mcguirel;bt2745 said:
Have to agree with BuilderBob.
+1. Still commentable to start this blog James, at least we content creators hope to get straight "from the horse's mouth" answers to issues either not seen or not found in the DevWiki. I concur with the other comments here re seeing these "tbd" entries or failing for searching there to find what one is really looking for.
Example: I uploaded 4 locomotives yesterday where I received the auto error checking message of each upload:
Image file 'sct_class_art/sct_class_art_icon.tga' is incorrectly used as both a texture.txt source file and a raw image file.
The "raw image" file mentioned is a 32 bit alpha channel art icon TGA (double checked if this is indeed a 1 layer with 1 alpha channel 32 bit uncompressed 128x64 pixels TGA file) for the little locomotive picture above the Driver's picture in Driver. It is referenced as texture.txt in the art icon folder of config.txt:
Primary=sct_class_art_icon.tga
Tile=st
Hint=Dynamic
Alpha=sct_class_art_icon.tga
Yet checking the DevWiki what issues I might have with my configuration of art icons I only get this:
"Thumbnails" container
Any asset may specify a thumbnail or preview image. The exact usage of this image may vary depending on the asset kind and the build of Trainz, but the following usages are historically common:
32x32 - standard icon representation for display in lists.
128x64 - ‘kind traincar’ list icon in Surveyor.
512x512 - ‘kind traincar’ preview image in Surveyor.
240x180 - Download Station thumbnail image - mandatory, and must be in JPEG format.
Note: The Art files directory used in old versions of Trainz should no longer be used- the Thumbnails container replaces and extends this functionality. (I know this now and consequently and hopefully fixed this by having these art icon and preview textures only referenced in the thumbnails container entry in the config.txt)
,
Any number of thumbnail entries may be present, however it is recommended that no more than 3 images are used. The specified width and height must match the actual width and height of the image file in pixels.
Supported image formats include:
32-bit uncompressed targa (.tga) - this supports an alpha channel
24-bit windows bitmap (.bmp)
JPEG (.jpg)
Texture file (.texture.txt) - strongly recommended. (though no example is given of WHERE and HOW EXACTLY this is implemented now).
When displaying an image, the closest-sized image required by the function (in terms of pixel dimensions) will generally be used in Trainz. The container numbers are simply identifiers and have no meaning in themselves.
Yet the ONLY example given was this below example of a single thumbnail entry of an icon file:
thumbnails
{
0
{
width 32
height 32
image "thumbnail-32.texture"
}
}
I know how to address/configure up to 3 different art file textures (each with a prefix from 0-2, the width and height and name also specified in the thumnails container) in the config.txt of said textures BUT does "Average Joe" know this when looking for a clue of how to configure up to 3 different art icon and a preview textures in the DevWiki? Not by what I found above when looking for help to correctly configure such art icons and preview pics in the DevWiki.
To get back to my error message I received, I think I found the problem but I will only know when my (I assume now) correctly made art icon entries are checked again and hopefully get approved.
I used the exactly same art icon configuration of my locomotive creations in the last 12 months for TS12 created ones, you people must have tightened up CORRECT configurations for such art icons now (which is VERY COMMENTABLE, albeit it is a bit late by now and should have been done a long time ago) but what I did, I referenced these art icons twice as
seen here and this was not flagged as an error in the past, except now it is.
What I am actually saying is, it should NOT be left to content creators to UPDATE the DevWiki, it should be done by you people (yes I know, not enough staff/people etc.) as YOU know what works and YOU know how to configure and implement such issues. By not finding the correct, not available or only partially made entries in the DevWiki does not exactly instill confidence in content creators to go about the correct way to produce error free content for Trainz.
Btw, my TS12 CMP never ever gave me any error messages when installing, configuring and exporting as a CDP the above NOW error producing uploads to the DLS, would it not be prudent to ALSO give CMP the same degree of error checking which is now mandatory and rigorously enforced and applied to any uploads to the DLS?
VinnyBarb
