Calendar in environmental is not updating for some reason, version 114800.

[Jayco-man]

When I'm in working in the session my trees are in Autumn colors and when I save some work the trees go back to Summer so I have to go in environmental and move it up a day and they go back to Autumn again until I save again and then I noticed the calendar is not changing days either.

[JCitron]

It's a bug that's been reported, but not fixed at least just yet.

[Tony_Hilliam]

Actually, it's not a bug (unless I am missing some steps in your repro).

You say "when I save some work the trees go back to Summer" - provide all the steps here including which layers your made changes in.

To clarify further, sessions and routes both have environment settings. It depends which actions you've taken in which layers and what you save as to the outcome.

Edit a session, change the date, make a physical change in the session layer only, save, and that session will have the new date.
Edit a session, change the date, make a physical change in the route layer, save, and that route and session will have the new date.

[justinroth]

When I'm in working in the session my trees are in Autumn colors and when I save some work the trees go back to Summer so I have to go in environmental and move it up a day and they go back to Autumn again until I save again and then I noticed the calendar is not changing days either.

This happens to me every time also, whether I "edit route" or "edit session". Everything goes to winter until I edit environment and select a different day (calendar is always on the correct month and day).

[JCitron]

Actually, it's not a bug (unless I am missing some steps in your repro).

You say "when I save some work the trees go back to Summer" - provide all the steps here including which layers your made changes in.

To clarify further, sessions and routes both have environment settings. It depends which actions you've taken in which layers and what you save as to the outcome.

Edit a session, change the date, make a physical change in the session layer only, save, and that session will have the new date.
Edit a session, change the date, make a physical change in the route layer, save, and that route and session will have the new date.

Setup a route. Set the environment to a date you want. In my routes, I use mid-July because I don't want snow.

This is fine until I save the route during editing.

It's at that point, any seasonal trees and textures change to the current season. Right now for me, it's autumn going into winter with bare trees and snow appearing on the ground.

I can keep the ground and trees green if I save then exit and not save the session then go back into Surveyor again to continue working.

[Tony_Hilliam]

OK, let's get down to specifics:

Steps:
1. Create a route, leave region as default
2. Place a seasonal tree
3. Change the date to Jan 1
4. Tree shows as winter
5. Make a change that affects the route layer (e.g. paint the ground)
6. Save route, don't save session
7. Exit
8. Edit route
9. Check the tree is bare and the date shows Jan 1
10. Change the date to July 1
11. Tree changes to green
12. Make a change that affects the route layer (e.g. paint the ground)
13. Save route, don't save session
14. Exit
15. Edit route
16. Check the tree is green and the date shows Jul 1

[Jayco-man]

Sounds like there is a problem if everyone is having the same problem.

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

I think the problem is that the logic of the whole thing is not intuitive. This step in particular;

5. Make a change that affects the route layer (e.g. paint the ground)

Sounds simple, but most/many people would intuitively expect that while in the Route layer, you change the date, then save the Route, the date change would naturally be included in the save. But it's not.

Instead, you have to remember to do something extra that is trivial and entirely unrelated to date (such as move an object or paint the ground) in order for the new date to be saved along with it. It's nuts.



.

[JCitron]

I have noticed something while going through Tony's steps above to repro the problem.

I setup a test route using nothing fancy and everything worked as expected.

Performing the same steps in a real world route created in TransDEM, and the behavior exists using the same steps outlined above.

Here are the steps:

1) Put down seasonal textures and seasonal trees.
2) Set the calendar to July 8th, or some other warm season so the trees and textures are green.
3) Save the route and not the session because I'm only working on the route at this point placing tracks an putting in trees, etc.

As soon as the route is saved, the trees and textures change.

4) Checking the calendar, and the calendar is still set to July 8th where I set it, but the trees and textures have winterized.

5) Change the date in the calendar by one day to "reset" the date, and the trees are normal.

6) Exit without saving the session.

7) Come back in and the trees are still green, but making a change and saving will reset the trees and textures to winter.

What is the difference between a real world route versus a generic one?

I can do this repeatedly using the steps above.

[Tony_Hilliam]

Sounds like there is a problem if everyone is having the same problem.

Except they're not - we're missing something in the repro steps, but we might be getting closer.

I wonder if dd/mm/yy vs mm/dd/yy is the difference (we had something like this many years ago).

