lol, I get 2 e-mails with forum posts from AjRose, but one is here and one on bimmerforums. Threw me off at first :P

Quote from AjRose :

They updated the forum and added a forum for Painting cars. They also posted up the templates.

That's some crazy high FFB. You're probably getting more force than feedback at those levels, depending on your windows settings.

I'm running 101% overall, everything else at 0, centering unchecked, and I use 5 FFB in the vette. It does have light steering, but if you raise the FFB too much you lose a lot of the actual feedback. I use 3-5 in game, depending on the car and how much caster is in the setup. This is on a G25.

Quote from StableX :

do you keep the same FFB setting for each car or do you tweak it for each?

For the C6R I find I have to add about 10 extra to the FFB setting in iRacing compared to say, the Mazda. I use 28 - 30 in the mazda depending on the track and 38 - 42 in the C6R.

Great job yesterday, Dave. It was good seeing you out there, and I hope more of the LFS guys give iRacing a shot.

The event was really awesome. I didn't do enough testing beforehand, so kind of screwed myself with strategy. I ended up with 12 laps extra fuel at the end, and I thought my tires were about to pop (didn't change in pits) so I backed off with about 10 to go. It turned out I had 44% left at the end, though :doh:. I'll definitely be more prepared next time.

This event got a lot of exposure, so I expect them to keep getting bigger and better.

Quote from DaveWS :

Thanks guys! If I'm honest though I'm a little disappointed. I had some kind of painful cramp in my back out of nowhere just before qualifying which was pretty horrible, but I don't think it affected me during the race.

The field today was truely awesome, just look at the qualifying times and how tight things were (5th to 21st place seperated by just over 6 tenths). Still I was pretty hopeful of a top 5 result after the first few laps, where I managed to get past Dom Duhan and stay there for 9 laps. Frustratingly I had a bit of a balancing act for a while where I was looking to get past Peter Read while keeping Dom in check, but Dom was all over me trying to get past and eventually we went into stowe side by side and then into Vale with him on the outside. I made sure to give him room, so I had to get on the brakes hard and keep to the inside, and locked up the rear in the process and spinning hopelessly at 20 mph (those who've driven the C6R will know how easy it is to end up doing this). Shortly after that, frustrated, I was a little to eager on the throttle in one of the following laps and had another spin out of club. I got my head together after that and slowly worked back up into the top 10.

Still, it was great fun and probably one of the most intense races I've been in, oh and yeah, well done Brian too!

Edit: James, yeah I'll definately try and do the pro series early next year.

Nice job guys

I'm signed up and can't wait.

congrats

You CoRe guys are pushovers.

Quote from BigTime :

That's what I like to hear, best of luck to you guys!

Last edited by brianmcd, Fri 18 Jul 2008, 20:33.

Glad to help. The reason the first thing I posted didn't work is because I made the same mistake as you. Like I said, string literals and c-strings aren't classes, so I was trying to use the + operator on c-strings (which are just arrays)...which doesn't work because they don't support the + operator. The second thing I posted works because you're always adding a C-string to a C++ string, and the C++ string class overloads the + operator to work when adding a c-string to a c++ string.

Really check out that book, Thinking in C++. It's awesome and if you want to study computer science in school, this will get you way ahead.

Sorry, I wasn't thinking.
string builder = "/msg ";
builder += t->PName;
builder += "^Lconnected";
strncpy_s(is_mst.Msg, builder.c_str(), 63); //c_str() returns the c-string equivalent (a char*)

can you copy/paste the code you're using?

<< is the stream insertion operator...which doesn't make sense there and won't compile (a string literal doesn't have operators, same reason try #1 didn't work). & is logical and, which ANDs bits together (e.g. 1 & 0 = 0, 0 & 0 = 0, 1 & 1 = 1), and is definitely not what you want. I don't know why the last thing compiled.

"/msg " isn't a C++ string, which has the overloaded + operator that concatenates. It's just an array of chars with \0 put on the end. You can't use + with c-strings to concatenate, you'd have to use another c std function (strcat, or there's probably an strcat_s that's length safe). The difference is that C++ strings are a class, which has methods and overloaded operators and the like. C-strings are just arrays that happen to have chars in them and always end in a null terminating character (\0). String literals, like "hey there" are basically c-strings (aka char arrays).

