My contributions to #GodotEngine are quite diverse.

While my title is "Web and infrastructure developer", I've found myself contributing to editor usability, documentation, and even core/rendering features.

— @HugoLocurcio

Most of my initial code contributions to #GodotEngine consisted in improving the editor UX in various ways.

I wanted to make Godot feel more consistent in terms of look and feel, while also trying to make things less cramped.

Before/after:

— @HugoLocurcio

These UX changes are not necessarily difficult to make, but they need agreement from the core developers and community.

When added up, these changes can massively improve the #GodotEngine editor usability.

Before/after:

— @HugoLocurcio

I'm an active contributor to #GodotEngine's documentation, with over 350 commits to the documentation repository.

I also contribute to the class reference regularly – this is the documentation that covers the Godot API and is available offline in the editor.

— @HugoLocurcio

I also built a website to track the #GodotEngine class reference completion percentage: https://godotengine.github.io/doc-status/ 

It started as an experiment using the Hugo static site generator, but it's nice to see the documentation progress this way :)

— @HugoLocurcio

While renderer engineering isn't something I do by trade, I keep up-to-date with the latest rendering advancements.

For instance, I added an option for smoother soft shadows in Godot 3.3's GLES2 renderer (something missing since Godot 2).



— @HugoLocurcio

To continue on the editor work, one of the large undertakings I'm going through is redesigning the editor theme for #GodotEngine 4.0.

The Godot 3.x editor theme is doing its job fine, but we can make it look more modern by adopting the current design trends.

— @HugoLocurcio

As always, the editor theme remains customizable so you can easily adjust the fonts, the base colors, the contrast rate, border width and corner radius.

This way, you can make the #GodotEngine theme yours in a few minutes' time.

— @HugoLocurcio

Another theming task I'll look into in the future is to redesign the default project theme using vector elements.

The current project theme (pictured) dates back to the Godot 2 days. It's old and uses a lot of bitmaps, making it scale poorly to high resolutions.

— @HugoLocurcio

A quick note on the #GodotEngine development workflow. Unlike most C++ projects, the build system is SCons instead of CMake.

All third-party libraries are also included in the engine source tree, so you don't have to scour for dependencies, especially on Windows.

— @HugoLocurcio

These development choices make it very easy to get started developing #GodotEngine, even if you've never compiled a C++ project before.

However, this is also a compromise in terms of build system performance, which impacts engine iteration times negatively.

— @HugoLocurcio

There are plans to move #GodotEngine's build system to Meson in the future.

Starting from a clean base, this would allow for faster build times and out-of-tree builds, allowing engine contributors to iterate faster.

— @HugoLocurcio

Thanks for tuning in today!
See you tomorrow for more details about #GodotEngine's design principles, where it particularly shines and the tradeoffs Godot needs to make.

— @HugoLocurcio