Forums » Community Projects
AutoNote - Insert Targetless Ore Data Into Sector Notes
Hello - I have created a small plugin to complement Targetless and aid in the finding of ore when you need it.
I have tested this quite extensively myself on my Windows 7 machine, and I am happy with the results so far, so I would now like to see if anyone else might find this useful and use/test it for me - as well as offering feedback and suggestions (such as more features).
This is my first plugin for VO and so I would be grateful if an experienced plugin maker would cast and eye over my code and let me know of any obvious (or not so obvious) problems.
Targetless is required - if you don't use Targetless this plugin will do nothing for you!
Name: AutoNote
Version: 1.0
What does it do?
It uses roid data collected by Targetless to automatically insert some useful roid and ore information into all sector notes in every system where you have scanned at least one asteroid.
NOTE: This plugin will not erase your existing notes, it will simply add an insert to the top or bottom of any existing notes (you can change which with the append mode, see usage below).
What it inserts will look something like this (although the ore roid numbers should be aligned in game):
====== AutoNote ======
Scanned 110 roids...
Carbonic: 94 roids
Ferric: 78 roids
VanAzek: 29 roids
Lanthanic: 12 roids
====== AutoNote ======
Why do I want to do that?
The big reason is that notes are searchable - so you can very quickly find where the ore is that you're looking for, assuming you have found it somewhere in the past.
The secondary reason is to have a nice compact snapshot of ore contents on the navigation screen.
How do I use it?
Download the zip and extract to your plugins folder.
***Probably best to backup your notes just in case - to do this copy all the files in the Vendetta Online/settings/<character name>/ directory.
In-game usage is:
/autonote import - create/update system notes - use this when you first install it (and again after any future prospecting session, I might add an on-the-fly mode so you only need to import once, but that depends on demand as I am happy using it how it is).
/autonote append - toggle append mode (by default AutoNote inserts at the top of notes - if you turn append mode on it will insert then at the bottom instead).
/autonote remove - removes all AutoNotes from your sector notes.
DOWNLOAD
I have tested this quite extensively myself on my Windows 7 machine, and I am happy with the results so far, so I would now like to see if anyone else might find this useful and use/test it for me - as well as offering feedback and suggestions (such as more features).
This is my first plugin for VO and so I would be grateful if an experienced plugin maker would cast and eye over my code and let me know of any obvious (or not so obvious) problems.
Targetless is required - if you don't use Targetless this plugin will do nothing for you!
Name: AutoNote
Version: 1.0
What does it do?
It uses roid data collected by Targetless to automatically insert some useful roid and ore information into all sector notes in every system where you have scanned at least one asteroid.
NOTE: This plugin will not erase your existing notes, it will simply add an insert to the top or bottom of any existing notes (you can change which with the append mode, see usage below).
What it inserts will look something like this (although the ore roid numbers should be aligned in game):
====== AutoNote ======
Scanned 110 roids...
Carbonic: 94 roids
Ferric: 78 roids
VanAzek: 29 roids
Lanthanic: 12 roids
====== AutoNote ======
Why do I want to do that?
The big reason is that notes are searchable - so you can very quickly find where the ore is that you're looking for, assuming you have found it somewhere in the past.
The secondary reason is to have a nice compact snapshot of ore contents on the navigation screen.
How do I use it?
Download the zip and extract to your plugins folder.
***Probably best to backup your notes just in case - to do this copy all the files in the Vendetta Online/settings/<character name>/ directory.
In-game usage is:
/autonote import - create/update system notes - use this when you first install it (and again after any future prospecting session, I might add an on-the-fly mode so you only need to import once, but that depends on demand as I am happy using it how it is).
/autonote append - toggle append mode (by default AutoNote inserts at the top of notes - if you turn append mode on it will insert then at the bottom instead).
/autonote remove - removes all AutoNotes from your sector notes.
DOWNLOAD
Good idea! The ability to search for roids is really missing in Targetless. I will test that plugin.
Nice plugin idea.
Code-wise, I suggest in lines 142-148 determining the number of tabs to use based on the number of characters in the ore name. That will make your plugin a little more robust if any new ore types get added to the game.
As far as ideas for new features go, I suggest saving the aggregate data for all the sectors of a system in the notes for that system. Then the player could zoom out to the system map and see at a glance what is in each system by placing the cursor over each system. Having the total number of each ore type as well as the the number of sectors with at least one roid containing each ore type would be good. You could include average number or roids per sector too, along with whatever other stats you can think of.
It would also be cool to colorize the sectors in the navmap based on the ore content. I'm thinking you could add a dropdown menu to the navmap from which you can select an ore type and then colorize all sectors with that ore. You could even make the ore color darker for sectors with higher numbers of that ore. A good starting point would be to use the colors targetless uses for the ore types, which can be found in targetless/var.lua in the table targetless.var.orecolor.
