rec.autos.simulators

hi all,

i am sure you are all aware of the setting in the track.ini files that
allows you to position the pit board guy (for lack of a better name)
so that you get your most recent lap time after crossing the start /
finish line.

anyway, i've been looking for a quick and easy editor to set these
values and haven't found one yet.  yesterday i whipped one up in
delphi and i was wondering if maybe i am doing it for nothing.

my question is.  does any of the existing gpl tools do this already.
i haven't found it yet in another program, but maybe i just overlooked
an option in the Replay Analyser or something.

If there is a need for this, i might as well make the program
available to the community.  sort of my thank you to all of you fellow
racing nuts.

Istoff,

I'm not aware of any program to do this, and yes, I think it would be
very useful.

I often advise people, when trying to learn a track, trying
different lines, trying different approaches etc. etc. to alter
the pit board to get immediate feedback as to whether
that approach was faster than the previous.

Thing is you need to change it back for any online racing
as it is confusing in a race situation, often giving misleading
information.

Not sure how your program works but it would be good if
you had the revised location user-configurable, even if
just in an ini file. Some of the alternate locations I've seen
are not what I would personally choose. Also you'd perhaps
need to cater for new tracks seeing as we are getting them
thick & fast at the moment adn this is where altering the
lap display is most useful.

Maxx

hi all,

well.  currently the program needs to to be told where your gpl is
installed.  it then reads the gp.ini and gets a list of the installed
tracks.

it then reads an ini file which contains the default values for the
two parameters and also suggested values.  the suggested values are
currently the same as the default values, but I intend to change them
to the ones on the gplglory site.

finally the currently installed settings from your gpl tracks folder
is imported.  there is a button to auto set each track back to the
default or recommended settings.  you can also just type it in
yourself.

there is an apply button which writes it all back to your gpl tracks
directory.

i've been meaning to put in a backup option just in case of
earthquakes / solar flares / whatever causing the program to corrupt
the track.ini files, but i haven't.

i figure GPL is probably the most backed up thing on my hard disk and
its probably the same for you guys. :)

It seems that you would appreciate having more than one pre-set
pitboard man position (a la ring trainer) so I might build that in as
well.

the program is currently totally configured via the ini file and new
tracks can be added simply by maintaining the .ini file.  I think that
I will release a default ini file and its up to the community to bring
it up to date.  I don't have Noonan's converter and I currently only
have 46 tracks installed, so i would hope that someone else could
produce an up to date ini file.

anybody wanting to try a beta, drop me a line via email using
 istoff at worldonline dot co dot za

i am at work now and will only be able to get a version out tomorrow
at the earliest.

Here's a site with some great info on this subject that you may find
useful.  http://www.***jeans.de/gpl/Pitboard.htm

Are you sure about this?  I thought the server controlled the pitboard.  I seem
to remember run a Nurburgring race, and the pitboard was normal even though I'd
moved it on my system with ringtrainer...

Eldred
--
Dale Earnhardt, Sr. R.I.P. 1951-2001
Homepage - http://www.umich.edu/~epickett
F1 hcp. +16.36...Monster +366.59...

Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
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I think Ringtrainer just moves the offline pit stall position, not the
pitboard. AFAIK the pitboard location is determined locally. The server
determines online pit stall positions and your Ringtrainer pit positions
will be ignored.

The misleading info to which Maxx refers is I believe caused by the guy
behind you not having crossed the start/finish by the time you read the
pitboard (assuming you've moved it to near the beginning of the lap) and so
you end up with "old" data on your board.

I'm using the word "pitboard" to mean the board held by a little man with
your lap times, number of laps to go etc on it (the one you see every lap),
NOT the little tiny black one that marks your pit stall position. Dunno what
the latter is called.

Cheers, if you can understand all that then your brain is probably suffering
as much as mine in this heat :0)

Jim

hi all.

prog is on track for a release tomorrow night.

1) revamped the interface to make it easier to use.
2) support for all tracks in \tracks folder including any 3rd party
ones
3) default ini file with Andreas Frank's setting already inserted
(i can only type in the tracks that I have, so no Dave Noonan
converted tracks, sorry).
4) added the ability to have multiple settings per track so you can
have more than one position for the pit board guy per track

there will just be a single .exe and .ini file.  currently < 500k.
i can put in nice logo's & splash screens or whatever, but it will add
no functionality to the program so why bother?

Eldred, I don't play the game online at all (yet).  I can't test the
effects of these changes on online play.  I don't think it causes any
problems though, but I've been wrong before.

the ini file is quite simple
[kyalami]
Setting1=9.0 3953.4,Original
setting2=6.4 400.0 ,Andreas Frank setting

You can have as many settings as you like, but I can't see the point
of having more than 2 or 3 really.

