Hi Becky,

is the possibility to control LFSC via keyboard still somewhere on top of the todo list? This would be a major improvement.

Crowley

Quote from Becky Rose :

You do know you can save your config now dont you? Once you've driven your lap, it's driven, permanently, no need to repeat. Just save the config and you'll never have to do it again .

This is an important point in case not everybody noticed this feature!
It works fine for me and it definitely improved the accuracy of LFSC.

Furthermore I'm not sure whether the inaccuracies that appear sometimes are actually all to blame on LFSC. Did you ever pay close attention to the position given by LFS in the HUD? This is itself not always accurate. It's often off right after the start (just for a few secs, no big problem there) and probably always at the end of a race, when the leader(s) have already crossed the line while you're still in the final lap. Usually you improve your position drastically only to be pushed back where you belong shortly after the line. I guess this always happen when there are lapped drivers in the race (or when you're laps down yourself?).

Even sometimes during a race the number seems to be inaccurate, especially when lapped drivers come into the equation. Sometimes it just seems to take a while to sort out the correct position. If LFS gives exactly the same value via InSim, LFSC can't always be right.

Maybe it's just that with pit radio it's much harder not to miss those little glitches.

Crowley

Quote from Becky Rose :

The problem is not detecting the trigger, but the way it works out. You are more likely to get a report for the wrong number of laps remaining when you are not the leader, as the leader is usually the most consistent driver or amongst them.

If the radio triggers as the viewed player crosses the line that's another message at a time when I am already culling some messages at that point because the radio is so busy.

Also it has all the same problems as the current system, except in slightly different circumstances. It's no better to trigger on the player than the leader.

The only way to seriously improve the routine would be to do a heuristic calculation based upon both the leader and the viewed players position and try to give a more intelligent answer based on the two.

Well, if you can use the start/finish crossing of the player as trigger, you would have to take the number of laps he has driven so far, add the number of laps he is behind the leader (if any) and subtract this from the overall number of laps (race length). This would give you an acurate number of laps to drive at this moment in the race. Of course this information could later become inacurate by being lapped, by the leader pulling out of the race, whatever...
But that's just like IRL, isn't it? It doesn't really matter because anytime you cross start/finish you get the then acurate number of laps left again. What more could you ask for?

About the massing up of messages: I don't understand why there are especially many messages around start/finish but I guess you're right if you say so.
Just an idea: Maybe you could implement a delay for certain messages that don't have to be played immediately, like lap number, fuel (as long as it isn't urgent) or position change. Those messages could be placed in the queue but wouldn't have to be played as soon as possible but within - let's say - the next 30 secs (what's the shortest lap time in LFS?). Should there be no possibility to play them within that time frame - because of other more urgent messages - they could just be deleted from the queue. Would be no problem because you can live without those informations and you usually get an update during the next lap anyhow.
Maybe this could be another approach to the problem of having too many messages at one time sometimes?

Just my 2 cents.

Crowley

Hi Becky,

thanks for your reply.

Quote from Becky Rose :

arrrrgh. I just lost the post as I typed my reply to your last comment! So infuriating, ok here goes again - only perhaps a bit briefer! ...

So sorry, been there as well!

Quote from Becky Rose :

1. The lap announcement: I think it works better this way after considering the atlernative, changes in the laps remaining state because you are lapped and long lists of queed messages as you cross the line (some of which are already culled because of the message triggers at this point). Both systems have similar flaws, so it's 6 of one and half a dozen of the other, without a complex heuristic to more accurately reflect what a Human pit crew would tell you then it's going to be flawed.

Is it possible to detect the start/finish crossing of any driver (apart from the leader) via InSim? If not, I guess I understand the problem.
I just can't imagine there's no way. Can't you look for the number of laps driven by the observed driver and detect when it goes up by one. You could use this as trigger and there would be no need to queue something up.

Sorry if I'm being to naive here?

Crowley

Hi Becky,

Quote from Becky Rose :

when I look at the source code again in a week or two for the next update.

Some suggestions for when you look at the source code again (or maybe later):
(Warning: Longish text!)

The lap announcement ("last lap" etc.) could do with some improvement. I seem to remember reading somewhere here that those messages are triggered by the leader crossing start/finish. That's fine as long as you are the leader.
Some days ago I had a race, where I entered my penultimate lap when I was just in front of the race leader (let's not get into the ugly details, WHY I was so far behind... . Anyway shortly after beginning this lap I got the "last lap" message because the leader was crossing start/finish for his final lap. As he didn't catch me in this lap, I actually had nearly two more full laps to go. I know this is the most extreme example but it actually happened. And the messages are often inaccurate if you're some time behind the leader, because you get the "last lap" message while you're actually in your penultimate lap. I already learned to adapt to this special behaviour but it would be better if the lap message was triggered by the driver him/herself crossing the line.

Another nice touch would be, if the fuel messages wouldn't tell you the amount of fuel left in percent but in laps "You have fuel for 10 more laps" or "You can go 3 more laps". I know this will have to take into consideration the average consumption for the combo but maybe you can read this value from LFS via InSim?

One more thing: The messages about "the car behind/in front is for position" etc. are sometimes very hectic. I noticed several times that when I overtake someone, just a few seconds later I get the "car behind is for position" which is of course obvious in this case. I don't know the mechanism you use for this, but maybe there is some easy way to reduced these kind of messages or maybe limit them to one or two per lap. I guess in a proper endurance race with clean drivers this isn't actually a problem. But if you race the typical 6 laps on BL1 with 23 drivers it get's a bit too much.

