iPortals and CMTM

I will need a crash course in CMTM since I have not implemented it yet. I can see scheduled trains since my route is PRR set in the 1950's but I am flexible.

May I suggest you read the first post in this thread. The important thing to keep in mind is that interactive industries are not required. In fact, I never use them. In CMTM, all it takes is a track mark to define the location of an industry. If you want to read more, the manual can be found here CMTMSystem4 User's Manual

David
 
Yes, I've pledged to kickstarter :). I hadn't realized that it is prototypical for so much "randomness". I guess it makes sense though. Bob will order what he needs from Jimmy and Judy. But he isn't a rail transporter. The rail company handles the actual transport and its up to them to set the most profitable schedule. We (operators of a certain route area) handle what is sent to us. CMTM sets the schedule. Dap, do you think its possible though to be able to imagine a scenario where we can request freight and offer freight to a centralized clearing house? It may be too complicated, nor worth the effort if the upcoming version will have it built in. but it would be nice! You had asked in an earlier post about sending trainz through the portal. When I send a train to a friend he gets everything I send, BUT if I send a payware train and he doesn't own it he doesn't get it. From what I've been able to test out, his system will receive a file with the KUIDs of the train and its contents. If his system doesn't have those contents, they wont come in. What I ended up doing when I used it was to push a consist into decoupling before it was too late. On the other end he'd get the consist with a message to retrieve it. That make sense?
 
That is true you have to have all the equipment previously installed or the train will reverse direction or not even appear at the receiving iPortal. It does not matter if it is pay ware or not.

Dap, I have the manual, just need to read it again (and again), also all my industries produce or consume commodities. I like the train dynamics of a loaded verses empty car. I have CMTM portals, and now putting track marks at all industries.
 
Yes, I've pledged to kickstarter :). I hadn't realized that it is prototypical for so much "randomness". I guess it makes sense though. Bob will order what he needs from Jimmy and Judy. But he isn't a rail transporter. The rail company handles the actual transport and its up to them to set the most profitable schedule. We (operators of a certain route area) handle what is sent to us. CMTM sets the schedule. Dap, do you think its possible though to be able to imagine a scenario where we can request freight and offer freight to a centralized clearing house? It may be too complicated, nor worth the effort if the upcoming version will have it built in. but it would be nice! You had asked in an earlier post about sending trainz through the portal. When I send a train to a friend he gets everything I send, BUT if I send a payware train and he doesn't own it he doesn't get it. From what I've been able to test out, his system will receive a file with the KUIDs of the train and its contents. If his system doesn't have those contents, they wont come in. What I ended up doing when I used it was to push a consist into decoupling before it was too late. On the other end he'd get the consist with a message to retrieve it. That make sense?

I'm pleased you see the wisdom of simulating the common carrier and not the purveyor of commodities. The railroad takes orders from the shipper. If Jimmy and Judy can only partially fill the orders from Bob, the railroad can only deliver what it picks up from Jimmy & Judy. If you have your CMTM set up properly, your inbound traffic needs will probably be met. Especially if you let me know via PM or email if you need any special cars. You can also have your own CMTM Portal with trains at the ready if no one responds to your request. With QuickPortalManager, you have trains staged but not scheduled. At any time you can schedule the arrival of any of these trains. And using an appropriate train name, you can make sure that only the records for that train get used, and those records will not get used by any other train.

My CMTM Portals support accepting and emitting a string of cars without a locomotive. It works great for an interchange with another railroad, the portal track being the interchange track. And when cars arrive this way, a message is sent to the message board. Makes lot of sense to me.

So, are we ready to give this thing a try?

David
 
. . . I like the train dynamics of a loaded verses empty car. . . .

CMTM does load the cars when they should be loaded. It definately changes the train dynamics. There is even a load at random option. If you list a car as loaded, but definte the commodity with an "x", CMTM will select a load queue at random and then select one of the products for that queue at random, and load the car with that product when it is emitted from the portal. Makes for some interesting trains.

Being a prototype operations guy, I'm wondering how others design and run their routes. Do you expect only cars for your industries or do you also handle through freight. Cars that are bound for industries beyond your route? I've built routes several ways. My Long Island Western is an industrial switching rairoad that interfaces only with one other railroad and has no through freight to handle. My CC&LE mainly services its industries, but interchanges at three different points with other railroads. My very first CMTM route was the Huron Central which serviced industries on a single track main and a branch line as well as routing through freight from each of three portals.

David
 
My present iPortal route is about 60 miles long and is in the shape of a +. I have east, west, north and south portals. All my main line is double tracked and set to 75mph for priority 1 traffic. In the center is my major yard including an operating hump, engine servicing (steam only) roundhouse, car repair etc... I am set up for through traffic and actually like having it. I also like passenger traffic be it accommodation, limited or commuter. I have accommodation traffic which stops at ever station along the way.

