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tutorial Cori's Guide to Displaying Fancy Game Variables
CorinaMarie posted a topic in SC4 Modding - Open Discussion
Cori's Guide to Displaying Fancy Game Variables by CorinaMarie Intro In this tutorial we will learn how to do some quick editing to display internal variables which are now available when using @Null 45's DLLs. At a minimum, you'll want to install: Query Tool UI Extensions DLL for SimCity 4 Lua Extensions DLL (Not needed initially, but we'll prolly dip into it in a Part Two or Part Three.) Also you'll need to insure the file we create here loads after any other override for the Maxis Coal Power Plant and the Power Query UI. (I'm using them for our demo.) See here if you need to learn about load orders: SC4 Folder and File Loading Order The Plugins Directory - How are files loaded? General Load Order Software Archeology - Plugin Load Order Getting Started After installing the aforementioned DLLs, you'll also need Reader 0.9.3. I will assume y'all have a wee bit of familiarity with Reader, but hopefully this'll still be clear enough if not. Our goal is a quick down and dirty bit of editing to allow us to see the newly revealed internal Age Degradation variable. (Second paragraph here and my pic in the next post there.) I'll number these as steps to correspond to the pic numbers and that can help if there are comments or questions. Edit: I just noticed Null released an update to the Query Tool UI Extensions DLL (see version 2.6.3 details) and that simplifies the code in my Steps 25, 31, 36, and 38. Feel free to use his cleaner method, or continue with this tutorial as-is. It will still work exactly as intended. Step 01 In Reader, open simcity_1.dat Single click on any exemplar to activate the Navigator button. Click said Navigator button, expand the Power tree, then the Lots tree, and right click on the Maxis Coal Power Plant: Then click on Group Add to patch. Step 02 That will pop up this dialog box: ^ Click OK. Step 03 Close Navigator, then click on the Patch button. Next control-click the top Exemplar, the TRK file, and the PNG file entries. Then click the Remove button. Step 04 Here we see we still have the Building Exemplar, two LText entries, and the UI file. ^ Click Create DAT. Step 05 Name it whatever you want. I went with: Age Degradation UI Display v0.01 by Cori.dat Like so: ^ Then click the Save button. Step 06 I personally close Reader then reload it. My idea is that clears up the memory that was in use for the big file. Anyhow, we next open the .dat file we just created. On my system there seems to be a weird bug such that the pre-highlighted Exemplar doesn't display the data for its properties. Step 07 So, I click on some other entry: Step 08 Then click back on the Exemplar and it'll populate the fields: Step 09 This is an interim step which will later show us we are referencing the correct exemplar once we get into the game. ^ Double click the Exemplar Name in the right-hand panel. Step 10 That'll pop up this dialog box: Step 11 Rename it to something else which you will later recognize as your own text: ^ Click the bottom Apply button after editing in place or if editing in the "Value as text" box, first click the other Apply (which is like a Set button) and then the final Apply. Preparing for Later LUA Coding Step 12 We'll go ahead and get this ready in case anyone would later like a Part Two of this tutorial which shows how to do data formatting (such as showing a specified number of decimal places). Right-click on the first LText entry, then click Generate new instance. Step 13 Notice how the IID has changed to some other hexadecimal number: Step 14 While that LText entry is highlighted, click the File Info button. Then click Edit: Step 15 Here's what it'll look like with the exception that your "Instance" number will be different. Step 16 Edit both the Type and the Group numbers to be ca63e2a3 and 4a5e8ef6 respectively. ^ And click OK. Step 17 Notice it still says LText and also still shows the old T and G numbers? Step 18 Click a different entry, then click back on the LText we are working with. Notice it now updates both the Type and the Group numbers. It does not, however, recognize the category change. Step 19 So, click to save the file and yes, we are happy to overwrite our existing one. Step 20 Close the file then re-open it and notice how it properly recognizes this as a LUA entry. Step 21 Single-click the LUA file entry. We are going to put some placeholder Lua code in here. ^ Click the Edit button in the right-hand panel, highlight the existing text, and paste the following right on top of it: --#-package:03092f5a# -- package signature -- -- For Lua file entry IID 0xf3092f5a --EOF Step 22 Notice the two hexadecimal numbers. The 2nd one needs to be edited to match the IID you generated in Step 12 (and seen in Step 13). Then the package ID will be the very same number, but replace the first hex digit with a 0. (Note: Any package signature number greater than 0x7FFFFFFF will not be recognized by the game. Only positive integers are allowed when it converts those to decimal.) ^ Click the Apply button when you are finished editing. Back to the Main Part Step 23 Right-click the remaining LText entry and select Generate new group & instance. Step 24 Notice that both the Group and Instance numbers are now different. Step 25 Paste this over the existing text: #null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value(hex2dec('00000020'))# Edit: The Query Tool UI Extensions DLL was updated to v2.6.3 at the same time I was gathering pics and writing this tutorial. As such, I've shown the method which was in effect via v2.6.2. Fortunately both code methods will still work. If you have v2.6.3 or later, you can use the following code instead. (I'm not going to update the picture.) #null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value('00000020')# Note: The # on each end of the code makes this a Token which means the UI will display the value it produces rather than the code itself. Also Note: It needs pasted from the right-click menu. For some reason Ctrl+V is not allowed. ^ Then click the Apply button. Step 26 This'll be the down and dirty part in which we are just going to steal a spot in the UI to display our data (rather than expanding it nicely like @Kel9509 does). Right-click on the UI file entry and select Text View. Step 27 I have Reader smaller than I typically do for editing so the pics here can be smaller. As such I have to scroll the right-hand panel a wee bit. What we are looking for is the line where the word Efficiency is displayed. We are going to replace ea5524eb,8a5ba2a7 with the values we created in Step 24. Step 28 Mine are 4721f708,820e0172 so that's what I paste in. Be sure to use your own T & G as generated in Step 24. ^ Click the Apply button. Step 29 Now we save the whole file again and yes, we are happy to overwrite. Step 30 Finally the fun part! Load the game and plop a Coal Power Plant then Query it. ^ You should see whatever text you used in Step 11. This was a mini goal which shows we've correctly edited the UI to use our own unique LText and the proper code to access the data provided by Null's DLL. Step 31 Remember the linked post above? We are now ready to use that 0xc910b4cf which Null tracked down to display the Age Degradation of the Queried Power Plant. Re-edit the LText to be: #null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value(hex2dec('c910b4cf'))# Edit: The Query Tool UI Extensions DLL was updated to v2.6.3 at the same time I was gathering pics and writing this tutorial. As such, I've shown the method which was in effect via v2.6.2. Fortunately both code methods will still work. If you have v2.6.3 or later, you can use the following code instead. (I'm not going to update the picture.) #null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value('c910b4cf')# ^ And then click Apply. Step 32 Let's now do a Save as... Step 33 Increment your version number while leaving all the rest of the file name the same. This will cause the 2nd version to load later than your first one and so we don't need to clean out our folder just yet. Step 34 We go in the game, plop a Coal Plant, query it, and we see the Efficiency word instead of any data. ^ Close the query and run time till the next month. Step 35 Now when we query, we see a zero. This tells us that the value retrieved was nil when we first plopped the power plant, but that it updated to a numeric response after running time. Step 36 Quit the game and let's take care of that nil value borking our code. Paste in: #null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value(hex2dec('c910b4cf')) or 0# Edit: The Query Tool UI Extensions DLL was updated to v2.6.3 at the same time I was gathering pics and writing this tutorial. As such, I've shown the method which was in effect via v2.6.2. Fortunately both code methods will still work. If you have v2.6.3 or later, you can use the following code instead. (I'm not going to update the picture.) #null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value('c910b4cf') or 0# That or 0 part is handy. If the first part doesn't even exist (the nil value) then it makes