Fleet program
- Thread starter Stumonster
- Start date
GamerDude
Cosmic Mongoose
If i may a hint from my days in IT (and teaching CompSci at a local collage).Stumonster said:
Look at how the document is being sent to the printer... do you have to manually add a CR/LF (old school) at each page break or something like that? Is the printer/Word2003 or whatever sending an additional CR/LF to end the document? Looks like you have two CR/LF being generated at the end of the last real page
Yes Yes.. CR/LF is old teletype Carriage Return/Line Feed.. and I come from back in the days where you had to allow for the two seperate commands... and deal with these things when going from C=64 to IBM and such.
Stumonster
Mongoose
Thanks for the feedback, GamerDude.
From what I understand, the versions of Word are backwards compatible, but of course not forward compatible. So, what I meant by making it work with Word 2000 should have no effect on Word 2003 or later. I was just thinking more people could use the program if an earlier version of word was supported. (In fact, I sent an earlier version of this program to Mongoose to evaluate if they wanted to. I was told that they do not have Word 2003 or later, so they could not use the program. I was also told they have something like this already in the works that will not have to rely on specific programs so more people could use their program. I had a suggestion from a board member to change to open office, which would be nice since it is free, but there does not seem to be much good documentation that a duffer programmer like me can use, and the interface for Open Office seems much harder to use. SVC seems pretty busy at the moment with all the new products he is doing, so I have not sent it to anyone at ADB yet. I have one person from the boards helping test it at the moment as well.)
For the extra page I was thinking it had to do with the loop that inserts a new page running one time too many. That has not proven correct so far, but I will take a look at what you have suggested as well.
Thanks again to everyone for the encouraging words.
From what I understand, the versions of Word are backwards compatible, but of course not forward compatible. So, what I meant by making it work with Word 2000 should have no effect on Word 2003 or later. I was just thinking more people could use the program if an earlier version of word was supported. (In fact, I sent an earlier version of this program to Mongoose to evaluate if they wanted to. I was told that they do not have Word 2003 or later, so they could not use the program. I was also told they have something like this already in the works that will not have to rely on specific programs so more people could use their program. I had a suggestion from a board member to change to open office, which would be nice since it is free, but there does not seem to be much good documentation that a duffer programmer like me can use, and the interface for Open Office seems much harder to use. SVC seems pretty busy at the moment with all the new products he is doing, so I have not sent it to anyone at ADB yet. I have one person from the boards helping test it at the moment as well.)
For the extra page I was thinking it had to do with the loop that inserts a new page running one time too many. That has not proven correct so far, but I will take a look at what you have suggested as well.
Thanks again to everyone for the encouraging words.
GamerDude
Cosmic Mongoose
In general you are right, although in some strange alignment of the multiverses Microsoft did put out a Word 2003/XP patch to let it read .docx files from Word 2007/10. But you can't tell who has applied it. I just would hate to see anyone do something that forced people to use Office 2007/10, the ribbon interface is horrible. Even worse than the verision of Word that came under Windows 2.11 (available only under a gov't desktop computer contract back in the early 90's).Stumonster said:
Microsoft does have a bad habit of horribly breaking backwards compatibility, as a database the USAF contracted to be written in Access v2 broke under Access 2000 (due to major changes in VBA commands and some other features). Totally broke our entire system and we had to go to running one non-networked machine under Win98/Access v2 to do our job.
As for Open Office, that is a strong program, written in Java, by programmers, for programmers and engineers. It is horribly complex compared to Office (2003 and earlier), commands/menu options put in strange places (avoid lawsuit from MS?), and lacks some key functionality. I'm a guy who, besides having several degrees in computing and taught computing at the undergrad level, had to learn MS office on-the-fly converting documents and presentations for another unit overnight (and a Colonel hovering over me most of the time. UGH!). I'm good with this stuff been doing it for decades. Yet I spent about a year beating my head on Open Office so that between my WinBoxes and my MacBox I wouldn't have to switch between programs (don't get me started on iWork, please don't).
