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It is a great progress bar compared to many others I've seen, but my point is that the concept of a progress bar is unnecessary and only causes people to watch it with unnecessary anticipation. Who cares EXACTLY when something will load. If it's 5 seconds, 10 seconds, who gives a sheet?! It only matters whether something IS loading or whether it isn't and has frozen, which in Open Rails' case, really only matters the first time loading a particular route is attempted. If it loads the first time, you can pretty much assume it will load the same way everytime, and from then on you already "know" approximately how much time it will take to load and the progress bar becomes redundant and at that point only serves to remind people they should have the fear that, like the dozens of other progess bars they've suffered thru over the years, that it will get to 95% and freeze. Unless you put a sign on it that says, "our progress bar is different from other progress bar you've ever seen", people will have the same unnecessary anticipation/anxiety they do with every other progress bar. With OR, your not loading a terabyte into memory, just a few hundred MB, and anyone running a fast enough machine to run Open Rails will assume that isn't going to take 2 minutes or 5 minutes or 10 minutes. I have a quad-core 3.6Ghz machine with 110 routes installed. I don't think anything's ever taken more than 15 seconds to load. If a route won't load in 25-30 seconds the first time I try it, then I know there's a problem. More likely, with OR, the "bad" route's error will just throw you back to the menu anyway. I don't think I've ever had to hit the Reset button because a route wouldn't load in OR. And that's really what the progress bar was for - to tell you your machine is locked up and needs a Reset (or a CRTL/ALT/DEL). I'm no psychologist, but I had a TRS-80 and an original Mac and was a beta tester for Win 95 & 98 and have worked in hardware and software and the internet and built every machine I've used for 20 years, and I know that a progress bar is unnecessary now that modern hardware and OS's work reliably. Using a "Knight Rider"-style bar that simply shows an animation that indicates that the computer is still doing something and hasn't locked up serves the purpose and doesn't cause people to stare at it with anticipation. Do you not stare at the progress bar when something is loading? Take note everytime you load a route and see if you're not staring at the progress bar, unnecessarily rooting for it to work correctly when you already know it will. Plus, I just don't see other games/simulations implementing it. I see it as a relic of a bygone era.
This all goes back to my original post issue-- you said that it is an XNA issue that now keeps me from being able to ALT-TAB back to another program while a route loads, but as I mentioned, this was not an issue in the 0.9beta. I could toggle back over to Winamp and click play or continue reading a webpage while a route was loading and when it was ready it would reassert focus and come up fullscreen ready to go. Now, with the experimentals since 0.9, if you do the same thing, OR still comes up but none of the scenery has loaded, it's just an empty gray world. Did something change with XNA between the time 0.9 was released and now, or did something in OR change? It used to be really cool to select an activity and hit 'START', ALT-TAB over to Winamp and start the music, and then 2 seconds later, have OR throw the route up fullscreen ready to go right as the music was starting. Not that big of a deal of course because almost no other game/sim I play lets you do it, but it would be nice to have that luxury.
Activity Loading Hostage
Can't ALT+TAB during activity load anymore
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#12
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Posted 01 March 2014 - 11:57 AM
jasondial, on 01 March 2014 - 09:06 AM, said:
It used to be really cool to select an activity and hit 'START', ALT-TAB over to Winamp and start the music, and then 2 seconds later, have OR throw the route up fullscreen ready to go right as the music was starting. Not that big of a deal of course because almost no other game/sim I play lets you do it, but it would be nice to have that luxury.
I understand you might make it to select another song for WinAmp to play in the the 15 seconds ORTS needs to load, but how do you want to read a web page in that time?
Yours, Markus
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Posted 01 March 2014 - 03:03 PM
jasondial, on 01 March 2014 - 09:06 AM, said:
It is a great progress bar compared to many others I've seen, but my point is that the concept of a progress bar is unnecessary and only causes people to watch it with unnecessary anticipation. Who cares EXACTLY when something will load. .... I see it as a relic of a bygone era.
All due respect, but I don't think you're managed to articulate why we should remove the progress bar we currently have.
jasondial, on 01 March 2014 - 09:06 AM, said:
Did something change with XNA between the time 0.9 was released and now, or did something in OR change?
We went from being an amateur game to a professional simulation.
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Posted 21 March 2014 - 03:35 PM
Jason, you might be interested in the new experimental option "Fast full-screen alt-tab" I've added in X2114. It makes full-screen be a screen-sized window instead of an exclusive device; this means you can alt-tab without minimising, and even put other windows on top of the "full-screen" Open Rails window. It may have a performance impact, however.