the answer be zero. Apply and Save. Step 37 Back in the game and now we have our 0 the moment we plop the power plant. (Quit the game again.) Step 38 The other thing going on is Maxis programmed the UI to automatically truncate any decimal portion of numbers displayed and that's very good for things like population. However, we are wanting exact data to be shown. As such, we can fool the UI's hidden code by making our number into a string. The following code will concatenate the middle dot to the end of the number we want to see and then the UI replaces it with a space. Paste in: #(null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value(hex2dec('c910b4cf')) or 0)..string.char(183)# Edit: The Query Tool UI Extensions DLL was updated to v2.6.3 at the same time I was gathering pics and writing this tutorial. As such, I've shown the method which was in effect via v2.6.2. Fortunately both code methods will still work. If you have v2.6.3 or later, you can use the following code instead. (I'm not going to update the picture.) #(null45_query_ui_extensions.get_property_value('c910b4cf') or 0)..string.char(183)# Click Apply, then Save the file. Step 39 Back in the game. We already know we get a zero when first plopping so this pic is after running time to the next month. This shows how a Float32 variable handles the number. Step 40 Run another month and check again... Conclusion That should be enough to get your feet wet. Special thanks to @Cyclone Boom for following this tutorial, providing feedback, and for fancy tweaking of the post to make it presentable. -
Chicago Query ! Some information about something you build would be nice. I found some interesting statistic and graphs about chiacago on SecondCityZoning ! https://secondcityzoning.org/zones/ Thie describe seveal area of the city with their assigned designation and wealth numbers, up there´s a link to the under The Zoningmap wich gives a graphical representation of the city. When you these figures this doesn´t say much about the economic model used wich is completely different from the rest of america ! Under a video about Chcago economic model by Peter Santenello a interview with First Ammandmen Attorney Benjamin Barr about this ! This enlighten some of the economic and demographic moves the city maid in the past and present ! If you want to know anything about this city this is very usefull information to understand the politcs from the 1920 till now, thank thesesources for sharing these ! Prakticly, except the graph and info on detail there isn´t much to add except add excellence of venues in their splendour and here there add some historic thriomph or failour if so ! Inbetween I started the central loop area with various result will post these soon ! Sincerey yours, Kschmidt
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I"m wondering if i have found conflicting files, as im auditing my plugins folder (returning to SC4). I have 2 GraphModd's found in my Plugins folder. I think the first one is from the STEX I think the second one comes from the SC3K Incinerator download QUESTION: Does anyone know if the V21 is actually the SAME as the V2 just with extra improvements? OR Are these separate files for separate purposes and should both be retained together, without regard for order of loading? Besides that, I recall while loading my NAM 47 yesterday, that there was some kind of Graphmodd or DataViewMod in there. Does anyone know if the NAM conflicts with these 2 files so i can figure out how to keep all the functionality, but remove any unnecessary duplication? -- A similar question is: THL_DataViewMod_MoreDetail.dat - I found in my plugins, but cannot find it anywhere on the STEX. Does anyone know where this came from, what it does, and if it conflicts with the GraphModd files above, or the NAM 47? Today I found this on the STEX - does it have any additional functionality not already included in the ones (above) that I have already? And lastly, I have a strong suspicion that this Improved Traffic Volume View may be superseded entirely by the NAM 47. Can anyone confirm that for sure? Thanks!
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Hello! I'm excited to upgrade from NAM 31.2 to NAM 47 today. During the installation process I read that there is a new Abandoned Buildings Data View. Q1 - Abandoned Building vs Radiation DataView: Does this Eliminate the Radiation Data View entirely from availability? Or does this just use that view to show the Abandoned Buildings, and if there happens to be any Radiation, it will also show up as GREEN Glow on the same Data View? How does this work exactly? Q2 - Transit - Ferry DataView - I noticed that the Ferry view in Transit does not have the 100% 130% 300% etc designators like all the other ones. Is this a bug in the NAM 47 or could I possibly have some DataView Mods competing with it that I should clean out? Q3 - Other Replaced Features / Functionality (in or besides DataView) : And besides the possibility of this replacing previous functionality, what OTHER NAM 47 full install items ALSO replace (eliminate) game functionality that older players like myself may have been using a decade ago?
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CoriBoom Those Stretchy RCI Graph Demand Bars
CorinaMarie posted a topic in SimCity 4 General Discussion
Those Stretchy RCI Graph Demand Bars (Being a Comparison of, and a Diagnostic Panel for, the Differences Between Actual and Apparent Visible Demand in the Game's RCI Graph.) Background Some of y'all may have used The C.O.R.I. Reports and the parts of interest for this topic are the Active Demands. I have confirmed the game variables for these are the very same shown in RJ's Census Repository query panel. Namely: game.g_r1_active_demand game.g_r2_active_demand game.g_r3_active_demand game.g_co2_active_demand game.g_co3_active_demand game.g_id_active_demand game.g_im_active_demand game.g_iht_active_demand And those are found in the Lua in entry ca63e2a3-4a5e8ef6-ffbf9ccf of SimCity_1.dat. Initial Observation I noticed that the numeric values for Demand often seem to be significantly different than what the RCI Bar Graph shows. At first I just assumed the known delay of the internal game.g variables updating was out of sync with the chart. However, in a stable city where those are not changing there actually is a difference. In this pic, CB has cropped out the demand info from the repository panel to place alongside the graph: ^ It's apparent that the graph shows completely different values. Like in this example the Actual Demand for R$ is 2,582, yet the graph shows it at around 4,000. So, what's up with that methinks? Investigation After peeking and testing, I found that this discrepancy is deliberate. If we change the Data Graph to have a baseline of zero (by removing the Graph minimum Y value property 0xea4aedc6), it then corresponds perfectly to the Actual Demand values: ^ See how that 2,582 of R$ (and all the others with a number in the repository panel) now match up? Analysis Next I set the demands to a fixed, unchanging amount and CB measured the pixel heights of the Y Axis tick marks and the visible bars: ^ I also altered the scale so they would be multiples of 512 and taller to insure better accuracy. The idea worked perfectly to determine if there was an underlying formula for how much the bars are stretched. That turns out to be: Visible Demand = (Bar Height / (Actual Demand * (Distance per Y Tick Line / Y Tick Value))) * Actual Demand ^--- All parentheses in equation added for clarity. Ofc, this was only the first step since the game doesn't actually tell us the height of the bars in pixels. Correlation By running multiple sets of specific demands and CB measuring the bars to get the Visible Demand numbers, I then used polynomial regression and the best fit was when comparing the natural log of the Actual Demand to the natural log of the percent of the space used by the Visible Demand between the zero line and the maximum Y tick value. CB created a nice UI panel where I could show the correlation between the two sets of data: ^ We've set this to be an override for the Maxis Park Query so it's relatively easy to access anywhere within your city. The upper left keeps the Maxis info for the Monthly Maintenance Cost and the rest is the new data display. Technical Consideration You might notice that the demand for CS-$, CS-$$, CS-$$$, and Agriculture are now included in our query panel. I discovered that one of the built-in Maxis Lua functions allows direct access to the Actual Demand for all 12 RCI types as follows: game.trend_value(hex2dec("2A67A399"),0) -- Low Wealth Residential (R-§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("AA67A3A0"),0) -- Medium Wealth Residential (R-§§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("8A67A3A4"),0) -- High Wealth Residential (R-§§§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("0A67A3A9"),0) -- Low Wealth Commercial Services (CS-§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("AA67A3AD"),0) -- Medium Wealth Commercial Services (CS-§§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("CA67A3B2"),0) -- High Wealth Commercial Services (CS-§§§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("AA67A3B7"),0) -- Medium Wealth Commercial Office (CO-§§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("2A67A3BC"),0) -- High Wealth Commercial Office (CO-§§§) game.trend_value(hex2dec("EA67A3BF"),0) -- Agriculture (I-Ag) game.trend_value(hex2dec("0A67A3C4"),0) -- Dirty Industry (I-D) game.trend_value(hex2dec("EA67A3C8"),0) -- Manufacturing Industry (I-M) game.trend_value(hex2dec("8A67A3CC"),0) -- High Tech Industry (I-HT) With the actual demand info now available for all of them, I wrote some Lua code that can convert the real demand into the Apparent Visible Demand as seen on the RCI Graph. Well, most of the time. (It's not perfect.) The code is also scalable to any other graph Minimum and Maximum (excluding a zero minimum where the graph is already accurate and which would confuzzle the hell out of my code). Caveats: Since the above functions access the current month data the moment the query panel is opened, it can show a different value from what you will see in the RCI graph because said graph only updates once per month. Also, my calculations are not 100% accurate, only pretty damn close, so there can be a few percent of error depending on the particular values of the Actual Demand data. And further, the data in the query panel does not update unless closing it and reopening. (This part is the same as all UI panels which show Lua variable's info including the Census Repository's.) In Game Results Here's a city tile I've been playing for a long while which shows how our new Diagnostic Panel looks in the game and you can compare the calculated Apparent Demand with the Bar Chart: Other Scales Ofc, this wouldn't be of much interest unless it can work with custom content (which it does). Here's the same city while using CAM 2.1.0's demand enhancements: ^ Notice how the game goes extra stretchy for the bars when the actual demand is lower? Look at R$$$ with an Actual Demand of 3,706, but which comes in around 20,438 on the chart. The Attachments Note: Use only one at once! For Vanilla Maxis Replacement: CoriBoom Actual Demand vs Apparent (+6k to -6k ) as Park Query - v1.0.dat As long as you are not using any other RCI Demand Graph override nor any Park Query override, you can drop our file anywhere in your Plugins. For SPAM: Use the Vanilla Maxis Replacement file above. (SPAM does not alter the RCI graph.) Same as above, drop anywhere in plugins providing you have no other RCI Demand Graph override nor any Park Query override. For CAM 2.1.0: CoriBoom Actual Demand vs Apparent (+54k to -10k ) as Park Query - v1.0.dat This one can be placed in your ..\Documents\SimCity 4\Plugins\a__CAM\a__Core folder. It doesn't technically need to override any CAM exemplars, but that's a good place to put it. The only consideration is to not be using any other Park Query override. For XX_Turbo: zCoriBoom Actual Demand vs Apparent (+52k to -10k ) as Park Query - v1.0.dat This one is a slightly special case inasmuch as XX_Turbo includes an override for the RCI Demand Graph, but it is not consistent with the maximum enhanced demands it sets. (The settings allow up to +52,000, but the graph has a maximum of 50,000.) This causes the bars to go above the top line like this: Our file therefore includes a modification to set the top of the graph to 52,000 so it looks like this: By default the installer for XX_Turbo places the XX_Turbo.dat file in ..\Documents\SimCity 4\Plugins\xxdita_bsc folder and ours needs to go in the same place. (If you've moved their mod to some other location in your Plugins, just search for "XX_Turbo.dat" and add our file there.) For the Radical RCI demand/graph mod: This one sets all the Demands to a Maximum of 65,536 and does not vary. We didn't make a Query for this since it would show the same numbers in both columns. For my 40_MZ v0.01 - Demands Graph Increased Height (to 9000).dat: This seemed like a good idea at the time when I didn't realize changing the scale only stretched the RCI Graph bars rather than showing some new, hidden demand. Simply remove the file if you downloaded it then use the appropriate file attached above. Tweaking for Any Other RCI Demand Graph Range Since we don't know if there are any other Custom graphs, here's how you can modify the attached Vanilla file to work with other Heights. Download the Maxis Vanilla file attached above and open it in Reader 0.9.3. What you are looking for is entry ca63e2a3-4a5e8ef6-f8b44574 which is the Lua code. The only two things which need to be revised are in this top section: ^ Notice the two variables: cmMaxGraphYTickValue cmMinGraphYTickValue Change the cmMaxGraphYTickValue to match the maximum demand the mod you are using can have and change the value of cmMinGraphYTickValue to match the minimum demand. Arbitrary Example: If you happen to have a mod which uses, say, a range of 24,000 to -12,000 then the changes would look like this: Apply the tweaks and save the file. It's a good idea to alter the file name so it reflects the range you've set. Conclusion Nothing in the attached mods change any demand settings nor alter gameplay in any way. Our new Diagnostic Panel simply provides detailed info about the Actual and Apparent Demands for peeps who might be curious. Appreciation Special thanks yet again to @Cyclone Boom for all the technical help measuring the data bars in graph after graph, fine tuning of all the pics, proofreading, and final post layout polishing.- 11 Replies
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CoriBoom 2nd Beta - All 3 City Halls Fixes + 1 for ModPacc Zero
CorinaMarie posted a topic in SC4 Modding - Open Discussion
All Three City Halls + 1 (for ModPacc Zero ) With New Data Summary Panel Background As many of you know, Maxis shipped the game with Model files, Lots and Building exemplars, some LText, and some Lua code for a total of three City Halls with each building progressively larger than the previous. However, the Lua code to trigger the Phase 2 and Phase 3 versions was commented out when they decided to have them upgrade in place. The code for the latter was never completed by Maxis. Next came @MrTruesage's All 3 CityHalls Modd Reward fix in December, 2004 to allow all three City Halls to be plopped in the game. This was accomplished by reactivating Maxis's code, creating some new LText files, and additionally tweaking some of the properties in the building exemplars. It was later in August, 2005 that @Andreas Roth created the City Hall Fix to deal with the custom trees that would sometimes appear on the Phase 1 lot. Then in October, 2016 @simmaster07 created Real Upgradeable City Halls which has a DLL and Lua code to finally implement Maxis's intention of the upgrade in place. Considerations For ModPacc Zero, CB re-lotted all three City Halls to improve their appearance so that props no longer intrude on other nearby elements and also preventing the tree oddities. (The original Maxis Phase 2 and Phase 3 were rather scant and boring so he's improved upon that too.) The mod by MrTruesage has several tweaks such that the population and mayor rating requirements are greater than Maxis defined along with adding CAP relief, spreading the available jobs across all three wealth levels, and changing the lots to Do Construction after plopping. With this being the de facto standard for anyone who wants all three City Halls, we have made the ModPacc Zero versions conform to the same alterations for better compatibility. However, we have also corrected minor mistakes in the Demand Created property and written new Lua code so that entire Lua entries do not need to be overwritten. (This latter part uses techniques which were apparently unknown back in 2004.) Re-Lotted Versions by Cyclone Boom Phase 1: Phase 2: Phase 3: And introducing a new Phase 0 (Village Hall) by CB which can be plopped any time in a newly established city: ^ This allows immediate access to all the data in his new UI query. (Note: All 4 lots use Maxis props, and as such require no dependencies.) Village Hall Background The Village Hall was the first brick duplex built in a small hamlet founded by Silas Woodthorpe and was dedicated to the community as a place for meetings and other local government business. Ever since, it has become the design favored by Mayors across the land when they need their first source of useful information. (Lotted by @Cyclone Boom) Building Exemplar Properties The tweaks MrTruesage made to Demand Created have been updated to Maxis Standards. In each case of Jobs Created they also need a corresponding entry for Amenities and we have added those. The changes they made to Wealth, Demand Satisfied (CAP Relief), Landmark Effects, and Water Consumed are maintained for backward compatibility. Lua Code The Lua code is where the game checks if the criteria for a reward lot has been achieved and then makes them available in the Reward Menu. It also handles the reward earned popup advisor messages and the fluff news messages. MrTruesage's mod copies those Lua entries in their entirety and while this was the only known method at the time, it's not a good idea because that precludes any other mod from making changes to code in the same sections. For ModPacc Zero, I've completely rewritten the Lua