Getting Started¶
Note
I often add details that are unnecessary for most but may be helpfully for those new to some of these technologies. Sometimes installation instructions mention several things in passing that I must research elsewhere before I understand enough to complete the installation. So, hopefully I can reduce the number of “I wish I had known that” moments.
Intro¶
One game night with friends, I was introduced to the dice tossing game Farkle. Although it was obviously a game of chance, after a few rounds, it was clear that there was only a tiny possibility of applying skill to the game. I wanted to learn what I could about that small nugget of skill. I found a paper that included the expected values for many situations in Farkle. That satisfied my initial curiosity, but that static pdf didn’t provide the ability to adjust point values or play out what-if scenarios using customizable house rules. I was interested in creating that.
I decided to implement the game itself first because the analysis requires a certain amount of the game mechanics anyway and acts as a good reference for the analysis.
Python Version¶
This is a “Python 3 first” project. Primary development and testing is being done using Python 3.5. After things are working for you using 3, you have my permission to mess around with the code in 2.7.
When I originally learned Python way back when, I learned Python 3. Once I
started using a handful of third-party packages, it became clear that support
for Python 3 was severely lacking. So, I proceeded with 2.7 (while frequently
importing from the __future__ module).
Years later, Python 3 adoption has improved significantly. As such, I prefer using Python 3 for new projects, especially personal ones. However, since Python 2.7 is still so heavily used and I have a history of writing for Python 2.7, I tend to write backwards compatible code. Ultimately, I plan to have the code fully backward compatible.
Web Interface¶
Once the server is running, the website has a help view that provides help specific to the web interface.