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Start Page » Game Development with the Drag[en]gine » Remote Launching
Remote launching allows to launch applications in development on remote devices using the Drag[en]gine Integrated Game Development Environment (IGDE) using the Project Editor. Multiple remote instances can be launched at the same time allowing to easily develop and test network based applications. All remote systems are supported where the Drag[en]gine Remote Launcher can be installed on. While connected the remote launcher synchronizes automatically project files matching the selected profile. This synchronization runs also while the application is running so you can even make live edits if supported by the application. Log files are send back to the IGDE on the main machine so you can watch and examine log files of all instances at the same time.
Network Protocol
Communication with the remote launchers is done using the Remote Launcher Network Protocol. This protocol is based on the Drag[en]gine Network Protocol Specification.
Server (IGDE)
The Drag[en]gine Integrated Game Development Environment (IGDE) contains support to use remote launcher clients. This support is found in the IGDE Project Editor/Runner right below the local test running panel. To use this feature enter the IP or host address to listen. Each connected client is shown as a new tab in the window to the right.
To remote launch you first have to synchronize the game content to the client. This is done by clicking the Synchronize button. Depending on the network speed and the size of the project synchronizing runs faster or slower. Only the new and changed files are send to the client as well as deleting no more existing files. This makes synchronizing smaller changes quick.
Once synchronized you can test run the game as you would locally using the start, stop and kill button. The logs of the client will be send to the server and shown in the log window.
Multiple clients can connect to the same server. Each client can be synchronized individually or all at the same time. Each client can run individually so you can launch the required clients to do your testing.
Client
Clients are simple programs not requiring special settings like developer mode or similar. It is only required to have the game engine installed on the test system. The remote launcher can then be downloaded and unpacked locally to use. Clients exists right now for these platforms:
- Windows (10 or higher)
- Linux
More supported platforms will be added in the future. The downloads are found on the Drag[en]gine Tools Download Page.
After starting the client enter the IP or host address of the server to connect to. Click Connect to connect. Once done the client is controlled from the server. The running game is then controlled by the client.
Before connecting you can also select the directory to store the synchronized data in. If required separate directories can be used for separate projects. In general this is not required since synchronizing fully aligns the directory content. For large projects though it might be useful to use an own directory to avoid lengthy synchronization.
