Maelstrom's FBI Editor

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 19 Oct 2005, 15:12

Upon request by various people in this thread I made an Excel worksheet that had some cool macros that load in FBI files. When I showed it to NOiZE, he really liked it. Thought it was great. And so, im releasing it to the Spring public in general, not just those few who read the obscure thread in the Development forum.

Features:
Edit unlimited FBI's simultaniously.
Easy to use interface.
Open existing FBI files into Excel, then Export them back out.
Tools for quick editing of all values.
Ability to dynamically add in new settings on the run.
Categorised Settings.
Looks damn fine to boot.

Go get it here:
http://maelstrom.wik3d.com/files/FBI/FBI%20Editor.xls

Todo list:
Make an TDF editor.
Put the FBI and TDF editors together in one workbook (probably wont happen)
Hyperlink the FBI weapon tags to the TDF weapons (if possible)

Any comments and stuff are welcome. Just made this cause I had nothing to do and people wanted it. If you like it, thats cool. If you hate it, thats also cool. But some people like it, so please dont dismiss it as total crap.

NOiZE · Post by **NOiZE** » 19 Oct 2005, 15:51

Excelent program i just love it :d

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 21 Oct 2005, 11:57

Ok. As per the other thread here, What if you set up the TDF editor as a seperate sheet from the FBI editor. That way you could have them both in the same program and zoom between the two on click easily (I think, I don't know excel so well...)

[edit] what you need to do is make the TDF editor define a code name for each weapon listing when you load them up (the code name should be the same as the weapon name that is found in the [NAME] in the TDF) and then have every FBI weapon listing hyperlink to the name assigned in it's data field in the other sheet.

I'm not sure if it allows you to assign a hyperlink to an defined code name if the code name hasn't been defined yet via VBcoding... if so it could create some scary instabilities and needs to be tested a few times, if not then you need to recheck all the inactive hyperlinks every time a new TDF is loaded to see if one of them now has a valid code name to link to.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 21 Oct 2005, 12:39

Well I COULD put them both together, but it could take a while. For now, you will have to stick with the two seperate programs, but that might happen eventually. The problem is with putting them together, is that apart from syntax, FBI and TDF files are completley different. Which gives us a major problem, as the code I currently have is designed specifically for FBI files. So unless I rewrite most of my code (which would probably be a good thing anyway, but...) it will be obcenley difficult, and I will require some help from people more knowledgeble than me, so I would have to wait till ATLEAST monday. (If you havnt figured it out already, I like doing things quickly, so monday is quite a while away for me.)

So... My to-do list:
Make a dropdown list of actions (Save, Open, Mathsbox, New Worksheet, ect)
Make an TDF editor.
Make the FBI editor dropdown a list of Weapons
Make +256 units overflow to another worksheet
Put the FBI and TDF editors together in one worksheet

Feel free to suggest more stuff.

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 21 Oct 2005, 14:14

Hyper link FBI weapon entries to thier TDF called equivalents if both files are open (to do after merging)

Pxtl · Post by **Pxtl** » 21 Oct 2005, 23:16

Tell me, I'm too lazy to look, but is the program actually coded using Excel scripting? Or does the program just create an excel spreadsheet using VBScript?

Because after all, there are other spreadsheet programs than excel that don't have a silly page-size-limit. OpenOffice for example.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 22 Oct 2005, 03:11

It uses Excel Macros, which are coded in VBA. Dont know how it would translate to another program, but it is worth a try. Where would I get this program you speak of?

Gnomre · Post by **Gnomre** » 22 Oct 2005, 03:27

http://www.openoffice.org

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 22 Oct 2005, 03:36

Will look into that. But, do people really want to download a 75mb file just to use this editor? I will try to make a version compatible with both, but I think Excel would be the smarter option, just because more people have it.

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 22 Oct 2005, 04:42

mmm... Excell is probably going to be more common amoungh your average user. But open office is a far better office suite then the microsoft line. You really aren't shooting yourself in the foot by using it.

Caydr · Post by **Caydr** » 22 Oct 2005, 16:05

When I go to save FBI files after doing the multiplication on the line of sight values, it just keeps on saying the directory I've chosen is invalid; even after I create a new directory called Output straight at C:. Any ideas?

By the way, how does your program handle values that come out as decimals? I don't think spring likes units with 181.3 LoS!

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 23 Oct 2005, 04:09

Crap. Bug found. Was using the 'Name' feild, not the 'UnitName' Feild as the file name. So you probably had an invalid character in there. Im about to release a new version. Should be out by the end of the day. Lots of stuff fixed, so expect it to work a bit better now.

EDIT: It appears you were right. I was able to save straight to my C:\ drive, but not anywhere else in it. I removed the check that was playing up, and checked if it was valid in a different way. Works fine now. Have no idea why it was playing up, but oh well.

As for invalid values and such, the FBI editor does NOT check at all if a value is correct or not. It is up to the user to do that. However, as Spring apparently does not support decimal places, I will add some options to the Maths Box (need a better name for it) for rounding and stuff.

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 23 Oct 2005, 05:26

Maelstrom wrote:Crap. Bug found. Was using the 'Name' feild, not the 'UnitName' Feild as the file name. So you probably had an invalid character in there. Im about to release a new version. Should be out by the end of the day. Lots of stuff fixed, so expect it to work a bit better now.