Even one more (they just keep on coming ): It would be nice if the lap messages would adapt to the race length. Take the famous 6 laps at BL1 for example: After completion of the first lap (having luckily survived T1 ) you get the message "Only 5 more laps to go!". Maybe LFSC could start those messages only after half of the race is completed. This way you always would have the last lap announced and usually the penultimate lap as well, but things like "5 more laps" in a 6 lap race wouldn't happen.

Finally: We really need the keyboard thing and with that a way to turn off/on pit radio. Because while qualifying it keeps telling me that I'm headed for the podium and I should go for it! illepall
Really sweet would be if we had two sets of configuration, one for racing, one for training/qualifying and we could change between the two via keyboard. Now I know that I only need to call up the LFSC gui and change the options. Unfortunately the black gui problem hinders me. Anyway it would be much cooler to have two separate configs between which we could change with a simple keypress. For example during race I need lap, position and "for position" messages while for qualifying split times and fuel left would be more interesting.
Maybe it's easier to implement something like this than getting LFSC to recognize the difference between racing and qualifying?
Another useful feature would be a "shut up" key which makes the pit quiet for let's say until after the next lap. This would come in handy when you're entering a tough battle for position and don't want to be distracted by information that is unwanted at this moment.

Finally finally some problem that's probably impossible to overcome: LFSC seems to have a nasty habit of talking to me while I negotiate the most crucial corners of a track. That's bad because I turned up the radio volume a bit to understand it better. But now it cancels out the skid sounds from the tyres which are important for me. So I'm usually a bit slower on the power than necessary just to be on the safe side.
Do you think there's any way to make the message queue wait for an appropriate moment like when the speed ist above some predefined limit or something?

Having said all of this, I already enjoy LFSC very much the way it works now and I'm using it most of the time. These are just suggestions how it could be made even better (at least for me! )

Thanks very much for your work on this.

Crowley

Hi,

Quote from S0ul :

Now, it lets me race for about 10 seconds,then LFS minimizes and companion shuts down,saying:Parameter must be positive.
S0ul

I had this problem as well with v0.3. I then updated to v0.41 and after that it worked without any problems.

Crowley

Quote from Becky Rose :

• Allow players to specify driver that radio messages are given for

How and where can I specify the driver to follow? Or am I being stupid here?

Nice work. It gets better and better... :-)


Crowley

Hi Becky,

this is a very good mod. Actually a while back I was thinking, how cool it would be to have exactly this kind of pitradio.
I tested it today for some time. Apart from the volume it worked really good. I noticed, that I'm hardly looking on the mini map anymore. :-)

So this is really a nice tool that gives even better immersion in the game as well as additional info. I already have some improvement suggestions, but I will keep them to myself until you publish a beta or even final version. Maybe those things are still to come anyway.

But there are some glitches that I would like to report:
As you said yourself, after a race is finished the pit radio get's a bit carried away. The same happens, when a new race ist started. While I was waiting in the pit, no messages at all (which is normal) but as soon as voting for new race was successfull, several messages are coming before and while I was placed in the grid. I guess until the actual start of the race the pit radio shouldn't say anything (or even better until first split, to avoid adding to the usual T1 confusion :-).

First I was racing on a server with obligatory pitstop, where I was correctly told when the guy before me yet had to pit (really welcomed information BTW). Then I changed onto a server without pitstops. There I kept getting this message, even though it made no sense at all.

After closing LFS and restarting it while leaving your app open, LFS couldn't connect to your app again ("/insim=29999"). I had to close your app as well and restart it. Not sure whether this is by design, just noticed it by coincidence.

So, again, this is a very nice and welcomed mod and I'm looking forward how it develops.

Crowley

Quote from Chopst1x :

I've checked all the settings but can't find the one that shifts the center view so that the steering wheel is on one side and not split down the center?

Any ideas?

Important: You have to be on track in car to access those options! It doesn't work if you call "Options/View" from the main menu!

Crowley

Hi,

is there any information or documentation available on how the AI and especially the learning feature actually works?

I don't mean what I have to do to make them learn, but what techniques are used to improve (? :-) their driving, like neural networks or whatever?

I played around a little bit with the AI drivers and I would like to learn more about the technical background.

Crowley

Thanks Forbin, that was exactly the kind of information I was looking for!



Crowley

Hi,

I'm thinking about getting a new gfx card. Specs right now:

AMD Athlon XP 3000+
512 MB DDR-SDRAM
GeForce 3 Ti200

With this system I run a resolution of 1024x768 and get fps around 60-70 which is fine with me.
BUT: I can't use any AA oder AF, as this slows down the fps too much.

So I am looking for a new gfx card, that would allow me to keep current resolution and fps (although a little bit more wouldn't hurt) AND use maximum or at least very high AA und AF settings.

I was thinking about a 6600 GT but I am not sure whether a cheaper one wouldn't do the trick as well. Don't want to spend more money than I have to. Apart from LFS I'm playing next to no other games, so the performance for this software is decisive.

Any advice or experience from users with similar systems would be appreciated. I'm not looking for a specific manufacturer oder model, just the general class would be enough.
Noise on the other hand is an issue, so if anyone can point me to a model that is fast enough and quiet (at least in 2D-Mode), that would be nice.

Crowley