Raymond's Newbie Thoughts

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Hiya Cori, @CorinaMarie

It half worked.

The attached file is LUA' script and result, I have checked a bit of sequence of num and some material name, they matched, thanks for your formatting, I could see them clearly.

I don't know why the TGI are not hex code which i could see in reader, maybe it needs some tohex function.IMO.

Yours,

-- Raymond

RayTest_04.zip

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

3 hours ago, Raymond7cn said:

It half worked.

Yay! That's exciting.

 

3 hours ago, Raymond7cn said:

I don't know why the TGI are not hex code which i could see in reader, maybe it needs some tohex function.IMO.

One Decimal to Hex conversion coming right up!

^ Ofc, ignore my change in Line 2.

The changes are in Line17 where I pass the T, G, and I off to the function Dec2Hex and it converts the decimal to hex and pads it at the beginning with zeroes if it's not a full 8 characters long. And then the new function in lines 26 to 29

Here they are so you can copy them as text:

Line 17:

file:write(" T: ",Dec2Hex(T)," G: ",Dec2Hex(G)," I: ",Dec2Hex(I)," count: ",count," name: ",name," id: ",id)

New function:

function Dec2Hex(IN)
    OUT = string.rep("0", (8 - (string.len(string.format("%x", IN))))) .. string.format("%x", IN)
    return OUT
end

Now, it does seem there's a bug in the reader:entry_GetTGI(entry) thinger because it gets the value for G once correctly and then never updates it again.   <--- Oopsie. Not a bug. Expected. See Raymond's comment below.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Woww! Cori you are angel for doing this, Speechless, Actually i don't mind the Group value by now, they are all the same with S3D, Thank you Cori! I also dream that maybe one day we could search what we need in a database, My knowledge about sql is better than C or LUA.

Sincerely,

-- Raymond

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

2 minutes ago, Raymond7cn said:

i don't mind the Group value by now, they are all the same with S3D,

Oh! Silly me. The Flag == 2 is doing that.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

⑨, UP : Yes, Such a simple name of this Lot, but you might know this picture:

I pretty like this movie, since my son just looks like that little boy Carl, so really hope one day this Lot could be floating UP in the sky, and i'm just standing at the edge of the house, Enjoying the views of my city…

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

[Study journal 1] : Recently, I start to focus on the study of Computer graphics due to some issues, I found that though i could use Photoshop to make some nice pictures, though i could use 3ds max to make those models with light and shadow, though i thought i knew it since i always work with it, but apparently i'm not that clear enough when you ask me:

what's the difference between BMP and PNG pictures? why the size of picture is increased after you just save as it to another file without any change? what is RGB and CMYK and greyscale or Index image? why they can be represented with number 0~255? what is alpha channel? Do all pictures have alpha channel and RGB channel? what's the Bitmap?

There are so many questions i couldn't answer them, especially when i want to know the amount of color shift the game renders models, I just want to match the color of (daytime lighted by the sun) rendered model to the sample which i refer to, I found that it's technical impossible, i even need to learn advanced math, So i was aware that it's not as simple as painting on a paper, Actually, sometimes i probably just order the computer to draw it.

Today I learnt a lot from a user manual of rivit's great tool, GOFSH, Before that, all i know about this tool comes from this tutorial by Cori:

 

But Unfortunately, after that i stop learning until recently, have you noticed that the size of this tool's manual is bigger than the tool itself? if not, it's quite pity, since there's pirate's treasure inside, i plan to consult some problems with him or other experts with a new thread and then update the link here, Furthermore, there are other two excellent posts:

 

I'm so glad that there're still so many specialists with us. i have learned so much from your prior effort, Thank you!!

