I think you should store the results in an xml format so they can be easily read by a program or a website.

Nah if the data needed to be portable I would use SQL, XML is for geeks who love XML - it's the script equivellent of Linux. Unfortunately neither SQL or XML outputted data would be much use without the pages to go with it, so I figured i'd skip a step and go straight to that.

Ultimately i'm created what I need for myself, and just passing on the fruits of that work to you guys and just adding the quick and easy things you guys want, XML/SQL data output would not be quick and easy to add unfortunately.

I dont think so, if you have the data and did it with the website you should do it in fast.
But anyone could make a converter website <-> SQL/XML instead

Quote from Becky Rose :

Nah if the data needed to be portable I would use SQL, XML is for geeks who love XML - it's the script equivellent of Linux. Unfortunately neither SQL or XML outputted data would be much use without the pages to go with it, so I figured i'd skip a step and go straight to that.

Ultimately i'm created what I need for myself, and just passing on the fruits of that work to you guys and just adding the quick and easy things you guys want, XML/SQL data output would not be quick and easy to add unfortunately.

i think you have some confusion about what sql or xml are. depending of the purpose you need to store data, you may need one or another: if you need to store plenty of relational data, you may need a database (not sql, sql is a query language, it is not a thing that can contain data) you have plaenty of solutions and the simplest and smallest is sqlite (file based), otherwise if realationships are not so important and data have a table structure you may choose to save in csv format (comma separated values) which is very universal (i.e. excel will import it flawlessly); on the other hand if you have structured data (i.e. objects), the alternatives are xml or java properties file format, xml is not for geeks, it's quite simple and you can use http://xerces.apache.org/ which is a quite simple library to handle xml (xml in the contrary of sql is a file format and can store data).

my hint: don't go for personal solutions to rediscover the hot water, you can find almost everything you need, yet done by someone else...save your efforts

EDIT: almost forgot, windows have apis to hanlde ini files, but it's more suitable for config files.

Quote from Micron88 :

set up the same resolution and refresh rate @ desktop and ingame

Thx for the tip, tried it before. GUI is still black...

If you want XML files holding race data, you write it. I wanted web pages showing race data, so I wrote it.

Quote from sil3ntwar :

I think you should store the results in an xml format so they can be easily read by a program or a website.

HTML is XML, effectively. Theres no reason why you couldn't read it like every other bit of XML, as long as its well formed.

If you make the template file empty save for one line containing "*2" you would have very little stripping away of html to do anyway, just the odd colour code.

Can some one give me a hand, i'm having real troubles getting the statistics to work. This is what i do:

I start LFS Companion, then i start LFS in windowed mode because of the graphic glitch. I start LFS with the "D:\Games\LFS\LFS.exe /insim=49999" command, my cfg.txt has this at the bottom
OutGauge Mode 1
OutGauge Delay 1
OutGauge IP 127.0.0.1
OutGauge Port 56551
OutGauge ID 0

I then seltect a .mpr replay, let it play all the way through then quit LFS and click compile stats, it flicks up generating stats briefly, then i click view and nothing happens. There is only the templates in the stats folder still aswell.

I can't think of what to try next and i'd really like to get this thing running, Cheers.

it was only a suggestion no need to get all shitty over it

Becky - Just wanted to let you know how thoroughly I'm enjoying LFS Companion. I drove the other night without it and the game felt so empty! Once you get the program nailed down so that it doesn't get confused about which player it's watching, I think it will be one of the most used mods for LFS ever.

I know that you plan to put a name field in the program, to tell Companion which player to watch. How will this affect tabbing around from car to car?

Chopstix, if you are getting the radio and backfires then the stats are being recorded, you click on Compile Stats and the files will be made, then view stats to open them up in a browser.

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it was only a suggestion no need to get all shitty over it

Sorry. I was being stood corrected, incorrectly, by some posters.

Quote :

I know that you plan to put a name field in the program, to tell Companion which player to watch. How will this affect tabbing around from car to car?

This is already in, drive a lap then goto the config screen and turn off auto-detect player. The radio should then only give messages for your car regardless of who the camera is watching.

Please make the first post's download links a bit more clear... just write a note that says "DOWNLOAD THIS AND THIS ONLY". It's pretty confusing now. Took 5 mins to understand what should I download and I actually decided to download every version from 0.2 full just to make sure I'm not missing any files...

And did I something wrong because everytime I change car the mod stops working? To get it working again I need to restart the game and the mod. And typing /insim 49999 after changing the car gives me some "InSim: ISI received before ISI packet" or something error text. Or is it supposed to be like this or what I'm doing wrong? Do I have to do something to the relay settings in the utility? And simple readme or at least short kind of step-by-step guide would be nice...

Quote :

did I something wrong because everytime I change car the mod stops working?

Backfires should pick up straight away, the radio usually takes a few laps to start kicking in again because it uses historical information and you wont have any. You might find the radio starts following the wrong car until you complete a lap, unless you have fixed messages to a particular car in the LFSC config.

If this is not happening, can you tell me what is please?

The downloads are clearly marked with (FULL) or (UPDATE), is this not enough?

