Still Seeking a Solution for Hidden Layers Issue

[cfl1604]

Well, I don't think that it's a JR only issue...I even don't own (beside of some built-in items) any JR products.

I once built a locomotive (not exactly, but it should have act like one) myself and it has gone into that hidden nirvana too.
Together with the entire consist where it got coupled to. In TS 10 & 12!
It wasn't yellow and didn't have a script.

So, what have may be the cause? I have no clue at all.
I "recycled" the item because I didn't need it that bad, but I agree...that's not a solution at all.

I know, it doesn't help either KingConrail76 ornorfolksouthern37, but there are surely other people out there who are dealing with this phenomenon...

 

[shaneturner12]

If it's also involving disappearing tracks, then yes I'm well aware of the phenomenon in my TS12 SP1 version, although it's probably a different issue to pre-SP1 and TS2010.

I'm surprised that merging the layers does not fix it though.

Shane

 

[KingConrail76]

all textures with a .texture.txt configuration file are DXT compressed into .texture files when an asset is committed. if your hardware (GPU) drivers are having an issue compressing the files i can certainly see where the texture color could make a difference. if you would like more information on how DXT works you can look for it, but i doubt it would be helpful for you here. try what i suggested above by toggling the setting and see if there are any differences.

Ok, That makes sense, and perhaps I still have blinders on, because of previous experimentation, and the common factor at that time being JR Scripts (from TS2010 thread).
I was not aware of how Trainz handles TGA's, converting them in-use to DXT compressed...this would explain why changing the TGA's of some cars has made improvements, and in others not...it isn't exactly the TGA file itself, but how Trainz is processing it.
-I will change my hardware accelaration setting to see if it makes a difference.

I do apologize if you took my comment as "demanding" you fix my problem. My initial post was ment to reference what I mistakenly perceived to be a "dismissive" attitude, that I sensed from your reply to the OPs post.

Most recent error messege when attempting to move an invisible car:
"-Runtime Error!

Program: C:\Auran\TS2010\bin\Trainz.exe

R6025
-pure function call"

Edit:
-Changed "use hardware TL", game locked up - reverted to "unchecked" state.
-Changed "texture detail"; no change
-changed "use compatability mode"; no change

I'll do some research on hardware acceleration-trainz-radeon-etc, a little later...time to go see real trains in Perryville, MD...NS Port Road/NEC Junction

 

[norfolksouthern37]

did you try to toggle the hardware texture compression setting in cmp?

it appears you do not know what setting i am referring to, so ill give you a little guidance.

1. go to cmp settings and tick or untick the 'use hardware compression' option

2. open any of the 'trouble' assets for edit in cmp.

3. commit the assets again.

 

[KingConrail76]

did you try to toggle the hardware texture compression setting in cmp?

it appears you do not know what setting i am referring to, so ill give you a little guidance.

1. go to cmp settings and tick or untick the 'use hardware compression' option

2. open any of the 'trouble' assets for edit in cmp.

3. commit the assets again.

Yes, at first I did misunderstand, but doing a google search turned up Shane's mini tutorial on You Tube. Doing as you state above seems to have actually solved the issue as far as placing in surveyor, save-close-reopen in either surveyor or driver and they are still there where I put them.

I have not tried them in a session yet, but I suspect the process has been successful.

I'd like to again apologise for misunderstanding you to begin with, and thank both you, and Shane, for your assistance.

 

[mtldrm38]

I recall when first in 2010 trains dissapearing invisible signal s etc especially with routes originally created in 2006 and lower....
I found basically overhauling the routes completely... first thing was clicking the DELTE MISSING ASSETS in in layers and basic map then going into map view find the train and invisible signals and delete those sections of track...
also found a lot of older box trees etc converted into speed trees even group trees where speed trees and although you see em they didnt exist so deleting and replacing those objects helped alot then it was searching around the route for splines that hit high numbers and finally textures in which a lot of the older ones updated are 3d type and heavy conflicts with frame rates occured....
afterwards I clicked on the route in cmp to view all the dependancies and checked for any flags and updates theyre....
May also note a lot of older bridges and road splines where heavy hitters with dissapearing bords and lags.........
working also in native mode while doin this eventually gets you back on the right track......

 

[KingConrail76]

I recall when first in 2010 trains dissapearing invisible signal s etc especially with routes originally created in 2006 and lower....
I found basically overhauling the routes completely... first thing was clicking the DELTE MISSING ASSETS in in layers and basic map then going into map view find the train and invisible signals and delete those sections of track...
also found a lot of older box trees etc converted into speed trees even group trees where speed trees and although you see em they didnt exist so deleting and replacing those objects helped alot then it was searching around the route for splines that hit high numbers and finally textures in which a lot of the older ones updated are 3d type and heavy conflicts with frame rates occured....
afterwards I clicked on the route in cmp to view all the dependancies and checked for any flags and updates theyre....
May also note a lot of older bridges and road splines where heavy hitters with dissapearing bords and lags.........
working also in native mode while doin this eventually gets you back on the right track......

