If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

[American_Connections]

I read many threads here about the different requirements between versions. I can understand improvements, but why whould Auran make evey version outdate the standards of evey one before it? Just does not make sense to me!

 

[fran1]

It's called progress, whether it's forwards, sideways or backwords depends on your point of view and how deep your pocket is.

 

[crohakon]

The reality is that they are making improvements and that is exactly WHY we see incompatibility between versions. This has been minor until 2010 when they got really strict with the way things must be done in content creation. The result is that the content for 2010 will be more standardized and of a higher quality thus improving the performance (when in native mode.)

That said, I know I am also guilty of complaining about the incompatibility issue with 2010. The DLS contains a vary small selection of native content for 2010 and most people who download have to spend an equal amount of time fixing assets. In the long term, the changes Auran made that have caused this short term inconvenience will end in better quality.

That also said, I am in no way promising that I will not complain about it in some other thread! :hehe:

 

[aardvark1]

Hi AC...

Please read this post by Windwalkr.....

http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showpost.php?p=557576&postcount=11

Quote:
Originally Posted by motorbreath
The only thing I want to know is if future versions will ever be fully compatible with older content. I spent $20 for a brand new TRS06 a few years ago. Spending $50 for 2010 is no big deal, but the hundreds of dollars I have spent on payware is no good, or faulty unless you use compatibility mode, which is not as good as native mode (so I think). Or if I somehow manually try to fix it all. And my trees would be replaced with Smurf trees.

To a fairly large extent, each version of Trainz is fully compatible with correctly formed older content. There are specific exceptions, and we've made mistakes from time to time, but we've put a lot of effort into this in TS2009 and TS2010 - Compatibility Mode is just one sign of this.

When third-party pay-ware content is faulty, you will need to talk to the creators in question about the possibility of updates. Auran obviously cannot make guarantees about content created by third parties. We do improve our error checking from time to time, and this means that content errors that were less noticeable in the past may be flagged in newer versions of the game. For this reason, we allow Compatibility Mode to load content that is flagged as faulty.

hope this helps clarify the situation,

chris
..........................................................................

AC.... not sure if this answers your concerns.

Regards and have fun,

 

[Great_Lakes]

The reality is that they are making improvements and that is exactly WHY we see incompatibility between versions. This has been minor until 2010 when they got really strict with the way things must be done in content creation. The result is that the content for 2010 will be more standardized and of a higher quality thus improving the performance (when in native mode.)

That said, I know I am also guilty of complaining about the incompatibility issue with 2010. The DLS contains a vary small selection of native content for 2010 and most people who download have to spend an equal amount of time fixing assets. In the long term, the changes Auran made that have caused this short term inconvenience will end in better quality.

That also said, I am in no way promising that I will not complain about it in some other thread! :hehe:

How can they aim for high quality when they don't even practice what they preach? What kind of blatant insult to our intelligence is this? Just a bunch of "give me money" snake oil salesmen gimics if you ask me. As far as change goes; over rated bunch of catch words that are used in political advancement at the cost of logic and business ethics.

 

[American_Connections]

My point exactly

When third-party pay-ware content is faulty....quote]
This is exactly my point! When the assets were made, they were set to the standards that Auran set at the time. Now they want to say they are not to standard! Not good business practice in my opinion. This is why I now have no spirit to create anything new! Why work so hard making things just to have to change them all every year to conform to the "new" standards, that will be out the window by the next version.

 

[johnwhelan]

When third-party pay-ware content is faulty....quote]
This is exactly my point! When the assets were made, they were set to the standards that Auran set at the time. Now they want to say they are not to standard! Not good business practice in my opinion. This is why I now have no spirit to create anything new! Why work so hard making things just to have to change them all every year to conform to the "new" standards, that will be out the window by the next version.

I disagree, many were faulty by the CCG standards of the time but the error checking wasn't that good.

In TRS2004 I spent a lot of time with Trainzobjects going through and correcting basic errors in config.txt files.

Cheerio John

 

[aardvark1]

Johnwhelan....

I did not say that.... you quoting me as saying that.... is incorrect.

You should be quoting AmericanConnections.

Have fun,

 

[sparky15]

Pro-gress: to expand, grow, advance, become better.

So what is the opposite? Con-gress. We all know where that gets you.

I will second second Great Lakes' and A.C's posts. A miss spelled word or "tag organization not allowed" error in a config serves what purpose as far as performance goes? For missing textures errors, I usually just give it one and CMP shuts up. It has zero effect on appearance or performance of what I've done it to.

Other than the hassle I don't see any difference at all. But, that is true of my version, errors or not.

Dave.....

 

[johnwhelan]

Johnwhelan....

I did not say that.... you quoting me as saying that.... is incorrect.

You should be quoting AmericanConnections.

Have fun,

Sorry about that I picked up your name by mistake.

The comment remains.

Thanks John

 

[martinvk]

...

Other than the hassle I don't see any difference at all. But, that is true of my version, errors or not.

Dave.....

Just because you don't see a difference, doesn't mean there is none. If the rendering engine has to work extra hard to compensate for minor errors in faulty assets, that is time that could be better spend doing important things.

 

[pommie]

If everyone had that attitude toward progress we would still be using MSDOS or windows 1.3, how many people are still on W98 because XP would not run a lot of programs ?? I know there are a lot still on XP because Vista/W7 broke a lot of programs.
The payware still runs ok in 06 does it not, and that was the platform it was bought for, either get on to the creators to update it or run 06.

