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Jackhammer 1.0 Public Alpha - New Level Editor
Jackhammer is a brand new level editor for games with a quake-style BSP architecture. The aim is to develop a convenient cross-platform tool capable of incorporating the best features of existing editors, such as Valve Hammer Editor, Q3Radiant and others. Despite Quake and Half-Life having been released a long time ago, the large community have arisen around, still developing mods and games on their bases. However the existing editors suffer from fundamental disadvantages their users are well familiar with. Jackhammer does aspire to be the universal level design tool for classic games. But not only the classics! The editor shall become a key development tool for the Volatile3D II engine, that is why its second name is Volatile Development Kit.

Jackhammer is being developed since August 2013, that means the editor is very young. But the team of professional programmers and testers is ready to present the public alpha within four months. Despite not all the functions being implemented, not all the planned games being supported and only a small extent of the new ideas being realized, today you are able to download, install and evaluate Jackhammer in action. Please don't forget that alpha is the first, quite a raw version, and may contain some issues. We are interested in a vast testing of the editor and grateful in advance for your comments and suggestions! In addition, you can provide Jackhammer with financial support, donating funds for the further development.

This version supports Quake, Quake II and Half-life.

Web page
Features

DOWNLOAD - Win32 now, Linux in future.

Quoth FGD for Jackhammer

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Run As Admin 
I installed to the program files directory which is why I need to run as admin. Windows doesnt like power users who want to use program files like any normal folder. In case anyone else has done the same, admin will solve your problems with saving user preferences. 
TyrUtils Only 
I have been using TyrUtils. I have not used the compile tools supplied with Jackhammer. Valve Hammer works, TyrUtils support Map 220. My guess is somewhere between loading a RMF (or .map)created by Hammer into Jackhammer something is changed. My impression was you should get the same output .map as Hammer. 
 
Well, then please send me compilers, wad, rmf and batch file as you suggested before. The compile log with errors is also necessary.
Email: support a hlfx point ru
Issues can be related either to floating-point coordinates JH exports map in (unlike VHE that rounds all floats to integers), or with TyrUtils themselves, I'll check it.
I can't output the same .map as Hammer because JH editing algorithms are different. 
Fixed 1 Broke Another 
I see now the after comparing the .map files. My assumption that VHE and JH used the same system was wrong.
XaeroX Fixed the error. Used a different version of compile tools.

Found I was able to crash the editor by exporting to map. I can load the rmf from VHE into Jackhammer fine, works/compiles. If I load the .map and then export from Jackhammer crashes.
I sent that in to support.

Thank you for your help. 
Wow, Huge Map! 
Thank you for the archive. There was no crash on export, but a crash on import, and I've fixed it. You should check the new version of JH when it's available for further consideration.
Yes, because of the complexity it's impossible to compile your map with a JH's Q1 compiler. 
Excellent, But Small Issue 
Just tried this, found it to be excellent.

However there is a small issue, for some reason the texture browser is only displaying white instead of textures, see this screenshot:

http://br0gspot.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/jh_tbrows.jpg

Everything else works fine so far... 
Newer Texture Formats 
Great stuff so far, with one roadblock at the moment. Modern q2 clients can load in alternative texture formats (png, jpg), so it would be nice to be able to access these resources from JH.
I've modified the gamecfg.ini to bring these in, and the files are enumerated in the folder list, but they aren't accessible from the texture browser. 
JH Supports Only The Classic Engines 
If the authors of alternative clients want their support in JH, they may contact me and tell what they exactly need. There are billions of different Q1/2/3 forks, but I personally use none of them. :)
Or, alternatively, wait for Plugin SDK, because such support can easily be achieved via plugins. 
 
Fair enough :P

One non-extension request, then:
When pasting a brush in the x/y window, it should inherit the z of the origin brush. Right now, pasted brushes align to the center of the camera axis you are not pasting in. The same logic can apply to brush creation. 
Love Being Able To See The Monsters 
Seeing the models is quite awesome in the 3d viewport. I like how as soon as you type a number on a "skin" key that it auto-updates the model. I wish the monsters could be animated though. I tried "frame" as a key but it didn't do anything to change it. The weapons spin though which is fantastic!

The only thing major feature missing now from this awesome editor is lighting preview in the 3d view. Ahh then I would never have to compile again lol. Dream on Qmaster, dream on. 
Lighting Preview Will Probably Appear... One Day 
>>I tried "frame" as a key but it didn't do anything to change it.
Use "sequence" key. But animation is not available, because frames are changed by game logic. Internal sequences, i.e. "frame groups" (particularly, flame models) are animated correctly. 
Someday, Mebbe... 
A torus tool, or skew function? As it is, I have to go from GTKRadiant to Jack to work on curves pipage and the like. 
 
Well, torus is better implemented as a model.
What do you mean by "skew"? There is a third editing mode, "shear" (click the selection two times to activate it) - isn't it? 
Can't Load Models. 
Not seeing the models in the 3d port, and the console is full of "can't load *.mdl". What am I doing wrong? Otherwise, having a blast with Jack otherwise thus far. 
Otherwise. 
 
Minor Compiling Problem 
Hey I've just tried Jackhammer today for the first time and I must say I'm very pleased so far. Finally an editor that's not crashing every 10 minutes hurrahh. :)

However once I tried to compile a map , any map I get this:

>> There was a problem compiling the map.
>> Check the file D:\Steam\SteamApps\common\Half-Life\Firestorm\mapsop4f20.log for the cause.

It's compiling without making signaling that the maps folder is a folder \ <<< that sign is missing. What can I do as it appears I'm the only one suffering from this.

game exe: D:/Steam/SteamApps/common/Half-Life/hl.exe
base game folder: D:\Steam\SteamApps\common\Half-Life\

mod dir: D:\Steam\SteamApps\common\Half-Life\Firestorm

source dir: D:\HL Editing\current mapping\Jack


I'm using Vluzacn's ZHLT v33 compilers 64bit for Half-Life1. 
 
Nevermind I've solved it myself. I had to disable "copy file $path/$file $bspdir/$file.$ext

It's still weird as I have to click on that everytime I wanna compile something. Otherwise the error returns.

Also 1 request: Make make it possible to increase the camera turn rate. Perhaps build a new button within the options where you can accelerate the turn rate speed of the camera. At the moment it's so slow and steals time. 
Jackhammer And Map Compilation 
I'm posting this here as a request to reach out to XaeroX, or whomever is the main developer of Jackhammer, for a one on one conversation in regards to Jackhammer, and a potential problem it seems to be having.

The details of this problem are big, and I don't want to copy and paste all of that onto here, which is why I would like to speak privately about it. If you could get in contact with me via email which is in my profile, or whichever way you are comfortable with, it would be highly appreciated. 
Okay 
For those who may know what I'm talking about, I'll say it here. I'm leaving out a lot of details, so I'll just give the really condensed version and hopefully that will be enough.

I have a map, fairly complex. I save it in Worldcraft 1.6. Compile it, no leaks.
Same map, save it in Jackhammer. Compile it, multiple leaks passing through solid brushes (as well as many off point warnings in the compile log).

So what's the story here? 
 
all i can think of is floating point planes in the map file 
Yup 
That would be my guess as well. Maybe upload the two map files somewhere so that we can take a look? 
So... 
How's it going?

Is there a plan for any more updates, or is the current plan to work work work and get it ready for full fledged release? As it stands, it's almost ready as is. Honestly, the only thing holding it back for me is the hotkey for Deselect (should be *SHIFT* plus Q in my opinion, not CTRL) but if a full release has support for remapping hotkeys then woohoo!!

Anyways, Jackhammer is now my goto editor for Quake mapping. I love it!

(P.S. There is some mysterious bug that causes the CTRL or SHIFT keys to become stuck on, at least as far as Windows is concerned. I've noticed it on both Win7 and Win8. How to reproduce: map like a fool. How to fix: *shrugs* it seems to fix after hitting the key a bunch of times while typing something in Notepad) 
Is Open Source Or Closed Source 
And if the latter, what long term value does such an editor provide since the Quake community tends to outlast the lifespan of closed-source projects.

[Sure I hate to ask, but is very valid question looking at graveyard full of closed-source map editors of yesteryears's ...] 
 
>>How's it going?
Delayed a little, because I have recently switched to some other projects. But there will be new releases for sure. ^^
>>should be *SHIFT* plus Q in my opinion, not CTRL
Why? Ctrl-based hotkeys in "Edit" menu are standard de-facto. I don't understand why Valve (or whoever) decided to use a shift-based one.
>>graveyard full of closed-source map editors of yesteryears's
Opensourceness is possible. But actually I don't care. :)
The primary goal of the editor is to support my own game engine. But I'm grateful to the Quake community for the testing, of course. 
 
Very neat to see this!

Are there any plans to support saving .map formats older than v220 in the future, or is this unlikely to happen? (I've seen the v220 compilers for Quake1, but not for other Q1 or Q2 engine games) 
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