DAMN Development Thread (formerly known as "Custom Submenus")

[High5Tower]

After reading  the jaxom thread I most confirm that it does not work. I then checked the BSC Forest Tract set and found two that did not function. 1st, Forest Track Crossroad 1x1 Centre. 2nd Forest Track Corner 1x1 Offset (First one). Thank you for your hard work.

[Diggis]

Great - so, when can I start? And what exactly do I have to do to create the necessary menu files (got lots of candidates for it)?

You wait till daeley has ironed the wrinkles out of the programs used to create them.

After reading  the jaxom thread I most confirm that it does not work. I then checked the BSC Forest Tract set and found two that did not function. 1st, Forest Track Crossroad 1x1 Centre. 2nd Forest Track Corner 1x1 Offset (First one). Thank you for your hard work.

By IT I assume you mean the 1x1 trail narrow with bench?  Not the whole thing.

[jaxom101]

Well in spite of all the "it works for me" notes, I still cannot access the link. Is there some security setting I need to open? Any other ideas. This is the page I get directly from the link provided in Daely's message.

Try right clicking the link and select save as. This isnt a page link but a download link and I know there is secruity settings in Most browsers not to access .ZIPs and thats probably your problem. Right clicking and save as should override and let you save it.

[jaxom101]

Can you add in the Base Maxis sets?

You still need MMLs so you can find the Maxis items you will allways use. But if they could be built into this then you wouldnt ever need to use the regular menus again.

[catty]

Catty:  Thank for the report.  To plop the lot from the menu, whithout going to the info page, click on the lot icon on the left.

Went back and tried again with the same results, but taking your advice

Once tip on your file structure. Personally I would keep all the menu.dat files in the same place.  Then you can easily check what is installed in there.

I shifted the Custom Menu files from My Docs/Plugins into Program/Plugins as I don't keep anything in there except the background files and the problem with plopping went away.

The only noticeable thing now is the larger the city the more lag there is when clicking on it or plopping anything, but you have that when using the game default menu.

I am not sure that I plopped everything available, but had no problems with the ones I did plop. 

[CasperVg]

caspervg cannot wait to see the final version and the development set released... 

[dragonshardz]

I haven't tested the CMM-B yet, but from all the reports so far it looks like it works.

Incidentally, who was it that created the BSC Forest Tracks? Deadwoods, right?

~~Dragonshardz~~

[FrankU]

Ha! Great news on the front!
I'm not a tester and thus are still waiting patiently for the result.
Only thing I can do is stand on the sideline and yell enthousiastically at you that are working so hard.

I have an idea though.
Might it be possible to make a mod file that moves all the menu items of the lots into, e.g., the trash menu? So this is then going to be an awfully filled up menu, but it is hardly neccessary to access this menu. So the other menus will be cleaned from all the files that can be accessed by the new mod. Hopefully this is understandable?

[Swamper77]

While it may be a good idea in theory to move the lots to the garbage utilities menu, it won't be a good idea in practice. The menu that lots are placed in has a direct effect on how they will function. Placing lots into a different menu than how they are designed to function might cause issues, so it is best to leave them where they are.

-Swamper

[bwatterud]

How about having the submenu file for a given set move that set to the bottom of whatever menu it is in.  That way, you wouldn't have to scroll through endless sets of, say for example, seawalls, in order to access lots that don't have a submenu file because they are standalone lots, or are a low priority. 

[Jonathan]

Wow, awesome work Daeley, I downloaded and tried out your menus, and they work great

FrankU: As far as I understand it the Daeleys modd replaces the icons in the MAXIS menus, they still function correctly, but the icon is only in the news message. I tried making my own menus and lots in it, and managed to get it to work to anextent although I had to replace the ones in the download.

Anyway fantastic Work.

[yoshiisland2]

This is some awesome stuff Daeley, hats off to you my friend!  I'd do a beta test, but the BAT has both my hands tied these days...the reason I could never understand this modding lingo.

