1.6 KiB
Pieces storage
What is stored
If you don't know what a polyomino is, check this other file.
Generating polyominos of size n is exponential in regard to n. Because of this, we will store the pieces beforehand and load them upon launching the game.
We want the pieces to be always sorted in the same order, always attributed the same color, and always set at the same spawn position, no matter how they were generated. We also want them to be separated in 3 categories : convex, not convex but wihtout a hole, and with a hole. Theses problematics are already resolved internally, but will be calculated before storage as to not need extra calculcations upon load.
How is it stored
Pieces are stored in binary files. Each file simply contains every polyomino of one size, one after the other. Since each file contains all polyominos of the same size, we know how much stuff to read and don't need delimiters. We know we've read all pieces simply when we reach the end of file character.
Each piece is stored as follows:
- 1 byte for the length of the piece
- 1 byte for the other characteristics of the piece:
ABCCCCCCwhere A indicates if the piece is convex, B indicates if it has a hole, and C is the color number of the piece - 1 byte for each cell:
XXXXYYYYwhere X is the x coordinate of the cell and Y is the y coordinate of the cell
The current implementation only allows to generate polyominos up to size 16, but can be upgraded by storing coordinates on 8 bits instead of 4. It has been choosen to use pieces only up to size 15 for this game.