Easy way to restart app?

therobby3

I remember searching for this in the distant past, but I don't remember finding a clear solution. So I have a game, and would like to create a "return to main menu" button in-game. Instead of having to reset all of my dang variables, and remove all of the required objects from the stage, add/remove the appropriate listeners, etc etc... I feel it would be a whole heck of a lot easier if I could just essentially reload the entire game itself as it was from the start. Does anyone know of any easy way to do this? Preferably a way that will be cross platform between desktop app, android, and ios?

hugo

I don't know if fits your needs but I did that on my "AIR AutoUpdate" for Windows and macOS: https://forum.starling-framework.org/topic/air-autoupdate-available-on-github

It's specific code for each use case but you can easily create a generic function abnostic for the OS.

In the case of macOS, you can open another process and immediately close your current one.
In the case of Windows, it's more complicated and you will need an external utility an even so give a delay (I used a more rudimentary solution to support Windows XP and all other Windows versions).

ozmachine

It's possible for a Windows app, I know, but really... resetting the game's state and variables should be a given. You'd want to give the user a clean experience.

hugo

@Mike Gowan,

Not necessary.
I have an App that the menu is build dependent on specific settings.
This settings after a first setup are rarelly changed (if ever), so it's much cleaner (on the code point of view) and better performance if simply restarta the App on this specifc scenario.

One the other hand if it's something that can change a lot, one see an App restart frequently seems and "ugly" solution like "windows updates solution".

ozmachine

I've done many kiosk-style apps that I've needed to auto-restart (as in, the app exits itself and tells Windows to then start it back up) after running for 12 hours. Makes sense to have the system refresh, there. What's required is to give the app specific rights to do so in the OS. It's a bit complex. I'm almost certain that Android and iOS would not permit this.

hugo

On that use case, makes more sense a refresh mechanism instead of App restart.
No doubt of that.

On Android I believe that could be possible with an ANE.
On iOS I also doubt that is allowed.

Ironically, on macOS is the easier of all.

therobby3

Resetting the variables would make sense and all, but if there was a good way to just reset the app to how it was when it first loaded, that would be much much easier. Not only that, it would completely remove the possibility for there to be any bugs in which I forgot to reset a variable or remove something, etc. Also, I won't have to continue go back to that reset function and add things later down the line as I continue developing the app.

hugo, so it sounds like you need an ANE or something of that sort to do this your saying? I was hoping there was some built in method for doing this that would just enable it to work across multiple platforms. Maybe something in some System or NativeApplication class somewhere I was missing. =/

joshtynjala

Not only that, it would completely remove the possibility for there to be any bugs in which I forgot to reset a variable or remove something, etc.

If you can keep your game's state in one class (or only the dependencies of the one main class), that would make it easier for you to to simply remove it from the display list and dispose it. When you want to start a new session with a fresh state, you can simply instantiate a new instance. You shouldn't need to reset any variables as long as you avoid storing things in static/global variables.

Obviously, you'll still need to make sure to dispose things like textures that Starling can't dispose automatically, but it's not difficult to do that in an override of dispose().

I was hoping there was some built in method for doing this that would just enable it to work across multiple platforms. Maybe something in some System or NativeApplication class somewhere I was missing. =/

There definitely isn't anything like that built into AIR.

hugo

No built-in feature in AIR.
You don't need an ANE for this (at least for desktop).
But, it's tricky. I tested my use case on every since version for Windows 32 bits + 64 bits, starting on Windows XP to Windows 10 + macOS.
Find the minimum common denominator is not an easy task and required ugly things but it works.

On my use case was for updating and a restart it's necessary (no option).
On your use case, I would go for Josh solution.
Try to centralize your settings on a single class (with the things well done, you could even automate for future settings).

LeeFJ

you can load a AOT compiled swf by Loader ,make the ios app Crash. this is a way to shut down your ios app

therobby3

Ah ok, thanks for the info guys. So it sounds like there's no easy way to do it. Weird there's not some type of way to do this built in. I didn't think about creating a new instance of my whole game, perhaps I could probably do that then. I do however use a handful of static variables and such, but shouldn't be TOO much of a problem.