Track Viewer - Activity Editor

[scottb613]

Hi Folks,

Just a heads up - as it may not be obvious unless you're following along pretty closely with development efforts... The OR team has the new "Track Viewer" included in the automatic "experimental" builds available on James Ross's site... It's a separate executable contained in the OR directory... While it's still in it's very early stages - it definitely loads a route and allows you to pan around in a full screen track view of your route... I believe this is the precursor to an activity editor - but - I'm not part of the OR team so I'm just guessing... They do have some initial ability to edit paths - but - I haven't gotten it to work yet... It's much better for viewing a track map than the original activity editor already...

The feature that has me the most intrigued - is the "couple/uncouple" points I see they have included... Could this mean we will have the ability to drop off or pick up cars with AI trains ???

[James Collins]

Hi Scott. This is very interesting indeed, but could you give a link to James' site for us who dont know where to find this?

[scottb613]

Track Viewer - Activity Editor

Hi James,

Oh - sorry...

For the last couple of weeks OR includes an "automatic updater" on the menu screen - top right will tell you if you have the latest experimental build... No need to go to his site after you update to a fairly recent version...

http://james-ross.co.uk/projects/or/builds

[smiljacc18]

Thanks for the heads up-I'm also not part of the team but would have to guess an activity editor in the making!Runs full screen-no more eyestrain,chose colors for it,option to show roads- This will be a huge asset and step forward for O.R.Thanks team.

[EricF]

Right now, the track viewer has some path editing capability -- so we don't have to resort to the old MSTS AE all the time! It's a very early experiment, something worth getting excited about for certain. Though the developer himself expects it to only be one piece in the puzzle -- Tools specific to Open Rails are yet to come after version 1.0.

[scottb613]

Track Viewer - Activity Editor

Morn'n Folks,

Yeah - I played with the path editor again last night - with whichever was the latest version at the time... It works well and is so much easier to use than the MSTS one...

One thing to know - is that the [Page Up] and [Page Down] control how much of the path you see... It extends or reduces the path by one increment at a time... When you start working with a path you only see three segments... Use [Shift] [Page Up] or [Page Down] to show or hide the entire path... Don't forget to edit the metadata before you save it... The future is looking bright for OR... I'm a full time convert - I can't use MSTS anymore...

[cn bala]

Scott -- first want to say thank you for the link to download. And I know it's very early stage with Track Viewer - Activity Editor at this point. Anyway I did download and extract to desktop. I created the folder with the name " SIMIS " That part is no problem. But when I open the folder and click the application with " Simis Editor " and doesn't do anything -- stop working and closed the program. What have I done wrong with this? I am not sure what did I do with this? My computer run on Windows 7 and yes I do have Microsoft NET 3.5 SP1 Framework installed in my computer.

John

[scottb613]

Hi John,

Not sure what "Simis Editor" is... Simis is just the name of your folder ? I'm not in front of my computer but isn't the executable for Track Viewer called "track viewer" or something like that ?

If you've never used Open Rails before you need XNA installed as well...

The install instructions are here:

http://www.openrails.org/release.html

[cn bala]

OK I created the folder with the name " SIMIS Editor " on desktop but had a feeling that I am wrong where to put the folderin? Are the files should be in Open Rails folder or not? That's where I am confused with? Right now I put the folder with the name " SIMIS Editor " separated from other folder with the name " Open Rails " Let me know about this. Yes I have used the program of Open Rails for a while and now using the latest update version with X2111 to run the simulator.

John

[scottb613]

Hi John,

Sorry - I may not be grasping the entire nature of your issue... If you had open rails running before - you're right - all the prerequisites must be in place... With OR - no installation necessary - I keep mine in a desktop folder as well... Just copy the contents of the download into your folder... At this point you should be able to click the OR executable and see the normal open rails interface you are familiar with... If that doesn't start - maybe it's a corrupted download.... If OR starts - just close it... Then go back into the OR folder and look for some executable with "Track Viewer" in the name and launch that one... That's the only part that is new... It's separate from the main program... Hope this helps...

[James Collins]

The TrackViewer is inside your OR main directory and is named Contrib.TrackViewer.exe I have no idea what SIMIS Editor is.

[cn bala]

Thanks James for the screenshot and now I see that. Also put the files in the right place with the main folder of Open Rails. Now about " SIMIS Editor " you can download from James Ross site but this is in early stage and long way to go before the program of SIMIS editor be able to use. The same idea with the program of Microsoft Train Simulator Editors and Tools program. I add the word myself with " SIMIS " because I see in readme.txt that James Ross wrote with this word, " SIMIS ". You can download this from his site and it's http://james-ross.co.uk/projects/jgrmsts

John

[OTTODAD]

I use the MSTS 0-Zero compass coordinates display or the MSTS Activity Editor route map to show me the co-ordinates of a location I want to work at in the MSTS Route Editor, or view that location in the real world as shown by Google Earth.

What do these figures ORTS show at the bottom of its Track Viewer tell me ?

What ORTS could do with is a sizable / movable overlay window when running a route which shows where the player is, like Trainz and Railworks have !






.

[twpol]

Thanks James for the screenshot and now I see that. Also put the files in the right place with the main folder of Open Rails. Now about " SIMIS Editor " you can download from James Ross site but this is in early stage and long way to go before the program of SIMIS editor be able to use. The same idea with the program of Microsoft Train Simulator Editors and Tools program. I add the word myself with " SIMIS " because I see in readme.txt that James Ross wrote with this word, " SIMIS ". You can download this from his site and it's http://james-ross.co.uk/projects/jgrmsts

John

Hi John,

The Simis Editor and related tools were developed specifically for editing MSTS data files, although I mostly stopped working on them when I found and started working on Open Rails about 3 years ago (my, how time flies). "Simis" is the code-name of the game engine used by Kuju to develop Microsoft Train Simulator (and some other titles for other publishers) and it is embedded in the header of many/most of the game data files.

I'd like to finish them off a bit more but Open Rails keeps me pretty busy.

A different James

[James Collins]

[B][COLOR=#0000cd]

What do these figures ORTS show at the bottom of its Track Viewer tell me ?

Hi, they look to be camera coordinates, such as tile x and tile z. Comparing TrackViewer to MSTS, at least x and y camera coordinates are used as well.