Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

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Geo Ghost
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Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

Post by Geo Ghost »

Hey all.

This idea crossed my mind some time ago, and it's just today popped back in my head.
The spark for this idea comes from trying to flick through my vehicle orders, sometimes which can be pretty long and filled with waypoints/stations, trying to find a particular station. It sometimes becomes difficult to read and leads to sometimes getting orders wrong when customizing or changing.

So I wondered... what if orders could have a custom colour chosen rather than just all black, and possibly if a 'default' can be enabled for order types (such as stations, waypoints, depot, etc).
Had a quick type in the search function, and didn't get anything up (unless I haven't used the right key words of course).

To help communicate how I was envisioning the idea in my head, I've drawn up a couple of concepts for what I feel might be an interesting and helpful little feature.
White has been preserved as 'selected order', allowing access to another bottom for selecting an individual colour. Preserved black on the station cargo/stopping position options to make it easier to identify.

Be interesting to see what people might think to such an idea, if others might find it beneficial, and of course if it is possible in the first place :D

All the best!
Order_Colours_Concept.png
Order_Colours_Concept.png (262.28 KiB) Viewed 1283 times
Order_Colour_Concept2.png
Order_Colour_Concept2.png (77.03 KiB) Viewed 1283 times
skc
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Re: Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

Post by skc »

I love the idea.
I don't think it would be terribly difficult to implement either.

I'd certainly find it handy with my trams - I use conditional orders a fair bit wit them as I usually use them to collect passengers in a town to take them to a train station or airport, and I don't want them to go to the transfer point until they are at least nearly full. This will make it much easier to read the order list.
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Geo Ghost
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Re: Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

Post by Geo Ghost »

skc wrote: 10 Dec 2022 01:33 I'd certainly find it handy with my trams - I use conditional orders a fair bit wit them as I usually use them to collect passengers in a town to take them to a train station or airport, and I don't want them to go to the transfer point until they are at least nearly full. This will make it much easier to read the order list.
This is something I am starting to play around with. Conditional orders and such.
Having a complex route or order pattern can be difficult to read a bulk of orders I find. Find things easier to read when separated by colour, figured others might have a similar learning/reading technique :)
LaChupacabra
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Re: Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

Post by LaChupacabra »

Yes, that would definitely be helpful. :) In many cases. One of these may be ship routes, where there are a thousand buoys in the orders. Sometimes it's hard to find important orders among them.

Example:
Below you have a not too long schedule of ferry connections. They are bi-directional, i.e. A-B-C + C-B-A. There is an mistake in the orders because one of the stations has not been added in one of the directions. Try to find this mistake. ;)
Color orders x.png
Color orders x.png (34.26 KiB) Viewed 1159 times
With color marked orders it would be much easier.
Color orders v2.png
Color orders v2.png (38.62 KiB) Viewed 1159 times
I am sorry for may English. I know is bed.
mrjack2
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Re: Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

Post by mrjack2 »

A great suggestion. I've created depot orders then deleted the depots to get a red "invalid order", to create some visual structure for my complex conditional order schemes. See below for an example. Order colours could potentially help with this even further, as could non-order items such as headings.

RNknysq.png
(165.72 KiB) Not downloaded yet
Nathkel
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Re: Suggestion: Custom colours for Vehicle Orders

Post by Nathkel »

+1!
As an alternative, for players who might get lost in the visual chaos of different colors, I would also like to suggest different indentations or even custom bullets. Any of these would help in the analysis of our systems.
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