There's a marked for user manuals but not for books on how to interface with a program. If you want to do something nice and consistant? Just output directly to PDF, safe to PDF and forget the rest. Even Office and OpenOffice include some form of "print to PDF" functionality. Go look at Hero Lab by Lone Wolf Publishing, (and Army Builder). They handle this quite nicely.
For the extra page I was thinking it had to do with the loop that inserts a new page running one time too many. That has not proven correct so far, but I will take a look at what you have suggested as well.
Thanks again to everyone for the encouraging words.[/quote]
Stumonster
Mongoose
Well, GamerDude, I did some poking around the internet to see if I could take your advice and eliminate the use of Word from the program. I found a super cool PDF class that a person wrote and lets others use for free. So, the program can now write a PDF file for the ship control sheets directly!
Here is a sample of a pdf directory:
And here is one of the sheets:
One thing still bugs me a bit: The class assumes that Acrobat Reader is installed in a fixed spot. Good news is that the program does not error out if it is not there, it just will not open the pdf file automatically when saved. It instead just saves it an you have to go open it yourself.
There is one thing that will fail out the program: If the PDF file you are trying to save is open at the moment you try and create it again (to save some changes for example) then the program will say 'Access Denied' and throw an error. My general error trapping does not like to handle this, so I have to see what I can do to trap this specific error only.
On the good side, there is no extra page at the end now.
I am confident the program code is solid now with only the one error above, and now MS Word in no longer required!!
Here is a sample of a pdf directory:
And here is one of the sheets:
One thing still bugs me a bit: The class assumes that Acrobat Reader is installed in a fixed spot. Good news is that the program does not error out if it is not there, it just will not open the pdf file automatically when saved. It instead just saves it an you have to go open it yourself.
There is one thing that will fail out the program: If the PDF file you are trying to save is open at the moment you try and create it again (to save some changes for example) then the program will say 'Access Denied' and throw an error. My general error trapping does not like to handle this, so I have to see what I can do to trap this specific error only.
On the good side, there is no extra page at the end now.
I am confident the program code is solid now with only the one error above, and now MS Word in no longer required!!
Renny
Mongoose
So, Stumonster, has any decision been made on what you're going to do with this tool once you're ready to pass it on? Have Mongoose been in touch at all? Seems like you've done a ton of work on this and it looks first class. I can see how you're efforts may clash with the official ship cards, although given the revision record so far, i'd always be reluctant to lay out cash on a set of cards which may very well be redundant the week after i've bought them. So I can't understand why Mongoose won't just license this from you and everybody wins. You get some reward for your hard work, Mongoose still get to sell their hard copy cards to those who want them and the players get a dynamic ship sheet, able to cope with whichever errata gets thrown at it.
Stumonster
Mongoose
Hi Renny,
No, No official word. When I Initially contacted them, Mongoose said they have their own program in the works. I guess we have to wait to see what they come up with. I have not contacted ADB yet. I want to smooth out the last wrinkles first to make sure that any evaluation goes smoothly. I am almost there. Once I think the pdf version is ready for outside testing I will probably send it out to a couple of people (that I can verify have the rules) to see if they can break it. Then I will run it by the powers that be again.
The cool thing is that the control sheets are easily swapped out. They are just files that are grabbed and put into the PDF or Word document on the fly. Technically, any control sheet could be used if the files are named correctly and the print setup is done to match the size of the control sheet being used. On the down side, of course, as the number of ships available in the game goes up, swapping out files for all of them could get a bit time consuming. :shock:
No, No official word. When I Initially contacted them, Mongoose said they have their own program in the works. I guess we have to wait to see what they come up with. I have not contacted ADB yet. I want to smooth out the last wrinkles first to make sure that any evaluation goes smoothly. I am almost there. Once I think the pdf version is ready for outside testing I will probably send it out to a couple of people (that I can verify have the rules) to see if they can break it. Then I will run it by the powers that be again.
