Either this should be in the Welcome message or automatically generated above or below it.

The server my team runs will quite often change the track config and available cars. Usually we tend to try and edit the welcome message so it fits that particular config and car.

Example:

Quote :

Welcome....

Current config is 10 laps @ FE Club REV with the UFR

Use 7% fuel finishes the race. Pitstop required

The worst part is, the welcome message has to be changed everytime we change the config. We like to tell our users what track and car they will be using, as well as the fuel needed -- very important.

What I suggest is this. No matter what track/config you choose, the number of laps, track config, and the cars available can be shown. ALSO, it would be nice if an admin could use a command such as /fuel=7% or something, and this way it could all be on the welcome screen without editing one file. It does it all for you.

I am thinking that a text file couldn't do this, so maybe some other filetype could make it possible and you could maybe have the welcome message use strings which designate the information like so:

Quote :

Welcome....

Current config is $laps laps @ $config with the $cars

Use $fuel fuel finishes the race. $pitstop

No fancy coding or something, but it would be cool to have this. Please ellaborate on it, so maybe this could be possible. Even if the Welcome message wasn't using this feature, could we please have maybe a thing of boxes to the left of the welcome message that lists it like this or something?:

Track: FE Club REV
Cars: UFR
Laps: 10
Fuel: 7%
Pitstop: YES

Just a thought. Maybe someone could make a script that does this?

What sort of database would it use for the fuel? I know there was one started, but AFAIK, it is incomplete.

+1

i get sick of messing around, then someone restarts the race only to find out that its 100 laps long and there is a pitstop i dont know about

not to sure about the fuel though; since you can have multiple cars that wouldn't work out to well; -1 for the fuel, but +1 for all others

Quote from XCNuse :

not to sure about the fuel though; since you can have multiple cars that wouldn't work out to well; -1 for the fuel, but +1 for all others

Doh, that's right!!! :doh: Minus the fuel one then I guess that is more of a word-of-mouth before a race, and people aren't reluctant to tell fuel percentage.

But yeah, the other parts to the Welcome Message text, it would be nice to have methinks.

This would basically mean that everyone could have a nice 'automated' welcome message that conforms to what the current settings are. Would be really easy to customize for admins too.

Here is another example of how you could format a message:

Quote :

Welcome to Blah Motorsports!!!

Track: $config
Laps: $laps
Car(s): $cars
Pitstop: $pitstop

Race clean, and have fun!

And the result would be like this:

Quote :

Welcome to Blah Motorsports!!!

Track: Kyoto National REV (KY2R)
Laps: 8
Car(s): FOX
Pitstop: NO

Race clean, and have fun!

And if the cars allowed were a multiple group like the XRR, FXR, or FZR, it could show "GTR". Basically the classes that an admin types when setting them like so:

Quote from From README.txt :

ALL - all cars
ROAD - road legal cars
RACE - race cars
TBO - same as XRT+RB4+FXO
LRF - same as LX6+RAC+FZ5
GTR - same as FXR+XRR+FZR

And other variations could be thought of. There isn't much room for a long line/list of cars, so this keeps it short.

Quote from MonkOnHotTinRoof :

Easiest way to do it ?

Just parse the hostxxxx.txt file, create welcome file and send /welcome=newwelcomefile.txt via insim app. And put that in schedule.

Sounds interesting. Would be nice to have . You can edit your welcome message via admin ingame? Is that what this would do? If an insim app can change a file on the server, then I guess someone could code one up. Doesn't seem like it would be that hard I think.

I think it wouldn't be a problem to do that. However I don't see much point in all this. When you select server, you can already see the configuration and cars. And when you join server, it doesn't take much more time to join race and go back to pits, if fuel ammount needs to be changed. Hmm, pit stop info can't be seen from game ?

Well when browsing the server list yes you do see the car and track, but I often join a server that is saved in my history. And when I come on and find that it is on a different config, well it would be nice if it explained it in the welcome message.

Even though the information is explained on the list of servers, it would be nice to have a welcome message which is customized to fit what configuration you are running. Because with my examples above, you could blend it in with your welcome message, and it just looks nicer. The main reason for this is because I often have to edit the welcome message whenever a config is changed. And other team members do not have access to do that, so when they go and decide to change the config to something completely different, it would say you are joining a FOX server with an old XF GTi welcome message. :zombie:

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

What sort of database would it use for the fuel? I know there was one started, but AFAIK, it is incomplete.

Fuel control online. We ought to have an LFS commnity Let's-finish-FCO weekend

In addtion to the current short welcome message, I would like there to be a "MOTD" window that pops up when you have connected to the server. This window would stay open as long as you click to dismiss it and it should be able to hold much longer text (scrollable) with some formatting also. It could also be re-opened from the esc menu...

+1 for the welcome message with info, but +1 for a command like /race_info to query the server, the latter should be quite straightforward to implement, because i think it will nicely fit into the scripting system

I like these ideas a lot. I think I'll definitely be editing our welcome messages to be more informative, especially regarding the amount of fuel needed. A lot of people enter a server and immediately ask how much fuel is required.. and a lot of people already on the server seem to get annoyed by that. Solve the problem by including the info in the welcome message.

I've written a simple web interface (ASP & PHP hybrid) to edit the welcome message file. On save, it automatically sends "/welcome=welcomefile.txt" via insim. This reloads the welcome message on the server, and people who then join see the revised version.

I'd also like to have the in-game command "/? welcome" or something like it, so people can remind themselves of the welcome message any time they like without exiting the server and re-entering.