[C#][Source] BlackRain - Simple Object Manager Library

[!@^^@!]

I actually ditched the entire 'object searching' method, in favor of (faster) LINQ queries.
---SNIP---

Apoc, isn't LINQ slower because the keywords used by LINQ are syntactic sugar for invoactions to a set of generic routines that iterates collections and filtering through lambda expressions, meaning less possibilities for optimization? I may very well be wrong though...

[Seifer]

I've copied and pasted your code exactly (apart from readonly, for somereason it won't compile with that there), yet am getting NullReferenceException errors when reading health, wow is open and logged in etc. Any chance of a heads up?

Process[] _wowProc = Process.GetProcessesByName("Wow");
int pid = _wowProc[0].Id; // Will grab the first WoW process found. (0th element)
ObjectManager.Initialize(pid);
int playerHealth = ObjectManager.Me.Health;

Which version are you using?

...

From the post:

Alright, I missed something obvious.

[uliena1979]

You need to populate ObjectManager.Me first.
You can do that with ObjectManager.Pulse()

I've copied and pasted your code exactly (apart from readonly, for somereason it won't compile with that there), yet am getting NullReferenceException errors when reading health, wow is open and logged in etc. Any chance of a heads up?

Process[] _wowProc = Process.GetProcessesByName("Wow");
int pid = _wowProc[0].Id; // Will grab the first WoW process found. (0th element)
ObjectManager.Initialize(pid);
int playerHealth = ObjectManager.Me.Health;

[Jackedy129]

Im using Pulse now and health comes out as -3753472532?? And using latest version.

[Seifer]

Im using Pulse now and health comes out as -3753472532?? And using latest version.

You're right, it did initialize ObjectManage.Me, and populated it, but didn't read the descriptors appropriately. That has been fixed, and a new revision is up on the SVN and as a download, which should display your health properly:

[23/04/2010 14:49:38] - Type: 4
BaseAddress: 0x775334xxx
GUID: 360287xxxx2076xxxx
Health: 69
Location: 1680.705,-4443.605,19.18787

And the testing code I used:

lst_Objects.Items.Add("Me Type: " + ObjectManager.Me.Type);
            lst_Objects.Items.Add(string.Format("Me BaseAddress: 0x{0:X}", ObjectManager.Me.BaseAddress));
            lst_Objects.Items.Add("Me GUID: " + ObjectManager.Me.GUID);
            lst_Objects.Items.Add(ObjectManager.Me.ToString());
            lst_Objects.Items.Add(ObjectManager.Me.Health);

The only problem I've run into is that when you foreach loop WowPlayer, it throws an exception about not being able to convert WowItem to WowPlayer. Yet have to find out where that originates.

Anyway, download the new lib/src and you should be going again.

[Bananenbrot]

As a sidenote, if you want to rely on Blackmagic, so might want to try the new 1.1 version with built-in asm support I think. Didn't test it, but API seems to be quite the same. Get it from GameDeception.com.
Sooner or later I would suggest to write your own memory implementation is a more Apoc-style with generics and IntPtr instead of uint addresses for some people on x64.
One big advantage of .net 4, and that was because I downloaded the VS 10 RC at that time, is, that IntPtr got the long awaited offset operator and .Add/Substract methods. While not affecting efficiency it is a gratification for my eyes to use

Memory.Read<IntPtr>(BaseAddress + 0x546548);

instead of something like

Memory.Read<IntPtr>(new IntPtr(BaseAddress.ToInt64() + 0x546548));

Great to see someone doing something for the beginners in this forum to get an insight into how to combine all that source snippets

EDIT: Forget about what I said about the Blackmagic 1.1 and the fasm dependency. I just examined the project and I haven't noticed any changes.

[Seifer]

I might implement an IntPtr based memory library at a later point in time, but as of now, BlackMagic does its job perfectly. I'm based on an x64 system myself, and haven't had any trouble at all with BlackMagic, or fasm_managed.

Currently, I'm working on better and more detailed Exception handling, and logging. Thanks for the suggestion.

[solttu]

The only problem I've run into is that when you foreach loop WowPlayer, it throws an exception about not being able to convert WowItem to WowPlayer. Yet have to find out where that originates.

It also throws an exception when I try to foreach loop WowGameObjects.

InvalidCastException was unhandled

Unable to cast object of type 'BlackRain.Common.Objects.WowItem' to type 'BlackRain.Common.Objects.WowGameObject'.