code as a standalone package. This allows surgical edits which will not interfere with Lua code of any other mod. It is highly advised to remove MrTruesage's mod from your plugins and use the MZ version instead. Reward Triggers The Maxis code for the first City Hall (Phase 1) is set to 12,500+ population and 20+ for mayor rating. MrTruesage's mod increases this to 15,500+ population and 40+ mayor rating. This can cause a discrepancy for players who have cities they created under the Maxis criteria, but then install the mod. Let me illustrate what I mean. This city tile was originally played without the All 3 City Halls fix: Playing later with MrTruesage's mod installed, I decided I wanted to move the City Hall because I'd randomly plopped it when it became available under the vanilla rule of 12,500 population. So, I bulldoze it: But now I don't meet the new requirements! I created some special Lua code to check for this exact situation. If a Phase 1 City Hall exists in a city tile and it does not meet the increased requirements, I set them back to 12,500 population and 20 mayor rating (as originally set by Maxis) so that the City Hall can be bulldozed and re-plopped wherever I want. With the new code after bulldozing: Note: If you bulldoze the vanilla City Hall, save, then exit the city tile it will revert to the 15,500 and 40 mayor rating requirement the next time you load it. The idea is that my tweak only applies to previously plopped City Halls that are in the gap between the original 12,500 threshold and the new 15,500 and which are to be moved in the same play session. In the same play session I can go re-plop the City Hall because it meets the old requirements: And it'll grow: Availability and Menu Placement The Maxis code (which was commented out) and re-implemented by MrTruesage has the requirement that the prior City Hall must be plopped before the next one becomes available (along with the population and mayor rating requirements). In a city which meets the population and mayor rating requirements where one wants to place only the Phase 3 City Hall, that means one has to jump thru several hoops to accomplish it. Ergo, plop Phase 1, let it grow, see Phase 2 become available, pause the game, bulldoze Phase 1, plop Phase 2 without running time (or it'll disappear from the menu), let that one grow, see Phase 3 become available, pause, bulldoze Phase 2, and then (finally) plop Phase 3. This all seems a bit cumbersome to me so I've made it so that the only requirements are the population and mayor rating thresholds. This gives the player the choice to have each one plopped so 1, 2, or 3 are present in their city. Or just a single City Hall if they like. In this tile created by CB, it meets the requirements for all 3 Halls. We select this area to grow Phase 3: ^ Notice too that I've changed the Item Order property so all 3 are grouped together in the menu. Now we can immediately plop Phase 3 without all the prior plop, grow, bulldoze, plop hassle: Let it grow: And it still has the City Exclusion Group property so you can only have one of each phase: Additionally, I've added Requirements text to the menu items for Phase 2 and 3 instead of using Maxis (and MrTruesage's) code for: return reward_state.HIDDEN The User Interface (UI) aka the Query Window MrTruesage added some additional information to the query: We've greatly expanded that for MZ: CB has also created a separate, optional No City Hall Query Sound v1.0.dat file which makes the query silent. YIMBY not NIMBY The description for MrTruesage's mod states that the Landmark Effect of each Phase is a NIMBY influence. This is incorrect. The Landmark Effect in their mod (and this MZ version) is a YIMBY for Commercial and completely neutral for Residential and Industrial. Fluff News Removal MrTruesage's mod also commented out all the Fluff News (without ever mentioning that was done). While this might be desirable for many peeps, we believe it should not be forced on anyone. We've made a separate, standalone mod that will do the same thing so y'all can make your own decision if you'd like the Fluff News items deleted. (Note: Many other news items are also fluff in nature, but are created in separate Lua code which was not altered.) New Building Names Rather than Small, Medium, and Large we've named them as follows: Town Hall City Hall Metropolis Hall Also, LText is included and assigned for each name, which means if you rename any of them that new name will be saved in the city tile data and persist from one play session to the next. New Building Addition As mentioned above, CB has created a new Village Hall that can be plopped with no requirements so the enhanced data display in our UI can be available even in newly established cities. Compatability With simmmaster07's Mod This MZ version of All 3 City Halls is fully compatible with @simmaster07's Real Upgradeable City Halls mod. Simply refrain from plopping Phase 2 and Phase 3 and if your city has 45,000 population when loading, his advisor popup will allow Phase 1 to upgrade in place to Phase 2 and if your city has 95,000 population when loading, it'll allow the upgrade of either Phase 1 (if you didn't agree to the phase 2 upgrade) or Phase 2 to become Phase 3. Simply install his mod according to the instructions listed in the STEX description. Incompatability With Other Mods @MrTruesage's All 3 CityHalls Modd Reward fix When using our ModPacc Zero City Halls fix, MrTruesage's mod should be completely removed from your plugins. While it was certainly a brilliant addition in 2004, it does not meet current standards for Lua coding alterations. Look for a folder named CityHall Package and delete it and its contents. If you've installed their mod in a different folder than the one contained in the original zip file, look for these individual files: CityHall.dat CityHall_LText.dat ConstantsLUA.dat (Overrides TGI CA63E2A3-4A5E8EF6-FF048A3E) NewsItemsLUA.dat (Overrides TGI CA63E2A3-4A5E8EF6-FFA79144) RewardLUA.dat (Overrides TGI CA63E2A3-4A5E8EF6-FFA8F301) UI.dat Remove all of the above. @Andreas Roth's City Hall Fix Remove CityHall_fix.dat from your plugins when using our ModPacc Zero version. (Or, for this one, just be certain our mod loads last and it will safely override their copy of the LotConfigurations exemplar.) As part of the main MZ release, we will provide a master Cleanitol text file to remove the original mods by file name. Beta Testing Requested As with our other newly created mods for ModPacc Zero, we'd like y'all to beta test this and provide feedback. Ofc, be certain to test safely. It's best to use only copies of your city tiles so you can restore them to their pre-testing versions. We cannot be certain at this time if there will need to be any additional modifications, and as such you'll want backups of any cities where you test. Ofc, please do post feedback and/or pictures to let us know your impression of our new creation. The Files Contained in the .Zip: MZ City Hall Package (Beta v1.0).dat <--- The main file. MZ Fluff News Remover (Beta v1.0).dat <--- Optional file. No City Hall Query Sound v1.0.dat <--- Optional file. The Download File: ModPacc Zero - City Halls (Beta v1.0).zip See new v1.1 updated beta (and better) release to download from our post here. Thanks! -Cori & CB- 62 Replies
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I am moving to a new computer, I copied over the plugins which worked. I remembered I downloaded some mod a long time ago that needed an edit/merge of simcity_1.dat This is backed up by my simcity_1.dat file having a different last modified date than the rest of the files. Can I safely copy this over? I can't remember what mod needed to modify this
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Building Design Methodology: Using Lidar Imagery and GIS?
MekkA posted a topic in Cities: Skylines Modding - Open Discussion
I am completely newb to 3D software and asset creation but am starting to fall into the deep rabbit hole of learning. Given the accuracy I'm sure most creators adhere to for matching their assets to the real structure, I was wondering if anyone here has utilized this path to extracting building data? As I work for a major municipality using GIS daily, we recently released a major set of satellite imagery and some googling showed me that extracting accurate building footprints and 3D dimensions is a huge benefit of LIDAR. If someone has gone this route for their building designs, what methodology could be used to then migrate that data into a usable base for 3D modeling software? Thinking about this also makes me generally wonder: If this is not a common method in getting accurate data for a future building asset, what are some of the more common ways in which creators ensure their designs are in fact "accurate?" Thanks everyone! -
Not exactly sure what has happened but I had backed up all my SimCity game files to another drive and when I checked them out they only contain image files and txt info. No data or other files necessary, to load them into a game. This stops me in my tracks to begin to play again because a large portion of the files I had saved, no longer exist. I am very disappointed and don't know who to blame.