[rsc204 21,808]

On 03/07/2020 at 2:13 AM, Raymond7cn said:

I made some by tweaking the textures, then i have z-fighting issue,

Bear in mind, if due to multiple props being placed in close proximity, they overlap, z-fighting is an inevitable issue you will run into. Regardless of any settings used to alleviate the issue, you can't alter the fact that multiple textures are sharing the same space. Typically when MMPing like this, go slow and stead with regular saving, so you can undo anything that goes horribly wrong. Otherwise, try rotating or zooming in/out, every time the screen re-draws the effect of z-fighting changes. Sometimes it's sufficient to take a screenshot without the problem showing.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Many thanks to you Dear Robin, I do appreciate every professional advices you provide, Thank you!

-----

Hiya @hugues aroux, it's a pity that i couldn't make much progress on signpost by now, here are all i've found:

The attached file signpost.dat is those FSHs are relevant to the frame of signpost, you can find them in simcity_2.dat. I want to find out their parent objects, but no luck in S3D and UI files, (Cori helped me a lot with coding, Thank you!)

Those two above maybe the label's UI files, by doing these, i have learned a lot of knowledge about LUA and UI, most of them i thought you might have known very well since you have made great Blue UI mod, what i have learned, E.g. every widgets has their property parameters by which we can tweak such as winflag_visible and winflag_enabled (may control whether the widget shows to us), area (maybe relative coordinates), Image(background picture),Text, fillcolor,forecolor,bkgcolor, and the TextEditor is something like the text area of signpost where we could input, and if we set the button's id=0x0000107a and style=radiocheck, we can make the function which could keep the buildings to history. These UI are really interesting, I may look back all of this someday, Ah, BTW, another attached file key_signlabel.dat is some shortcuts i added to call the function of labels and signs, I set signpost as Y and Label as U and remove = CTRL+Y, you could change them to others you prefer with Reader.

Besides, Here are two other interesting FSH i found in simcity_2.dat, 7AB50E44-891B0E1A-CA5CC9C1 ,7AB50E44-891B0E1A-CA5CC9C0, by modifying these 257x1 and indexd color maps, I can make some changes of cutaway,

I haven't figure out the precise definition of their index, but Dear Rivit is helping me with it. so i will go back to model that futurist building a while, Sorry for wasn't able to be more helpful to you Hugues, but i will definitely find the signpost again someday, I still have a feeling that they are somewhere.

Sincerely,

-- Raymond

key_signlabel.dat

signpost.dat

[hugues aroux 3,784]

Yoohoo! Thank you so much, Raymond! As soon as I have a few minutes, I'll dive into the subject. I can't wait!

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Just for a record I quote these threads here, And just because of them, I began to make ANT-AM mod and those flying cars, I have some newbie's thoughts about the path of SC4, So alone with dreaming i do need to learn the theory of SC4Path, I don't know whether or not it's difficult to learn, i will write down all of them here.

Furthermore, I start thinking CAN-AM, I'm just aware that the pieces of can-am could be plopped upon the road, so i also wonder if it's possible to fill those diagonal angles or sidewalks of road in this way, but i haven't seen a diagonal canal before, I know these maybe some stupid questions, but i'd like to delve into them.

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

7 minutes ago, Raymond7cn said:

i also wonder if it's possible to fill those diagonal angles or sidewalks of road

Yep. Just takes creating the fillers. See @Cyclone Boom's post here.

[rsc204 21,808]

9 minutes ago, Raymond7cn said:

so i also wonder if it's possible to fill those diagonal angles or sidewalks of road in this way, but i haven't seen a diagonal canal before

And now you have:

There are tricks you can use to avoid the "diagonal jaggies". Canals are basically lots, since the outer parts aren't the NAM transit pieces, it's what matters. If you removed the base textures from these lots, the model parts (the actual canal), would happily work without the textures and no more jaggies. You can see this behaviour by dragging a diagonal section of the Maxis Highway network.

Complicating matters though, is how those pieces are used, see here how I've run roads/streets around the canals, so one set of diagonal jaggies meets up with the other. If you removed these grass textures from the canal lots, now you've created a problem when such networks are run alongside them. You can make one set with and one without (offering users the choice), or use overhanging props, but there'll always be a situation that catches you out.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

17 minutes ago, CorinaMarie said:

Yep. Just takes creating the fillers. See @Cyclone Boom's post here.