I think you are misunderstanding the term "invisible" in this case.
-Unlike "missing assets" which usually show some sort of marker of where they should be, in this case, the rolling stock is actually placed on an "invisible layer". This "invisible layer" is inaccessable, as it does not show as an actual layer in the layers tool box, and it is impossible to remove or replace any asset that is on that layer. The only positive fix is to delete the route completely, and reinstall, or remake, in the case of a route-in-progress.
--Some people have had luck merging the "session" layer into the "Route" layer, but I personally never found that to work for this particular issue.

 

[illinoiscentral]

I can't say for certain what it is, but I can say for certain the only factors I have discovered so far have been JR rolling stock. Its certain pieces. Have not had a single problem with DLS or RR Mods cars, but some JR cars trip the trains up. Whether it be disappear, or unable to load. I know this, because I have experimented with the trains and various rolling stock. Why it is, I have no idea.

Corrupt copy of Trainz...a N3V product?! NEVER! Right...that's laughable.

I'm not trying to say JR has crappy stuff at all, I'm just simply trying to help problem solve not only for myself, but anyone else who runs into this problem (which have been many, I know people who are not active forum members who struggle with this as well).

Basically, I have experimented and am able to run trains again, I just have to check each piece of JR stock to make sure it loads...if it doesn't, then I know that piece will hide the train in driver. So far I have found a CRDX hopper, all 89ft autoracks and the TTX flatcar to be raising this issue. Its sketchy...don't understand it at all. lol

Cheers,
Woody

 

[stagecoach]

Has anyone looked at the build number for these assets or any of their dependencies? It might be that the asset has a higher build number on one of them and this would make the item fail when loaded. It wont show any errors as the item may be installed but not able to work.

 

[JCitron]

I've been following this thread on the sidelines and thinking about it. Mr. Stagecoach has hit on exactly what I was thinking.

When your trains disappear, do you still see the green and red arrows? I have seen this happen with older content which failed to load in properly into Trainz. There are no errors indicated in Content Manager, but the content will not load properly. Instead of seeing a train car or loco all that is visible are the two arrows. You can't click on them and they act as though they are on a new layer. This may also be the case with newer content, although I no longer run into that issue because I have the latest and everything is now below me version-wise.

A good test for this is to connect a known working train, to the consist. You can then delete the consist and this will delete the faulty train car as well.

Regards,

John

 

[KingConrail76]

I've been following this thread on the sidelines and thinking about it. Mr. Stagecoach has hit on exactly what I was thinking.

When your trains disappear, do you still see the green and red arrows? I have seen this happen with older content which failed to load in properly into Trainz. There are no errors indicated in Content Manager, but the content will not load properly. Instead of seeing a train car or loco all that is visible are the two arrows. You can't click on them and they act as though they are on a new layer. This may also be the case with newer content, although I no longer run into that issue because I have the latest and everything is now below me version-wise.

A good test for this is to connect a known working train, to the consist. You can then delete the consist and this will delete the faulty train car as well.

Regards,

John

Sadly, this is not the case. In my case, all assets and dependencies are build 2.9 or lower. Using Justin and Shane's advice, and turning off "hardware acceleration", then "open for edit" the affected rolling stock, and then re-commit has solved the problem that I was having with JR Stock. No dependencies missing, no faulty items, no broken items.

I'm sure it is hard to understand if you have never had the problem, but (prior to being fixed), if you would place an affected item on the track in Surveyor, be it alone or in a consist, everything was fine. Car and Consist both visible and editable(moveable/deleteable). But then AFTER you SAVE the Route/Session, Trainz for some un-known reason creates a new layer that is "invisible". The layer does not show in the Tool Box for either Routes, or Sessions when open in surveyor, so NOTHING on the layer is visible, and nothing on the layer is editable/moveable in Surveyor. The layer exists in both surveyor AND driver, in fact, you can drive the affected train in driver, and even see the "effects" of exhaust smoke, but the train itself is invisible, and can not interact with anything on any other layer, for example coupling to a "visible" train/consist/engine. Because the new layer is not visible in the Tool Box, it CANNOT be selected, and therefore it CANNOT be merged into the main Route Layer, as has been the fix for some other similar issues.

Here is a link to the other thread in the TS2010 section: some very good info in there; http://forums.auran.com/trainz/show...ellcars-disappear-after-placement-in-surveyor

 

[JCitron]

Sadly, this is not the case. In my case, all assets and dependencies are build 2.9 or lower. Using Justin and Shane's advice, and turning off "hardware acceleration", then "open for edit" the affected rolling stock, and then re-commit has solved the problem that I was having with JR Stock. No dependencies missing, no faulty items, no broken items.