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Nothing major, just throwing a fun fact out here. I've been looking at savegame-related stuff lately and found a weird quirk in how SC4 loads data. Almost every modder already knows that most game data (plugins, .dat files, savegames) is packaged as DBPF files. Here's what the SC4Devotion wiki has to say about them: This actually isn't true! For some absolutely insane reason, if a file doesn't start with "DBPF," the game will still scan through the entire file and try to load it by looking for this byte sequence: 80 9D 88 EC 8F 24 03 6C C9 A6 31 56 5B CF 77 22 If the game finds these magic bytes it'll try to load any data from that point on as a DBPF. This lets you do weird things like combine .dat and .jpg files. If you want an example, download the demo.jpg file I attached to this post and put it in your plugins folder. If it worked, you'll see this hastily made icon in your parks menu: Now as a novelty I think this is pretty funny, but I can't think of a practical reason for why anyone would do this. Here's what I think this could mean for modding though: it's a pretty solid confirmation that the game will waste time on non-game files like JPEGs that get stuck in plugin folders. This is inefficient since the game is forcing itself to fully scan every file in the Plugins folder for this kind of data. But it's possible to patch out this check so that the game only looks for the "DBPF" sequence at the start, and bails out early if it's not there. This could meaningfully improve load times for people with large plugin folders that still have JPGs, ZIP files and other non-game data in them. But since spinning hard drives are going out of style, this might not offer much improvement either. Anyway, here's the demo file I mentioned earlier: demo.jpg
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Version 1.1.0
938 Downloads
SC4Cartographer - Generate and save map images from SimCity 4 saves. Small tool that allows you to create, customize and save map images of cities. Has the following features: Fully Customize zone colors and map backgrounds Customizable map proportions (perfect form making or printing posters) Browse through available save games and regions or load specific save files Map preview with ability to zoom Prerequisites Single executable, does not require installation, can be placed and used anywhere on computer. Only requires .NET framework 4.7.1 or higher if you do not already have it installed. Source code, issues and feedback If you want to see the code, report a bug or suggest a feature head over to Github to checkout the project -
Hi everyone, i have this issue again and i know that corrupted city file has been discussed extensively in the past. I was wandering if something has changed through all these years or corrupted city files will be always corrupted and nothing can be done. We stuck in a game 17 years old and I'm sick of trying to make compatible the game with nowdays technology and still having all these problems. 4 of my best cities that i spent many many hours are causing me trouble. I'm seriously thinking to stop playing this game. Unfortunately all other city build games aren't good enough, what's why we keep playing this stone age game.
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So i downloaded and it worked and i can view regions but i cannot view the regions I have created and downloaded. Would be great to know how to do that and maybe some other help with the app would be good.
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Hi guys, I'm interested in mining data from my regions. Are there any good tools designed for this purpose? Is there any way I can import data to excel for analysis? Any help is greatly appreciated, or if there is a data tool megathread, please link me! Thank you.
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Version 1.0
2,058 Downloads
CoriBoom™ Productions Proudly Presents... Cori's Parks Aura. It's time to explore Park Effect in Data View form. In our 4th official CoriBoom™ release to the STEX, @CorinaMarie and I are delighted to present a mod which represents the effects of Parks Aura as a Data View. SimCity 4 is an intricate and creative city building simulation, featuring extensive information for how interactions are connected with various wide-ranging gameplay variables. Much of this happens under the hood, and so it's not always plainly evident exactly what's going on. There are ways to observe and determine the desirable and more unsavory parts of town. In terms of a visual representation though of aura effects, this isn't directly defined as displayed data. As such it might not be apparent just how far the negative aura spreads from the local landfill, or the positiveness generated from plopped parks. By knowing this information, it's possible to make design decisions based on what it means. As we've all become familiar with the standard offering of mayoral tools, Cori's Parks Aura is a mod you may not have realized might ever be useful. However, we believe it is very much so. What this allows is a completely new perspective into the diverse interactions of the simulation, and to determine more distinctly the reasons for residential development in different locations. Background Info Parks Aura is a primary YIMBY factor in SC4 which allows residential development to thrive. However in the game, this data is hidden away in the simulation and cannot visibly be seen. The standard Desirability view can help to a limited extent. This represents several variables including "Transient Aura" effects, but it doesn't directly depict the Park Effect as many ploppable lots provide. That's where you may find our mod useful, giving a new perspective to see how this important data is formed within a city. It can be used to make strategical city planning decisions for where zoning should take place, and also to identify the sources for where either the positive or negative Park Effect is emitted from. Note that this mod is a visual representation of the Parks Aura within each city tile. It doesn't modify or alter the strength of aura effects, or any aspect of the gameplay whatsoever. Main Design Features Extreme cogitation has been devoted into all modding aspects: Proven verified accuracy in the data representation. Distinct breakpoints allow the data to be seen clearly and precisely. Blending between the green and neutral allows for a gradual transition of the aura magnitude. Updated legend scale with distinguishable colors (and value ranges represented). Neutral aura is shown as an opaque and contrasting white shade. Subtle transparency which lets the terrain show through. Landfills and other trash processing facilities are highlighted yellow in the panel map so they're visible. RCI zones appear when the view is active. Overrides the standard Garbage view. The Data Distribution As mentioned, extensive testing has been conducted to identify the breakpoint thresholds forming the scale. This was done through a methodical and progressional testing approach, incrementally narrowing down the possibilities until identifying where each range is distributed. This is important because it means the distributions of how colors are arranged is fully accurate to their true values. For representing the data, a Color Ramp scale is used. As follows: This forms how the Data View panel appears with the 9 breakpoints: Sample Pics In addition to the above previews, here's a few samples from how the Parks Aura view appears in game: (Click to enlarge, and the arrow keys can be used to flick between them.) Deuteranopia Version (For color blindness) To help in consideration for people with Deuteranopia color blindness, we've created a version specially with an optimized color scale. This allows the full extent of the ranges to be seen in shades from dark yellow to dark blue, meaning they contrast distinctly to equally represent the Parks Aura data accurately. Here's the file to install in the same way (place in your Plugins folder instead of the main file): zz_Deuteranopia DataView - Cori's Parks Aura v1.0.dat Open the spoiler below for a sample: Note on Maxis Parks An observation from testing is how the Maxis Parks generate a high amount of aura. This is cumulative which means it builds up as more are located within a close vicinity. As such it means they're prone to producing the maximum extent of Park Effect that is shown as the top end Lovely side of