Quote from Becky Rose :

The downloads are clearly marked with (FULL) or (UPDATE), is this not enough?

You don't do customer support, do you?
When dealing with customers no amount of information is enough. Some might forget breathing during the installation because the screen doesn't tell them to do so...

*Insert random rant about stupid people here*

Vain

Quote :

You don't do customer support, do you?

Not if I can possibly avoid it, no.

You're not a customer untill you've handed over some cash, so, you can either spend an hour working out how to make it work for your situation, or, you can spend an hour working somewhere else, send Becky the hours wages, and then you're officially a customer.

more importantly :

that's some really excellent modding, thank you very much indeed

Quote from Vain :

You don't do customer support, do you?
When dealing with customers no amount of information is enough. Some might forget breathing during the installation because the screen doesn't tell them to do so...

*Insert random rant about stupid people here*

Vain

But at least those people won't (be able to) sue you

(sorry for offtopic)

Quote from Becky Rose :

Backfires should pick up straight away, the radio usually takes a few laps to start kicking in again because it uses historical information and you wont have any. You might find the radio starts following the wrong car until you complete a lap, unless you have fixed messages to a particular car in the LFSC config.

If this is not happening, can you tell me what is please?

It works as long as I don't change the car. After I've changed the car and start to play, I don't hear anything not even the backfires. I don't get any error messages but if I write "/insim=49999" I get "Insim: packet received before ISI packet" error text after a few secs...

Should this work without touching those relay settings the GUI? Both outgauge and insim relays says "inactive", what does that supposed to mean?

Quote :

The downloads are clearly marked with (FULL) or (UPDATE), is this not enough?

These confuses "0.5mb LFS Companion v0.3 to v0.41 Updater (Updates v0.3 only)" and "LFS Companion 0.41 Alpha (Updates v0.3 only)". File size is different but at least I don't get it because it looks like the same update from the link names. And I'm not a n00b with computers but I don't understand why not just write "<-- you need to download only this" note after the link. It just makes things easier when there are multiple download links with older updates and versions. And why even keep those older versions in the first place listed there.

The relays are just for making other mods work with LFS Companion. The ISI packet you are getting because by typing /insim=49999 you are re-initialising LFS's insim communications, but LFSC is still sending data as if it is already logged into LFS.

LFSC should continue to work after changing car, and this was done many times whilst writting the software and never failed. I have no suggestions as to why this is not working, but will endeavour to find out why when I look at the source code again in a week or two for the next update.

Quote from Becky Rose :

The downloads are clearly marked with (FULL) or (UPDATE), is this not enough?

Honestly, it IS pretty confusing. You might want to remove all the old versions and just have one link for the .30 version and one link for the .41 upgrade. The first two links seem to be the same file, but the descriptions are different. This is confusing. I don't see any reason to have the older versions at all.

Hi Becky,

Quote from Becky Rose :

when I look at the source code again in a week or two for the next update.

Some suggestions for when you look at the source code again (or maybe later):
(Warning: Longish text!)

The lap announcement ("last lap" etc.) could do with some improvement. I seem to remember reading somewhere here that those messages are triggered by the leader crossing start/finish. That's fine as long as you are the leader.
Some days ago I had a race, where I entered my penultimate lap when I was just in front of the race leader (let's not get into the ugly details, WHY I was so far behind... . Anyway shortly after beginning this lap I got the "last lap" message because the leader was crossing start/finish for his final lap. As he didn't catch me in this lap, I actually had nearly two more full laps to go. I know this is the most extreme example but it actually happened. And the messages are often inaccurate if you're some time behind the leader, because you get the "last lap" message while you're actually in your penultimate lap. I already learned to adapt to this special behaviour but it would be better if the lap message was triggered by the driver him/herself crossing the line.

Another nice touch would be, if the fuel messages wouldn't tell you the amount of fuel left in percent but in laps "You have fuel for 10 more laps" or "You can go 3 more laps". I know this will have to take into consideration the average consumption for the combo but maybe you can read this value from LFS via InSim?

One more thing: The messages about "the car behind/in front is for position" etc. are sometimes very hectic. I noticed several times that when I overtake someone, just a few seconds later I get the "car behind is for position" which is of course obvious in this case. I don't know the mechanism you use for this, but maybe there is some easy way to reduced these kind of messages or maybe limit them to one or two per lap. I guess in a proper endurance race with clean drivers this isn't actually a problem. But if you race the typical 6 laps on BL1 with 23 drivers it get's a bit too much.

Even one more (they just keep on coming ): It would be nice if the lap messages would adapt to the race length. Take the famous 6 laps at BL1 for example: After completion of the first lap (having luckily survived T1 ) you get the message "Only 5 more laps to go!". Maybe LFSC could start those messages only after half of the race is completed. This way you always would have the last lap announced and usually the penultimate lap as well, but things like "5 more laps" in a 6 lap race wouldn't happen.

