MSTS Improvements, Innovations and Tricks

[OTTODAD]

There have been many improvements to MSTS, many made by MSTSBin and others by clever and talented graphics creators like those who have supplied all the animations for the SEAVIEW-5, I can not run in ORTS.

MSTSBin can now toggle doors open and close with Ctrl-7 or 9 on either side of passenger cars, providing rolling stock's shape files have been coded accordingly and Tiger Trains rolling stock forinstance uses these functions to open and close box cars doors and load and unload hoppers.

The creators of the Bernina rolling stock have used Ctrl-8 to move the driver / engineer in and out of his cab, shown in the first part of this video and looks like somebody kicked him up his backside, get a move on:

https://www.otto-wipfel.co.uk/video/...nnovations.wmv

and open and close passenger cars with Ctrl-7 or 9.

Problem in ORTS is that as soon as the throttle is being used the passenger car doors toggle open and shut ceaselessly, shown in part 2 !

The next part of this video shows an Italian passenger coaches train leaving Dortmund in the Wupper-Express-11, using the undocumented by ORTS #7 view. Although programmed for the doors are not responding to these keys-combos at all when the train is not moving.

This #7 key is supposed to be the Yard view, now enhanced with a fish-eye camera to move with the train.

Noticed that the ZERO compass function still works, which is better than the ORTS F5 HUD Long/Latt indicator, especially useful when beta-testing a route.

The pantos do not rise to their proper height and the train brakes do not work.

There are so many of these clever tricks which will make it hard work if not impossible to incorporate them all into ORTS.

O t t o

[twpol]

Most of these sound like simple things to add to OR to be honest (and you seem to have written this as if OR somehow magically has all the random features MSTSBin has added, which I don't understand at all), and what's the train brakes problem? It's not ; and ' like MSTS but ; and # which catches people out (and I think the docs are wrong on this).

[mnjrr]

Hello Otto,

The Open Rails team is of the steadfast belief that the innovative train simulator community will come through for Open Rails in much the same manner as the community has done for MSTS, Trainz, and Railworks with creating many wonderful add-ons. We look forward to when the community will add new features to the Open Rails software. This transition will take place when the team feels that Open Rails is a stable platform ready for direct contributions from the community.

On a different note, for a list of key commands, including the zero and 7 keys, please visit http://openrails.org/SoftDocs.pdf.

Thank you for pointing out the interesting occurances with using commands from MSTSBIN in Open Rails. The latter program is not compatible with MSTSBIN, except for the MSTSBIN sound changes. Please note that any command such as the zero key used in Open Rails the team has to add the code for in the software.

The team does plan to add a pantograph function tied with a catenary system in Open Rails. Moreover, work continues on refining the brakes. All this work will take time.

[mnjrr]

Thanks to you and James, who is a member of the team, for pointing out the mistake in the software quide. The team will correct that mistake.

[OTTODAD]

On a different note, for a list of key commands, including the zero and 7 keys, please visit http://openrails.org/SoftDocs.pdf

Thanks.

Missed that in the SoftDocs.pdf which came with the download, I printed to hard copy.

Could the yellow text be changed to something more pleasant to look at ?

Having been a programmer for 30 years I appreciate that not much can be done at the drop of a hat !

O t t o

[csantucci]

The latter program (ORTS) is not compatible with MSTSBIN, except for the MSTSBIN sound changes.]

This is a big strategy error.

Carlo

[longiron]

Community members,
The excellent feedback is truly appreciated as it will make Open Rails a better train sim. It is not that Open Rails isn't compatible with MSTSBIN, rather we haven't implemented all the features that BIN offers. While we don't make any promises to implement each and every one of them, most are on our TO DO list, We will continue to develop Open Rails more fully, but it takes time.
Thanks

[buttercup]

There have been many improvements to MSTS, many made by MSTSBin and others by clever and talented graphics creators like those who have supplied all the animations for the SEAVIEW-5, I can not run in ORTS.

Have you tried moving your starting point, etc. OR will run Sea View 5 on my system.

[OTTODAD]

Have you tried moving your starting point, etc. OR will run Sea View 5 on my system.

Did that now and deleted all activities, paths, services, there not being any AI trains.

Created a new one and got the same error !



3+ million lines ?

That made me think and checked the TDB. Sure enough it had millions of empty lines. How the blazes did the Route Editor manage to create them ?

No way to delete them with UltraEdit32, taking too long to do.

So I thought lets place a 1m straight into a field and save the route and voilà, the size of the TDB was reduced to 51698 lines ORTS no longer had a problem with !

Now I got something to do again, there not being much else to do in MSTS and RW !

O t t o

[mnjrr]

Hello,

As for myself, I am able to use the ' to apply the brakes in Open Rails. I did not configure the ' for the brakes.

[mnjrr]

James informed me, "I imagine it is keyboard layouts being a pain. The code looks for the OemSemicolon and OemQuotes keys, but it's always been ; and # to release and apply on my UK keyboard (MSTS is ; and ' though).

http://msdn.microsof...input.keys.aspx is very specific about which ones are "For any country/region" and which aren't. Basically the problem is XNA is providing the raw key codes and not the characters you'd get if you were typing (see KeyDown vs KeyPress for the same thing). Sometimes that's what you want, sometimes it isn't."

[twpol]

Now that I got the Seaview-5 working in ORTS I checked on what it's many animations do.

As expected they did not work, ORTS not yet having been coded to play them.

That is what I was wondering about whether it will be able to, MSTSBin allowing these animations to be coded into their SHAPE files like the opening doors ?

As long as we (OR) can work out how MSTSBin triggers and plays the animations (in the same way we'd normally have to figure out how MSTS does something) there is no reason for OR not to support then. Just needs time and people.

[OTTODAD]

As for myself, I am able to use the ' to apply the brakes in Open Rails. I did not configure the ' for the brakes.

Strange ! Definitely does not work here.

Try the V.360 download from your web site and test it, after backing-up your copy !

Anybody else having problems braking trains with ' (Apostrophe) ?

Now that I got the Seaview-5 working in ORTS I checked on what it's many animations do.

As expected they did not work, ORTS not yet having been coded to play them.

That is what I was wondering about whether it will be able to, MSTSBin allowing these animations to be coded into their SHAPE files like the opening doors the same as Pantos animations, present in Shape files since day 1 od MSTS, some have used to open and close doors with.

O t t o

[mnjrr]

Hello Otto,

I had v360 installed and used the ' to apply the brakes. The different key controls must be because of regional differences with the keyboards as James mentioned.

[OTTODAD]

Basically the problem is XNA is providing the raw key codes and not the characters you'd get if you were typing (see KeyDown vs KeyPress for the same thing). Sometimes that's what you want, sometimes it isn't."

For years having used the PowerBasic32 INKEY$ for reading keyboard's Scancodes output, which still applies right up to VISTA, my PowerBasic-32 programs still work under, they are:

' Dec-96/Hex-60 (apostrophe)
# Dec-35/Hex-23

and no matter where they are on the keyboard they will be read by Windows like that.

I am sure that C++ and other compilers read the same Scancodes for display on the screen ?

O t t o