ReDoomEd: Mac/Linux/BSD port of id Software's 1993 Doom map editor for NeXTSTEP

I was wondering when someone would try porting DoomEd to modern systems, awesome! 

"DoomEd the way id did" project anyone?

Doom 2020 is off to a good start, then! For those who want to map Doom the old skool way, a bit like a Chocolate Doom Builder of some sorts.

Nice work @tedge and welcome to the Doom Community.

Very interesting, it is more featureful than I would have expected for a program of that era.  The floating windows would bug the crap out of me though.

Here’s a corresponding demo video for the GNUstep version of ReDoomEd. It’s running on Ubuntu Linux 19.10, with the Window Maker window manager.

GNUstep’s widgets and Window Maker’s windows/desktop have a NeXTSTEP look & feel, so this version’s closer to what DoomEd looked like on a 1990s NeXTSTEP workstation.

DoomEd / ReDoomEd screenshot comparison

1993 DoomEd on NeXTSTEP (from Doom Wiki):

2020 ReDoomEd (GNUstep version) on Ubuntu 19.10 with Window Maker:

2020 ReDoomEd (Mac version) on macOS 10.14:

Any interest in porting it to a crossplatform toolkit such as Qt or wxWidgets? It'd allow to make a Windows build.

That might be difficult because it is written in Objective-C.

1 hour ago, Gez said:

It'd allow to make a Windows build.

i believe that there was windows GNUstep port. dunno if it is still alive, though.

Looks like this is the first public beta release. But once it's more stable, do you have any plans to add more features/enhancements/compatibility like those in other modern level editors, e.g. Doom Builder?

On 1/10/2020 at 7:10 AM, Gez said:

Any interest in porting it to a crossplatform toolkit such as Qt or wxWidgets? It'd allow to make a Windows build.

That shouldn't be necessary. GNUStep, which is used to compile the Linux version of the program, is also available for Windows, so it should be possible to make a Windows port with the existing source code. I say "should" because I have tried it and failed. Several times, each time making small changes to some source files in order to fix the error messages I was getting, until I ran out of ideas.

This is why I am here. I want to know if there's anyone here who has some experience with building GNUStep apps on Windows who's willing to try to build this program, or offer me some help in doing that.

On 1/10/2020 at 11:56 PM, Triple_sSs said:

Looks like this is the first public beta release. But once it's more stable, do you have any plans to add more features/enhancements/compatibility like those in other modern level editors, e.g. Doom Builder?

Don't you think that defeats the purpose of porting the program?

35 minutes ago, QuotePilgrim said:

Don't you think that defeats the purpose of porting the program?

but do you really believe that nobody'll pick it up, and start adding features? ;-)

3 minutes ago, ketmar said:

but do you really believe that nobody'll pick it up, and start adding features? ;-)

Sure, but it'd still be good to have a Chocolate DoomEd to start from, rather than having to start from scratch.

4 hours ago, ketmar said:

but do you really believe that nobody'll pick it up, and start adding features? ;-)

No, I don't. And to be honest I don't know why you would assume I do. I didn't say it won't happen, only that it would be pointless.

The whole point of a project like ReDoomEd is to have a program that is as close to the original as possible in functionality, if not identical. Adding features that didn't exist in the original is outside the scope of the project. So I don't believe the program's developer will do that.

And besides, if you want Doom Builder features, I don't see why you wouldn't just use Doom Builder.

3 hours ago, QuotePilgrim said:

And to be honest I don't know why you would assume I do.

i was joking. didn't made myself clear enough, sorry.

On 2/4/2020 at 11:50 PM, QuotePilgrim said:

No, I don't. And to be honest I don't know why you would assume I do. I didn't say it won't happen, only that it would be pointless.

 

The whole point of a project like ReDoomEd is to have a program that is as close to the original as possible in functionality, if not identical. Adding features that didn't exist in the original is outside the scope of the project. So I don't believe the program's developer will do that.

 

And besides, if you want Doom Builder features, I don't see why you wouldn't just use Doom Builder.

The point is that macOS doesn't have Doom Builder. Instead it only has some cross platform editors (Eureka, SLADE). This DoomEd would make a nice base for a good native macOS editor. 

On 4/18/2020 at 5:50 PM, printz said:

The point is that macOS doesn't have Doom Builder. Instead it only has some cross platform editors (Eureka, SLADE). This DoomEd would make a nice base for a good native macOS editor. 

I see. I don't use macOS, I run Windows 7 (begrudginlgy), Lubuntu, and Manjaro Linux (which I actually enjoy), so I wouldn't know. I could have looked it up, I guess, but the thought didn't even cross my mind.

Out of curiosity, though, what is wrong with SLADE? Is it just the fact that it's not native on its own or does that actually cause problems that the program doesn't have on other platforms? You see, I have tried SLADE and Ultimate Doom Builder, and I like SLADE a lot better. From what I understand there's nothing Doom Builder does that it can't, and it also has many features Doom Builder doesn't because of its wider scope as a general WAD editor rather than only a map editor, which forces people to use SLADE anyway if they use Doom Builder as their map editor. Assuming SLADE runs as well on macOS as it does on the OSes I have installed, I see little reason to have a native program. Being native for the sake of being native is... not a great reason, to say the least. IMHO, that is.

On 4/21/2020 at 1:21 AM, QuotePilgrim said:

I see. I don't use macOS, I run Windows 7 (begrudginlgy), Lubuntu, and Manjaro Linux (which I actually enjoy), so I wouldn't know. I could have looked it up, I guess, but the thought didn't even cross my mind.

Out of curiosity, though, what is wrong with SLADE? Is it just the fact that it's not native on its own or does that actually cause problems that the program doesn't have on other platforms? You see, I have tried SLADE and Ultimate Doom Builder, and I like SLADE a lot better. From what I understand there's nothing Doom Builder does that it can't, and it also has many features Doom Builder doesn't because of its wider scope as a general WAD editor rather than only a map editor, which forces people to use SLADE anyway if they use Doom Builder as their map editor. Assuming SLADE runs as well on macOS as it does on the OSes I have installed, I see little reason to have a native program. Being native for the sake of being native is... not a great reason, to say the least. IMHO, that is.

On Mac, every time I've used it it has crashed on me. Also, building levels in SLADE is a bit different and cumbersome as compared to what I'm used to (coming from DoomBuilder 1 and 2). 

It would be great to get ReDoomEd to the point of where it could possibly incorporate features from DoomBuilderX (if the author of that would allow such things) on Mac OS so we would have an editor that is up to par with something like DB-X on Windows, or GZDoomBuilder on Windows... I think the reason (and it's been noted here and elsewhere) is the use of SlimDX? .. if we could find a work-around for it for a Mac Build, to get DBX features ported into ReDoomEd (or just DBX ported over in general) that would be great...