Regards all,
istoff

Ah...ok.
Nevermind...<G>

Eldred
--
Dale Earnhardt, Sr. R.I.P. 1951-2001
Homepage - http://www.umich.edu/~epickett
F1 hcp. +16.36...Monster +366.59...

Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
Remove SPAM-OFF to reply.

Now, *where* have I heard that before...? :-)

I think that it's cool that people can even WRITE utilities like these.  I
wouldn't have the first idea how...

Eldred
--
Dale Earnhardt, Sr. R.I.P. 1951-2001
Homepage - http://www.umich.edu/~epickett
F1 hcp. +16.36...Monster +366.59...

Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
Remove SPAM-OFF to reply.

hello again,

mmmm.  just to prove my dedication, i just sent the first release off
to a unsuspecting beta tester.  hope he has the time to test / approve
it. so there eldred, its actually done :)

made it even more friendly than b4.  all that's missing is a readme
file.  i am looking for someone to host it as my fortunecities account
is pretty slow.  i will probably put a version on there just to see
how many people actually download it.  good for my ego :)

it's a lot easier than you think :)  without meaning to get all
technical and all, as long as somebody can explain what the settings
in the .ini files mean, its easy to create a frontend for it.

now converting track data from one format to another (eg GPL to N4)
and reverse engineering something like that is another story and *WAY*
beyond me.  now *THAT's* cool. :)

I started this thing just as a way for me to quickly (and safely)
change the pit board position and having looked at the ini file, I see
that there's lots more interesting settings in there.  maybe the
program can be expanded to do some more useful stuff.

damn.  all this because i can't seem to convert from a digital
throttle/brakes (remember my trusty psx joypad) to my MS FF wheel with
analog throttle/brakes, but that's another topic and i'm off to bed.

regards,
istoff
Regards all,
istoff

Writing stuff like this in Delphi is actually quite simple - Delphi's
such a nice environment, far better than ***y Visual Basic <ducks>.
For heaven's sake, even *I've* written a util in Delphi, so it can't be
that hard. Doing it in assembler is another matter.

The real difference between istoff and me is that he actually
*finishes* his programs... <g>

--
David. (GPLRank handicap -6.57; Monsters of GPL +271.79)
The GPL Scrapyard: http://www.racesimcentral.net/
"After all, a mere thousand yards - such a harmless little knoll,
really" - Raymond Mays on Shelsley Walsh.

you'll find that many delphi programmers / hobbyists are actually
ex-VB users.  I find that delphi allows me to do *almost* anything i
want. normally you use a particular tool for a particular task.
delphi allows you to write programs for so many different
environments.

define finish :)  

for me, its finished when i can use it.  i don't mind if it looks
lousy or if the manual is vapourware.  hell, if i wrote it, i should
damn well know where to click!

now all you gpl fans are a tough crowd.  i cringe in anticipation of
the criticism and wish lists.  mmmm.  time to read the bofh manual
again.

tonight i did some programming to clean it all up, spent some time
with my daughters and watched vertical limit on dvd with my wife.
also did a few laps of kyalami to test the proggy.  not bad! :)

its hard balancing real life with learning to drive quickly in gpl.
now i complicate matters by attempting this as well.  

btw, if anybody wants the source code for this thingy, they are
welcome to it.  my email is in the original post of this thread.

for interest sake, its only about 200 lines of code in the program.
it might make interesting reading for guys who don't know how to
program, but wonder what lurks behind the scenes.

regards,
istoff

Regards all,
istoff

But is the *installer* finished already?
Ok, I'll stop... <g>

Eldred
--
Dale Earnhardt, Sr. R.I.P. 1951-2001
Homepage - http://www.umich.edu/~epickett
F1 hcp. +16.36...Monster +366.59...

Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
Remove SPAM-OFF to reply.

  hi there folks...i'd like to introduce myself.  i'm the unsuspecting beta
tester...  as soon as i'm through reading tonight, i'll check out istoff's
little prog.  he is quite good, he made a file swapper for me a while back
that changed all the various nascar heat mods.  I meant to pass it along but
the newest patch kinda takes care of that.  Anyhow..i can vouch for his
programming skills, his stuff worked very well for me...i'll let ya know
soon about this one...btw...whats good for cleaning 'non-working left shift
keys'?
dave henrie

Dave....

Try getting a bottle of "Shiftex"....its the green stuff.....not the blue
stuff.

Tom

...lol......