To be clear, I can save a route with a winter setting, then edit a session and save it with a summer setting. If I now Edit Route, it will be winter, if I Edit Session is will be summer.

And as for the requirement for a route edit, this is only if you want to update the route setting and you haven't made a change to the route. If you want to savethe session, then that's fine.

John - can you send a small test map to QA so we can try to repro your DEM data test.

[G.M.]

Tony what you do here is what I call a "workaround" in your steps 5 and 12
It seems Trainz currently only thinks a route or session needs to be saved,
when an actually item is placed or removed on/from a layer.
Even just a parameter change (like a date), should be sufficient to call the "save" code
Unless...it would require huge amount of resources to do this,
then we better stick to the workaround and a clear explanation in the Manual(wiki)

[boleyd]

Could it have something to do with Winter in Australia, Summer in America? Wild guess...

[pware]

To be clear, I can save a route with a winter setting, then edit a session and save it with a summer setting. If I now Edit Route, it will be winter, if I Edit Session is will be summer.

So, to clarify my understanding of this,

• if you load a Session into Driver, which has its date set to summer, and its parent Route (also loaded, obviously) has its date set to winter, will the end result be summer as per the Session?
• if you load a Session into Driver and the Session has not been saved with a set date, and using the same Route as above then will the end result be winter as per the Route?
• if no date has been set for the Session and the Route, then will the end result in Driver be the season according to today's calendar date and the latitude?

[JCitron]

Except they're not - we're missing something in the repro steps, but we might be getting closer.

I wonder if dd/mm/yy vs mm/dd/yy is the difference (we had something like this many years ago).

To be clear, I can save a route with a winter setting, then edit a session and save it with a summer setting. If I now Edit Route, it will be winter, if I Edit Session is will be summer.

And as for the requirement for a route edit, this is only if you want to update the route setting and you haven't made a change to the route. If you want to savethe session, then that's fine.

John - can you send a small test map to QA so we can try to repro your DEM data test.

I'll do that. I'll write up my steps a long with it so the QA Team will have something to play with.

[pware]

To throw another spanner in the works, I have just run some tests on changing the hemisphere only (not the date). This is a necessary first step for those of us who are in the (ahem) better southern hemisphere before even setting the date. I have found that the change does not seem to have any effect.

1. Create a new route and session
2. In a route layer add seasonal scenery. Note that their appearance matches the current date and NORTHERN hemisphere
3. Save both route and session. Exit Surveyor
4. Load both route and session into Surveyor, scenery still appears correct as per date and NORTHERN hemisphere
5. Open Edit Environment. Set hemisphere to SOUTHERN. After a short delay (a few seconds) the scenery changes to match the season for the SOUTHERN hemisphere. DO NOT CHANGE ANYTHING ELSE. Save as a new route (different name) and session. Exit Surveyor.
6. Load route only saved in step 5 above into Surveyor (note that the thumbnail is NOT a guide to the actual season). Scenery appears correct as per date and NORTHERN hemisphere, not SOUTHERN. Open Edit Environment and check, do not change, that the hemisphere is unchanged as SOUTHERN. Exit without saving.
7. Load route and session saved in step 5 above. Scenery appears correct as per date and NORTHERN hemisphere. Open Edit Environment and check, do not change, that the hemisphere is unchanged as SOUTHERN.
8. Select the route layer and move a scenery item. Open Save command. Note that the options presented are Overwrite existing route and Create new session confirming that no change has been made to the session. Change selection to Overwrite existing route and Do not save session. Save and exit.
9. Load route only saved in step 8 above. Scenery still appears correct as per date and NORTHERN hemisphere.

EDIT: More testing reveals that a change to the hemisphere will only save if a change is also made to the date.

EDIT 2: As a result of further testing I am now able to answer my original questions.

if you load a Session into Driver, which has its date set to summer, and its parent Route (also loaded, obviously) has its date set to winter, will the end result be summer as per the Session?

The date set in a Session overrides the date set in a Route to become the visible season.

if you load a Session into Driver and the Session has not been saved with a set date, and using the same Route as above then will the end result be winter as per the Route?

The date set in the Route then becomes the visible season.

if no date has been set for the Session and the Route, then will the end result in Driver be the season according to today's calendar date and the latitude?

This seems to be correct although I would have to wait until the actual change of season according to the calendar to confirm this.