Gremnon's Patch Pack (GPP, r18413)

[Gremnon]

Here, as any OpenTTD Dev will confirm - if you use one patch, bugs go to the author of that patch. If you use a patchpack, it goes to the patchpack creator - me.
While I'll readily admit that debugging isn't my forte, if people can provide the same details as a normal bug (inc. crash dump and save) then it'll save a lot of time, because then I can try to replicate it myself, and attempt to localize the problem.

Which is where my now huge folder of various experiments come in. Each one has anywhere from one to four (currently) patches that the pack will use, excluding CargoDist itself, so if I feed the replicated results through each, I can find out which patch is the cause, and therefore, either fix it, or bring it to the attention of the patch owner if it happens in trunk as well.

[Gremnon]

Alright, we have a new opinion poll open. I'm not updating the thread's poll because it needs clearing from the last one, and I haven't figured that out yet.

The patch in question: Grass Growth on Old Tracks
The question: What do users want?

Some people have asked how to turn it off - the answer being, you can't. It doesn't do anything, except add some grass on old tracks. Just what it says on the can.
So, I'm putting it up for debate - do you want it to be included, excluded, or have the patch rebuilt with an option to disable it? (I'm not doing this one myself though, I've got enough to do before my own personal projects)

[petert]

I would take it out. It's rather annoying. I don't know what the patch bases it's time on (what is "old" and what is "new"), so most of my rails are usually covered in grass. Please don't include it. (Well, an option to disable would be great also)

[fonso]

Which is where my now huge folder of various experiments come in. Each one has anywhere from one to four (currently) patches that the pack will use, excluding CargoDist itself, so if I feed the replicated results through each, I can find out which patch is the cause, and therefore, either fix it, or bring it to the attention of the patch owner if it happens in trunk as well.

This won't work. You cannot load crash saves from cargodist in a game without cargodist. Cargodist extensively adds and modifies chunks in the savegame (just as probably half of your other patches).

[Gremnon]

I wasn't thinking of loading the game - if I can identify what happened at the time of the crash gameplay wise, then I can replicated it in each of those separate builds to narrow it down on which patch.
True, in some cases it wouldn't fully work, but I think this way would help, at least.

One more patch update - Trafficlights. After a fair bit of work... it's not being included. Not for now, anyway.

[Gremnon]

Four pieces of news.

First: Grass growth on old tracks. As few people have commented on this, and those who have, have asked for its removal or to have an option to disable it, it has been removed from the pack for now. I'll possibly look into making it toggleable another time.

Second: New patch being considered for addition: AI Config - move AIs up and down the list.

Third: Another new patch being considered: Close adjacent level crossings

Fourth: At present, work on the pack is on hold because my laptop has just been formatted and restored into Fedora (As opposed to Ubuntu) and I'm still working on getting it back up to normal operation. Once I've got that, I'll continue working on this.
Do be patient, because I'm not sure if/when I'll actually manage to put out another one, but at least for now you have an idea of what might/might not be in the final build.

[petert]

Second: New patch being considered for addition: AI Config - move AIs up and down the list.

Only considered? Well, the way I see it, it's a great feature. It doesn't modify very much code, and it's easily update able.

[Gremnon]

The patches are marked as considered, because until I track down one last package hiding from me in Fedora's repositories, I can't actually compile anything. There is, irritatingly, no equivilent of Ubuntu's build-essential package that pulls in all the needed packages, and I'm missing just one.

Once I have that, and I can get back to work on the pack, then they'll move on. Most patches have been pushed back to 'considered' actually, since I lost a fair bit of test data I was using for what patches worked with what other patches etc. I'm working on it.

Also, OT, but I strongly recommend not relying on Fedora's IRC channel if you ever use Fedora, anyone. I just left it after I got nothing but abuse thrown at me for asking a simple question.

[petert]

Also, OT, but I strongly recommend not relying on Fedora's IRC channel if you ever use Fedora, anyone. I just left it after I got nothing but abuse thrown at me for asking a simple question.

