Han Solo

I'm glad to hear it was worth the effort! I can't tell you how many times I wrote a draft only to delete it. That sounds like a great solution to me. Perhaps this thread could be used as a proof of concept of what I mean?... I really would like a showcase thread of my own, where I can talk about the changes I have made and as a result, hopefully generate a bit of a knowledge base for other users.

Sorry for it taking me a while to reply but between the British Grand Prix, the World Cup, and my sister visiting, I've barely been online long enough to write a well thought out post. I'm glad to hear that you and CB are in favour of it, assuming it is implemented correctly. I asked myself the same question when I first started mulling over the idea of uploading modified maps. The conclusion I came to is that I don't think it's possible to come up with an all encompassing set of criteria that will solely include good faith efforts, whilst excluding the kind of low effort or abusive uploads that shouldn't be on the STEX. I think that moderation will be required. I also think that the amount of alteration isn't necessarily a fundamental criteria. There are alterations that take a minimal amount of effort, expertise, time, software tools, and perhaps most importantly, artistic creativity. For example, simply rotating a map by a multiple of 90° takes a bare minimum of effort, time, just two pieces of software, and zero creativity. So by that metric, I'd argue that such uploads probably shouldn't be allowed. If another user wants to rotate a region, it's a simple job that can easily be described in a tutorial. This might also be a pretty good yardstick by which to judge the justification for and value of an upload.If another user can create an exact replica of a modified work, simply by starting with the same original work then following a set of instructions, without needing to make artistic decisions or to use skill with a brush tool, then I think such works probably shouldn't be allowed. There is a counter argument to that though. There are instances were lower effort uploads perhaps should still be allowed. What if the simple alteration is widely desirable? For example, what if a map has been uploaded to the STEX years ago, the original creator is no longer active, and for what ever reason, it's upside down or mirrored when compared to the real world, or perhaps it has some other mistake that is easy to correct? If it means saving a large number of users the time to perform the same minor alterations, or if it means objectively fixing or improving the original mappers work, perhaps cases such as these should be the exception that proves the rule? It is somewhat of an edge case though. As to the question of more "significant alterations". In order to answer that question, I think the most simple solution would be to let the creator of the modified work argue their case. Then the decision of whether it should be uploaded would be at the moderator's discretion. I envision either a single thread for modified maps, where a user submits their work for approval along with a description of what changes they have made, or perhaps as user such as myself could create their own thread. I was thinking about creating a project thread to document my work. Then when I'm ready to upload a modified work, I could "@" you or CB? I think I could clearly demonstrate that if modified works were to be allowed, my efforts should fall into that category. The list of changes I have made to each map is extensive. They've required a lot of time, not least because of the repeated exporting and in-game testing and checking. But also because I exercised creativity. I've created new terrain in both GIMP and SC4Terraformer, as well as manually correcting and retouching various issues. A process that is all but impossible to replicate simply by following instructions. I think this is a fine line to walk... I don't want to gain unfair credit off another’s work, which is why I do wonder whether even having a link to my work placed in their upload page is the best solution... it all depends on how it's done I guess. There's also the fact that I can't deny that I do want some credit for my portion of the work. Perhaps such uploads should have their own upload page but there should be certain requirements such having their own "modified maps" category, the name making it clear that it's a modified map or at the very least, a disclaimer at the top of the description with the name of the original mapper and a link to the map in question. At the risk of this reply dragging on or me writing myself in circles, I'll leave it there for now.

