It is not officially abandoned as anybody can write bug fixes for Allegro 4.4 and submit them. But all of the core developers have moved on to Allegro 5.

You could replace your A4 code with Allegro 5.

That would make not sense, I mean, my 'engine' uses A4 'only' for sound, input, and special file format loading routines, I'm writting the graphic core myself for OGL and D3D, so this is why A4 was useful for me.

I think replacing A4 with A5 only for the afformentioned tasks would be overkill.

Isn't A5 more modular than A4? It would technically make it less overkill ...

You can set the flags ALLEGRO_DIRECT3D or ALLEGRO_OPENGL to require that Allegro give you a valid context/device to work with.

Thomas, your marketing skills are awesome!, as much as I hate to admit it, I knew since the beginning that sooner or later I would end switching to A5

You can't see it, but right now Edgar is crying... Don't worry my friend A4 it's going to live forever.......................... Inside a Museum of course... hohohohoh...

so that's what it is I'm doing!

I think he doesn't like A5 because you have to link more than 1 library. Using sfml will save dozens of man seconds per millenia.

SFML is modular too. The biggest difference is that it's C++. If you like C++ and like SFML's design, then that's probably sufficient reason to use it.

Thanks for putting words in my mouth Trent. No, I don't like having to link ten different libraries at a time when it should be a single library. SFML is the same way though, they're modular as well.

@Paul
I never said I refuse to use Allegro 5, in fact I've been learning it along with everyone else here, and helping other people learn to use it too. But SFML has been looking like a good alternative to Allegro 5 since I started looking at it. It's something to consider after all.

@Trent
"Fiercely opposed", no. Moderately annoyed, yes. Modularity has it's benefits, but there's also no reason allegro's build system can't support a monolith build for those who appreciate it's convenience. Yes, do it yourself if you want it, blah blah. If I ever get serious about using A5 in a project, I will probably build a static monolith for personal use using ar. The main reason multiple modules bother me is because it makes it harder to work with an SVN version when there are features I want to add / bugs I want to help fix.

Edit
One thing it looks like SFML lacks though is the ability to draw onto an Image object. You can only draw on a RenderWindow and Copy from the Screen onto an Image.

You enjoy linking 10 different libraries, good for you. Have fun. It's bothersome to have to set the same giant set of dependencies up just for simple test projects, whether it's a Code Blocks project, or a makefile, or compiling on the command line. There's no reason a monolith build can't be provided for those who wish to use it. But the Allegro developers don't care about their users, they only care about how they will use it, which is fine, it's their project, whatever.

Maybe, but all it really means is you have to draw everything over again each frame, and with hwaccel that doesn't mean much. With complex games you pretty much have to do a full redraw anyway. And it may be an easy enough change anyway. All you would have to do is derive Image from RenderTarget and overload the necessary functions.

Because it makes compiling from the command line a major pain in the ass. With A4 all I have to remember is one library, and with A5 I have to remember 10.