Finally: We really need the keyboard thing and with that a way to turn off/on pit radio. Because while qualifying it keeps telling me that I'm headed for the podium and I should go for it! illepall
Really sweet would be if we had two sets of configuration, one for racing, one for training/qualifying and we could change between the two via keyboard. Now I know that I only need to call up the LFSC gui and change the options. Unfortunately the black gui problem hinders me. Anyway it would be much cooler to have two separate configs between which we could change with a simple keypress. For example during race I need lap, position and "for position" messages while for qualifying split times and fuel left would be more interesting.
Maybe it's easier to implement something like this than getting LFSC to recognize the difference between racing and qualifying?
Another useful feature would be a "shut up" key which makes the pit quiet for let's say until after the next lap. This would come in handy when you're entering a tough battle for position and don't want to be distracted by information that is unwanted at this moment.

Finally finally some problem that's probably impossible to overcome: LFSC seems to have a nasty habit of talking to me while I negotiate the most crucial corners of a track. That's bad because I turned up the radio volume a bit to understand it better. But now it cancels out the skid sounds from the tyres which are important for me. So I'm usually a bit slower on the power than necessary just to be on the safe side.
Do you think there's any way to make the message queue wait for an appropriate moment like when the speed ist above some predefined limit or something?

Having said all of this, I already enjoy LFSC very much the way it works now and I'm using it most of the time. These are just suggestions how it could be made even better (at least for me! )

Thanks very much for your work on this.

Crowley

arrrrgh. I just lost the post as I typed my reply to your last comment! So infuriating, ok here goes again - only perhaps a bit briefer! ...

1. The lap announcement: I think it works better this way after considering the atlernative, changes in the laps remaining state because you are lapped and long lists of queed messages as you cross the line (some of which are already culled because of the message triggers at this point). Both systems have similar flaws, so it's 6 of one and half a dozen of the other, without a complex heuristic to more accurately reflect what a Human pit crew would tell you then it's going to be flawed.

Quote :

Another nice touch would be, if the fuel messages wouldn't tell you the amount of fuel left in percent but in laps "You have fuel for 10 more laps" or "You can go 3 more laps".

This will happen because I want it too, but it's a mid-long term enhancement .

Quote :

One more thing: The messages about "the car behind/in front is for position" etc. are sometimes very hectic.

One more thing indeed... . The current trigger is when the car ahead/behind changes but these are not cross referenced, I will look at if it is possible to add that which should solve issues regarding battling for position. There is currently a dead zone too which helps a lot. Really though this is designed for long races and i'd personally consider turning it off in races under 10-20 laps or so.

Quote :

It would be nice if the lap messages would adapt to the race length.

Good idea, after about 30% distance would seem about right to me.

Quote :

We really need the keyboard thing and with that a way to turn off/on pit radio.

It's coming! I need to figure out how to do the keyboard hooks, as i've not done anything of the kind for over a year and dont recall the commands to do it, only the methodology, once I figure that out it'll be very easy to add.

Quote :

while qualifying it keeps telling me that I'm headed for the podium and I should go for it! illepall

There will be new voice triggers for qualifying but these will come much later. It will auto-detect.

Quote :

Finally finally some problem that's probably impossible to overcome: LFSC seems to have a nasty habit of talking to me while I negotiate the most crucial corners of a track.

Interesting point. I can detect where a player is on a track, but I can't necessarily say what is a good time to give a message and what isn't so this might require a special tool to set which parts of which track you want to hear radio messages in.

Quote from Crowley :

The lap announcement ("last lap" etc.) could do with some improvement. I seem to remember reading somewhere here that those messages are triggered by the leader crossing start/finish. That's fine as long as you are the leader.
Some days ago I had a race, where I entered my penultimate lap when I was just in front of the race leader (let's not get into the ugly details, WHY I was so far behind... . Anyway shortly after beginning this lap I got the "last lap" message because the leader was crossing start/finish for his final lap. As he didn't catch me in this lap, I actually had nearly two more full laps to go.

Actually, you didn't have two laps to go. Because once the leader crosses the line, that's your last lap too. You'll just be X number of laps down. Though, I understand what you're saying.

Perhaps a somewhat easy way to fix this: If the observed car is on the lead lap, play "last lap" message. If not, play "leader just crossed the finish" message?

Quote :

One more thing: The messages about "the car behind/in front is for position" etc. are sometimes very hectic.

I found the same thing as well. Since the tool is designed for long races the short ones can become quite busy with radio chatter. I actually renamed the "racing for position" and "car is a place" messages so that I don't get them any longer. Now, I'll know if a car behind or in front is a lapped car, or if I am a lapped car, but I don't have to hear that every car on the track is "a position".

Quote :

Another useful feature would be a "shut up" key which makes the pit quiet for let's say until after the next lap.

Once Becky has a chance to get everything nailed down I don't think this will really be necessary. If we can stop all messages after the race finishes, turn off unnecessary messages during practice/qualifying, and somehow make the program a little more intelligent about when to play what, an on/off button and mode button won't be neccessary.

Quote from Cue-Ball :

Actually, you didn't have two laps to go.

Well, he wrote "nearly". And that is true; he wasn't lapped by the leader in the end.

And as to the mod itself, Becky...
As a representative of Polish players, I have to say that it's great and we've made our own sound samples, but you're never going to get a word of thanks from us

I think that after some improvements and tweaks, this one's going to be a "must-have". Good work