#+title: A Virtual World for Sensate Creatures

 #+author: Robert McIntyre

 #+email: rlm@mit.edu

 #+description: Creating a Virtual World for AI constructs using clojure and JME3

 #+keywords: JME3, clojure, virtual world, exception handling

 #+SETUPFILE: ../../aurellem/org/setup.org

 #+INCLUDE: ../../aurellem/org/level-0.org

 #+BABEL: :mkdirp yes :noweb yes :exports both

 

 * The  World

 

 There's no point in having senses if there's nothing to experience. In

 this section I make some tools with which to build virtual worlds for

 my characters to inhabit. If you look at the tutorials at [[http://www.jmonkeyengine.org/wiki/doku.php/jme3:beginner][the jme3

 website]], you will see a pattern in how virtual worlds are normally

 built. I call this "the Java way" of making worlds.

 

  - The Java way:  

    - Create a class that extends =SimpleApplication= or =Application=

    - Implement setup functions that create all the scene objects using

      the inherited =assetManager= and call them by overriding the

      =simpleInitApp= method.

    - Create =ActionListeners= and add them to the =inputManager=

      inherited from =Application= to handle key-bindings.

    - Override =simpleUpdate= to implement game logic.

    - Running/Testing an Application involves creating a new JVM,

      running the App, and then closing everything down.

 

 

  - A more Clojureish way:

    - Use a map from keys->functions to specify key-bindings. 

    - Use functions to create objects separately from any particular

      application.

    - Use a REPL -- this means that there's only ever one JVM, and

      Applications come and go.

 

 Since most development work using jMonkeyEngine is done in Java, jme3

 supports "the Java way" quite well out of the box. To work "the

 clojure way", it necessary to wrap the JME3 elements that deal with

 the Application life-cycle with a REPL driven interface.

 

 The most important modifications are:

 

  - Separation of Object life-cycles with the Application life-cycle.

  - Functional interface to the underlying =Application= and

    =SimpleApplication= classes.

 

 ** Header

 #+srcname: header

 #+begin_src clojure :results silent    

 (ns cortex.world

   "World Creation, abstracion over jme3's input system, and REPL

   driven exception handling"

   {:author "Robert McIntyre"}

   

   (:use (clojure.contrib (def :only (defvar))))

   (:use [pokemon [lpsolve :only [constant-map]]])

   (:use [clojure.contrib [str-utils :only [re-gsub]]])

 

   (:import com.aurellem.capture.IsoTimer)

 

   (:import com.jme3.math.Vector3f)

   (:import com.jme3.scene.Node)

   (:import com.jme3.system.AppSettings)

   (:import com.jme3.system.JmeSystem)

   (:import com.jme3.input.KeyInput)

   (:import com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger)

   (:import com.jme3.input.controls.MouseButtonTrigger)

   (:import com.jme3.input.InputManager)

   (:import com.jme3.bullet.BulletAppState)

   (:import com.jme3.shadow.BasicShadowRenderer)

   (:import com.jme3.app.SimpleApplication)

   (:import com.jme3.input.controls.ActionListener)

   (:import com.jme3.renderer.queue.RenderQueue$ShadowMode)

   (:import org.lwjgl.input.Mouse))

 #+end_src    

     

 ** General Settings    

 #+srcname: settings    

 #+begin_src clojure 

 (in-ns 'cortex.world)

 

 (defvar *app-settings*

   (doto (AppSettings. true)

     (.setFullscreen false)

     (.setTitle "Aurellem.")

     ;; The "Send" AudioRenderer supports sumulated hearing.

     (.setAudioRenderer "Send"))

   "These settings control how the game is displayed on the screen for

    debugging purposes.  Use binding forms to change this if desired.

    Full-screen mode does not work on some computers.")    

 

 (defn asset-manager

   "returns a new, configured assetManager" []

   (JmeSystem/newAssetManager

    (.getResource

     (.getContextClassLoader (Thread/currentThread))

     "com/jme3/asset/Desktop.cfg")))

 #+end_src

 

 Normally, people just use the =AssetManager= inherited from

 =Application= whenever they extend that class. However,

 =AssetManagers= are useful on their own to create objects/ materials,

 independent from any particular application. =(asset-manager)= makes

 object creation less tightly bound to a particular Application

 Instance.