the scale. For reference, here's a list of the data values: With these strengths of effects and it's very easy to build a few Small, Medium, or Large classed parks and see how the coverage soon mounts up. Additional Notes Aura Thresholds The highest aura the game tracks is 166 and above, which is represented by the Lovely shade. Once the 100 threshold is attained, this is significant because it's the maximum usefulness for positive aura. As per what @xxdita posted here, it's the most that RCI see as an aura growth cap (YIMBY factor). Quoting for reference: Color Layering Due to the color ramp having a light opacity which depicts the data in a more elegant fashion, occasionally the Yuck color at the negative end will appear somewhat purple shaded when over water. This happens because the shades mix up with the added blue hues. Additionally the same applies for different terrain mods also. Any given terrain mod will alter the color on the playing area. The scale has been optimally designed for regular green and brownish terrain, however the layering may appear differently depending on each individual type of terrain. Game Glitch Discovered: Phantom Aura You may occasionally find how some Park Effect still persists from an unknown source. As per what @Naomi57 posted here, and @xxdita also did here, it can be seen how the data is still shown even with nothing plopped to generate the effect. When bulldozing some lots which produce aura, we believe our mod is revealing how the game doesn't always fully tidy up the underlying data. In our own tests, it doesn't appear tied to any particular lot. Also any given lot may or may not produce the leftover incorrect Park Effect data. As a potential remedy, we suggest to run at least a full month of game time prior to bulldozing any park, especially on ones larger than 1 x 1 in size. Then save the game, bulldoze the lot, and run a few more days while watching our Parks Aura data view. Should the glitch appear, now exit without saving and come back to try again. Or better still, avoid bulldozing any parks! This really is an area where it was never known about until having a tool to show it. Quite possibly this view might explain why sometimes there can be stalled development if the phantom aura is causing it to be. Making regular backups of one's cities is thoroughly recommended in any case. Again, just to emphasize how our mod doesn't alter any data, and only displays what the game already has calculated. This is all internally stored and presented from within the internal saved file. Location of Garbage Since we expect most people already effectively manage their garbage well, only the location of the trash facilities is displayed (highlighted yellow). Additionally, the Garbage Graph is more useful if needing to know how close to capacity one is, over the trends of time. Installation This mod uses the standard process of installing SC4 content. Copy the z_DataView - Cori's Parks Aura v1.0.dat file into the root of your Plugins. The file is prefixed with a "z_" to ensure it loads last. This is important because otherwise the replacement view wouldn't override others which alter the Garbage Data View. So, just to be clear... *** Replaces the default Garbage Data View *** (And let's face it, that is pretty rubbish for usefulness! ) Note: This v1.0 version is functionally the same as the final v0.15 beta release. The exception is a small change that rearranges the legend scale text, making them sequentially ordered from the low to high range values (which seems more logical). Special Thanks To everyone who helped with testing and posting feedback from the inherited development thread, the scope and direction wouldn't have been achievable without your valuable input to assist. In particular, the meticulous testing carefully conducted by @Naomi57 with each posted beta version inspired this release to be possible. Thank you! // CoriBoom™ Productions Release \\ Cori's Parks Aura v1.0 — (26 Jan 2020) -
stats Simtropolis All-Time Reputation Giving Leaders
TakemeThere posted a topic in Simtropolis Related
A while back I created a topic which tabulated the leaders for total amount of rep received in a given year compiled through the sites search function and recently updated for 2017 & 2018. Seeing these figures left me and few other members curious about who was giving out the most reps... and now I finally have an answer for that question. And not just for like, but also the leaders for these three other categories >>> A big thanks goes out to @Cyclone Boom for responding to my request and for taking the time to tabulate the numbers through the database. Unfortunately we don't have access to these stats directly through the search function, however they can be tabulated by the site administrators and Cyclone can confirm that they are indeed accurate(as of Jan 16th - I had tried to post this data up earlier in the week but lists made using the "@" function can be unwieldy to say the least, but I finally managed to get things to work! as they say third time's a charm ). I've decided to post this in a new thread since I know seeing a lot of numbers all over the place can be confusing - these likes are strictly for reputation given and not received. Here are the top 20 all-time leaders for reputation given - All types _1. 12,126 @raynev1 _2. 11,117 @CorinaMarie _3. 10,749 @matias93 _4._ 9,879 @mrsmartman _5._ 9,639 @bobolee _6._ 9,612 @lapacifica _7._ 8,355 @Cyclone Boom _8._ 7,883 @JP Schriefer _9._ 7,680 @Schulmanator 10.. 7,430 @Aaron Graham 11.. 7,060 @nos.17 12.. 6,801 @Compdude787 13.. 6,501 @korver 14.. 5,726 @AsimPika3172 15.. 5,129 @Fantozzi 16.. 4,962 @Huston 17.. 4,955 @Ceafus 88 18.. 4,928 @Hellken 19.. 4,805 @Amthaak 20.. 4,464 @weixc812 (29th 3,356 myself!) The top 20 all-time leaders for reputation given - Likes Very similar to the list above since new types of likes were only made available more recently. Exact the same members made the top 20 list, just in a slightly different order. _1. 12,126 @raynev1 _2._ 9,879 @mrsmartman _3._ 9,849 @CorinaMarie _4._ 9,655 @matias93 _5._ 9,633 @bobolee _6._ 9,612 @lapacifica _7._ 7,856 @JP Schriefer _8._ 7,679 @Schulmanator _9._ 7,430 @Aaron Graham 10.. 7,127 @Cyclone Boom 11.. 7,019 @nos.17 12.. 6,797 @Compdude787 13.. 6,335 @korver 14.. 5,413 @AsimPika3172 15.. 4,949 @Huston tie.. 4,949 @Ceafus 88 17.. 4,928 @Hellken 18.. 4,805 @Amthaak 19.. 4,654 @Fantozzi 20.. 4,464 @weixc812 (27th 3,336 myself!) The top 20 all-time leaders for reputation given - Thanks _1. 959 @Tyberius06 _2. 754 @CorinaMarie_ 7 54 _3. 645 @Cyclone Boom_ _4. 338 @matias93_ _5. 266 @Fantozzi_ _6. 228 @Haljackey_ _7. 167 @AsimPika3172_ _8. 136 @RobertLM78_ _9... 87 @jeffryfisher_ 10._ 84 @That Retro Guy. 11._ 81 @Dragonxander. 12._ 70 @Alan Waters. 13._ 61 @CT14. 14._ 58 @Badi_Dea. 15._ 57 @markussaage. 16._ 54 @tariely. 17._ 53 @korver. 18._ 48 @Namiko. tie._ 48 @Terring. 20._ 41 @kingofpop. The top 20 all-time leaders for reputation given - Yes! _1. 645 @matias93 _2. 525 @Cyclone Boom_ _3. 414 @CorinaMarie_ _4. 290 @RobertLM78_ _5. 223 @jeffryfisher 223 _6. 193 @Haljackey_ _7. 180 @Fantozzi _8. 163 @Evanjs _9. 150 @Dragonxander_ 10. 147 @NMUSpidey. 11. 140 @bladeberkman. 12._ 97 @AsimPika3172. 13._ 96 @korver. 14._ 78 @ESP15. 15._ 77 @CT14 16._ 69 @T Wrecks 17._ 62 @kim026 18._ 47 @APSMS 19._ 37 @Edvarz 20._ 33 @twalsh102 The top 20 all-time leaders for reputation given - Haha _1. 123 @RobertLM78 _2. 111 @matias93 _3. 100 @CorinaMarie _4._ 58 @Cyclone Boom _5._ 52 @AsimPika3172 _6._ 46 @Haljackey _7._ 32 @T Wrecks _8._ 29 @Fantozzi _9._ 26 @c4bl3fl4m3 tie._ 26 @Terring 11._ 23 @jeffryfisher 12._ 21 @Tyberius06 13._ 20 @korver 14._ 16 @RRetail 15._ 15 @Evanjs 16._ 14 @Dragonxander tie._ 14 @Tarkus 18._ 13 @airman15 tie._ 13 @Edvarz 20._ 12 @Handyman- 26 Replies
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To back up my current Regions and Cities, is it as simple as saving my SimCity 4 file to another hard drive on a semi regular basis and then exporting that to a different computer? I only ask because I recently found, on my new computer, the SimCity 4 file from the My Documents section of my old computer which had been recovered when my old computer died. Many of the city tiles in the regions I worked on the most are just gone, leaving blank flat land. Some of the old cities remain but they're mostly just blank slates. Would love to effectively back up my current cities and avoid losing all the work. Thanks!
