Source SDK: Mastering the Source/About this Book

Welcome to Source SDK: Mastering the Source, a Wikibook designed to teach you everything you need to know about the Source SDK. We hope that with the help of this book you will soon be on your way to designing, building, and publishing video game material using this fine program. Together with the information in this book, and your cooperation with all of it's aspects you are guaranteed to learn not only the abilities that the Source SDK has to offer, but how to master them as well.

=About this Book=

Source SDK: Mastering the Source is a book created by Wikibooks member MasterSkrat. This book is designed to help you understand the workings of the Source SDK, and the Hammer World Editor. In this book you will be taught on all aspects of the Source SDK and all it's abilities. We hope that this book satisfies your desire to learn about Source, and we hope that you finish this book cover to cover.

=Sections=

This book is divided into four separate sections, in order to properly train you on all aspects of the Source SDK, or simply which ever ones you want to learn about.

Section one: The Hammer World Editor-this section covers all aspects of the most popular application in the Source SDK. Most likely you are here right now simply to learn about the Hammer editor, and due to this book's sectioning system, you can learn it, and not worry about anything else(but that's not what we recommend).

Section Two: Other Applications-this section covers the other three applications located in the Application Browser of the Source SDK, these applications being the Face Poser, Model Viewer, and Itemtest. These three applications do not coincide with anything in the other sections, meaning you are free to skip this section, and learn about simply what interests you(but that's not what we recommend).

Section Three: Documentation-this section quickly covers the two document pieces located in the Documentation Bar of the Application Browser, these two documents contain links to a complete list of updates to the Source SDK, and a developer site similar to this book. You can find a link to this developer site on the home page of this book, and of course under Section Three.

Section Four: Utilities-the final section covers the utilities bar on the Application Browser, which contains the Create a Mod application, as well as three settings configuration buttons. The Create a Mod application is one of the most important aspects of the Source SDK, right behind the Hammer Editor. The Create a Mod app is what allows you to create a stand alone game, rather than simply a level. Creating a mod will be the second most critical thing for you to learn in this book, right after the Hammer Editor.

=Versions=

As you read on the previous page, you know that the Source SDK comes with different versions of itself for specific games. This book will help you to understand what aspects of the SDK refer to the game you want to learn about. This is achieved by a colored logo that represents each specific game, that will be located beside each page name in the Table of Contents, and at the top of the page itself. If a page does not have the logo of the game you're working on beside it, then you can skip it, but in order to master the Source SDK and all it's abilities we recommend that you read every page.

The following is a list of all versions of the Source SDK, and the logos that will represent it in the Table of Contents:

Source SDK: Half-life 2( '), Team Fortress 2( ') Garry's Mod( ) Day of Defeat: Source( '), Counter-Strike: Source( '),

Left 4 Dead Authoring Tools: Left 4 Dead( )

Left 4 Dead 2 Authoring Tools: Left 4 Dead 2( )

Portal 2 Authoring Tools: Portal 2( )

=Quizzes=

At certain points in between pages, and at the end of every chapter you will take a quiz. This will help you in learning to remember specific things such as names, tools, and entities after you've learned about them, because if you can't remember what you've learned after you've read it, then why read it at all. Typical quizzes will have on average 10 questions, with ones at the end of a section having upwards of 20 questions. We recommend you take the quizzes, because they are a critical part of this book and your ability to learn and master the Source SDK, which is this book's intention.

=Helping you Read=

As we all know reading a book, especially a book this size, takes a lot of effort and devotion. So in order to help make sure that you see it through and don't give in to your short attention span we have a set of tips that we believe can help you finish this book, quick and easy.


 * Scheduling-a book with this many pages will no doubt take a long time to read, so we recommend you plan a way to read it. The number of pages you read in a day is important, say if you were to read a page a day, you would most likely finish this book in a year. If you were to read 5 pages a day, you could finish in about a month or two. We recommend finding dull points in your day, say when there's nothing on t.v. or if it's raining outside, or even if you're at school, take these do nothing moments and put them to use on this book, and before you know it you'll find something new to do and you've already finished a good set of pages today. It's also important for you to some days read more than your average amount of pages, say if your average is 5 pages a day, sometimes make it 10 pages a day, so you can balance out days you didn't read at all.


 * Music-it's no ancient secret that listening to music makes anything better. One thing you can do is make a playlist(on youtube, mp3, etc.) and put it on autoplay while you read. Or you can listen to extended soundtracks on Youtube, if you're here then you're most likely a typical gamer and we're sure you must have some favorite video game tunes, a nice soothing extended theme from a video game lasts a long time, and is less likely to distract because of a lack of lyrics.

=Video Tutorials=

Each page of this book will come complete with a set of video tutorials gathered from multiple outlets on the internet. The videos are not made or endorsed by wikibooks, but they will allow additional information on subjects. It's important to note that you are perfectly capable of learning everything you need to know about a subject on the wiki page, these videos are simply added as an extra precaution in case you have trouble understanding a subject. The video's will not teach any new material, they will simply present an alternative form of educating you on the subject in a way that might suit you better than the wiki. We do not recommend watching the videos, but we don't find anything wrong with it either.

Well, now you know everything you need when it comes to understanding this book. So please continue onto the next page.