I have several other routes in process but no where near usable, one of them is about 400+ miles long and I am not sure if the game engine will handle it. Another one is the Pennsylvania Middle division from Harrisburg to Altoona probably more manageable that the 400 mile one.
I had a narrow gauge one but it went south :( and I did not start over.

As for car loading I am picky, I want the commodity loaded that is needed by me of someone else, nothing random. I have seen the load at random, I would like the same thing but a load with commodity of my choosing.
 
. . . As for car loading I am picky, I want the commodity loaded that is needed by me of someone else, nothing random. I have seen the load at random, I would like the same thing but a load with commodity of my choosing.

That is one thing that CMTM does well. You can load the exact commodity you want into most any car. The car does not need to be enabled to accommodate that commodity. If done properly any boxcar can be loaded with any commodity that would be appropriate for a boxcar, any hopper with any commodity appropriate for a hopper, etc.

How many industries do you have on your route?

I have just installed an iPortal on a test route. I named it "Portal CMTMiTest1". If someone would send me a train, I can give it a test. I have all of majekear's freight cars installed on my computer. And a hodge podge of locomotives. Plese keep the train to under 25 cars. It is a small test route, not big enough to handle a 100 car train.

David
 
I have just installed an iPortal on a test route. I named it "Portal CMTMiTest1". If someone would send me a train, I can give it a test. I have all of majekear's freight cars installed on my computer. And a hodge podge of locomotives. Plese keep the train to under 25 cars. It is a small test route, not big enough to handle a 100 car train.

Sorry Dap I was not available yesterday, I have most of the PRR stuff installed and also I added you to my iChat buddy list, add me and if you see me msg me.
 
OK Dave, I sent you a train and a string to your iPortal from Cattaraugus. Everything is made up from CCLE so you should have it all on your system. The first one is 21 cars (with loco) and the second is 10 loaded hoppers (no loco). You should be able to return stuff to "Portal CMTM-Test DS".
 
When I have my test route open and have done the ctrl - right click on the portal, I now have a little window that is open. There is a green rectangle that says online followed by a circle with a red X in the circle. How does this worl?
 
I believe the red X is if you dont have the iProtal set to check for trains. That is some that that needs to be set in surveyor.

ip1_zps7c49042d.jpg


I made this little image of how the portal should be set up in surveyor.

Yellow = The name of it on line, this can be any thing but it must be the same name that you tell people to send trains to. In this case, you could send a train to my user name and tell your portal to send it to JTest.

Red = The user you want to send the train to.

Orange = The portal on the users route you want to send a train to. In theory, if left blank, the train will pop out at any iPortal on the user's route. This allows a route to have multiple iPortals. But this is untested. (So DS could send a train to my north Portal, and Dap could send one to my south portal.)

Green = This is how often the iPortal looks online to see if there is a train waiting to be produced. This is also how often it will automatically produce a train if there is one or more waiting to enter the route.
 
And in game I made this:

ip2_zpsd3d42ca4.jpg


Black = If there is a train waiting to enter your route, this will be highlighted. Clicking this will crate the train then, and skip the timer if you have one set up.

Red = This indicates that your iPortal is able to connect to the internet and is able to send and receive trains.

Green = This indicates the "Check for trains" mode. A clock means it is on a timer, while a clock with a red X in it indicates that no timer has been set for the "Check for trains" mode, and you will have to click on "Create Train" if/when it is highlighted.

Orange = At any time any of the settings, with the exception of "Check for trains" mode and "Drive after exit" mode can be changed. Clicking "Apply" will apply these settings.
 
You will want the "Route Selector Rule" on the DLS which puts a small box in the upper left corner and you can display iPortals, Hump yard, ePortals from anywhere on your route you then don't have to ctrl-right-click on the asset. I generally don't have my iPortal checking for trains but use the message window as it notifies you of a train arriving at an iPortal and with the above rule I can "create train" from anywhere.
 
I renamed my portal. Seems the name was too long to type into the name field. New name is PortaliCMTM.

David
 
I'll be looking for it. What is your portal name? I'll send you a train in return.
 
The only problem I see with using CMTMS4 an iPortals is how do I route a car from Player A to Player C via Player B?

Lets assume for this example that my route runs from Detroit MI to Toledo OH. And that Dap's runs from Toledo OH to Lima OH. And then Ken's route runs from Lima OH to Dayton OH. (This could be done...) On my route I have a factory that needs box cars of auto parts. Ken has the factory that will load auto parts. And Dap has a factory that loads general goods into box cars. Now I have a record that send an empty box car from an ECS track to Dayton OH. So to route this car prototypicaly, I would need to send it on a train to Dap to then get forwarded on to Ken. And here's where I think we might have a problem. As the train from me to Ken reaches Dap, his CMTMS4 would see a box car, and assign its own record to it. Meaning my box car might never make it to Ken.