[Apoc]

I already explained to seifer why it was throwing exceptions, and how to fix it.

foreach(var obj in ObjectList.OfType<WowPlayer>()) { DoStuff(); }

You can't convert a WoWItem to a WoWPlayer. Go read up on OOP, and how inheritance works.

[Seifer]

I already explained to seifer why it was throwing exceptions, and how to fix it.

foreach(var obj in ObjectList.OfType<WowPlayer>()) { DoStuff(); }

You can't convert a WoWItem to a WoWPlayer. Go read up on OOP, and how inheritance works.

Correct, I've just been extremely lazy and haven't got around to updating it. I do plan on doing this sometime in the near future.

[Seifer]

Alright, I've been rate lazy and finally kicked my own bollocks into updating this again. Should've done it long ago, since Apoc just spoon-fed the solution, basically.

This update will fix the problem people had with the "Unable to cast object of type 'BlackRain.Common.Objects.WowItem' to type 'BlackRain.Common.Objects.WowGameObject'.".

Where we used to do:

foreach (WowPlayer obj in ObjectManager.Objects)

We now do:

foreach (WowPlayer obj in ObjectManager.Objects.OfType<WowPlayer>())

This requires the System.Linq reference in the file where you are calling the list, and the Type.
Somewhere in the coming weeks I'll be kicking this rig up again, and use LINQ to get Object "Searching" done, and make this something proper and up to standards again.

Small push to the SVN to reflect these changes. Enjoy.

// Edit - No bins this time around, everything you need is on the SVN. If you want the "latest compiled binary", even though changes are extremely minimal; grab it from the SVN.

[Bananenbrot]

I'm doing it with a single query and mostly with named paramters.
The actual implementation is (needless to say) ugly, especially the prototype:

public static IEnumerable<T> Search<T>(int minLevel = int.MinValue, int maxLevel = int.MaxValue, int exactLevel = int.MaxValue, 
            bool? dead = null, bool? canAttack = null, bool lineOfSight = false, bool includeMe = true, string name = "",
            float minDistance = float.MinValue, float maxDistance = float.MaxValue, ulong guid = 0) 
            where T: WoWObject
        {
            if (guid != 0)
                return new T[] { GetObjectByGuid(guid) as T };

            var query = ObjectList.OfType<T>();

            if (exactLevel != int.MaxValue)
                query = query.Where(o => (o as WoWUnit).Level == exactLevel);
            else
            {
                if (minLevel != int.MinValue)
                    query = query.Where(o => (o as WoWUnit).Level >= minLevel);
                if (maxLevel != int.MinValue)
                    query = query.Where(o => (o as WoWUnit).Level <= maxLevel);
            }

            if (dead.HasValue)
                query = query.Where(o => (o as WoWUnit).IsDead == dead);
            if (canAttack.HasValue)
                query = query.Where(o => (o as WoWUnit).IsCritter == !canAttack);
            if (lineOfSight)
                query = query.Where(o => o.IsInLineOfSight);
            if (!includeMe)
                query = query.Where(o => !(o as WoWUnit).IsMe);

            if(minDistance != float.MinValue)
                query = query.Where(o => o.Distance(ObjectManager.Me) >= minDistance);
            if(maxDistance != float.MaxValue)
                query = query.Where(o => o.Distance(ObjectManager.Me) <= maxDistance);

            return query;
        }

Searching for an object boils down to something like:

var nextMob = ObjectManager.Search<WoWUnit>(
    minLevel: 1, 
    maxLevel: 3, 
    dead: false, 
    canAttack: true, 
    includeMe: false,
).OrderBy(u => u.Distance(ObjectManager.Me)).First();

[~Unknown~]

Very nice work on the library. Few questions though. I'm just wondering why you aren't using a dictionary structure for your wow objects. I always thought it was a better data structure for that, but I could be mistaken. Also, have you planned on using locks in the manager at some point for use in multi-threaded applications?

[Seifer]

Very nice work on the library. Few questions though. I'm just wondering why you aren't using a dictionary structure for your wow objects. I always thought it was a better data structure for that, but I could be mistaken. Also, have you planned on using locks in the manager at some point for use in multi-threaded applications?

Thanks. And I prefer lists over dictionaries, because I have no reason whatsoever to use the TKey, TValue structure, I just want a list of my objects and then use LINQ to search what I need, rather than Dictionary[index] and Dictionarty.ContainsKey stuff, which - in my opinion - is just rubbish. Feel free to use dictionaries for it, though. :P

And no, I don't plan to implement locks in the near future.

[Kryso]

I personally use Dictionary because in theory it should be faster than list when we are refreshing it, unless you are destroying and re-creating all objects in which case speed should be about the same.