 

 

 ** Exception Protection

 #+srcname: exceptions

 #+begin_src clojure

 (in-ns 'cortex.world)

 

 (defmacro no-exceptions

   "Sweet relief like I never knew."

   [& forms]

   `(try ~@forms (catch Exception e# (.printStackTrace e#))))

 

 (defn thread-exception-removal

   "Exceptions thrown in the graphics rendering thread generally cause

   the entire REPL to crash! It is good to suppress them while trying

   things out to shorten the debug loop."

   []

   (.setUncaughtExceptionHandler

    (Thread/currentThread)

    (proxy [Thread$UncaughtExceptionHandler] []

      (uncaughtException

        [thread thrown]

        (println "uncaught-exception thrown in " thread)

        (println (.getMessage thrown))))))

 

 #+end_src

 

 Exceptions thrown in the LWJGL render thread, if not caught, will

 destroy the entire JVM process including the REPL and slow development

 to a crawl.  It is better to try to continue on in the face of

 exceptions and keep the REPL alive as long as possible.  Normally it

 is possible to just exit the faulty Application, fix the bug,

 reevaluate the appropriate forms, and be on your way, without

 restarting the JVM.

 

 ** Input

 #+srcname: input

 #+begin_src clojure

 (in-ns 'cortex.world)

 

 (defn all-keys

   "Uses reflection to generate a map of string names to jme3 trigger

   objects, which govern input from the keyboard and mouse"

   []

   (let [inputs (pokemon.lpsolve/constant-map KeyInput)]

     (assoc

 	(zipmap (map (fn [field]

 		       (.toLowerCase (re-gsub #"_" "-" field))) (vals inputs))

 		(map (fn [val] (KeyTrigger. val)) (keys inputs)))

       ;;explicitly add mouse controls

       "mouse-left" (MouseButtonTrigger. 0)

       "mouse-middle" (MouseButtonTrigger. 2)

       "mouse-right" (MouseButtonTrigger. 1))))

 

 (defn initialize-inputs

   "Establish key-bindings for a particular virtual world."

   [game  input-manager key-map]

   (doall

    (map (fn [[name trigger]]

           (.addMapping

            ^InputManager input-manager

            name (into-array (class trigger)

                             [trigger]))) key-map))

   (doall

    (map (fn [name] 

           (.addListener

            ^InputManager input-manager game

            (into-array String [name]))) (keys key-map))))

 

 #+end_src

 

 These functions are for controlling the world through the keyboard and

 mouse.

 

 I reuse =constant-map= from [[../../pokemon-types/html/lpsolve.html#sec-3-2-4][=pokemon.lpsolve=]] to get the numerical

 values for all the keys defined in the =KeyInput= class. The

 documentation for =constant-map= is:

 

 #+begin_src clojure :results output :exports both

 (doc pokemon.lpsolve/constant-map)

 #+end_src

 

 #+results:

 : -------------------------

 : pokemon.lpsolve/constant-map

 : ([class])

 :   Takes a class and creates a map of the static constant integer

 :   fields with their names.  This helps with C wrappers where they have

 :   just defined a bunch of integer constants instead of enums

 

 #+begin_src clojure :exports both :results verbatim

 (take 5 (vals (pokemon.lpsolve/constant-map KeyInput)))

 #+end_src

 

 #+results:

 : ("KEY_ESCAPE" "KEY_1" "KEY_2" "KEY_3" "KEY_4")

 

 =(all-keys)= converts the constant names like =KEY_J= to the more

 clojure-like =key-j=, and returns a map from these keys to

 jMonkeyEngine =KeyTrigger= objects, which jMonkeyEngine3 uses as it's

 abstraction over the physical keys. =all-keys= also adds the three

 mouse button controls to the map.