[daeley]

In attachment the first public version of the DAMN Development Toolkit (DDTK - there's already enough 3-letter acronyms, don't you agree?)

obviously, read the tutorial first

(a fairly recent Java version is required to run the enclosed apps)

[FrankU]

Swamper,
Now, after I have moved almost all indusdtry and harbourrelated lots into my harbour menu, after everybody has told me this is without danger, you say that there can be issues?
OMG, I hope nothing serious?
In fact, I never found anything strange, but I msut admit I am not too interested in details...
As long as things start to grow and I am able to plop what I want to plop I am happy.

[HandsOn]

Swamper,
Now, after I have moved almost all indusdtry and harbourrelated lots into my harbour menu, after everybody has told me this is without danger, you say that there can be issues?
OMG, I hope nothing serious?
In fact, I never found anything strange, but I msut admit I am not too interested in details...
As long as things start to grow and I am able to plop what I want to plop I am happy.

Having done the same kind of moves, I think Swamper's concern is only true for the utility menus: I've accidentally moved a park into the Water menu and every time I tried to use it the city switched to underground view. Thus, yes, there maybe issues, but not with the harbour, misc. transport, or parks menus.

[CasperVg]

It's out, the developement kit is out. My day's good today

[Jonathan]

Awesome work on the DTK, I think I managed to do it all right up to step 4, what IID and package ID should be used? As far as I know the DTK only says to set them correctly, what is correctly?

Other than that, great work to all involved in this.

[daeley]

Awesome work on the DTK, I think I managed to do it all right up to step 4, what IID and package ID should be used? As far as I know the DTK only says to set them correctly, what is correctly?

Other than that, great work to all involved in this.

short answer:

set the LUA IID and Package ID to the same number smaller then 0x7FFF FFFF

slightly longer answer:

the PID and IID don't have to be the same, but for convenience I generally take them the same. The package number does have to be smaller then 7FFF FFFF because they seem to be read as signed integers. Hence anything higher becomes negative and invalid to SC4.

[FrankU]

Having done the same kind of moves, I think Swamper's concern is only true for the utility menus: I've accidentally moved a park into the Water menu and every time I tried to use it the city switched to underground view. Thus, yes, there maybe issues, but not with the harbour, misc. transport, or parks menus.

Thanks HandsOn. Now I can sleep again.

[Chrisim]

Dear Dealey,
your custom submenus system is fantastic - it can make it so much easier to select custom content and I had no problem so far 
I used the Reader to look and understand the system - and I can tell that it is a masterpiece
The most significant achievement for SC4 custom gameplay for years, just next to the NAM. Thank you! 
However, there is still much work to be done to get the custom submenu system working for much more sets.

I downloaded the developer tool kit and read your tutorial, but I haven't tried generating new submenues yet.
Obviously, the customMenu.dat is the main "controller" LUA file for all folders (the main sub menu and sub-sub menues).
And each menu file like JRJ Modular Zoo.dat contains a LUA file that does reference the main LUA file. Clever!

I have a few questions:
Translations. It is easy to add more LTEXT (just changing the GID in the usual way). But much text is inside the LUA files. Do we have to create a LUA file for each language or can you use constants inside LUA that are defined in a central language file?

Is the main menu structure (Recreation, ..., Air) and the first level submenu final?
Example: for Transport, there are only two submenues: public transport and others
I would create one submenu for each type of network, e.g., train lots, ..., bus stops, ..., GLR stations, ...
If you ask 100 persons, you would get 200 opinions how to structure it. 
Everybody could in principle create a personal version of customMenu.dat, but in order to get one system (to which everybody can contribute), you (or the BSC) may probably want to keep ownership of this main controller and update it from time to time?

Are you going to create a (high level) visible forum thread with a list of existing sets, where contributors can tell which sets they are working on (to avoid duplicate work)? New files, shall they be attached inside such a thread? A publication of single files on the LEX would not make much sense, but a regular LEX publication of all available sets would then be useful. What's the strategy?