Now Dap could have a record that say's box cars from PortalTOJib go to Dayton OH. But then what happens if I try to send a box car to Dap for an industry he has?

Sure more work around to this problem exist. Such as making sure we are all on the same day of the week. And having records assigned to days of the week for specific trains. So on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays I would send trains with cars for Dayton OH to Dap so he can move them on to Ken. Then on Tuesdays and Thursdays I send trains to Dap for Dap. (Actually, with CMTMS4 this would work as far as I can tell.)

But this is why I was suggesting a centralized system. Some thing that would assign the same records to the same car at each stop. My evil idea or dream idea is to get a bunch of people together, and simulate a much, MUCH, larger railroad system that what can be rendered on a single route. In theory, build a network of players working together on a scale much lager then that of the largest MP route(s).

As for your e-mail Dap, I did get it. Ill work on a few test records tomorrow. Maybe afew of us could get together and work out a few more details on TeamSpeak or in Trainz chat some time.
 
Chat or TS sounds good I should be around this evening. Interesting problem Jib, not sure what could be done about it. Dap we cross
posted but I was thinking the same thing, if Jib wants autopart I would send him "my" loaded cars. I just am not familiar enough with CMTM to know what is needed for routing. In my case I want coal and iron by the train load for my Steal mill, the reefer traffic I would take as pass through to NYC/Philadelphia/Baltimore. Oh and I counted my industries and I am 43+ not all active though and can be changed if needed. We can do a spread sheet for commodities like we had and possibly for equipment so we know what we need to install.
 
Last edited:
Why would you send an empty car from Detroit to Dayton. In reality, the local agent in Dayton would grab the nearest empty and have it sent to the factory, where it would be loaded and sent to Detroit. Detroit will not know what car to expect until it arrives.

Let's look at this on a macro level. Consider each independent route to be a division of a larger railroad. A division services only those industries that is in its division boundaries. It does not care about other specific industries located on other divisions nor does it want to know about them. Its primary concern is to move the freight from its point of entry into the division to its point of destination. And a majority of those points of destination is to another division. (In CMTM this is called thru traffic. It does not get delivered to a customer within the division.)

Most of a divisions traffic will be thru traffic. With this managed properly, there will be a sufficient flow of traffic to adjoining divisions to meet their local and thru traffic needs. As division B, you don't care that a car bound for division A goes to factory X, Y or Z. You primary concern is to get it to division A. And division A doesn't care what the car looks like, as long as it has the right products and is destined to the proper location. Does it really matter that one of the cars you sent north loaded with widgets was is a C&NW car and when division A gets a car with widgets it is a SOO car? Division B is happy because they got the widgets sent on their way to division A. Division A is happy because they have a car load of widgets to deliver to they customer. Division A has no idea what the car looked like that you sent to them, nor should they care. Their primary concern it to get the widgets delivered.

So, an iPortal CMTM system does not have to be a centralized system. It can easily be distributed processing on a route by route basis. Each route applies movement records that will meet the needs of its industries. Other routes don't really need to know what they are. Route A just sends you an occasional or regularly scheduled train that has a variety of train cars and most likely you will get what you need. And the cars you don't need get sent on to another route where they will go through the same process. This way it takes little or no coordination between routes and it can be implemented immediately (assuming my latest bit of code writing is without error).

I know there is no direct correlation between what I ship and what you get, but if we just suspend our disbelief and let what happens, happen, it will seem as though we each have a part of a large interconnected railroad system.

So, how do we handle that route that uses specialized cars such as autoracks. Those in the group publish a wish list of cars they expect to see coming from each adjoining route. It is then up to those adjoining routes to make sure they send an appropriate number of those cars as requested. The sender does not need to know their final destination, or what specific product they need to be hauling. And if your route is between the sender and the receiver, you make sure you have movement records that send those special cars on to the next route.

If the group wants to make sure specific cars are routed from point A to point B, it can easily be arranged. CMTM's most restrictive assignment of movement records is for cars with a specific reporting mark. For example, I have an IBP packing plant on my route. I ship frozen beef sides and packaged beef products in leased reefers with IBPX reporting mark. All other routes in the group should have a movement record or two that will specify IBPX as the only reporting mark to which the record can be applied that will send them to the appropriate portal to arrive on my route. (See note below.)

The only other enhancement that I could add would be for iPortal trains to have names and mission codes the same as QuickPortalManager allows. If we find that this is a must have feature, I'll add it some time next year, but for now, lets give what we have so far an extensive test.

David


Note: (These will actually be classified as "local" records, but if the both first and second destinations are for the appropriate portal through which they need to depart the route, they will get the car where it needs to be. There are several ways that CMTM records can be used that I have not yet documented. I belive there is enough flexibility in the system to make our goal achievable.)
 
Back
Top