Oolite Bulletins

Capt. Murphy wrote:

Maybe we need a overide_universal flag for such projects so OXPs that want to change these settings for individual systems are not overwritten by OXP's that include universal settings in the planetinfo. It would also be nice if the log file reported if there are multiple OXP's with universal settings and report which one 'won'.

My understanding was that, this is exactly how the universal setting works. I haven't tested that part though. Wildblood's Sensible SUN uses the universal setting, and in his read me he states that the OXP will be overridden by any OXP that specifically addresses a system. Can anyone confirm my understanding.

Gimi wrote:

Capt. Murphy wrote:

Maybe we need a overide_universal flag for such projects so OXPs that want to change these settings for individual systems are not overwritten by OXP's that include universal settings in the planetinfo. It would also be nice if the log file reported if there are multiple OXP's with universal settings and report which one 'won'.

My understanding was that, this is exactly how the universal setting works. I haven't tested that part though. Wildeblood's Sensible SUN uses the universal setting, and in his read me he states that the OXP will be overridden by any OXP that specifically addresses a system. Can anyone confirm my understanding.

Correct. I created Sensible Sun shortly after the episode I described above. I prefer smaller than default suns, but on that occasion I wanted one, and only one, system to have a larger than normal sun. I was frustrated by Farsun (which uses javascript, not planetinfo settings) moving my star further away, after I had specifically defined it to be closer.

If the player, or OXPs like Sensible Sun, Lights Down or Clear Skies, alter the universal defaults in planetinfo, they don't interfere with OXPs like "Tianve" that re-style one specific system. There's no need to maintain a list of exceptions or over-rides as there is with the javascript OXPs like Farsun, System Redux etc.

Thanks Wildblood, good to know.

The reason I don't use anything that changes the space globally is precisely because of these incompatibilities - not only among themselves but also (at least previously) with some missions.

Gimi wrote:

I have put together a replacement for this written in openstep rather than XML. It' an easy little script for a beginner, like me, to start with, and it should be easy for the player to adjust values to his or her liking. I will publish later today or tomorrow under the name Darkspace.oxp. Just need to write the read-me and pack it up. Murgh will be duly credited as the origin of the idea.

Don't forget to include a license...

Cmdr. Maegil wrote:

The reason I don't use anything that changes the space globally is precisely because of these incompatibilities - not only among themselves but also (at least previously) with some missions.

If I understand Wildblood and the "universal" setting correct, it will be overwritten by any OXP targeting that specific setting. Thus, incompatibility should only occur when another OXP uses "universal" with the same settings. So for something like clearskies.oxp or darkspace.oxp it's perfect.

From the Wiki

Universal settings

Some options can be applied to the entire universe, such as ambient lighting levels, eg.

<key>universal</key>
<dict>
...
</dict>

Universal options can be overriden by specifying the same option for a specific system or location in interstellar space. Obviously, not all options make sense to apply to the whole universe.

Gimi wrote:

Cmdr. Maegil wrote:

The reason I don't use anything that changes the space globally is precisely because of these incompatibilities - not only among themselves but also (at least previously) with some missions.

If I understand Wildblood and the "universal" setting correct, it will be overwritten by any OXP targeting that specific setting. Thus, incompatibility should only occur when another OXP uses "universal" with the same settings. So for something like clearskies.oxp or darkspace.oxp it's perfect.

From the Wiki

Universal settings

Some options can be applied to the entire universe, such as ambient lighting levels, eg.

<key>universal</key>
<dict>
...
</dict>

Universal options can be overriden by specifying the same option for a specific system or location in interstellar space. Obviously, not all options make sense to apply to the whole universe.

The main problem is, oxp's can not change the data at planetinfo easily. It is much better to do them by script and providing a way for special systems to be excluded is a better idea. The reason I posted that is currently as a team we are working on an OXP which will have specific behaviors for a certain system. And if we can not find a OXP way of overriding that behaviour we will end up writing this mission OXP is not compatible with such and such OXP, and I think it is not fare to tell the player they can not have their favorite OXP's to play the mission.

What about if you set the system info via js while exiting witchspace? That should override all plists.