What kind of abuse? Did you ask a question that was covered in the FAQ? I can't imagine that they would just yell at you for no reason.

[Gremnon]

You know in Ubuntu, you can just go System->Preferances->Login Screen to change the GDM login screen's settings? It's part of Gnome, and the binary for it is called gdmsetup.
Well, completely unknown to me, Fedora uses a different branch of Gnome as it's base, one that doesn't have that in, and as a result of their choice in Gnome branch, it hasn't been for several releases of Fedora. So when I asked where it was, or what package to find it in - I know now, but at the time I didn't - I think they must have had enough of people complaining (or their words, whining) about it being missing for so long, and taken it out on me.

The Fedora forums seem to show that a lot of people want gdmsetup, but that Fedora doesn't seem interested in either changing branch, or making a temporary replacement until it comes back again. It seems to me that if your users want something back that you removed, you give it back to them, but then I've never been in the position of being a developer of a distribution.

Back on topic again, I found the package, thanks to 'yum search' on the command line. Yum on the command line is much quicker than any graphic package manager, and better than apt-get too, IMO.

[Gremnon]

Ladies and gentlemen, and anyone else who doesn't fit into either category, I give you the next generation of Gremnon's Patch Pack!
After a whole lot of work, a lot of lost patience, and some mucking around in source code, it's finally finished, and finally here.

Please note that the Google Code pages are in need of an overhaul to bring them up to date, so please don't rely on them to be fully accurate.
However, attached to this post, you'll find The patch against r18413

Due to time constraints, and changes in trunk, I'm afraid trunk compatibility is unlikely (The finished pack hasn't been tested as yet, so I can't be sure)
So without further ado, here is the new current list of patches in this version of the patch:
-As promised, this is build on CargoDist technology, giving all of the benefits of all parts of it, including the small map zoom
-Diagonal Level and Clear
-Closing of Adjacent level crossings
-AI Config - move up and down
-Airport Upgrade (Note - Airport Close and the More Airports have been removed due to conflicts with other patches, and trunk changes)
-Autoload face
-Building of a road up to an obstacle
-Build while paused in editor
-Caternary over 3rd rail type (For those Japanset users)
-No Air crashes
-Passenger-only signals
-Query Land Shortcut (Why is this not in trunk, one wonders)
-The much requested Reduced tree growth
-Improved reliability (Trains don't lose reliability while loading/unloading at a station)
-and finally, Transfer with Shift-Click

There are some absences, for various reasons, some of them explained in that above list, but this is the present list.
Enjoy.

[petert]

I get the following error after successfully patching the latest trunk. Other than that, it looks like the development of GPP can be continued! (I will update my List of Known PatchPacks)

[Gremnon]

New patch uploaded in my previous post. I forgot to mark one file for inclusion when I generated the patch.
Which just goes to show how important one file can be.

[petert]

Gremnon, could you make me a project owner please? I'd like to clean up the site a bit, eg edit descriptions, make old files non-featured. I can only do this if I am a project owner. I will upload a win32 binary in a bit.

[Gremnon]

I think I've just done that. Sometimes the GC administration interface doesn't make sense to me, so I might be mistaken.

[petert]

Yes, you have. Thanks

[Gremnon]

No problem.
I have to stress that this has had no testing at all. My experimental builds with 1-3 patches have, but all of them together, haven't. So if you're worried about losing data to a crash, turn on the autosave.
That said, I've had little trouble so far, but if I'm the only one testing it...
Anyway, enjoy it all. I'm having a break. I think I've earned it this time.

[petert]

New patch uploaded in my previous post. I forgot to mark one file for inclusion when I generated the patch.

I still get the following error. (Perhaps you should try and patch the source against latest trunk and compile before uploading another patch)

[Gremnon]

I think I might have tracked it down, were you using the right revision of trunk?

[petert]

I think I might have tracked it down, were you using the right revision of trunk?

No, I was using the latest revision, r18467. I will retry with the proper revision.