I don't have much experience in setting sector colors in the navmap, but I know the plugin NavComp does it. See the navcomp.pda:PaintSystemHazards function found in NavComp/ui/pda.lua for specifics.
There are three different places to find the navmap within VO's various interfaces: CapShipPDAShipNavigationTab [1][1][1], PDAShipNavigationTab[1][1][1], & StationPDAShipNavigationTab[1][1][1]. I recommend using the table viewer in DevKit to see how things are structured (you'll want to enable the ReadIUP checkbox).
You can test changing the color of a sector from the console:
/lua PDAShipNavigationTab[1][1][1]["COLOR4609"] = "255 255 0"
That changes the color of Dau A-1 to yellow (assuming you are not in a station or capship).
Code-wise, I suggest in lines 142-148 determining the number of tabs to use based on the number of characters in the ore name. That will make your plugin a little more robust if any new ore types get added to the game.
As far as ideas for new features go, I suggest saving the aggregate data for all the sectors of a system in the notes for that system. Then the player could zoom out to the system map and see at a glance what is in each system by placing the cursor over each system. Having the total number of each ore type as well as the the number of sectors with at least one roid containing each ore type would be good. You could include average number or roids per sector too, along with whatever other stats you can think of.
It would also be cool to colorize the sectors in the navmap based on the ore content. I'm thinking you could add a dropdown menu to the navmap from which you can select an ore type and then colorize all sectors with that ore. You could even make the ore color darker for sectors with higher numbers of that ore. A good starting point would be to use the colors targetless uses for the ore types, which can be found in targetless/var.lua in the table targetless.var.orecolor.
I don't have much experience in setting sector colors in the navmap, but I know the plugin NavComp does it. See the navcomp.pda:PaintSystemHazards function found in NavComp/ui/pda.lua for specifics.
There are three different places to find the navmap within VO's various interfaces: CapShipPDAShipNavigationTab [1][1][1], PDAShipNavigationTab[1][1][1], & StationPDAShipNavigationTab[1][1][1]. I recommend using the table viewer in DevKit to see how things are structured (you'll want to enable the ReadIUP checkbox).
You can test changing the color of a sector from the console:
/lua PDAShipNavigationTab[1][1][1]["COLOR4609"] = "255 255 0"
That changes the color of Dau A-1 to yellow (assuming you are not in a station or capship).
First of all, thank you both for testing and for the feedback.
I have taken on board your comment about determining string length of ore names and that is a really good idea, I will certainly do that in the next "release".
I like the idea of aggregate data on the system notes screen and I could certainly add that.
I am not entirely convinced of the need for the system colouration though - my main thoughts being that there are so many different rods on a system by system basis that colouring them for one or another would be pretty meaningless. The idea of the drop down to choose which ore to highlight is interesting - but again the fact that you can search notes does reduce the usefulness of it - because a user would get the same information (or very similar) simply by searching the system notes for a given ore.
My primary concern when adding new features is that there is already at least one plugin available to certain guilds that does something similar to this (and many other nice features) and I am not sure that re-inventing the wheel is the best idea (I have had a lot of people tell me I will get no interest in this plugin for that reason).
Having said that I do have some ideas to really enhance this.
The first thing is to have the system automatically import newly scanned roid data while enabled - and also do something with the actual percentage of ore, asteroid type/size, and so on, to make it easy to see actually how much ore you are likely to be able to mine of a given type in a given sector.
For now though I am busy scanning systems for this bloody elusive Xithricite. xD
I have taken on board your comment about determining string length of ore names and that is a really good idea, I will certainly do that in the next "release".
I like the idea of aggregate data on the system notes screen and I could certainly add that.
I am not entirely convinced of the need for the system colouration though - my main thoughts being that there are so many different rods on a system by system basis that colouring them for one or another would be pretty meaningless. The idea of the drop down to choose which ore to highlight is interesting - but again the fact that you can search notes does reduce the usefulness of it - because a user would get the same information (or very similar) simply by searching the system notes for a given ore.
My primary concern when adding new features is that there is already at least one plugin available to certain guilds that does something similar to this (and many other nice features) and I am not sure that re-inventing the wheel is the best idea (I have had a lot of people tell me I will get no interest in this plugin for that reason).
Having said that I do have some ideas to really enhance this.
The first thing is to have the system automatically import newly scanned roid data while enabled - and also do something with the actual percentage of ore, asteroid type/size, and so on, to make it easy to see actually how much ore you are likely to be able to mine of a given type in a given sector.
For now though I am busy scanning systems for this bloody elusive Xithricite. xD
I support this thread!
Great job ViniH, we should chat in-game sometime and exchange ideas :)
Great job ViniH, we should chat in-game sometime and exchange ideas :)
Don't think he'll be around anymore drazed.
http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/1/26784?page=2#326232
http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/1/26784?page=2#326232
yeah I saw that after I posted >.>
Perhaps someone should continue on the same lines as this plugin is. You know, make it more useful?
Prolly.