Happy Birthday!

[frosch]

Today, 10 years ago, August 11th 2002 TTDPatch 1.8.2 alpha 4 was released.
What is special about this particular release?

A small item in the Changelog talking about a newships feature. In detail this means some extended processing of the file "ttdpatch.grf". After the first 48 sprites (presignals) it allowed putting a new type of sprite, called "pseudosprite" into the file. These pseudosprites could further be distinguished into something called "Action 0" to "Action 3" - the foundation of NewGRFs!

While 1.8.2 alpha 4 allowed only a single NewGRF file, which also contained other stuff in front, the basic layout of Action 1-2-3
chains was settled. (Though "chain" might be an exaggeration since there were no variational or random actions, so you could not chain them.)

This first format experienced some syntactical changes throughout the process, so the original format and also the format used by TTDPatch 1.9 (2002-10-29) is not supported (anymore) by todays TTDPatch and OpenTTD. It took till TTDPatch 2.0 (2003-09-26) to settle for something called GRF version 2.

Independent of these releases, today seems to be most appropiate to party the 10th anniversary of NewGRFs!


So far, for the general announcement. Do you want to know more? Do you want to know how the first version of NewGRF specs for TTDPatch 1.8.2 alpha 4 looked like?
Take a look at the following links and summarized history of 10 years of NewGRF spec evolution. (There are some more details in the beginning, since the announcements were kind of bigger and the changes were faster; later on bigger stuff was done, which took months, so you cannot give a meaningful date.)

Also, feel free to share your NewGRF-related stories and memories

2002-08-11 1.8.2 alpha 4
[list]
[*] Only single grf file (ttdpatch.grf), first 48 sprites were presignals, then real NewGRF stuff starts.
[*] Supporting action 0, 1, 2 and 3 for ships.
[*] Though some changes in the format were made up to 2.0, the basic Action 1-2-3 method is settled.[/list]

[list]
[*] Mailing list: http://lists.ttdpatch.net/ttdpatch/200208/msg00032.html
[*] Forum: http://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?p=1677#p1677
[*] Specs: http://hg.openttd.org/developers/frosch ... newgrf.txt[/list]

2002-10-29 1.9
[list]
[*] First stable release with support for NewShips.
[*] Compared to 1.8.2 alpha 4, Action 4 is new and there are some other marginal changes.[/list]

[list]
[*] Mailing list: http://lists.ttdpatch.net/ttdpatch-anno ... 00002.html
[*] Specs: http://hg.openttd.org/developers/frosch ... newgrf.txt[/list]

2003-12-10 1.9.1 alpha 5
[list]
[*] Configuration of grf files via newgrf.txt (no longer everything in ttdpatch.grf)
[*] Action 5
[*] Grf parameters, Action 6 and 7[/list]

2003-01-13 1.9.1 alpha 13
[list]
[*] Random and variational action 2 (types 80 and 81)[/list]

[list]
[*] Mailing list: http://lists.ttdpatch.net/ttdpatch/200301/msg00049.html
[*] Forum: http://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?t=1991
[*] Specs: http://hg.openttd.org/developers/frosch ... newgrf.txt[/list]

2003-09-26 2.0
[list]
[*] GRF version bump to 2 (all previous files are considered incompatible)
[*] All 4 vehicle types, Action 0 to A as we know them today basically (well, lots of additions in the details)[/list]

[list]
[*] Mailing list: http://lists.ttdpatch.net/ttdpatch-anno ... 00002.html
[*] Specs: http://hg.openttd.org/developers/frosch ... newgrf.txt[/list]

2003-10-12 2.0.1 alpha 3
[list]
[*] 40+x variables[/list]

2004
[list]
[*] callbacks (2004-01-25 2.0.1 alpha 11)
[*] 15bit callback results (2004-11-22 2.0.1 alpha 40)
[*] new stations
[*] canals
[*] bridges
[*] houses
[*] nforenum
[*] grfmaker[/list]

2005
[list]
[*] advanced varaction2 (2005-07-09 2.0.1 alpha 54)
[*] 60+x variables (2005-08-07 2.0.1 alpha 56)
[*] sound support (2005-08-21 2.0.1 alpha 57)
[*] cargo translation table (2005-10-21 2.0.1 alpha 66)
[*] industries
[*] cargos
[*] townnames[/list]

2006
[list]
[*] start of grf version 7 (2006-01-22 2.0.1 alpha 70)
[*] UTF-8 support (2006-02-13 2.0.1 alpha 73)[/list]