Thank you Cori, My head is all messed up these days and couldn't remember that thread i was involved as well, Really looking forward to the day CoriBoom™ publish it.

17 minutes ago, rsc204 said:

If you removed these grass textures from the canal lots, now you've created a problem when such networks are run alongside them.

Many thanks to you Robin, I didn't think of this, Frankly, I still have some questions about making a canal mod, but i will try to learn a bit by myself and then consult you with a new thread, I was fortunate in that I had you with us, Thank you!

Sincerely,

-- Raymond

[rsc204 21,808]

On 04/07/2020 at 4:26 PM, Raymond7cn said:

what's the difference between BMP and PNG pictures? why the size of picture is increased after you just save as it to another file without any change? what is RGB and CMYK and greyscale or Index image? why they can be represented with number 0~255? what is alpha channel? Do all pictures have alpha channel and RGB channel? what's the Bitmap?

I just saw this and figured I can answer a few.

BMPs and PNGs are simply different formats, neither really matters because Icons and some graphics aside, everything SC4 uses is actually FSH. Of course if you are not doing the more advanced stuff in Photoshop and uninterested in making repositories, PNG might work for you, but I couldn't go back, although the initial change to working with BMPs was not an easy transition. I guess the best way I can sum it up is that is gives me more control & precision when working with BMPs in regards to SC4.

An Alpha channel is an identically sized texture, which is "paired" with the source texture. In GoFSH parlance an A0 C0 pair. Any parts of the A0 texture that are white, will be kept on the C0 texture when you build the pair. Black pixels will turn into transparency, anything between black and white will give a percentage-based partial transparency. I.e. 50% grey will be 50% transparent.

Almost every application will handle saving slightly differently, even if the format is identical. Usually it's the compression that varies, you don't want to end up with copies of copies, this messes with the final quality. Ideally, you should always edit the source file, not subsequent revisions of one saved into something like PNG or BMP. I keep all my source files as PSD files.

RGB and CMYK are just different systems for displaying colour pallettes, I can't say one is better, since RGB is pretty standard for me, I've never bothered trying anything else. Most of these formats are more related to digital print/publication, where a specific format can drastically change the printed output.

Greyscale is simply many different shades of grey (including Black and White), but no colours in between. The values 0-255 (256) represent (for RGB anyway), each of the Red, Green and Blue channels. If all three are 0, you get Black, if all three are 255 you get White, by adjusting the amount of each colour, you get a full spectrum of colours for use. This is important for GoFSH and automation, the definition alphas we use need a very specific colour. For example Cyan, GoFSH knows if the corresponding pixel of the definition alpha is Cyan, to add grass from your desired source in that pixel. But it's looking for RGB 0, 255, 255 Cyan, not just any Cyan. If it detects pixels less than 100% cyan, it will apply transition or graded effects (i.e. semi-transparent pixels). This allows GoFSH to handle some incredibly complex textures and give accurate results. Rivit's genius was realising how we can place different Alpha Channels into each of the R, G and B spectrums. This allows us to build C0 D0 pairs, with definition Alphas, which dictate how to process the textures to make sets for use in game.

It used to be, to make a normal transit texture, you'd make the base texture, then three copies with added grass. Perhaps you also needed three more for the mid-high wealth zoning (if not identical to the no zoning one), you can even add a special 8th texture, only displayed next to Farm (I-AG) zoning. Armed with the base C0 texture and correctly configured D0 files, now we need only 1 texture in the repository, saving at least 75% space. Not to mention, GoFSH builds everything from that one texture automatically.

The image above shows how the C0 D0 pair (left) split the definition alpha into it's three separate Alpha channels (bottom) and uses that to generate the full set of textures as needed (top).

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

⑩, Floating Airport : I may need @Terring to help me with naming again, I just dreamed to have a Airport floating or standing in the sea. Frankly, I have no idea whether or not we have had a similar one, but i got a picture from web and was just modeling it. it will be a futurist style, And Quite possible consulting with others how to make it appear on the sea after modeling, Anyway, it's interesting to see those planes flying from this Airport, I will upload its shots soon.

