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Messages - Ashley

1
Tools / Re: TileCutter 0.5.5 Beta Release
Quote from: An_dz – on
Hey Timothy I can't open Tilecutter, It don't even shows anything.
I looked at ProceXP (It's a cool Task Manager) and it runs but is killed at same time
I've tried downloading version 0.5.4 but no results
I'm using Win7 Professional also i've attached the log

Hello An_dz, may I ask what operating system you are using? Also what do you have the language options set to? From the log this looks like an error to do with decoding one of the language files, I'll have to investigate.
5
Pak64 Add-ons and Graphics / Re: Error on EnCo Refrigerated Container Ship
Quote from: Sybill – on
Four cars are realistic for a ship of this size? Even a small ferry can carry more. The truck can carry 16 cars and it's a lot smaller.

Graphically the truck can carry 2 cars, with another 2 on the trailer. It'd be better to balance the car production chain so that each individual unit is worth more, and have the number of units transportable by the vehicle accurate to the way it looks.

And those ships are really very tiny, they are to the same scale as the cars drawn on the deck.

If you want to carry more, you need a bigger ship, e.g.:
9
Simutrans Help Center / Re: Error on EnCo refrigerated container ship?
Is there a version of Makeobj compiled for mac? I'd try and fix this, but it's late and the tools are not readily findable. I haven't used Makeobj in some time.

I've uploaded the source files for the ships, not sure why that particular one has broken, may be just changes to the freight categories, or the name of the good type or some kind of thing.

Source files are here:

http://entropy.me.uk/simutrans/enco-light-ships.zip
11
Pak64 Add-ons and Graphics / Re: Problems with downloading - bad links
I've finally found the cause of this issue, 78 files have corrupted names (probably from the original download of the old forum). Fortunately we didn't have too many international members back then or I'd have a heck of a job on my hands :) Should be fixed this weekend.
13
Randomness Lounge / The California Zephyr
I've been lucky enough to get the chance to travel on this train over the past few days and I thought I'd share some of the pictures. The route runs from Chicago through the midwest US, over the Rocky and Sierra Mountains and down into San Francisco bay. It's widely held to be one of the most scenic Amtrak routes, and we weren't disappointed!

http://entropy.me.uk/US2010/
15
Extension Requests / Re: How to make one way choose signals
This would likely need a code change, since there's no provision at the moment to have a combination roadsign where the one-way action happens in the opposite direction to the choose action. Could be added by making the one_way= parameter take a third value (say "2") which would indicate that it should act the opposite way around to a normal one-way sign...

Moving to Extension Requests.
16
Web & Wiki / Re: Unifying the Wikies - Community Discussion
I broadly support this proposal, a single source of documentation is better than many spread out ones.

I think that we possibly need to have another discussion about ways we can make Simutrans inherently easier for new players though. Many people won't even get as far as the Wiki, and nowadays people expect some kind of built-in tutorial in games which have any great level of complexity to them.

Creation of an in-game tutorial, with scripted prompts designed to introduce players to the game would complement a unified documentation source, and give players with short attention spans a chance to get into the game before frustration sets in.

I'd also call for very regular backups of the Wiki, we've lost too much in the past. Maybe we can set it up to be automatically mirrored to Isaac's server?
19
Tools / TileCutter 0.5.5 Beta Release
There is a newer release of TileCutter available, see: http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=6962.0

This is a beta release of the new TileCutter.

If you do encounter any issues while using TileCutter please submit a bug report by posting in reply to this thread with the following information:

1. Circumstances and description of the issue
2. tilecutter.log and TileCutter5.exe.log (if present)
3. Copy of the tc.config file

Changes 0.5.5 (beta):

ADD: Proper selection of path to makeobj via GUI
ADD: Command line scriptability:
Specify path to multiple .tcp files for automatic processing
Override output location of .dat/.png
Specify .pak output if required
Usage: "TileCutter5 -h" will give command line usage info
ADD: Ability to select .dat file output via UI checkbox
FIX: Selecting a file at the root of a drive on Windows leads to wrong path display
ADD: Basic documentation now available on website (via Online Help link in menu)

Known Bugs
- Panel display bug when choosing different languages, workaround is to resize the window, which appears to fix this


What's new
Command Line interface for scripting
Ability to disable .dat file output
Online documentation
UI Improvements

What's still to do
Specific platform source distribution via .zip/.tar.gz file
Lots of testing
Full dat file editor
Smoke editor
Mac distribution
Windows msi installer

Notes

Please see here for TileCutter documentation

All the paths in the main window are relative to the project save location path. This is intended to allow you to put all your work files in one directory, and then to be able to move or zip that directory and send it to someone else while preserving all the links to the images. Also note that the images are not saved with the project file, only links to them are (this may change at some point).