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I've discussed the problem of mansions popping up all over the place in this thread. I feel that a key part of this issue is that it seems to be too easy to get most of the city up to maximum Land Value. In this screenshot of my previous city, one can see that most of the city is at the highest level of green Land Value. Using the SHIFT + CTL + ALT + Query Tool, I was able to confirm that most of the city was at the maximum allowed Land Value of 255. This means high-wealth mansions can appear pretty much anywhere in the city - the default Medium/High wealth boundary is 120. I've been going through the list of known Exemplar properties trying to find something that might have an effect on this, and have then been creating some modified .DATs to test out in the game. I've been through a few and haven't noticed any effect, but I've now found one that looks very interesting, even though I don't know exactly what it's doing. There an Exemplar property called: 0x47e2c331 Float32 Land Value Desirability Factors Size of effects (see IDs) It's default value is 2.5. I changed it to 1. I then loaded up my city and the effect is instantly obvious on the Land Value data map. Instead of most of the city being maximum 255 Land Value, everything is reduced significantly. The highest I could see was 172, and then all kinds of numbers below that. Lots of land had gone below the High-wealth default threshold of 120. So I don't know exactly what's happening here or how it will affect other aspects of the game, but it looks promising.
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Way of getting detailed information about a tile?
Psiman posted a topic in SimCity 4 General Discussion
Are there any mods or tools that enable one to get detailed information about a particular tile, such as its exact land value? I know of the TerrainQuery tool, but that only shows terrain info. -
I've taken the liberty of starting this topic because I have just posted a major upgrade to DataNode, and to date there has not been a single place where support questions could be posted. DataNode is the sort of tool that is actually very easy to use, but overwhelming for many because of the massive amount of data it presents. The Manual included with it is there for a reason - to make this use of this data easier to understand and put to your own ends. Its really an audit tool aimed at a couple of tasks as a player: Checking that the load order of mods in plugins leads to the result you want - a fast loading, clean SC4 plugins folder. Checking that you have the dependencies needed for a mod As a modder it can help in verifying that your mod is correct and clean, and works as you expect if it overrides game content. Latest Version of SC4DataNode DataNode has been around for a while (since 2012) , and from time to time gets a mention when people encounter bugs or discuss how they manage their plugins. Today I've released a new version v1.06 that is well worth getting especially if you have a large plugin folder. After some forum discussion about what SC4Datanode shows of the files in the Plugins folder, I’ve decided to make all the files touched in the loading process visible. This slows the program a little bit but means it is now possible to see all files that SC4 ignores when loading those it recognises. These do no harm (generally) but slow the loading process as SC4 must look at every file to see if it is relevant. Here are the main changes: in the SC4 file view files that are coloured with a beige background and orange text, with zzz in the Dead column, are sleepers or zombies – they are examined by SC4 but only contribute to the time taken to start up the game. These are mostly documentation files – text and images - but may include all sorts of files included by authors of game material. You don’t have to remove these but if you do the game will start faster. By default, these go onto the scanning Log unless suppressed. In the Preferences panel one can suppress the logging (and display) of non-SC4 Files. This is useful if you have a lot of documentation files but want to leave them there and just concentrate on dependencies. If a file ends in .dat, .sav, .SC4, .SC4Desc, .SC4Lot, or .SC4Model, and the File is empty it will be flagged with an Apricot background, and Orange text. It will be put on the log as it may be damaged if it should be a SC4 file. But, for example, the uninst000.dat in SC4PLUGINS is a file that isn’t a real SC4 .dat. Occasionally installers leave .dll or .exe files in the Plugins – the ones in SimCity:Plugins and NAM are valid – others may just be installers for mods and can (should) be removed after installation. They are marked as IsOK in the Dead Column of the SC4 File display – just in case. SC4Datanode will now also show all files that could be loaded by SC4, LE or PIM-x even if they have no extensions or other wild names. These are treated as if they were SC4.Model files, that is, are loaded in phase 1 of the loading sequence. These should probably be renamed to have a .dat extension for easy identification in future but you’ll need to judge by its contents. When a path name becomes so long (more than 260 characters) that Windows refuses to handle it, SC4Datanode now shows you where it is and will stop running. At this point you will need to fix the problem by rearranging the folders so that the structure is not so deep. The CSV reports by view now produce one file per view – named according to the view – some reports have extra properties common to all items.The Q column has the value “=” when it is the only or final exemplar after overrides are accounted for. FileView and TGI views all produce a report. The program has had its Error Handling strengthened and should also run faster on x64 machines. Memory management has been a focus of testing. It is configured to adapt to x32 and x64 systems thus helping memory constraints if the plugins folder is very, very large. The Manual has been updated to reflect these changes. I recommend you (re)read the pages 10-15 to understand the new features. Memory and Performance During testing of this new version it became apparent that the old version would start to show memory problems on a large plugin set. This was due to the program being compiled for x32 machines. This program wades through a lot of data and uses up to 40% of the size of your plugins total during the scan. It has now been compiled to use x64 when on 64bit machines, and x86 on 32bit machines. Because pointers are double the size on x64 it will use about 50% more memory on x64 but have no ceiling other than physical memory (assuming no disk paging). On x32 the addressable memory is usually closer to 2GB. I have no idea if the Extended Flag works on .NET code - if so the limit may be 3.6GB. So: on x32 – 2GB addressable implies a maximum plugin size of about 4GB before memory may start causing issues. on x64 – 4GB memory implies about 7GB max plugin size, 8GB memory about 14GB, and 16GB should not give problems until 28GB of plugins. The memory used is shown on the status bar. A lot of work has been done to minimize use of memory. However, if you do exceed physical memory it may start disk-memory paging and become very slow or even CTD in the worst case (out of program control). Performance is very dependent on disk speed – the best times have come from SSD, and 10,000 rpm iron disks. The program is I/O bound and will use only one processor for itself by design. The OS (under the carpet) then can use as many cores as it wants for I/O. .NET is quite efficient in I/O, so the program is quite snappy – obviously the age of machine, OS, disk type and size of plugins affect performance. It is worth noting that if you run SC4Datanode directly after a reboot its run time may be quite a bit slower than subsequent rescans or scans. This is because Windows is filling its disk caches for the first time as it goes. These get used next time round leading to much faster loading times. This also holds for SC4. The more headroom in memory the more impressive this caching is. Also keep in mind that Windows can easily use 4GB (x64) on its own these days. These restrictions hold even more for SC4 – if you feed it a plugin collection in excess of 4GB its going to be slower and slower starting up and may actually run into problems. Its always more pleasant and responsive to run SC4 with a subset of your plugin archives. SC4Datanode will allow you to manage a much larger plugin set than SC4 can comfortably run. Finally this version would not be solid as it is without the efforts of @twalsh102 who now holds the record for SC4DataNode with a Plugins folder size of 14.1 GB with 29,961 files which was eventually scanned and analysed in 2 minutes 53 seconds settling on 2.36 GB of memory. This was achieved on a 2018 Win10 machine with 16GB of memory. This is nearly twice as large and fast as the 2012 testing figures held by @DocRorlach which were achieved on a Win7 machine of that time namely 7.34GB of plugins in 2m38s. Please use this place to can ask/comment/suggest about DataNode. Like any program it can be improved.