Finished!

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

22 minutes ago, Raymond7cn said:

And Quite possible consulting with others how to make it appear on the sea after modeling,

Tis easy to do.

All it takes is adding a water lot requirement to every cell of the LotConfigurations. If the final size is, say, 10 x 20 then there will be 200 entries that say that cell must be plopped on water.

Edit: Hmm. There's prolly an additional step to it. Here's a test that didn't turn out quite like I expected it:

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Thank you Cori, If you could help me to figure out those issues, I'm just aware of another problem, Should the Airport connect with the city with roads? if so, I couldn't think of how to deal with that by now.

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

Ah. Hmm. Yeah, it'll prolly want a road connection. We might be able to mod it so it doesn't. Or maybe run a FLUP by it when plopping. For it to show on the water surface, I know it can be done. I'll look into that after I've slept.

[Terring 6,473]

Ah, a floating airport. An interesting concept to increase the efficiency of the aircrafts and help solving land use, pollution and aircraft noise issues. The first discussion of a floating airport was for trans-Atlantic flights back in the 1930's. At that time, a passenger aircraft capable of crossing the Atlantic Ocean could be built, but it would had limited payload because of the massive need for fuel for the flight. So before introducing long-ranged airplanes, it had been proposed a series of floating airports crossing the ocean to refuel the planes and make traveling more comfortable for the passengers and the crew, from something humble like this basic airfield...

...to something luxurious like this mid-ocean self-contained city named "Atlantis", with five star hotels, room for several thousand inhabitants, and all the amenities a busy traveler needs.

By the way, Atlantis looks a lot like an immobile version of Freedom Ship, a proposed 1-mile-long (1,6-kilometers-long) ship which is actually a big floating city traveling around the world.

By the way, @2ch.net simplayer had made a commercial aircraft carrier that looks a lot like Freedom Ship, which virtually has the same effect as an airport by increasing the commercial demand. It's a landmark though, so it doesn't work like an actual airport.

Right now the easiest way to build a "floating" airport in SimCity 4 is by using the terraforming tools to create an artificial island big enough to support the airport and everything that it needs. Airports on artificial islands does exist in the real world, like the Dalian Jinzhouwan International Airport in China and the "unsinkable aircraft carriers", but ideas about actual floating airports still exist. Of course airports are a massive investment, especially if you want to build them over water, but considering overpopulation and the scarcity of large enough lands, I think that building them is only a matter of time.

Now, if it's possible to connect our floating airport with the rest of the city by using FLUPs as @CorinaMarie suggests, let's give ourselves a challenge and push the limits of the game and our capabilities once again. A floating airport is awesome, especially if it actually has in-game airport functionality, but how about a floating air/seaport, that serves both ships and airplanes? This facility can work as a hub for both passenger and cargo ships and passenger and cargo aircrafts, satisfying the needs of both commercial and industrial zones.

And by the way, a little out of topic. Is it possible at all to have something that has both airport and seaport functionality in the game? I'm not talking about something that looks like an airport but works like a seaport (simulating cargo planes) or something that looks like a seaport but works like an airport (simulating sea cruisers). I'm talking about something that works as an airport and as a seaport at the same time, using both airport controller and seaport controller.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Oh my goodness! The real one existed in China, I didn't know that. Thank you Terring for your thorough introduction, and I was intrigued by your story, Besides, you remind me that add some details at the bottom so that it could be acted as a seaport.

I was planing to add a bridge which connects the airport with the land, but it would be strict for people when they have complicated Terrain, So Cori is right there, The FLUPs probably is the best choice in this case, The only problem is that i seldom played with it in my cities, so I need to go for a inquiry of FLUP after modeling.

Furthermore, I also think of this one:

 

This hotel is located in Shanghai China, it's an underground building, Do you think it's possible in SC4? I'm sorry that i just threw out these newbie thoughts randomly, but most of them are worth taking seriously a bit.

