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The screen before the editor

The screen before the editor

· 2 min read
Dragos
Balaur

Started with no project, the editor opens on a screen rather than a usage line. It has three tabs: your projects, the examples that ship with it, and the engine build itself.

The Projects tab: a filter, the three ways to start, and the projects this machine has opened with their paths, times and engine versions

  • A screen, not a window. The same widgets draw it, editing its script hot reloads it, and it folds to one column on a phone. Godot opens a separate window for this; there was nothing to gain from a second one.
  • A row remembers more than a path. When it was last opened and which engine opened it. A folder that has gone stays in the list saying so, because it is usually an unplugged disk.
  • Opening one closes the one you came from. One process is one project: the export and import modules and the file root are built for the one the editor booted with.

Examples, not an empty state​

The Examples tab: a card per example project, each with its name and a line saying what it is

The twelve example projects ship beside the editor, each with a picture of itself running. Opening one copies it into your projects folder and opens the copy, so the shipped example stays as it was.

Which engine this is​

The Engine tab: this build and whether it is current, the channel to follow, and the releases on it

  • One line at a time. Follow picks alpha, beta, rc, stable or nightly, and the releases under it are that line's, newest first, with the installed one marked.
  • The feed is read once, when the tab opens, rather than a press per channel.
  • None of it is new code. balaur update has followed channels and tags for a while, and the screen calls the same functions.