Torque 3D Open Source Update 2012-10-02

Torque 3D Open Source Update 2012-10-02

Torque 3D was released under a MIT license on September 20, 2012. For those that may not have been following our blogs on this release, please give them a read:

GarageGames to Release T3D as Open Source
The Future of Torque 3D is Open Source!
Open Call: Join the Torque 3D Open Source Committee
Torque 3D MIT FAQ
It's here! The MIT licensed Torque 3D GitHub repo is ready!
First T3D MIT Committee Meeting

In today’s blog I wanted to provide an update on what has been happening with the repositories over the past week-and-a-half. We currently have two GitHub repositories:

• Torque3D
• Torque3D-Documentation

The Torque3D repository currently has just under 200 forks and more than 600 stars. As expected, the Torque3D repository’s development branch has seen most of the action. The following changes have been made:

• Fix some PHP 5.3.0 errors and warnings (Issue 42)
• Fixes the dllmain.h template file to include MIT header (Issue 16)
• Added support for FMOD 4.42.03 Stable (Issue 3)
• Torque 3D Toolbox fix for project launching (Issue 12)
• Prevented #define for in VS2012 (Issue 39)
• Made Item network members properly in the editor. (Issue 37)
• Required changes to the Torque3D to make it Linux-compatible. (Issue 19)

In addition, the master branch also received the Torque 3D Toolbox fix.

For each Pull Request submitted I go through a vetting process of both reading through the suggested changes as well as testing them locally. There have been more Pull Requests made than have been merged with the development branch, as would be expected. Those that haven’t yet been accepted usually result in a comment by me asking for more information. So far, only one request has been rejected.

Once the first round of community members have been added to the Steering Committee, I hope to share the responsibility of approving future Pull Requests. I certainly don’t want to become a bottleneck to the process.

Join the Torque 3D Open Source Steering Committee

There is still time to submit your name for the Steering Committee. We are looking to add the first members from the community on October 12th. Our plan is to build the committee slowly rather than attempt to fill all available slots at once.

If you think you may be interested in helping out, this blog provides a draft of the Steering Committee Charter, which outlines the roles and responsibilities. When you are ready to submit your name, please send me an email at davew@garagegames.com with a little about yourself.

- Dave

Announcing the Next Torque 3D Steering Committee and T3D 3.5.1

In September 2012 we launched Torque 3D as an open source engine under the MIT license. Since then, the appointed Steering Committee successfully launched three releases. On December 19, 2012, we launched T3D v2.0 as the first new, open source release. Then on May 9, 2013, we launched T3D v3.0, our second MIT release. Finally, on November 13, 2013, we launched T3D 3.5, the most recent version.

If you haven't been following the Torque 3D Forums or read Eric Preisz's Latest Blog you may have missed the news that following the T3D 3.5 release the Steering Committee was disbanded. Myself and GarageGames were heavily involved in pushing out each new open source release, and with my time now going towards the business' service work this was not sustainable. All work on the main T3D GitHub repository was put on hold, although of course, anyone was free to fork the repo and continue with their own work.

With one chapter closed, a new one began in January 2014 with a renewed interest from the community in continuing development in T3D's main repo. Over the last few months GarageGames and the community have come together to create the first, completely community driven Steering Committee.

The New Torque 3D Steering Committee

The following community members are now your new, Torque 3D Steering Committee:

• Andrew Mac
• Fyodor "bank" Osokin
• Daniel Buckmaster
• Jeff Raab
• Luis Anton Rebollo
• Thomas Fischer

With this fresh start, the new Steering Committee has come up with their own charter that replaces the previous one. You may read it here on the GitHub wiki. I expect that you will be seeing a number of changes on GitHub and elsewhere as they mold the public view of Torque 3D to their own vision.

Torque 3D 3.5.1

Following the T3D 3.5 release there were a few bugs introduced that impacted people's game creation. Since this release a few Pull Requests were merged into the development branch to fix these issues. In order to provide a clean start for the new Steering Committee I have pushed out these fixes as T3D 3.5.1 and the development branch is now clean.

The following changes have been made for T3D 3.5.1:

• Fix for ballistic projectiles not bouncing (link)
• Bullet physics applyImpulse() fix (link)
• Revert trigger polyhedron change (link)
• Update version reporting to 3.5.1 (link)

Where to Find Torque 3D 3.5.1

As always you may find Torque 3D over on GitHub. Here is a list of all repositories:

• Main repository: Torque3D
• Documentation: Torque3D-Documentation
• Project Manager: Torque3D-ProjectManager

With the release of Torque 3D 3.5.1 all changes in the development branch have been moved into the master branch.

In addition to GitHub we also have our own ZIP package that combines the Torque3D repository with the updated TorqueScript documentation, the Project Manager, and compiled versions of each of the templates. This package is ideal for those that do not wish to compile Torque 3D on their own, and is available here:


Complete Torque 3D 3.5.1 zip package

In Closing

Thanks to each of the new Steering Committee members for stepping forward and accepting the responsibility as Torque 3D's new stewards. I look forward to future releases of what I believe to be the best, open source 3D game engine available.


- Dave