This file must be distributed with TerrainMaker 2.0. Neither can be distributed commercially without written permission from us.
TerrainMaker 2.0 is a module for After Dark™ version 2.0. It generates a fractal landscape using rivers, canyons, mountains, and lakes. You can even choose to have the lakes and rivers filled with raw, toxic sludge! (Our environmental twist.)
Version 2.0 of TerrainMaker fixes all reported bugs, plus some more we found ourselves. Instead of drawing in two halves, we draw in the other direction just once. This fixes some ugly display problems. Also, version 2.0 doesn't run off the right side of large monitors. Some setting problems have been fixed. As a bonus feature, TerrainMaker 2.0 supports multiple monitors (probably something to do with the fact that one of us just got a second monitor). The generation algorithms have been made better, faster, and more efficient. Of course, we now support rivers, canyons, and sludge. To make this module better for you, we have given you powerful control over the settings. For people that don't have 24-bit color (unlike us, hehehe) we have included some color look-up tables. We take advantage of the FPU if it's available. At the request of many users, we have sped up our module's response time when you wish to stop it (though God knows why you'd want to).
We have a suggestion for people running TerrainMaker 2.0 on a 68000-based machine. Don't use large map dimensions.
A couple of general suggestions. Don't uncheck both the "Color or Shading?" and the "Framing?" check boxes unless you have a particular fondness for white (who knows, maybe it just snowed). Don't make things too rocky. Don't have too many lakes and mountains (it gets rather excessive after about 150).
We feel that After Dark™ is a wonderful piece of software for the Macintosh community because it enables many programmers to write shareware modules for it. To encourage programmers to write After Dark™ modules, we are willing to give out our complete source code for TerrainMaker 2.0. It demonstrates how to do many things that After Dark™ modules often need to do, such as sliders, check boxes, buttons, dialogs, multiple monitors, monochrome and color graphics, memory allocation, error checking, color look-up tables, saving and loading resources, using the FPU, using the Gestalt manager to determine computer configuration, three-dimensional graphics, polygons, and, of course, generating a fractal terrain. TerrainMaker was written in THINK Pascal™ 3.0. To obtain the source code send $10, a disk, and a self-addressed stamped envelope to:
Jakub Buchowski
BAKA Computers, Inc.
200 Pleasant Grove Rd.
Ithaca, NY 14850
We welcome your input. Please send comments and bug reports (and money if you're feeling particularly rich) to:
