New Wii Homebrew idea - Rosary

I am very interested in creating a new Wii Homebrew Application in the form of an interactive Rosary. However I am completely new to Wii Homebrew programming. I am a professional Visual Basic.NET developer but I know next to nothing about C or C++. I am currently looking at C++ tutorials for Windows development and have had some success with Console Applications but I haven't made it to Windows GUI yet.

Every tutorial I have found on developing a Wii Homebrew application have all been difficult for me to follow or I can never get the examples to compile. I am using the latest DevKitPro and libogc ( I just downloaded the latest version today May 26, 2010), but I am finding it to be very difficult. Also I know of no way to test any homebrew on my pc so anything I try to develop I can only test when I get home in the evening (which being married and having a 2 year old is not very easy). The computer I am using to develop on is my work laptop it is running Windows 7 64 bit, not sure if that matters.

What I would like to do is create an interactive Rosary because I know there is nothing out there like that now in the Wii Homebrew scene. Here is what I hope to achieve:

Picture of a rosary as the main image. Each bead is interactive in that when the user points at a bead certain information or prayers will be displayed
Allow user to choose which mystery they want to meditate on (depending on which mystery they choose the Rosary beads will reflect that information/prayers)
Have music playing in the background (can be turned off or on)
Wiimote integration
Assigning options or choices to button presses (or just adding a new menu when the home button is pressed)

I just want to know if anyone can and is willing to give me any advice or maybe point me in the right direction. And if anyone has the time and is willing maybe you could help me along here in the beginning. Any help would be much appreciated.

Thank you,
Jeremy

Serious replies only please.

p.s. - I was interested in LibWiiGui but that might be too much for me to start with. Then I figured I could try and model my code after the BibleQuiz game or RedSquare, those look to be good examples. Just a thought. Some of the compile errors I have been able to solve on my own, others not. If these issues persist I will post them here for some help.

I really don't mean to sound rude, but you simply can't do what you're looking to do without a solid foundation of C or C++ under your belt. You said your professional VisualBasic.NET developer and that you got some programs to compile for the Wii already; Thats a huge head start. Spend about a week learning the actual language and you'll probably be able to solve most of the issues you're having now.

Arikado, I'm familiar with some of your work, and I don't feel you are being rude in any way, and in fact I appreciate your opinion. Thank you for the advice. Honestly, I look at other Wii Homebrew source code and I'm overwhelmed, but that is because I know I'm trying to take in too much at once. I really want to make this program and get it out there so I will spend some time learning the basic foundation of the language first and go from there. One last question, is Wii homebrew coded more in C++ or C? Just how similar are they from what you know?

Thanks again for your help/advice.
-Jeremy

It can be coded in either C or C++. I would recommend getting fimiliar with console programs, but don't worry about programming for the windows GUI, it is irrelevant. Try not to get too overwhelemed with the source of egsisting apps, all they are are a bunch of function calls. To start out try to make a prgram that responds when you hit a button, returns the number of times you have hit the A button. Making these small programs may seem trivial, but it will really help you understand the libraries.
As for a graphics library, DON'T start with libwiigui, It is the most complex out of all the options. For C++ I use libwiisprite. It is easy for me to use, and it does what I need it to do. If you decide to use C, then use GRRLIB. I haven't used it in a long time, but plenty of people use it, so it can't be too difficult.
C is probably easier to learn, but when it comes to wii development, the only difference is C++ is object oriented.

g_man,

Thank you for your advice. Right now, even a Hello World example is not too trivial for me to test out because I need to start from the basics. I will go ahead and try to code the example you suggested if I have time today. As for libwiigui, yes it seems very complex to me, but also very impressive. However, I will take your advice and make a simple program with libwiisprite when I get to that point. Also, I already spent last week looking at C++ examples and coding a console app in Visual Studio 2008. It was a very basic app but enough to get me interested. So I believe I will stick with C++ for now. Also, do you have any homebrew apps out there to download that might help me along the way? Not even the source code necessarily, but even just the dol file itself so I can see what you can do with libwiisprite.

Thanks again.
-Jeremy

GRRLIB can be used for C++ as well...

Quote

I haven't used it in a long time, but plenty of people use it, so it can't be too difficult.

lol maybe you should stop saying crap you know nothing about then!


libwiigui, libwiisprite, GRRLIB....

They are all relatively easy / relatively hard.
I found libwiigui to be incredibly straight forward and simple... Just depends on what you already know about coding. Play with them all (once you get that basic background in coding) and see what you like. Don't let anyone tell you that one is HARD or one is EASY... Just take a look and you'll find what you like!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/01/2010 02:13PM by mdbrim.

Well I have started out by looking into libwiisprite and so far I like what I see. I just wish there was an easier way to test this out rather than having to go home and load it up on the wii (I am at work right now).

All I have done so far is create a new project in Programmers Notepad and used the template file included with libwiisprite. This gives me a white background until the Home button is pressed. I assume since it compiled that the dol file will work fine at home on the Wii. The only other change I made was I added in code to see if I can get a png loaded up on screen. The code compiled just fine but again I will have to wait until I get home to know if it will work as expected.

Here is the code, if anyone sees any mistakes please let me know.

Quote

#include
#include
#include

// libwiisprite uses wsp as it's namespace
using namespace wsp;

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
// Create the game window and initalise the VIDEO subsystem
GameWindow gwd;
gwd.InitVideo();

gwd.SetBackground((GXColor){ 255, 255, 255, 255 });

//trying to add in an image - 06/01/2010
Sprite sprite; // The drawable object we can modify.
Image image; // Holds our image/texture from the SD Card.

// Initialize filesystem to load from SD Card
fatInitDefault();

if(image.LoadImage("MPlayerCE.png") != IMG_LOAD_ERROR_NONE)exit(0);

sprite.SetImage(&image);
sprite.SetPosition(0, 0);

// Initialise Wiimote
WPAD_Init();

for(;;)
{
WPAD_ScanPads();
if(WPAD_ButtonsDown(WPAD_CHAN_0)&WPAD_BUTTON_HOME)
break;
gwd.Flush();
}
return 0;
}

I assume this will load the png on screen?

Now if I am going to use libwiisprite for this Rosary project is it correct for me to assume that by using other libraries I will be able to have text on screen, pointer integration, music etc?

Thank you so far for everyone's help and advice.
Jeremy

Okay sorry I'm not sure what happened when I quoted my code but the 3 include statements all showed up blank. They actually say the following

#include wiiuse/wpad.h
#include wiisprite.h
#include fat.h

But for some reason the less than symbol and the greater than symbol that is supposed to be surround the files to include is not showing up on here, I don't know why?

Oh well. I just wanted to post the correction.

Quote
JHardin1112
Well I have started out by looking into libwiisprite and so far I like what I see. I just wish there was an easier way to test this out rather than having to go home and load it up on the wii (I am at work right now).

You could try the Dolphin emulator: [www.dolphin-emu.com]

It works well for testing simple UI stuff.