Personally I would like to see a version with NO compatibility mode, and the start of a new DLS to accommodate only content that can go into native mode without errors.

Cheers David

 

[EdrickV]

Pro-gress: to expand, grow, advance, become better.

So what is the opposite? Con-gress. We all know where that gets you.

I will second second Great Lakes' and A.C's posts. A miss spelled word or "tag organization not allowed" error in a config serves what purpose as far as performance goes? For missing textures errors, I usually just give it one and CMP shuts up. It has zero effect on appearance or performance of what I've done it to.

Other than the hassle I don't see any difference at all. But, that is true of my version, errors or not.

Dave.....

Error messages about tags that are not allowed can find actual bugs, not just useless tags. For example:

Error: The Tag 'radius.015' is not permitted within a container of type 'light_switch'.

The above error is present in, I believe, at least a dozen C44 interiors by Gumbytrain and/or Sporbust and apparently was never caught till now. (It's not the only error either.) Granted, it's possible that error didn't affect things very much, but it could well have been something more important that was screwed up. The more error checking that's done by CMP, the less that Trainz needs to do at run time where performance is a bigger deal and the more stable it should be.

Native mode is intended for content designed or adapted for TS2010. Compatibility mode is for everything else. If content authors really want to make the best content they can, then IMHO they ought to at least use TS2010 for error checking since it can catch errors older versions didn't.

 

[Euphod]

Personally I would like to see a version with NO compatibility mode, and the start of a new DLS to accommodate only content that can go into native mode without errors.

Amen. And a separate forum too! The 2010 users have no business having to rub shoulders with the common folk. Those creating content for 2010 shouldn't have to be bothered with questions about whether or not it will work in earlier versions.

All in all, I find the very thought of 2010 boosters having to post on the same forum as the masses disgusting. I wish Auran would do something about this!

 

[pommie]

Ed, many a true word spoken in jest :hehe:

Cheers David

 

[Euphod]

Ed, many a true word spoken in jest

Jest? You think I am jesting? I assure you that I am quite serious.

Imagine the gall, the unmitigated affrontery foisted upon the best and brightest of the Trainz community and tell me SIR, that it doesn't have to end! Those masters of the game that have risen so far as to reach the very hem of the developers themselves, and they are forced to wallow in the excrement that everyone else does! The "lesser" versions, as they have come to be known and their adherants to the arcane ways, why...they have no place co-mingling with the elite! Even I, as one of the pre-2010 users can clearly see and admit that! No, we who labor under the weight of the lesser versions are just not fit, not worthy to bask in the light of the great ones.

Besides, I grow weary of the constant admonitions to purchase the Holy 2010. "I need a new monitor for my PC, can anyone tell me what a good brand is?"

"Why; just buy 2010, my friend! It will transform your old monitor into a visual stew of Trainz goodness!"

Yeah, I really do wish you guys had your own forums, can't you move back to Trainz Dev, they don't appear to be using it for anything else?

 

[pommie]

I can't even be bothered running 09, let alone buying 10, 06 gives me all I want without putting up with all the errors.
When they (Auran) decide to get behind the creators and give them a hand to create error free content for all versions, AND make sure it is when uploaded, then I just might return to having fun with trainz, after eight years of fixing errors that have been fixed by thousands of others but not on the dls I have had enough, the only reason I have Winblows is trainz, next major upgrade of Linux and I think Windoze will go unless I can get error free content, over to you Auran, you want my custom, clean up the dls

Cheers David

 

[Vern]

I love TS2010 and currently having great fun doing a railtour on the ECML, just sit back and let the AI drive. However...

...so far as route building goes, looks like I need to downgrade back to TRS2006. As soon as I start adding in terrain textures (other than the Transdem textures) and a couple of Speedtrees, Surveyor becomes a slideshow pretty much unuseable. When this happened the first time I thought it was down to using 5m grid, however this time round the route was created using the standard 10m system. The route is quite big (45 miles) and needs some surplus boards trimming, but nothing TRS2006 couldn't take in its stride. At the moment the finger of suspicion is pointing at the couple of Speedtrees I've planted on the solitary 1km strip I've worked on so far.

It does kind of defeat the object of the new version, if it has become such a performance hog that it is unuseable for one of the essential functions of a sandbox sim - the creation of new routes - on other than top end hardware.

 

[AJ_Fox]

Has anyone considered taking up golf? At least there you can blame the course or the club.

Cheers

AJ

 

[crohakon]

Personally I would like to see a version with NO compatibility mode, and the start of a new DLS to accommodate only content that can go into native mode without errors.

Cheers David

While Mr. E may disagree, I my friend do not. But the reality is that Auran will not make a separate DLS nor will they work to strengthen the error checking of content on the DLS. They can barely answer helpdesk tickets at the moment.

You can however narrow your search to minimum build version 2.9 and that will allow only 2009 and 2010 assets to be shown. But I warn you, not much exists. All of the really good content (or at least most) is still being created in 2006 and 2004 where the error checking is not so good. I am currently learning (thanks to a really great guy south of Michigan) to create content in gmax. Currently I am creating it for 2009 but once I get it down I will focus on building for 2010. I can't promise I will create anything of value though. I just hope some of the old builders who are well skilled at least follow 2010 building standards. As far as I know the content following these standards should work with, as Mr E. labeled them (hehe), lesser versions.

By the way, Mr .E, I enjoyed your post. It made me laugh.