[Terring 6,473]

That's a very cool hotel, Ray. I'm pretty sure it's possible to have it in the game as a kind of embankment wall or a sea wall. One way to customize slopes and shores is by terraforming a bit the landscape there and build some walls, like these:

I think that the best way to have the hotel in SimCity is by making it an overhanging prop, something like the walls at the pictures above, in order to place it on the side of a large enough hill, just like the real one in the video. @mattb325 can help you, he has already made a couple of buildings by using this methodology.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

①①, Commute time query : Long ago, when i was still playing the game as a newbie (until now), I was always dreaming, there is a function, by which i could get the value of the average or separate commute time when i click a building. As i learned more, I thought maybe that's possible.

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

Being the psychic that I am, I just knew you were going to ask about this so I've been preparing a reply. (If we don't tell anyone you mentioned it in a PM, they might believe me too.)
 

The most detailed info for Trip Length can be found using the Advanced Query. See @Cyclone Boom's post here or my post here for details on how to access it.

So, while using the Advanced Query (by holding down Shift+Ctrl+Alt) and mousing around, you'll see the extra info as you hover over various buildings. If you are already hovering with the regular query, hold the keys, move the mouse off of the building, and then back over it.

Here's an example of the data for a long (as listed in the normal query) commute:

 

And here's one with a short commute:

^ Please forgive that old vanilla Maxis bus stop. This city tile was created long before your eloquent new bus stops.  

Now, I don't know for sure what those numbers mean, but obviously smaller is quicker.

And for reference, here's the Route queries for each:

 

[Cyclone Boom 16,875]

Nice example there psychic Cori!

Very interesting, and how it shows that two neighbouring houses can have a short and a long commute length. I like how there can be variations this way, and the NAM settings in the TSCT might affect how this works also. It could be how the one who commutes by train and heads off to the bordering city tile, that there's the average commute time added for the entry point. For if the values are in minutes, then 487 is over 8 hours total. That would also mean there's a very lengthy waiting time at the railway station like in real life. All the usual delays and cancellations on railways, and by the time they got to work, it'd be about time to head home again!

Another possibility might be it's a measure of distance between each route. One thing which would prove that it's a duration of time is if the values happened to vary. Say if increasing traffic congestion, and then logically the values would then increase for the journey taking longer.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

I'm such a lucky guy to have CoriBoom™,  Thank you for making my dream come true, Now i want to sing a song:

Sincerely,

-- Raymond

BTW, Next time, when i start to make bus stops No.2 (Rural), Please share more and more screen-shots of your beautiful cities to me, It would be helpful.

[Whte_rbt 1,431]

Can't see R Kelly without getting Jeff Ross at that roast (was it Shaq or Emmet?) playing in my head...

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Hiya @CorinaMarieand @Cyclone Boom, I'm a bit curious about the extra cheats, ( As usual) since it is so amazing, Who made it? the Maxis or that name Buggi, I think this is likely beyond my scope, I could only read those program language for the benefit of human readers, however I'm still curious about its history.

I can tell it's a dll file, all i knew about it is that seems like a library, it's not a executable exe, but within there are some functions could be invoked by exe. so if this theory is right, This Master should has known the API of SC4 and wrote new functions (these cheat codes), then when we right click the cheat window, that list of extra cheats show up. 

it's interesting, Did buggi write those new function or he just combined some SC4's functions, Or those extra cheat functions had been written by the developer of Maxis, Buggi just knew how to call them.

I'm also curious that in which language he wrote the dll, assembler? if so, that is terrific! then i have a random thought here, since i knew there are LUA codes in SC4, so is it possible that the functions or cheats are exposed to the LUA interface?

Please ignore these questions above if that's not polite to ask, Or disobey the intellectual property of Maxis, I'm happy to hear a story of that as well, Thank you!

