, I'll submit it.