From the Forum — Issue #30

25 July 2014

From the Forum — Issue #30

Welcome to the latest installment of From the Forum. In this series, guest blogger Alex Jackson highlights outstanding threads from the Corona Forum. The goal is to bring attention to the most captivating, interesting, and thought-provoking discussions taking place in our very own backyard.

Please visit the forum to join these conversations or start your own!

1. Disabling background music

Having your apps and games use music housed on devices already is always a nice feather in your development cap. Aside from giving users another avenue of choice to make their experience more comfortable, it’s a good way to relieve the necessity of bringing in original music for which you have a license.

Developer jonjonsson asked this very question in the below thread, and in his research found a feature request that found an interesting workaround for the entire process. Another developer chimed with a really useful thread populated with some cool settings for the audiosession api. Run over and check it out, and if you have a suggestion of your own, toss it onto the pile!

http://forums.coronalabs.com/topic/45115-allowing-background-music-and-the-mute-button-on-ios/

2. Extensive Lua OOP library

I’m going to make an admission: I am a OOP newbie. I have not mastered the object-oriented mindset, and I desperately want to master the amazing versatility of the system. I won’t go into describing the intent behind OOP, but suffice to say it makes rapid prototyping projects infinitely easier.

Developer engel.teddy has created a nice OOP library for Corona and Lua that works very well with existing and new projects, and is a useful entry point for learning object-oriented programming in general. Lots of commenting and useful notes abound, so take a few minutes get some more Lua knowledge into your coding toolbelt!

http://forums.coronalabs.com/topic/40640-luoop-lua-oop-library/

3. Even more OOP!

Rounding out our post today is another thread that highlights object-oriented programming techniques and the reason why it makes coding so handy. Starting out with an OOP language like Lua means that learning OOP as soon as possible will only make your time developing and making your ideas come to life that much more quickly.

You can find even more input with tips on how to start with OOP theory, when it’s best to use it and what it’s best to use it on, and examples of implementations. The main theme here is that making your code OOP-centric instead means that you’re going to spend a lot less time repeating your functions and a lot more time making cool stuff!

So what are you waiting for? Go check it out and become an OOP ninja overnight!

http://forums.coronalabs.com/topic/49687-simple-objects/

About Alex

Alex Jackson is an indie developer and the founder of Panc Software, specializing in retro-style gaming. He has created several mobile applications, enjoys long walks on the beach, pixel art, and reading the Corona forums. Contact him by email or follow him on Twitter: @pancsoftware. Check out his new game Crosstown Smash on iOS, Android, and Amazon devices!