Signals and TDB...Old School Thinking?

[fchrist16]

FOR the route building gurus, I need some advice. I know with MSTS and route building, you ALWAYS waited until the very end to signal/etc., things, but with TSRE and ORTS is that still needed even with the MSTS root structure? I remember being told once before that you could do this while keeping things within a certain boundary??

If I wanted to SIGNAL inside the red lines/box while still building tracks/roads in other parts of the route...WOULD IT massively screw up the TDB using TSRE and ORTS only? The first image is the full route, the second image is zoomed in to where most scenery is done as well and the third image is zoomed in even more for reference.

Regards,

-Frank C.

So i image.png signalquestion2.jpg signalquestion.jpg

[eric]

It's not anywhere near as catastrophic to do signals while still working on a route. What Goku built for organizing and cleaning up the TDB is infinitely better than what Kuju did.

I hold back on them just to avoid some double work if I decide to tweak track after the initial passes thru the area. There's no real risk that I've found yet. Curious if others have had issues.

[longiron]

I'm 100% old school. Interactives as the last step in the route building When I build I always create a mini route with three versions + backups. One final track and no interactives so use as failsafe and creating activities. Two is last confirmed known good - or backup. And current version where I'm installing signals and other interactives. No matter what i create a route backup once a week when I'm really actively working.

[fchrist16]

Thanks for the replies! I guess I will wait until the TDB/RDB is more solidified. I really wanted to add interactives to the areas that are 100% done otherwise!

Regards,

-Frank C.

[rdayt]

Track is set up as nodes. Nodes are pieces of track between red poles (switch points) and/or blue poles (end of track.)
You can work on any node you want to at any time as long as the interactives (TDB items) have been removed from the node.
If you work on a switch the three nodes connected to it must be clean.
The best way I've found to do this is to turn on the TrackDB items in the view window.
Don't forget to place a track piece on the ends of and between switches.

Randy

If you need to remember where stuff goes you can always write on the terrtex.
q1PMTSFh.jpg

[landnrailroader]

Uh, what did Goku do to clean up the Tdb/Rdb databases. Is that a separate program or some part of TSRE, or does it happen automatically. For what it is worth, I still avoid joints close to the red lines and I plan to do my interactives last, or release unfinished routes before interactives are added.

Jerry Sullivan

[eric]

As part of the TDB save, it collapses empty nodes, which keeps the size down.

With auto fix, it will remove TrItem references that interactives create.

Those remnants (empty nodes and unreferenced references) caused problems with the MSRE. There were also likely some cases where was a disconnect between the world files and the TDB files. The way that TSRE is handling those data structures seems to be a lot more stabled and ordered than what MSRE did.