After a bit of a hiatus, I've come back to SimCity 4 and decided to start a new region. I have two maps in contention, both of which were downloaded from the STEX, and both of which I have been modifying with a mix of GIMP, SC4TerraFormer, and SC4 Mapper. The goal being to make each map more playable. Is been a fair amount of work... I'm talking tens of hours worth of work for each map, which got me wondering whether any other users would like to play my modified versions of the maps. If I have made significant modifications to a map downloaded from the STEX, what is the etiquette around me potentially re-uploading them (with credit to the original mappers of course)? NOTE: both creators of the maps in question, haven't been online for several years. So I can't just ask their permission.

tl;dr: If you're having performance issue when running SimCity 4 in a Bottle, try changing the Runner to something other than soda. ------ I've just recently had to install SC4 from scratch on a new Debian Linux PC. My installation method of choice was installing the GoG version of the game, using a Bottles "Bottle" which was created using the "Gaming" preset. After installing the game, I configured the resolution and colour depth using command line arguments, and installed the latest version of dgVoodoo2. Other than that, I also installed NAM and CAM but the game is otherwise stock. When playing the game and using right click and drag to move the camera, the game was intially slow to repond and then, when trying to move the camera for a second time, the game would not respond at all. Subsequent attempts would result in the camera either moving a very small amount or moving the desired amount... or not moving at all. It seamed to vary according to when I attempted to move the camera. It was also more severe at higher zoom levels. Clicking on UI elements was much the same story. Sometimes nothing would happen when clicking on a menu item or the exit button. I tried making various changes to the dgVoodoo2 config. I also tried following @MegaMiku's instructions for gettting dgVoodoo2 working on Linux. I thought I'd found the cause of my issues when I saw that DDraw.dll was not present at all in my WineCFG's Libraries menu (there is a ddrawex entry though). The next thing I tried turned out the be the fix I was looking for... I selected the SimCity 4 Bottle. Then under the Options section, I clicked "Settings" and in the "Components" section, I changed the Runner from Soda-9.0.1 to sys-wine-11.0. The change takes seconds and seams to have resolved my performance issues. So my advice to any fellow Linux and Bottles user is, before trying any other more involved or time consuming fixes, try just changing your Runner first.

Just a quick note... mostly so I don't forget it, and so that the information doesn't just sit in a document on my computer. When using GIMP 3.0.4 and editing a vaild .bmp image of a map (not the config file but the map itself), in order to export a .bmp that SC4 Mapper can use, you need the following settings. Run-Length Encoded: greyed out / unchecked Write colour space information: unchecked RGB format: 24 bit (R8 G8 B8)

Bob Weir passed away yesterday. For anyone who is a Dead Head, they'll know Bob for the energy, commitment, and humour that he brought to the stage. Not to mention the passion and love that he shared through his music. When I think of the Dead, it's Bob's voice I hear. Sometimes soft and soulful.... and sometimes howling and growling like a man possessed. I don't normally get effected by the deaths of famous people but this one hits hard. Rest in peace, Bob. Keep on dancing through to daylight Greet the morning air with song No one's noticed but the band's all packed and gone Was it ever here at all? .... But they kept on dancing

Hi outdatedSIM. It's been ages since I've used Lutris*, so I'm not sure how much help I can give but if you can explain the problems you're experiencing in more detail, I'd be happy to help you if I can. I'm not sure what you mean by that last sentence. What do you mean by setting the profile inside? * I've moved onto using Bottles, Proton (via Steam), and just plain WINE through the terminal or via custom ".desktop" shortcuts.

That's the easy way of doing things and where's the fun in that?... honestly though, the reason why I'm trying to get the music played by the game itself, is because of the way it plays only certain tracks whilst in the region view. I know it's a silly requirement but it's important to me for some reason that I can't fully explain. Rather than trying to make the window keep focus, or at least behave like it hasn't had focus taken from it, I'm looking into an alternate method that takes that variable out of the equation. Valve have developed a piece of software called "gamescope", which is what's called a compositor. A compositor is what handles the way windows are displayed and decorated on a Linux desktop. For example, it handles transparency effects. With gamescope, you can supposedly run an application in it's own compositor that is not effected by your desktop environment's compositor. In other words, when I run SC4 using gamescope, the music keeps playing even when I Alt+Tab to another window. There is one caveat though. It's only a small thing... a teeny, weeny little issue that, well, barely bothers me to be honest... I can hear the music but I'm only getting a blackscreen in the gamescope window. It's progress though and hopefully I'll find a work around for it as I think gamescope could offer me advantages in other ways too. [EDIT] I think I'm running into a bug with gamesscope + x11 + and the nvidia driver.

