Rokinath on 1/3/2016 at 17:25
Well, I just got home and was ready to get down to business with this, and... I find myself staring at a Hammerite priest, as opposed to the white triangle I left the night before. Forget repeatedly copying files into their correct places, restarting dromed and getting the model name correct, apparently Dromed just needs a night's sleep as much as I do.
I'm left just as confused as I was last night, but at least it works now. Ho hum :tsktsk: sorry for the bother.
LarryG on 1/3/2016 at 18:11
For a model change in the OBJ or MESH directories to take effect in game mode without restarting DromEd, you must exit game mode after making the change. Dromed only checks for new models at that time. Usually this means you must enter game mode, exit game mode, and then reenter game mode. When you copied the bin and cal files over to your MESH directory, that was, effectively, a change to the model (from not having one), so you would need to exit game mode to have the model show up in the game. Make sense?
john9818a on 2/3/2016 at 01:43
Not to contradict you Larry but whenever I add or change a model in either Obj or Mesh it happens right in front of me in the editor window. If I choose a model that dromed can't find it will say so in the mono screen even before I close the properties window for that object.
LarryG on 2/3/2016 at 03:46
I'm not talking about changing the reference to the model in Shape>Model name. You will see that immediately.
I'm talking about changing the contents of the .bin file in place. So if you have an A.bin in your MESH directory and have Shape>Model Name: A, and then change the contents of your MESH directory to have a new A.bin, you won't see the effect of that change until you either exit and reenter DromEd, or exit Game mode. I was hypothesizing that if you had a wedge shape showing up because DromEd couldn't find the referenced .bin, that you wouldn't see the change until you either exited and reentered DromEd or exited Game mode.
Rokinath on 2/3/2016 at 07:51
Well what I'm taking away from this is to make doubly sure I restart Dromed after adding files to my folders, and to check the mono if anything goes wrong. Hopefully I'll have much less hassle next time I try to change models.
LarryG on 2/3/2016 at 17:15
That will work ... but is excessive.
I don't know exactly how the code is written, but by black box behavior observation it must do something like this:
* When you place an object on your mission map, DromEd looks up the model name in a local lookup table, probably built for rendering efficiency. This table seems to be dynamically created when you open a saved mission map (.cow or .mis), and is not saved in the mission file.
* If the referenced model name is found in the table, it doesn't update the table at all when you go into Game Mode. On exiting Game Mode (going into Edit Mode), DromEd rebuilds that lookup table, updating it to reflect all the current .bin models.
* If a referenced model name isn't found in the table, then the object is added to the lookup table before going into Game Mode. If there is no matching .bin to the Shape>Model Name referenced, then a wedge is inked to the name in the table and displayed.
If you have never placed the object anywhere in your map, then, on first placing it in your map you will see the current version of the referenced .bin. If you rename the .bin to a new name in your MESH or OBJ directory and then reference it by its new name in Shape>Model Name, the object will reflect the new model immediately on placing it in your map.
So, what I have found to be a best practice is as follows:
Whenever you replace an existing .bin file in your OBJ or MESH directory for an object (AI or not) which is already placed in your map, your should go into Game Mode and then exit back to Edit Mode in order to see your changed model in DromEd.
You can always close and reopen DromEd and then reopen the desired .gam or .mis, but that is excessive when just going into Game Mode and then back to Edit Mode is sufficient to see how your changed model looks.
Tannar on 2/3/2016 at 17:28
Thanks for this info, Larry. I've been closing and restarting dromed every time I added an object texture or mesh texture file to their folders.
john9818a on 2/3/2016 at 17:51
Closing and reopening dromed would be tiresome especially when you have to move the camera back to where the object was created.
ZylonBane on 2/3/2016 at 22:27
That's why you make a note of the object number.
john9818a on 3/3/2016 at 02:42
When you exit dromed and restart the object usually changes to a different number once.
