Different authors, same asset?

[stationmistress]

I am making a route for 2009/10 users copying a route in TS12 61388 build 3.7. I have now discovered that author 9999 is Hottrainz and as such unavailable on the DLS. Using the title FMA I found the exact same asset by vendel, 149987. Vendel's asset is 37870 whilst the built-in Hottrainz version is 937870. The original was uploaded in 2007.

The question is, what was wrong with the original that another author produced the same asset/s built-in in a later version of Trainz?

According to another post, both vendel and hottrainz belong to the painted grace workgroup.

Checking the config, the author is vendel but is not vendel's kuid.

Any answers anyone?

 

[JCitron]

This sounds fishy, and perhaps a bit of paranoia sets in when we see this due to some past experience... However, the 9999 Kuid may very well be the group user id for the Painted Grace group so your best bet would be to contact Vendel via a PM and see what he has to say. If there's anything fishy, it will be up to him to report this to the Helpdesk and have the assets pulled from the DLS.

John

 

[stationmistress]

Sorry, but you read it wrong. 9999:xxxx is built-in to TS12. 149987:xxxx has been available on the DLS for years. I'll try a PM.

 

[JCitron]

Sorry, but you read it wrong. 9999:xxxx is built-in to TS12. 149987:xxxx has been available on the DLS for years. I'll try a PM.

Sorry for misreading... I got a phone call in the middle of the post and tried to continue typing while talk... I suppose it's like driving and mobile phone use at the same time. Then again, I've been throwing silverware away and putting peanut butter in the refrigerator so anything could be happening here.

I suppose the outcome is still the same, but I think the assets are fine; it's best to check.

John

 

[Falcus]

Trainz Built-in assets are assets that were either hand made by Auran/N3V, or assets from other creator's that have been.... Appropriated? By N3V. Generally with the author's permission, from the DLS and released through them for general use. Most assets that undergo this are given a new KUID, hence creating a duplicate asset.

I do not know the Full Story between HOTTRAINZ and FMA. They are both however Eastern European Content Creation Groups and both at different times have had their own websites. I do recall reading at one point (In some very broken/poorly translated English) that one of the sites was dieing and made mention of the other site (I think the FMA Site went down and is now hosted on HOTTRAINZ? Something like that). So I'm fairly certain they have at some time at least collaborated on that level.

As to why that specific asset was used the way it was, I do not know the full story, or even enough to hazard a guess beyond the very general information I posted above.

Good Luck,
Falcus

 

[wva-usa]

Trainz Built-in assets are assets that were either hand made by Auran/N3V, or assets from other creator's that have been.... Appropriated? By N3V. Generally with the author's permission, from the DLS and released through them for general use. Most assets that undergo this are given a new KUID, hence creating a duplicate asset. ...

Personally, I really wish N3V would always give them a new KUID when they "appropriate" an asset. N3V used one of my engine sound files on one of their payware locomotives leaving it with the KUID number I gave it. So now the sound file I created shows up as a built-in, and if I try to update it by creating incremented version of the asset I get an error message saying "Error: Not authorised to commit changes to asset <kuid>"

It's a really weird feeling to realize you've been (forever) locked out of updating/changing one of your own creations by DRM.

 

[mikeaust]

I got round that problem for assets on my own machine. I made a copy of the asset and placed it on the desktop.
Made the changes and updated the version number and imported it back into trains.
This would not work for uploading though unfortunately.
Cheers,
Mike

 

[S301]

Personally, I really wish N3V would always give them a new KUID when they "appropriate" an asset. N3V used one of my engine sound files on one of their payware locomotives leaving it with the KUID number I gave it. So now the sound file I created shows up as a built-in, and if I try to update it by creating incremented version of the asset I get an error message saying "Error: Not authorised to commit changes to asset <kuid>"

It's a really weird feeling to realize you've been (forever) locked out of updating/changing one of your own creations by DRM.

If you increment the revision number (e.g. kuid2:12345:9876:1 becomes kuid2:12345:9876:2 ) this should not be an issue. However, you'll need to create the new revision from either a local copy, or the DLS copy, of the asset and not the asset that is 'built-in'/included in the DLC pack. I've had to update a few assets from my own DLC packs, and this hasn't caused any issues (also shown by the fact that some users 'replace' the hornsound on the Berkshires by creating a new revision of the asset).

The main thing is that you cannot open for edit, or commit, items in DLC packs in TS12. There have been improvements to this system in T:ANE as well (which may improve handling of freeware content in DLC packs ).

As a note, we do not change the kuid number for built-in/'DLC' assets from 3rd part creator these days (back in TRS2004, and earlier, we did but that was dropped in TRS2006). In this case, it appears that another creator or a group has used the asset under a different UserID/kuid; as to their reason for this, only they could say (my question would be, are the two assets 100% identical?).

Regards
Zec

 

[stationmistress]

As a note, we do not change the kuid number for built-in/'DLC' assets from 3rd part creator these days (back in TRS2004, and earlier, we did but that was dropped in TRS2006). In this case, it appears that another creator or a group has used the asset under a different UserID/kuid; as to their reason for this, only they could say (my question would be, are the two assets 100% identical?).

Regards
Zec

In a word, Yes. To expand, apart from some extra usernames for different countries, to all intents and purposes the configs are virtually indentical.
N.B. This is only an example. There well be more of the same genre that I haven't bothered to look for.