EDIT: It appears you were right. I was able to save straight to my C:\ drive, but not anywhere else in it. I removed the check that was playing up, and checked if it was valid in a different way. Works fine now. Have no idea why it was playing up, but oh well.

As for invalid values and such, the FBI editor does NOT check at all if a value is correct or not. It is up to the user to do that. However, as Spring apparently does not support decimal places, I will add some options to the Maths Box (need a better name for it) for rounding and stuff.

Spring supports decimals... just not in intregers.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 23 Oct 2005, 06:00

Well that makes sense, as the definition of an integer is a whole number...

Well, again cause of how its done, I wont easily be able to check to see if numbers are valid without seriously impeding on the adaptability of my code. So people will just have to stick it out and make the values valid themselfs.

On another note, I have made all the functions avaliable in a handy drop-down menu at the top. No more diving through the macros to find the Maths box.

PauloMorfeo · Post by **PauloMorfeo** » 23 Oct 2005, 07:31

Maelstrom wrote:Will look into that. But, do people really want to download a 75mb file just to use this editor? ...

If you're refering to the download of OpenOffice.org, i would expect many people aren't going to download it just to ... since they already have it instead of ms-Office (like me).

I can tell you that alot of OpenOffice.org instalations are beeing shiped with new PCs, here in Portugal, as to reduce costs. I don't know know how much users it has outside of Portugal, or outside of the *nix world, but there are plenty (it is becoming very common).
Also, it is feasible to make something for OpenOffice.org that will work in Windows, Linux, etc, etc.

But, as my opinion, by no means do something you're not willing to. If excel is what you want, do it.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 23 Oct 2005, 08:17

Well, I had a look at the OpenOffice, and it does look nice. The Editor opens up in OO, but the Macro's do not work properly. After reading the help files, it turns out that OO uses a slightly different language than the VBA language Excel uses. Right now, I am not willing to go through and convert the program to OO style macros, but I might in the future. It would be to much work, making the Excel on while also learning OO and coding in that as well. When I have finished the editor to a standard im happy with, I will probably convert it. But until then, you will have to use Excel.

On another note, v0.3 is now out, and you can go get it from here:
http://www.fileuniverse.com/?p=showitem&ID=1673

Fixed to many bugs to list
Added a Drop-down menu next to the help button (Look at the top. Its cool)
Did other stuff.

Test and leave comments again. The more comments, the better it gets.

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 23 Oct 2005, 11:16

Maelstrom wrote:Well that makes sense, as the definition of an integer is a whole number...

Well, again cause of how its done, I wont easily be able to check to see if numbers are valid without seriously impeding on the adaptability of my code. So people will just have to stick it out and make the values valid themselfs.

On another note, I have made all the functions avaliable in a handy drop-down menu at the top. No more diving through the macros to find the Maths box.

heh, don't worry about the decimals thing. It isn't like the notepad FBI versions tell us which inputs accept decimals and which don't, yours is a huge improvement already. We might be able to get you a list of every variable type in the future, but for now just pretend it doesn't exist.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 23 Oct 2005, 13:29

Just a question, How would you people like it if this was made into a .EXE that incorporates an Access database? That would solve alot of problems. Ofcourse, it would also raise alot of new ones, but we can deal with them as they come.

Advantages of Access:
No 255 unit limit.
Dont have to have Excel OR Access to use it.
Can use extremley complex filtering.
Faster.

Problem is, I have no idea how to work with Access. My Dad has offered to help me transfer it over once ive finished it in Excel, as he is good in both, but It will still take a while. So, when the Excel version is down and working well, I will take a little break from this to learn Access. Then, when Ive done that, expect tosee a flash new version with lots of cool features.

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But, while we are still with excel, I was wondering how you would like the program to handle Unit overflows from one sheet to the next. I can see three options:

1) Sort the units from say A-K, and L-Z. This should half the number of units on each page. Also make it relativley easy to find units. But you could STILL overflow, if you have LOTS of units.

2) Create a new sheet every time you run out of space. This would work well, as you would never run out of space. More sheets would keep getting added on. However, the units would not be sorted in any specific order, with units with different names starting everywhere. This would make things hard to find, and quite confusing. Also, if you want to insert a unit somewhere in the middle of it all, you would have to move lots of units just to fit one into the full sheet.

3) Let the users manually create new sheets when needed. This way, they can be sorted however you want, with as many sheets as you want. You could sort it as Arm/Core, Tanks/Kbots/Planes, Building/Non-building, ect. Of course, only one sorting option would be avaliabe, and you would have to implement that manually. Also, not everyone would know how to add a new sheet in. I could make a function for it I suppose, so it wouldnt be that hard.

So, Choose how you want units to overflow. If you have another suggestion, dont hesitate to post it. If you dont, just vote on the ones here.

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 23 Oct 2005, 13:55

I personally like system2. It shouldn't be too hard for me to figure out that if I'm working with the arm AK, it's gonna be somewhere on sheet 2, and then remember that for the rest of the time I'm using the program. The excell version still sorts alphabetically right?

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 23 Oct 2005, 13:58

Well, it only sorts alphabetically cause their opened alphabetically. Otherwise, no. If you add a unit in AFTER, then it will just appear at the end of the row. There is a sort button built into excel though, so you could use that.

Spring RTS Engine

Maelstrom's FBI Editor

Maelstrom's FBI Editor

Hmm