 

 #+begin_src clojure :exports both :results output

 (require 'clojure.contrib.pprint)

 (clojure.contrib.pprint/pprint

  (take 6 (cortex.world/all-keys)))

 #+end_src

 

 #+results:

 : (["key-n" #<KeyTrigger com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger@9f9fec0>]

 :  ["key-apps" #<KeyTrigger com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger@28edbe7f>]

 :  ["key-pgup" #<KeyTrigger com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger@647fd33a>]

 :  ["key-f8" #<KeyTrigger com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger@24f97188>]

 :  ["key-o" #<KeyTrigger com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger@685c53ff>]

 :  ["key-at" #<KeyTrigger com.jme3.input.controls.KeyTrigger@4c3e2e5f>])

 

 ** World Creation

 #+srcname: world

 #+begin_src clojure :results silent

 (in-ns 'cortex.world)

 

 (defn no-op

   "Takes any number of arguments and does nothing."

   [& _])

 

 (defn traverse

   "apply f to every non-node, deeply"

   [f node]

   (if (isa? (class node) Node)

     (dorun (map (partial traverse f) (.getChildren node)))

     (f node)))

 

 (defn world

   "the =world= function takes care of the details of initializing a

   SimpleApplication.

 

    ***** Arguments:

 

    - root-node : a com.jme3.scene.Node object which contains all of

        the objects that should be in the simulation.

 

    - key-map : a map from strings describing keys to functions that

        should be executed whenever that key is pressed.

        the functions should take a SimpleApplication object and a

        boolean value.  The SimpleApplication is the current simulation

        that is running, and the boolean is true if the key is being

        pressed, and false if it is being released. As an example,

 

        {\"key-j\" (fn [game value] (if value (println \"key j pressed\")))}

 

        is a valid key-map which will cause the simulation to print a

        message whenever the 'j' key on the keyboard is pressed.

 

    - setup-fn : a function that takes a SimpleApplication object. It

        is called once when initializing the simulation. Use it to

        create things like lights, change the gravity, initialize debug

        nodes, etc.

 

    - update-fn : this function takes a SimpleApplication object and a

        float and is called every frame of the simulation.  The float

        tells how many seconds is has been since the last frame was

        rendered, according to whatever clock jme is currently

        using. The default is to use IsoTimer which will result in this

        value always being the same.

   "

   [root-node key-map setup-fn update-fn]

   (let [physics-manager (BulletAppState.)]

     (doto

         (proxy [SimpleApplication ActionListener] []

           (simpleInitApp

             []

             (no-exceptions

              ;; allow AI entities as much time as they need to think.

              (.setTimer this (IsoTimer. 60))

              (.setFrustumFar (.getCamera this) 300)

              ;; Create default key-map.

              (initialize-inputs this (.getInputManager this) (all-keys))

              ;; Don't take control of the mouse

              (org.lwjgl.input.Mouse/setGrabbed false)

              ;; add all objects to the world

              (.attachChild (.getRootNode this) root-node)

              ;; enable physics

              ;; add a physics manager

              (.attach (.getStateManager this) physics-manager)

              (.setGravity (.getPhysicsSpace physics-manager) 

                           (Vector3f. 0 -9.81 0))

              ;; go through every object and add it to the physics

              ;; manager if relevant.

              (traverse (fn [geom]

                          (dorun

                           (for [n (range (.getNumControls geom))]

                             (do

                               (.add (.getPhysicsSpace physics-manager)

                                     (.getControl geom n))))))

                        (.getRootNode this))

              ;; call the supplied setup-fn

              (if setup-fn

                (setup-fn this))))

           (simpleUpdate

             [tpf]

             (no-exceptions

              (update-fn this tpf))) 

           (onAction

             [binding value tpf]

             ;; whenever a key is pressed, call the function returned

             ;; from key-map.

             (no-exceptions

              (if-let [react (key-map binding)]

                (react this value)))))

       ;; don't show a menu to change options.      

       (.setShowSettings false)

       ;; continue running simulation even if the window has lost

       ;; focus.

       (.setPauseOnLostFocus false)

       (.setSettings *app-settings*))))

 #+end_src 

 

 

 =(world)= is the most important function here. It presents a more

 functional interface to the Application life-cycle, and all its

 arguments except =root-node= are plain immutable clojure data

 structures. This makes it easier to extend functionally by composing

 multiple functions together, and to add more keyboard-driven actions

 by combining clojure maps.

 

 

 

 * COMMENT code generation

 #+begin_src clojure :tangle ../src/cortex/world.clj :noweb yes

 <<header>>

 <<settings>>

 <<exceptions>>

 <<input>>

 <<world>>

 #+end_src