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Posted 21 March 2014 - 04:36 PM
I'm actually impressed with the progress bar code. Very ingenious. My compliments.
My only caveat is that it would be good to have one on the first opening of an activity, perhaps using he old standard formula.
In some ways, I like the Windows 7/8 progress bar that doesn't show progress, just scrolls across at a steady pace...
Robert
My only caveat is that it would be good to have one on the first opening of an activity, perhaps using he old standard formula.
In some ways, I like the Windows 7/8 progress bar that doesn't show progress, just scrolls across at a steady pace...
Robert
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Posted 22 March 2014 - 12:54 AM
rdamurphy, on 21 March 2014 - 04:36 PM, said:
using he old standard formula.
I'm confused. What do you mean by "standard formula"?
#17 Inactive_jasondial_*
Posted 03 April 2014 - 11:30 PM
James, I like the 'Fast full-screen alt-tab' option. It does seems to affect performance a bit like you said - I'm getting 61-62fps using it whereas I get 67fps running as an exclusive device. I could see it being useful for certain situations though or for people who have superfast systems. Another question- what's up with the "camera labeling" now? It's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. And why at least is it not suppressed by the "Suppress control confirmations" checkbox?! I swear, it's getting to the point where I'm scared to download a new build because of some of the "surprises" that end up in there. Haha. And on a related point, has noone ever said anything about why it TAKES A FULL 15 SECONDS for the 'screenshot filename location' message to fade out onscreen?... or better yet, why the screenshot message isn't suppressed altogether using the 'control confirmation' checkbox? More information I already know. When a person is "in" a simulation, they don't want to be reminded against their will that they are looking at a screen. They want to be left alone so they can focus on the route and get into the simulation - they don't want a bunch of messages popping up telling them stuff they already know.
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Posted 03 April 2014 - 11:56 PM
jasondial, on 03 April 2014 - 11:30 PM, said:
James, I like the 'Fast full-screen alt-tab' option. It does seems to affect performance a bit like you said - I'm getting 61-62fps using it whereas I get 67fps running as an exclusive device.
Good to know, thanks.
jasondial, on 03 April 2014 - 11:30 PM, said:
Another question- what's up with the "camera labeling" now?
Experimentation in experimental builds. It should be expected that, during development, many new features and adjustments to existing ones are tried out. You might be surprised to know that I've seen almost no complaints about the camera labelling (just two or three people including yourself IIRC) compared to some other issues. That doesn't mean it'll stay, or stay as-is; it is just an experiment for a bigger update to the interface that I am working on.
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Posted 04 April 2014 - 10:02 AM
jasondial, on 03 April 2014 - 11:30 PM, said:
And why at least is it not suppressed by the "Suppress control confirmations" checkbox?!
This checkbox is to suppress message to do with operating the trains, such as changing the throttle or brake setting, so you can immerse yourself better in the simulation. Activities like switching between cameras and taking screenshots are not in this category.
If there is a demand for hiding all messages, then perhaps we'll see it posted into the Wish List thread.
#20 Inactive_jasondial_*
Posted 11 April 2014 - 02:37 PM
@Chris, I will add it to the wish list along with my 'sandstorms and duststorms' request. (Notice I didn't wish for tornados but then again I am from Alabama.)
James, I like the idea of adding camera labeling as a way to enhance the simulation when needed but whether people mention it or not, and especially as routes get more photorealistic, I think that people deserve the opportunity to have a pure simulation experience free from any HUD info or pop-ups when they want, like the 'disable control confirmations' checkbox does with messages and the F5 does with the HUD. All I'm saying is, add all kinds of stuff like this, it's great, just please give users the option to enable or disable it when they want.
BTW, the new Trackviewer is great stuff. I don't think I need to tell you guys or the rest of the OR dev team how great of a job you have done so far.
James, I like the idea of adding camera labeling as a way to enhance the simulation when needed but whether people mention it or not, and especially as routes get more photorealistic, I think that people deserve the opportunity to have a pure simulation experience free from any HUD info or pop-ups when they want, like the 'disable control confirmations' checkbox does with messages and the F5 does with the HUD. All I'm saying is, add all kinds of stuff like this, it's great, just please give users the option to enable or disable it when they want.
BTW, the new Trackviewer is great stuff. I don't think I need to tell you guys or the rest of the OR dev team how great of a job you have done so far.