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The C.O.R.I. Reports (beta version) (Collection Of Relevant Information) I've been poking around in SC4's memory while the game is running and decided to create a text report of the global variables I found. This mod is basically all LUA code except for the LText needed for the popup and news item. It is a normal .dat file which needs to be placed in the Plugins folder. The data is simply what's currently in the global variables. That's not to say they are completely true to what the game shows in various places. (Those may be modified by other functions.) So, this is a beta release of something which may or may not be useful. Either way I've had fun playing around with it. (Some of the descriptions may need to be tweaked. When I didn't know for sure what something was I made it basically the in game variable name.) With the mod installed it will trigger a popup if Urgent Advice is turned on: The urgent advice is not required tho. Either way it can be found in the news box: Or you can chat with the City Planner. It can take several in game days (if the saved game time was running) or several seconds if paused before it shows up. The mod will stay put in the news and advisor panel so you can output a report anytime you like. (Reports output on the same Sim Game Date will overwrite a previous one.) Reports on unique dates will be written one after the other. You can X the news item and it will stay gone for the remainder of that city tile session. Some variables take about 14 game days before they populate properly. By default the report is placed in your Documents\SimCity 4 folder. (The folder path can be customized. More on that momentarily.) Also, by default the report has some header gibberish (which can be suppressed). Here's a sample of the generic version of the report: The report file is best viewed as a true .txt document with either Windoze Notepad or the much superior Notepad++. If you pull it up in Word or similar it'll goof up the spacing of the block and group headers. To customize where the text file is output (and other options) it needs to find CoriReport.ini and that must be in the install folder where SimCity 4.exe is located. The most useful entry in the INI is CoriReportPath= followed by a valid path to the folder where you want the text file to be written. The folder must already exist. My mod does not create any new folders. The easiest way (at least in Win 7) is to create the folder and copy the address as text. Paste that after the CoriReportPath= (with no space after the = sign) Example: CoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\Cori Reports Note that it's ok to have spaces in the folder names and do not put quotes around the path. Also, do not add a trailing backslash. No other text is allowed on this line, but you can have text on other lines for your notes. You can also have multiple CoriReportPath= lines and whichever is the last one is where the output will be written. CoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\Cori Reports CoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\My Farms CoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\My Farms\First 50 Years CoriReportPath=C:\Cori\Tested\This ^ In this example the report would go into C:\Cori\Tested\This You can also comment out a line. Any character you like can be used. -CoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\Cori Reports CoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\My Farms xCoriReportPath=C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\My Farms\First 50 Years ;CoriReportPath=C:\Cori\Tested\This ^ Here the report will go into C:\Users\Owner\Documents\SimCity 4\My Farms If you comment out all of them, the file output will default back to Documents\SimCity 4 The next option (on a separate line) in the INI file is: NumbersFormat= and it has 4 options: NumbersFormat=raw NumbersFormat=comma NumbersFormat=round NumbersFormat=both The raw format will show the numbers exactly as found in the variables. The comma option will add commas to separate groups of thousands. The round choice will round numbers that should be integers to zero decimal places, 1 decimal place for tax rates, and two decimal places for percentages. (Note: Currently the % symbol is not appended to anything.) And both will do round and comma. (Both is the default if this line isn't present.) Other options that can be used in the INI file do not need an = sign. They are simply toggles: HideGibberish HideFileName HideTimeStamp HideIniContents HideVersion HideGibberish suppresses the extra verbiage in the report. HideFileName suppresses the line that shows the output path and file name. HideTimeStamp suppresses the line with the date and time that the file was created. HideIniContents suppresses the output of what the mod found in CoriReport.ini, and HideVersion keeps the version number line from printing. Using all 5 of these options gives the cleanest looking report. One last option is the CustomTitle= option. By adding text here it will replace the default " * * * The C.O.R.I. City Report * * * " part of the report title. Example: CustomTitle=Your Custom Title Here For all entries in the INI file it does not care about upper or lower or camel case. However, for a custom report title you will want to make that however you want it to appear in the report. Also, any line can be commented out by placing some character in front of it. This includes the space character if you like. Special thanks to @Cyclone Boom who encouraged me throughout my trials and tribulations while learning about Lua coding. He's also responsible for many of the great ideas and options and for tirelessly testing version after version (after version) of the alpha releases. Things I've noticed: Street, road, and avenue tile counts are doubled Bridge tiles don't include road (may all be zero, I haven't checked the other kinds) Highway connection to a neighbor tile is counted as an avenue connection Anything relating to ferries is always zero Network building counts are the number of tiles occupied so one vanilla train station is counted as 6 Freight stations seem to be counted as Train stations Number of tollbooths is always zero Overworked power plants is always zero (CB's discovery) Power strike and power strike chance are always zero Colleges, libraries, and museums are not counted in total educational buildings Medical clinics are counted as hospitals Health capacity is always zero Number of patients is the same number as the landfill capacity (after a few game days running) Parks and recreation are the same number File attachment: The_CORI_Reports_beta_v02a.dat (old version see below) March 29, 2018 Update: Beta version v02b Fixes and Additions: The alpha versions had a last line for the End Of File and was missing in the beta release. I've added that back in. Added an INI option HideEOF to suppress said additional line if desired Made all possible variables used local to their functions to avoid cluttering the global stack Clears all necessary global variables when finished outputting the report file This also allows tabbing out to change any value in the CoriReport.ini between reports Added a UTILITIES block heading for Power and Water and moved Garbage and Pollution data to it Fixed the rounding of Tax Rates to match Maxis's method Added .0 to the end of integer value tax rates so a 9 will show as 9.0 now File attachment: The_CORI_Reports_beta_v02b.dat (old version see below) March 31, 2018 Update: Beta version v02c Tweaks and Additions: Now also searches in Documents\SimCity 4 for CoriReport.ini Added new INI option: CreateCSV The created .csv works with any NumbersFormat= but will strip out commas File attachment: The_CORI_Reports_beta_v02c.dat (old version see below) April 2, 2018 Update: Beta version v02d Fixes and Additions: Added the city tile size to the CSV file. Small will have the value of 4096 Medium will be 16384 Large is 65536 Added an INI option UniqueFilename to include a filename timestamp preventing reports being overwritten which have the same Sim Date. Fixed four block headings on the text report to be all caps like the others and added two missing new line commands below of them. Hotfix April 2, 2018 (had an else in the wrong place and non-unique City report wasn't running the CSV output) File attachment: The_CORI_Reports_beta_v02d.dat December 25, 2018 Update: Beta version v02e Bug Fix: Fixed a bug where the report would not run if the Sim Year had 4 digits. File attachment: The_CORI_Reports_beta_v02e.dat
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SimCity user agreement allows producers to gather your data?
FeTheC posted a topic in SimCity 4 General Discussion
I'm pretty sure I read that (was it the original SimCity? sc2k? sc3k? or sc4?) at least one of the SimCity games user Agreements basically allowed the Company to gather data on its users Actions on their computer. What'S the deal, I shortly googled and couldn'T come up with anything (but i didn't try very hard) anyone know anything about this? If not ill search again. The reason i remembered this is because i just realized sc4 is running as a Background process even though i closed it. only in Task Manager is it shown and using a fair bit of cpu usage -
data Statistical Proof of the SimCity 3000 Revival
Cyclone Boom posted a topic in Simtropolis Related
By now I'm sure many of you are well aware of our newly-founded SimCity 3000 forum and STEX categories. For those who haven't been keeping up with progress, there's been some really interesting discussions so far. Exploring areas of the game in more detail, including buildings, conversions, map generation, terrain & water, hex editing, custom tree props, and most recently property modding. Thanks everyone for your contributions so far, whether you've made one or multiple posts. And as a result, there's been some interesting trends in forum activity: Past 30 days Past 15 days Past 7 days (All data current as of 9th June 2017, 18:00 EDT) It just shows that with enough surrounding interest, there's still plenty of things to discover in a game released the previous century. OK, one year before the millennium, but still... Want to be notified on new topics and uploads? Follow the Forum Follow the Files- 8 Replies
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