Thank you @nos.17, I should have mentioned that I'm on Linux though. I'll edit my original post accordingly. To be specific, I'm running Debian 12 with the KDE desktop environment. Which has a built in "always on top" feature for application windows but sadly, it doesn't seam to have any effect on keeping the tunes flowing.

Donna Jean Godchaux August 22, 1947 – November 2, 2025 Donna Jean was an irreplaceable part of the magic that made the Grateful Dead truly special to Deadheads such as myself. Not only did her voice help to lift the Dead to some of their highest highs during the period she was with the band, she was also responsible for introducing Jerry Garcia to her husband Keith Godchaux who would go on to play keyboards with the Dead from '71 to '79. It's always a pleasure hearing Donna sing and on the handful of recordings where you hear her laughing (usually at Bob Weir growling out certain lyrics), it always brings a smile to my face.

Is it possible to have SimCity 4 keep playing it's music when the game window loses focus / I switch to another application? As I'm planning a new city, I like to switch back and forth between the game and my web browser but I also like to have the music playing through the game itself (rather than an external player). It gets pretty annoying though, when one of my favourite songs gets interrupted because I switch to my browser. [EDIT] I use Arc-... I mean, I use Debian 12 KDE.

I don't know why I start writing these replies either just before dinner, or just before going to bed... ------ Thanks for the information CorinaMarie. I think I understand it but having spent a few days playing around some more with editing existing RGB bitmaps with GIMP, I've come to the conclusion that it is at best, a heavily flawed method. It does solve one problem I have and that is that my eyesight just is not good enough to edit shorelines in greyscale images (but perhaps there's a better technique for that?). In any event though, I don't think editing images is the solution to my needs... it's not addressing the root issue that I have. What I'm trying to accomplish is to get a playable map of San Francisco, where the bulk of it's grid system aligns with the cardinal directions. In the same way that Izidor44 rotated their map of New York City so that Manhattan grid system is actually reproducible. In my testing, I've found that rotating the map 7.5 degrees clockwise accomplishes this goal to my satisfaction. I also want to edit a few other areas of the map to make it more playable. Which is why I (and my weary old eyes) have been messing around with RGB bitmaps. Much to my frustration though, I've discovered that simply rotating and existing RGB bitmap causes numerous issues which significantly impact the quality of the resulting map. This is due to rotation of the image requiring it to be resampled. So you may have an area of the map that has a bright green pixel right next to a dark blue pixel. Which before rotation, would would result in a smooth terrain gradient but once rotated, as the new pixels have their value calculated from the bright green and dark blue, the resulting colour of the new pixels causes sharp little spikes of terrain. In other areas of the map, the effect can be less severe. Leading to a sort of fingerprint effect... there are ridges on the terrain that looks like your fingers after you've had a bath. I've tried all the different types of rotation sampling in GIMP but they all result in the same issue to some degree. I could manually fix those issues but it'd be a lot of work. Plus it'd only add to the main problem that this whole process is lowering the quality of the map. Which leads me to to conclusion that if I want a high quality, modified map of San Francisco, I'll need to create it myself. Which has given me another idea... I already have MicroDEM installed from the last time I tried to crack this nut. But what if there's a better way? I'm getting really hungry now, so I'll leave this post on a cliff hanger until I research the feasibility of my idea a little more.

