Should add :force option to :caching parameter for new images

[banister]

New images should be able to be lazy-cached (caching: true), non-cached (caching: false) or force-cached (caching: force)

[bil-bas]

For your information, I turn off syncing globally and caching: true when something fails to work. Seems to be the best way to optimise for me, since I create a LOT of images, many of which I don't need to cache. Not sure of a situation where I'd want to force syncing, though.

[banister]

Hey homie,

The problem with relying on lazy cache (the current default) is that it waits until image manipulation occurs before it cache the image ---- this means that gameplay will slightly freeze up noticeably for the duration of the initial cache. If we use :cache force however we can move this runtime penalty to level load time (assuming it is the kind of image where this makes sense -- such as a level 'map' / background as in selene).

Using cache: forced has made selene noticeably smoother, and has also not significantly increased level load time as 0.5 second more in load-time is not noticeable but a 0.5 second slow-down in runtime IS noticeable.

The situation is now like this:

• If you dont intend to manipulate an image, turn caching off (false)
• If you do intend to manipulate but your focus is on reducing level-load times, use :lazy
• if you do intend to manipulate and your focus is on run-time performance and you dont mind a tiny increase in level load times, then use forced (true)

alternately you can turn caching off altogether and manually call #cache (or #refresh_cache) on an image at the proper moment.
:)

[bil-bas]

Thanks for the explanation.