It's also worth pointing out that in order for the one click exporting to work (e.g. makeobj integration) you need to have filled out the correct details in the dat editing window. Currently this is just a text entry box, but this will change in future to a proper dat editing UI. The image array information is automatically generated and appended to whatever you type into this box.

Download
You can download this beta release of TileCutter from the following link:

TileCutter_win_0.5.5-beta.zip (5.4 MB)

You can also download a source distribution:

TileCutter_src_0.5.5-beta.zip (232 KB)

NOTE: The source distribution requires that you have Python 2.6 or better installed already, and depends upon the wxWidgets library.

And you can check out the source for this release from the SVN, using this URL:

svn://entropy.me.uk/timothy/tilecutter/tags/0.5.5/

And the current latest version from this one:

svn://entropy.me.uk/timothy/tilecutter/trunk/

I recommend upgrading to this version over all previous versions of TileCutter, especially the 0.3 branch.
21
Pak128 Add-ons and Graphics / Re: 'Dutch Railway Set' (pak128) - is a correct version available?
Quote from: Hajo – on
I still wonder why no one does it, while so many ask for it. Simutrans sources are open, and it would be possible to create a pak decompiler from those ... one just needs some code that writes the PNG files and the DAT files after reading the data from a pak (reading is already included in Simutrans sources).

I'd propose that people stop asking for a decompiler except the one who actually will make it. Why do people always expect others to do the work for them? Stop whining, start doing.

There is AFAIK already a tool which can do this, but yes, people should put up or shut up... The functionality could even be built directly into Makeobj if desired (and this would be the ideal way to do it).

Quote from: wlindley – on
In another thread I was told that anyone who wrote a pak de-compiler would violate the Spirit of Something, bringing down the wrath of all pak-writers, and be ostracized from the Simutrans community.  Which is rather off-putting.  Otherwise I would write one in Perl (along with, possibly, a more sensible 'makeobj' that understands png transparency and could separate multi-tile buildings directly from the sensibly drawn images without needing pointy-clicky frustrating 'gui' tools like tilecutter that don't run on linux, but I was told not to do that either).

Bit of a misquote there. What I actually pointed out was that being able to decompile a pak file doesn't necessarily mean that you should do so, depending on the original intentions of the author and whether they have released the graphics into the public domain, or under an open-source licence. Given the amount of legacy material available in the community the widespread availability of a tool which can do this may not be a good idea. This is certainly a position which may need review however given the widespread trend within Simutrans to moving towards open-source.

TileCutter does in fact run on Linux, most Python scripts do. A scriptable interface is also relatively easy to do (nobody has so far requested it though - most users seem happy with the "pointy-clicky frustrating gui"), and the ability to run TileCutter from the command line with a .tcp template and source images as arguments is going into the next release (which will allow for scripting of cutting during pakset builds).

Who told you not to write a tool? You are welcome to of course. I'd advise against trying to re-implement Makeobj functions though since Makeobj changes quite often (this is why TileCutter just calls Makeobj to actually create pak objects). It might be more productive to add this code directly into Makeobj, as for the "decompilation" option (certainly, being able to recognise and discard 32bit transparency would be a boon, I am not so sure you've thought about the complexity of an entirely commandline version of TileCutter though - but good luck to you with that).
22
Tools / Re: JimsViewer, a tool for extracting paksets info and gathering statistics
Quote from: wlindley – on
Absolutely.  Providing a book in an open format does not reduce its copyright protection. 

A "pak decompiler" would be useful for two things only:  For personal enjoyment ("Fair Use") without the large trouble of rebuilding entire paks from scratch; and for developers to recover freely released paks for which the source has been lost.

Personal enjoyment is covered by the ability to use the pak file within the game, in the way the original author intended (e.g. with their dat file settings and original graphics). This is entirely fair use. Making any changes to the object IMO requires the permission of the original author, which isn't explicitly given by releasing an object in pak format (since there has always been this ****umption of non-decompilation). This is the crux of the issue really, the intention of the original author in releasing only the pak file and not the source was almost certainly because they didn't want to grant usage permissions beyond those normally ****ociated with a pak file.

The latter case is valid, and as has been pointed out there is a tool available to the main development team to do exactly this.
23
Incorporated Patches and Solved Bug Reports / Re: [patch] Minor improvements to image writer and reader
Quote from: wlindley – on
It looks like TileCutter (does that use the standard writer code?) can produce many identical 'squares' -- particularly blank ones, or when parts of a large image repeat in the various rotations. 