Yours Sincerely,

-- Raymond

PS(Note for my own research), Regardless of the theory of extra cheats, The cheats itself is interesting enough, why there are so many unknown cheats,

https://www.wiki.sc4devotion.com/index.php?title=Cheat_codes

And actually most of them i even did't know how to use:

Casper : ghosts appear on the cemetery lots

-- Do these ghosts exist in form of S3D or effect?

ForceIdle : unknown, maybe for letting the game running in idle mode?

-- what's a idle mode?

GOL : game of life, green splotches appear and "dance" in your city (probably a graphics performance test)

-- Interesting, Should try it and to see if i could use it for other purpose.

RP : Unknown (possibly the same as "RenderProp")

-- Interesting again.

1] [true|false] : Activates/deactivates a prop or changes a property value

-- Have no idea what the meaning of Activates a prop.

Snow : snow appears on the mountains (like with the Christmas easteregg)

-- Havn't tried it before, Is this snow totally the same as easteregg?

TastyZots : hides the zots for "no road access", "no water" etc.

-- It would be useful, since i had a city which had immortal no water signs, btw, what's the meaning of ZOT? I could only find a comic book with google.

TerrainQuery : adds coordinate values (X,Y,Z)to the cursor

-- It would be very useful when i make a Terrain Mod. Can i know the prop or Lot's coordinate?

toll : Lets you plop a square (presumably a toll booth) on to any network, effect of which is unknown

-- wanna give it a try, Maybe could think of other purposes.

[Cyclone Boom 16,875]

10 hours ago, Raymond7cn said:

I'm such a lucky guy to have CoriBoom™,  Thank you for making my dream come true, Now i want to sing a song

As ever, it's a pleasure we can help!

That video was a lovely and very inspirational song too. (I've heard that one before and I like it also.)

 

8 hours ago, Raymond7cn said:

I'm a bit curious about the extra cheats, ( As usual) since it is so amazing, Who made it?

This is a fascinating part with the history of SC4 indeed. I believe the Extra Cheats DLL was developed by Maxis originally for internal development use. It was what the original programmers used for testing functions in the game, for using it to do extra things not otherwise available from the main UI options. Then many years ago I think @Buggi got in contact with Maxis via email or somehow, and they kindly provided the DLL file to share with the community.

Maybe some more people who were around closer to the time might know more of the precise details.

The reason why there's so many unknown commands is due to the mystery surrounding them. It seems like either whoever Buggi got in contact with at Maxis didn't know what these were, or maybe they were never completed. One good reference is this guide which explains the known ones well.

For the snow command and I do believe this is the exact same as the "Easter Egg" snow which appears on Christmas Day based on system time.

With the Zots...
(Picture to show what they mean for anyone wondering.)

Spoiler

As you'll have with how they appear per lot depending on if there's no power, water, road access, or there is no job.

I think the word Zot is just a made up one Maxis created simply because it sounded cool.

Perhaps there is a backstory behind it though as to why they chose the word. I imagine they wanted to choose something which was short with few letters and syllables, so then it was more memorable for a term which can be referred to. A bit like with the term Sim also.

 

There are a few extra (extra) commands which @simmaster07 created and shared in this added DLL file.

It likely would be possible to add more also, but this is well beyond my area of expertise. For finding what the unknown commands are, it might be possible to do through experimentation to identify the valid syntax, or even if there's a way to inspect how the existing code works. How any DLL file supports the executable in providing extra functions, and the main difficulty is knowing what code to write which then hooks into what the game allows already.

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

Thanks a million dear CB, @Cyclone Boom, Now i think i have got what i need, and I just want a tree, but you give me forest, treasures were laying there, I have seen your name in that post as well, @simmaster07 is a incredible person, he made those great works just like a wizard, Maybe Gandolf? Anyway, I plan to give these cheats a try after this modeling. Thank you very much CB!

 

 

Sincerely,

-- Raymond

[Wiimeiser 444]

Some interesting ideas, like antigravity. I've been thinking about an eyecandy/landmark narrow-gauge railway set like the Puffing Billy, but I don't really have the skills or confidence to try making it myself...