[markus_GE]

I have never fooled with excel and would have to learn that (haven't even known of that possibility), but it might be an option. I´ll see what I can find on the WWW :)

Cheers, Markus

[conductorchris]

I think this development is terrific; thank you!

I suspect what will start to happen is that the actual real-world congestion tendencies of different routes will start to be discovered. While some of this will be from the current limits of the timetable option, some of it reflects the real world challenges the dispatchers have.

I have been working on the side with professional train simulators that are essentially built to simulate such congestion and capacity problems. For example, given the track layout of the Surfliner route and given the performance characteristics of the trainsets in use, what happens if we . . . [insert hypothetical situation here -- move the servicing facility, for example. Or add another frequency.] Sometimes it's fascinating to press the go button and watch all the trains move around the dispatcher board and quickly get in knots, tying up the railroad because what is being asked (in the schedule) is physically impossible.

Christopher

[Lindsayts]

markus_GE, on 28 May 2014 - 07:15 AM, said:

I have never fooled with excel and would have to learn that (haven't even known of that possibility), but it might be an option. I´ll see what I can find on the WWW :thumbdown3:

Cheers, Markus

I may be commiting an act of heresy here but excell appears to be just another spread sheet. For this type of work one is only using as a coloumned editor. For my own use I use either sc (unix command line spreadsheat) or Libreoffice's offering (localc).
For the timetable work I'll use localc as I do not think sc exports into a csv file.

When you've used one spread sheet you've used them all (sort of) :oldstry:.

LIndsay

[James Ross]

Lindsayts, on 28 May 2014 - 09:53 PM, said:

For this type of work one is only using as a coloumned editor.

Indeed, the fact the data is in a spreadsheet format is just for simplicity of editing and reading. We could (and probably should) make a GUI editor for timetables which has the basic grid-like structure but, like Markus said, has drop-down lists of paths and consists and the like. And if we separate the viewer/simulator code well enough, it should also be possible to have a dispatcher-like view that you can use to test it without leaving the editor.

[nicober]

Hi!

With the concept of the Timetable, is it possible to add loose consists on a route?

If you drive a freight train the interesting action is to pick-up some wagons along the route.

It's also more attractive if tou can see many wagons on a yard or on a side tracks along your travel.

I tried to add a loose consist in a column + a very short path and Time like an observer loco but nothing appear when I run near this place.

Thanks Rob for your excellent work!

[conductorchris]

Or could you use an include to swap between multiple different sheets of loose consists? A utility like Yardmaster or Activity generator could create all kinds of loose consist sheets that could be swapped in and out endlessly.
Christopher

[nicober]

nicober, on 30 May 2014 - 01:25 PM, said:

Hi!

With the concept of the Timetable, is it possible to add loose consists on a route?

I tried to add a loose consist in a column + a very short path and Time like an observer loco but nothing appear when I run near this place.

Hi!

OK - I found the solution to this problem -

You add a loose consist like a normal consist in a column. Plus
You need to add the row - #dispose and under the column of your loose consist add $static

With this, your loose consist stay on the track and not disappear of your route.

Cheers!

[A Tejesember]

Thanks for the great work Rob, looks very interesting!

I have two questions:
1. How are non-ASCII characters handled? MSTS files use UCS2-LE, but file systems vary (for example here Windows-1250) as far as I know. How should I encode the CSV file to work with station names like "Kiskunfélegyháza" and consist names like "7009 személyvonat".
2. What about stations, where every platform is named with its ID? For example "Szeged 1.v", "Szeged 2.v", etc. I have to mention all of these separately, right? Most Hungarian routes are made this way, so the timetables will look pretty messed up. :victory:

I'm currently working on a feature to my existing timetable-editor (made for OR activities) to export an activity to CSV, providing a base for a timetable without the need to type in all the platforms' names. It's not a big deal, but if there's interest, I will make it public here too. :good2:

[roeter]

Quote

You add a loose consist like a normal consist in a column.
Plus you need to add the row - #dispose and under the column of your loose consist add $static

That's the way to do it for now.
Later on, a specific $static command will be made available in the 'start' row to define static consists.

Quote

How are non-ASCII characters handled? MSTS files use UCS2-LE, but file systems vary (for example here Windows-1250) as far as I know. How should I encode the CSV file to work with station names like "Kiskunfélegyháza" and consist names like "7009 személyvonat".

The csv file is read using the same file streamer as is used to read STF-type files (i.e. normal activity files), so reading Unicode files should not be a problem.
If a spreadsheet can save the contents as unicode *.csv file is outside the scope of OR.
Only one way to find out ... :victory:

Quote

What about stations, where every platform is named with its ID? For example "Szeged 1.v", "Szeged 2.v", etc. I have to mention all of these separately, right? Most Hungarian routes are made this way, so the timetables will look pretty messed up.

That can't be helped. If you look at the example for Surfliner2 you'll see something similar : at LA, for instance, all platforms were defined as separate stations.
It does not only make timetables look messy, it also more easily leads to errors as the timings must be entered in the correct row for the platform which matches the train's route.
But there is nothing I can do about this - the station name is the only available link between platform definitions and the train's route.
The 'location' based path definition which is under construction may solve this problem, but that is still a fair way off.

Quote

Or could you use an include to swap between multiple different sheets of loose consists? A utility like Yardmaster or Activity generator could create all kinds of loose consist sheets that could be swapped in and out endlessly.

There are some ideas on the use of variable consists.
One is to use a 'consist pool' - a list of consist files from which a consist is selected by the program.
Options like these will be gradually introduced as time goes by.

Regards,
Rob Roeterdink

[markus_GE]

Lindsayts, on 28 May 2014 - 09:53 PM, said:

I may be commiting an act of heresy here but excell appears to be just another spread sheet. For this type of work one is only using as a coloumned editor. For my own use I use either sc (unix command line spreadsheat) or Libreoffice's offering (localc).
For the timetable work I'll use localc as I do not think sc exports into a csv file.

When you've used one spread sheet you've used them all (sort of) :blink:.

LIndsay

I´ve used Excel up and down, with virtually all features (I thought). What I wanted to say is I have never scripted macros for it, and havenßt been aware of that possibility. Will have to get into this, as time allows.

James Ross, on 29 May 2014 - 12:10 AM, said:

Indeed, the fact the data is in a spreadsheet format is just for simplicity of editing and reading. We could (and probably should) make a GUI editor for timetables which has the basic grid-like structure but, like Markus said, has drop-down lists of paths and consists and the like. And if we separate the viewer/simulator code well enough, it should also be possible to have a dispatcher-like view that you can use to test it without leaving the editor.

Glad to see somebody understands what I´m trying to say. It´s not about that doing all the typing manually would be impossible, but it´s very error-prone (as programmers, you all will know this, I guess :) ). Also I see the posibility that with a seperate editor, the problem of multiple platforms of the same station being defined as multiple stations could be come by easily: One could grey out / remove / whatever stations from the selectable list for a train based on where the path passes.


I´ll have to look into what can be done in Excel with macros (and, before that, in which language they will have to be written - information appreciated :excl: ) and maybe will be able to come up with a (temporary and partial) solution sometime. Nothing sure, however, as for me this currently hasnßt even entered "project state". Using macros to do all that in Excel is just an idea currently...

Cheers, Markus