Any thoughts on whether checking and re-using identical picture segments would be worthwhile in terms of space?

TileCutter doesn't make .pak files directly, but rather uses Makeobj to achieve this, so any optimisations made in Makeobj will apply equally to TileCutter-produced buildings (TileCutter doesn't attempt to optimise its image output for exactly this reason).
24
Tools / Re: JimsViewer, a tool for extracting paksets info and gathering statistics
Quote from: wlindley – on
Data is data... all the information from the .png and .dat is in the .pakfile ... it is all a pretty straightforward compile, thus a straightforward de-compile.  "The original choice was the paks shouldn't [be able to be] viewed or changed" is exactly the sort of foolishness that motivates "white hat" (good) hackers to write tools to extract binary formats like Microsoft Word's... and the "locking up" of data is what motivated R. Stallman to write his original free printer driver.

This is supposed to be free software, people... quit the jealousy.  There's no harm in a .pak -> .png+.dat program.

It isn't as straightforward as you might think, makeobj throws away some information when it creates the pak file (to optimise it for purpose).

As others have pointed out, Simutrans hasn't always been open source, and many of the objects (existing and historical) were never released into the public domain or under an open source licence (there is a difference). While it is wrong to think of the pak file format as DRM it is also wrong to think that just because you can potentially reverse-engineer a pak file, you should or are entitled to.

The majority of open source licenses are actually still about keeping control of your creations to an extent you can't by simply releasing a work into the public domain (see the "viral" qualities of the GPL for a perfect example). So even if a tool to reverse-engineer pak files was freely available it would not change your responsibility to respect the wishes of the original author. Generally speaking if the creator of an object in Simutrans wishes to release the graphics into the public domain, or under an open source licence they will do so with the source graphics (this is usually the case). Releasing only a .pak file can be taken as a statement of intent that the author does not wish the source to be freely available, and that they retain their rights over it as their creation.
26
Extension Requests / Re: NEW CLIMATES MODEL (was: The Equatorial Wind)
http://simblob.blogspot.com/2010/01/simple-map-generation.html

This blog article is relevant to this discussion :)

It's something I'm working on for my own game project, using wind/rainfall to model terrain is a very simple and effective idea. You can also take it a step further, and use that rainfall to produce rivers...

On the subject of the many many tiles problem, why not just dynamically generate them and cache the results? In reality there will only be a small subset of the tiles "in play" at any one time. With the amount of RAM available nowadays this is potentially a perfectly good solution... I've got code which demonstrates rendering a tile from scratch, and I'm working on dynamic caching of the results, it's very possible (even with two-steepness terrain, enhanced tileset and multiple terrain type graphics...)
27
Tools / Re: TileCutter 0.5.3.1 Alpha Release
Hi undrline,

TileCutter is really intended to be a tool for working with Simutrans images. The kind of tool you're describing would likely be fairly easy to create. Could you send me a more detailed list of requirements via PM, or here, so I can think about how best to go about writing such a program? If all you want is a method to automate cutting a png into smaller bits, this could probably be done with a script fairly easily...
28
Tools / TileCutter 0.5.4 Alpha Release
There is a newer release of TileCutter available, see: http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=4628

This is an alpha release of the new TileCutter.

Please note that this version is still under development, and there may be some major bugs. If you do encounter any issues using it please submit a bug report by posting in reply to this thread with the following information:

1. Circumstances and description of the issue
2. tilecutter.log and TileCutter5.exe.log (if present)

Changes 0.5.4:

FIX: Better controls layout
FIX: Bug with mask production on wxGTK
FIX: Better handling of save locations, caching of last save location
FIX: Dialog boxes positioned centered on application, not centered on window
ADD: Application window fits to size of contents on start
ADD: Updated translations

Known Bugs
- Panel display bug when choosing different languages, workaround is to resize the window, which appears to fix this


What's new
UI Improvements

What's still to do
Specific platform source distribution via .zip/.tar.gz file
Lots of testing
Full dat file editor
Smoke editor
Online documentation
Mac distribution
Windows msi installer

Notes
All the paths in the main window are relative to the project save location path. This is intended to allow you to put all your work files in one directory, and then to be able to move or zip that directory and send it to someone else while preserving all the links to the images. Also note that the images are not saved with the project file, only links to them are (this may change at some point).