I'm sure it is hard to understand if you have never had the problem, but (prior to being fixed), if you would place an affected item on the track in Surveyor, be it alone or in a consist, everything was fine. Car and Consist both visible and editable(moveable/deleteable). But then AFTER you SAVE the Route/Session, Trainz for some un-known reason creates a new layer that is "invisible". The layer does not show in the Tool Box for either Routes, or Sessions when open in surveyor, so NOTHING on the layer is visible, and nothing on the layer is editable/moveable in Surveyor. The layer exists in both surveyor AND driver, in fact, you can drive the affected train in driver, and even see the "effects" of exhaust smoke, but the train itself is invisible, and can not interact with anything on any other layer, for example coupling to a "visible" train/consist/engine. Because the new layer is not visible in the Tool Box, it CANNOT be selected, and therefore it CANNOT be merged into the main Route Layer, as has been the fix for some other similar issues.

Here is a link to the other thread in the TS2010 section: some very good info in there; http://forums.auran.com/trainz/show...ellcars-disappear-after-placement-in-surveyor

This isn't really a layer, but exactly what I've described. The only difference was I was able to grab the assets by coupling another consist to it. Perhaps I was a lucky soul when it came to this. I don't have much luck and when things go my way, I have a party!

For the assets that failed on me, they had similar problems to yours. One had a faulty shadow. It was there, but it was bad for some reason. When I converted the model to im from pm using PEV's PM2IM and added the mesh-table and all the stuff that goes with it, the asset was repaired. Another one had a bad texture like yours. A run through Images2TGA fixed that one. It was a fluke, but it worked. I did it on a hunch.

John

 

[illinoiscentral]

I've been following this thread on the sidelines and thinking about it. Mr. Stagecoach has hit on exactly what I was thinking.

When your trains disappear, do you still see the green and red arrows? I have seen this happen with older content which failed to load in properly into Trainz. There are no errors indicated in Content Manager, but the content will not load properly. Instead of seeing a train car or loco all that is visible are the two arrows. You can't click on them and they act as though they are on a new layer. This may also be the case with newer content, although I no longer run into that issue because I have the latest and everything is now below me version-wise.

A good test for this is to connect a known working train, to the consist. You can then delete the consist and this will delete the faulty train car as well.

Regards,

John

Hey John,
I have had this problem with Auran-made ALCo FA1 units before. However, this issue basically somewhat hides the train entirely. However, in driver, you can still drive it...as an invisible train.

Cheers,
Woody

 

[KingConrail76]

This isn't really a layer, but exactly what I've described. The only difference was I was able to grab the assets by coupling another consist to it. Perhaps I was a lucky soul when it came to this. I don't have much luck and when things go my way, I have a party!

..snip..
John

I'm sorry to have to argue with you John, but "Trainz" itself is calling it a hidden layer, with this error messege you get when trying to place an asset on the seemingly empty track: "There is already an asset in that location on a hidden layer".

Like I said, if you never had the problem IllinoisCentral (Woody) and I are talking about, it is hard to accept and understand.

Woody, have you tried turning off Hardware Acceleration, as Justin explained to me earlier in the thread? I did work for me with the JR/SoCal WellCars.

 

[JCitron]

Okay guys, I admit defeat on this one!

I've been using the program going on 10 years now and I've never seen anything like this before.

This only happens in TS2010, correct? If so it's a bug with that version that was never resolved, probably and unfortunately being an older version there will probably be no fixes. I say this as an IT person that has seen how companies work. It could also be a corrupted texture. Have you tried creating a new yellow texture and replacing the old one? I mean making one in PSP, Gimp, or some other paint program.

John

 

[KingConrail76]

Apologies John, I seem to have never answered one of your questions from above, about red/green arrows on placed consists. No, there are no red/green arrows where the "invisible" trains are located.

As for being an "un fixed bug", maybe so, but I think we're finding "work-arounds", or atleast in my case, I was able to get the JR Wellcars to work properly from that point forward. I do not know if I could have recovered any of the past attempts, because I deleted all of them and started over from scratch each time. I do not think it is limited to TS2010 either, though those with TS12 reporting very similar issues seem to be just slightly different enough to make me wonder.

 

[norfolksouthern37]

the texture itself isnt corrupt, it is the way the hardware driver is compressing it. this would happen if he made a new yellow texture too. my explanation as to why it might happen on JR stuff and not others is that I use a particular type of setup for materials, stuff like normal-spec maps. a lot of content creators still dont make use of those features, and most of the time where they do it is improperly applied or set up.

as far as it being called a hidden layer, i would have to agree that it isnt truly a hidden layer, but the result the code returns says it is a hidden layer. there are no other layers actually being constructed and hidden, just that the particular code that determines where the asset is probably by default falls through to 'it is on a hidden or locked layer' because under normal operation it should not be possible to do otherwise. just a misnomer.