The cool thing is that the control sheets are easily swapped out. They are just files that are grabbed and put into the PDF or Word document on the fly. Technically, any control sheet could be used if the files are named correctly and the print setup is done to match the size of the control sheet being used. On the down side, of course, as the number of ships available in the game goes up, swapping out files for all of them could get a bit time consuming. :shock:
GamerDude
Cosmic Mongoose
Great! Glad I was able to at least contribute a usable idea. This also removes the small issue of people trying to exchange the saved Word-format rosters and have them print out wrong on the other person's system (an ever present problem on Windows, the different printer drivers each handling a page slightly differently - something I was plagued by with all my early HackMaster forms and charts till I found 'CutePDF').Stumonster said:
Can't wait to see the final product.
Stumonster
Mongoose
Quick Update: I added the scout ships to the program on Sunday:
Note the D5WD. Points removed so I do not get in trouble.
Control Sheets ready too. Points removed so I do not get in trouble.
I sent a few test versions of the program out to some board members to see how it works for them on their PC's. So far, feedback has been good but they have only been able to take quick looks at the program. We will have to see how it goes once they get some more use time in.
Note the D5WD. Points removed so I do not get in trouble.
Control Sheets ready too. Points removed so I do not get in trouble.
I sent a few test versions of the program out to some board members to see how it works for them on their PC's. So far, feedback has been good but they have only been able to take quick looks at the program. We will have to see how it goes once they get some more use time in.
Stumonster
Mongoose
I wanted to take a minute to thank Billclo, LimeyDragon, and Da Boss for taking a look at the program and offering suggestions and finding data issues.
A special thank you is due to Greg Smith who, judging by all he found with the control sheets, must have gone through each and every ship of every fleet searching for errors. Thanks largely to his efforts I think that the data is spot on now, and all of the fleets work without error.
I appreciate all of your efforts!!
A special thank you is due to Greg Smith who, judging by all he found with the control sheets, must have gone through each and every ship of every fleet searching for errors. Thanks largely to his efforts I think that the data is spot on now, and all of the fleets work without error.
I appreciate all of your efforts!!
Greg Smith
Mongoose
It is a very, very good program and it has lots of cool bits and pieces in it.
Stumonster
Mongoose
@ Halfbat: Thanks! I had a good time (in a nerdy way) making what I have so far. I am already thinking about how to add fighters when the time comes, but that will depend on how they are implemented.
@McKinstry: Check your PM's please.
@McKinstry: Check your PM's please.
Stumonster
Mongoose
Quick Update: Sent a mail to SVC last week to see if he would like to see the program. No reply yet, but from what Jean had posted I gather he is pretty busy right now with SFB stuff.
Based on feedback from testers I made a couple of changes:
1) Made the max fleet size 3500 now, up from 2500 points.
2) Added a button so that you can change the max points for a fleet without having to start all over from scratch:
3) Had a suggestion to add a line on the control sheets to keep track of Boost Power to Shields. I was wondering what you all think of this:
Based on feedback from testers I made a couple of changes:
1) Made the max fleet size 3500 now, up from 2500 points.
2) Added a button so that you can change the max points for a fleet without having to start all over from scratch:
3) Had a suggestion to add a line on the control sheets to keep track of Boost Power to Shields. I was wondering what you all think of this:
We used them this evening for a game and they wer an absolute godsend - well laid out and extremely intuative. If they don't get an official stamp there is something seriously wrong in the world 
Re boosted shields - it may work to just have a box to write in next the main shields area? Thats what I tended to do tonight on the rare occassion I used them.
but again thank you for your creation
Re boosted shields - it may work to just have a box to write in next the main shields area? Thats what I tended to do tonight on the rare occassion I used them.
but again thank you for your creation