It's also worth pointing out that in order for the one click exporting to work (e.g. makeobj integration) you need to have filled out the correct details in the dat editing window. Currently this is just a text entry box, but this will change in future to a proper dat editing UI. The image array information is automatically generated and appended to whatever you type into this box.

Download
You can download this alpha release of TileCutter from the following link:

TileCutter_win_0.5.4-alpha.zip (5.4 MB)

You can also download a source distribution:

TileCutter_src_0.5.4-alpha.zip (232 KB)

NOTE: The source distribution requires that you have Python 2.6 or better installed already, and depends upon the wxWidgets library.

And you can check out the source for this release from the SVN, using this URL:

svn://entropy.me.uk/timothy/tilecutter/tags/0.5.4/

And the current latest version from this one:

svn://entropy.me.uk/timothy/tilecutter/trunk/

While this version of TileCutter is listed as an alpha release, it is in all likelihood more stable and likely to work than the previous (0.3d.1) version. I recommend using this version over the 0.3 releases.
29
Tools / Re: TileCutter 0.5.3.1 Alpha Release
Ok, I'll have to work on that to do a bit better detection of screen sizes. For now, you can edit the tc.config file, and set the "window_size" variable to different dimensions. This will make the program start up with a smaller window.
31
Tools / TileCutter 0.5.3.1 Alpha Release
There is a newer release of TileCutter available, see: http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=4434

This is an alpha release of the new TileCutter.

Please note that this version is still under development, and there may be some major bugs. If you do encounter any issues using it please submit a bug report by posting in reply to this thread with the following information:

1. Circumstances and description of the issue
2. tilecutter.log and TileCutter5.exe.log (if present)

Changes 0.5.3.1:

FIX: Window resizing not working below default size

Changes 0.5.3:

FIX: Export error with Python character mapping
FIX: Translation of strings in image path entry box
FIX: Layout of About window incorrect
FIX: Default language setting not being saved

ADD: Filepath of saved file displayed in the title bar, indicates saved/unsaved status
ADD: Exception handling for case of no WX being installed
ADD: Better integration with SimuTranslator
ADD: Translations from SimuTranslator, currently only German and Spanish are translated

DEL: Removed flags for country code - not a good way to indicate language

Known Bugs
- Last save directory not stored


What's new
Source distribution via public SVN
Source distribution in build script
Completely re-written cutting engine, no longer sucks (I hope!)
New and improved UI
Makeobj integration and one-click export
Ability to save + load project files
Better translation system and (hopefully) integration with SimuTranslator

What's still to do
Specific platform source distribution via .zip/.tar.gz file
Lots of testing
Full dat file editor
Smoke editor
Online documentation
Mac distribution
Windows msi installer

Notes
All the paths in the main window are relative to the project save location path. This is intended to allow you to put all your work files in one directory, and then to be able to move or zip that directory and send it to someone else while preserving all the links to the images. Also note that the images are not saved with the project file, only links to them are (this may change at some point).

It's also worth pointing out that in order for the one click exporting to work (e.g. makeobj integration) you need to have filled out the correct details in the dat editing window. Currently this is just a text entry box, but this will change in future to a proper dat editing UI. The image array information is automatically generated and appended to whatever you type into this box.

Download
You can download this alpha release of TileCutter from the following link:

TileCutter_win_0.5.3.1-alpha.zip (5.4 MB)

You can also download a source distribution:

TileCutter_src_0.5.3.1-alpha.zip (232 KB)

NOTE: The source distribution requires that you have Python 2.6 or better installed already, and depends upon the wxWidgets library.

And you can check out the source for this release from the SVN, using this URL:

svn://entropy.me.uk/timothy/tilecutter/tags/0.5.3.1/

And the current latest version from this one:

svn://entropy.me.uk/timothy/tilecutter/trunk/

While this version of TileCutter is listed as an alpha release, it is in all likelihood more stable and likely to work than the previous (0.3d.1) version. I recommend using this version over the 0.3 releases.
33
Translation and Help Texts / Re: Simutranslator for TileCutter
The ones with ampersands are for menu item keyboard shortcuts. The character after the Ampersand is the letter you click on to navigate to that item. E.g. when you press "Alt+F", to open the file menu, then x to exit.

Which items did you click on to get those errors? I deleted all the translation strings from the old import of the TileCutter objects, and the 26XXX IDs seem to be a lot older than the 39XXX ones for the working items. So it might just be that you're finding the old ones...
35
Tools / Re: TileCutter 0.5.2 Alpha Release
Translations are now available in SimuTranslator if people wish to begin translating them :) I'll include the results in each release of TileCutter.