2007-2008
[list]
[*] Dark age of NewGRFs
[*] There is nothing really new in these years. Previous developers left the projects; new ones had not yet caught up with NewGRF stuff.
[*] In retrospect there seem to be quite some additions which were unnecessary/wrong due to general unknownness under the remaining/new developers.
[*] OpenTTD 0.6.0 (2008-04-01): Approximately GRF feature parity between TTDPatch and OpenTTD. (the missing bits were basically unused)[/list]

2009
[list]
[*] begin of NewGRF spec consolidation (reviewing of existing specs, discovering inconsistencies between Specs, TTDPatch and OpenTTD)
[*] engine pool (up to 64k vehicles)[/list]

2010
[list]
[*] airport tiles
[*] railtypes
[*] objects
[*] Action 14 (parameter GUI)
[*] NML[/list]

2011
[list]
[*] GRF version 8[/list]

2012
[list]
[*] nfo32 and GRF container 2[/list]

[V453000 :)]

Birthday Happy!

[michael blunck]

Today, 10 years ago, August 11th 2002 TTDPatch 1.8.2 alpha 4 was released.
What is special about this particular release?

A small item in the Changelog talking about a newships feature. In detail this means some extended processing of the file "ttdpatch.grf". After the first 48 sprites (presignals) it allowed putting a new type of sprite, called "pseudosprite" into the file. These pseudosprites could further be distinguished into something called "Action 0" to "Action 3" - the foundation of NewGRFs! [...]

Very interesting find! And indeed, NewShips was the very first newGRF, released october 2002, together with TTDPatch 1.9.

Also, feel free to share your NewGRF-related stories and memories

I´ve been checking my mail archives, and this mail seems to be the first one still available, discussing both the new features of "newgrfs" and the work on NewShips:

At 06:54 AM 02/08/02, Michael Blunck wrote:

>>>> Oh, I didn't mean to rush you, just that you send me what you have
>>>> already so I can test it and see whether it'll work as I think it would.

> Attached you´ll find a zip archive containing pcx and nfo files of some ship
> graphics (test version). Type and loading status are marked in the NFO file.
> Nevertheless sprite numbers in this file are irrelevant, also the file name,
> hrrmm.

Thanks, that was very helpful. I have now managed to include them in
ttdpatch.grf, and load them in the game. However, the ships show up
invisible in the game, so there's obviously another bug I have to take care of.

> [drawing sprites "on the fly"]

>>>> But how do you decide when to draw a different sprite rather
>>>> than a regular one?

>>> Well, I wouldn't. I'd base it on refitting a ship to show a certain type
>>> of cargo.

> Yeah, that´s the problem because there are more than one ship for a special
> cargo (e.g. passengers, oil, goods).

Yeah, but there are also four different models available - two tankers and
two cargo ships right now. So that makes it possible to draw four
different ships for each cargo type. It wouldn't work very nice though
because you can't just select the type from a list.

> Mmh, I had the vision that there would be a list of all vehicle types
> somewhere inside the game, from which a routine gets names and data of new
> models which come into availability at a specific date. And that it would
> possible to add our new models to that list? Unfortunately I have no
> knowledge about ttd´s code so it´s just a guess.

Yes, there is such a list, but it's full already. There are 256 different
types of vehicles, and adding more is not easily possible. What's even
more difficult though is adding ships to the list of ships that you can
buy. TTD's GUI is awfully complicated and very time consuming to
change. I found that out when I did the bribe option...

But as I said, it might be possible to switch between two alternative lists
using the Ctrl key when opening the purchase window. But having all of
them on one list is not very feasible.

In any case, thanks for your work and I'm sure I'll have it working in the
game very soon.

Oh and by the way, what exactly is a reefer?

Josef

Thanks again to Josef (and Marcin, Oskar, Csaba, Dale, Steven, Lakie, Jonathan, ..) for years of creative work on TTDPatch/newgrf, and thanks to OpenTTD developers carrying on with developing one of the most interesting games at all.

regards
Michael

[andythenorth]

I should draw a cake

[orudge]

Ah, the old days of TTDPatch, that brings back a few memories. Happy birthday, NewGRF! And thanks to the many, many people who have gone on to keep this community alive by creating wonderful content for the game.

[Eddi]

i somehow missed that time.

I vaguely remember having TTDPatch 1.6/1.7, and then OpenTTD 0.4.0 (yes, that was only available for one week!)

[Yoshi]

I tried to translate your post into german:

http://www.tt-ms.de/forum/showthread.ph ... 9#pid81349