I finally found the time to test all the variables that go into exporting a valid RGB bitmap from GIMP. Please do note though, that when confirming the validity of the image with SC4 Mapper, I just had SC4 Mapper select the image, at which point it would either tell me the image was not valid or it would proceed as normal. I would then generate a map. I did not then test any of the maps in game though. So I cannot attest to the effect that certain options may or may not have on in-game map appearance or quality. ------- How to export a valid RGB bitmap from GIMP for use in SC4 Mapper Testing Methodology I started out with a known valid RGB bitmap image. Which was generated from Drunkapple's fantastic San Francisco map and exported from SC4 Mapper as an RGB bitmap. I then cropped the image to 257x257 pixels to make the SC4 Mapper portion of my testing procedure faster. Other than the cropping of the image, the image itself was completely unedited. This included the image's "Mode" and "Precision" settings in GIMP, being left at their default "RGB" and "8 bit" values. As the only other "Mode" available to me was "Greyscale", which would defeat the purpose of this whole thing, I left the Mode setting on RGB for all of my testing. I then exported sequentially numbered bitmap images, changing one variable with each export. Here is a screenshot of the "Precision" options available to me from the Image > Precision menu. When exporting an image from GIMP, it will first ask you to name the file. You can then change the image's format by either selecting the desired format for a menu in the lower left corner of the export window, or by manually appending the file extension to the end of the image's name. In our case, that would be ".bmp". When you click the export button on the lower right of the export window, you'll then be shown the export options window. Here is a screenshot of the available options. As you can see, some of the "bits" options are greyed out and cannot be selected. You'll also note that toward the top of the window, there is a "Compatibility Options" section with a single option, "Do not write colour space information". Every single time I export an image without this option selected, the exported image was invalid when attempting to open it with SC4 Mapper. You must select this option in order to create a valid RGB bitmap. The same is true for the "bits" options. I tried all the options available to me, both with and without the "Do not write colour space information" option selected. The only bits option that resulted in a valid image was "24 bits R8 G8 B8", that is selected in the screenshot above. So in short, if you're exporting an RGB bitmap from GIMP, which was sourced from a known valid image such as one generated by SC4 Mapper. Then as long as you use the export options shown in the above screenshot, and you haven't changed anything else in GIMP*, you should be good to go. *But what if you do change some of the Image settings in GIMP? Specifically the Precision options shown in the first screenshot of this post. Well, my testing in this area wasn't quite as thorough as I didn't really see the need but with the Export Options set to those shown above, I tried changing the image's Precision setting to all of the options shown in the first screenshot. I was seemingly able to export a valid image regardless of the Precision setting. SC4 Mapper accepted the images without complaint. So it seams that the key takeaway is that it's the export options that matter. That does leave some questions around creating images from scratch (i.e. not starting with a working image as described), as well as some of the other ways in which you could modify the image. Especially modifying the image by painting or editing. I would like to test them out for the sake of completeness but I've ran out of time for today. So at some point, I'll make a follow up post or just edit this one.

Thank you for the reply Corina. You're always so helpful and welcoming! I had just gotten half way through typing a response to you when inspiration struck... I think I may have solved the issue as I can now create a working, edited and exported image. But the birds have just started up another rendition of the dawn chorus, so I'm going to call it a night whilst it still is technically night. Tomorrow though, I'll do a bit more testing to narrow down some of the variables, and then I'll post an answer comment with a few screenshots explaining my findings. [EDIT] I'm dealing with some IRL stuff at the moment but I will have plenty of time over the weekend to post my findings.

I'm trying to learn how to create my own maps using RGB bitmap images. As a test image / reference, I'm using an RGB bmp the was generated from a map from the STEX, and then exported by SC4 Mapper as a bitmap. I can then use SC4 Mapper to generate an identical map using just the exported RGB bitmap. The problem I'm running into though is that when I edit this bitmap image using GIMP, even if it's something as innocuous as cropping the image, I can't export and images that SC4 Mapper likes. When I export the image using GIMP, I can change the bit depth and precisions so that the image's properties are identical to the working bitmap image. Yet SC4 Mapper says "This is not a valid file" when I try to use my edited bitmap to create a map. According to the images properties dialogue when comparing my image and the working image; the bit depth is the same, the precision is the same, and the he scale is correct. I've tried using a custom config.bmp... I just don't know what else to try. Any advice on creating and exporting a valid RGB bitmap for use with SC4 Mapper would be appreciated, please.