For your problem, I'd probably just:
#include <string>
using std::string; (or leave off if you've already got using namespace std

then

string builder = "/msg " + t->PName + "^Lconnected"; //uses the overloaded + operator of the string class
strncpy_s(is_mst.Msg, builder.c_str(), 63); //c_str() returns the c-string equivalent (a char*)

I'm assuming is_mst.Msg is a char*, and t is a pointer with a member PName that's a char*.

You should buy "Thinking in C++" by Bruce Eckel: http://www.amazon.com/Thinking ... qid=1215644946&sr=8-1. You can get a free copy of the older edition on his website, although it's a lot easier to read it from a book.

Quote from dougie-lampkin :

:bump:

I'm stuck again...I got playing with it, and I'm trying to put 3 different sized chars together into an MST. I'm trying to include NPL->PName in a message that's sent when someone connects. I've tried various things, such as:

strncpy_s(is_mst.Msg, ("/msg " + t->PName + " ^Lconnected"), 63);

strncpy_s(is_mst.Msg, ("/msg " << t->PName << " ^Lconnected"), 63);

strncpy_s(is_mst.Msg, ("/msg " & t->PName & " ^Lconnected"), 63);

strncpy_s(is_mst.Msg, ("/msg ", t->PName, " ^Lconnected"), 63);

None of which compiled, except the last one, which just has the connected bit.

I couldn't find much on t'interwebs, I'm probably just missing something basic though...

I disagree. Use the best language for the job. Unless you were just talking about learning, I agree it's better to stick to one language for a little.

OP: Buy "Thinking in C++" by Bruce Eckel if you want to understand C++ and pointers.

Quote from mcgas001 :

Word of advice: Pick a language and stick with it.

Gotcha. John Henry posted on the forums saying incidents counted something like 35% during time trials, 50% during qualifying and race warm up, and 100% during a race.

Quote from DarrenMarsh :

Yes, it's corners per incident. The numbers I stated were just what I, and other people in my club, were getting in the early stages, so it's what people can expect when they start.

In later stages when I had some incidents on my record it got harder to get ratings increases in time trials and qualifying as it took more laps to keep the average down.

I drove nKPro a long time ago, I guess when the first demo came out? It didn't wow me but it seemed like it had potential, I just never tried it again for whatever reason. So, I can't really compare iRacing and nK.

Quote from The Moose :

Have you driven nKPro? I'm interested in other peoples comparisons of the feel of both sims. They both feel excellent to me, but i didn't find iRacing significantly better in feel than nKpro like i was hoping. I think that just shows how good nKPro's physics and FF really is.

That's not true. It's not as cut and dry as that. I think it's based on how many turns you complete versus how many incidents you get, but I could be mistaken. I do know that I've run 0 incident races with no change to my safety rating, and I got a big increase in my safety rating during a race where I had 4 incidents. I just race cleanly and let the safety rating do it's thing, and it seems to work out.


Edit: Also, different licenses have different requirements for attaining a given safety rating. Once I got the Class D license (the first license after rookie), my safety rating dropped 1.0. This is because the class D license requires fewer incidents per...whatever they base it on, to maintain the same safety rating. Some of the guys who have been in the sim longer kept their 4.9s (maxed out safety rating), because they had few enough incidents to qualify for that.

Hope that made sense...

Quote from DarrenMarsh :

You get 0.2 for every incident free race and 0.1 for an incident free time trial or qualifying (assuming you do enough laps in those sessions)

Last edited by brianmcd, Fri 6 Jun 2008, 02:36.

Heh well they said it has something to do with different racing lines crossing. There's 2 different lines that people take through there, and the bumps are in the part where they cross. The rest of the track is 100% perfect, though. I've driven hundreds of laps at VIR, so I know that track very well. I was so amazed when I took my first lap around there in iRacing.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

Er... OK. How the **** did they end up with some unrealistic bumps from laser-scanning a track?

You just made their unique selling point ****ing worthless in one simple sentence.

I've experienced all of that stuff, too, participating in MoE, IGTC, and LOTA. I guess the reason I focused on that stuff is that a lot of people are unsure of what the service will be like, and it's hard to tell people how the sim feels through the wheel, you just have to drive it and experience it. I drive on real race tracks pretty often, and I can say the iRacing is the closest thing to real life. My "home track", VIR, is in the game. It feels just like it does in real life, except for some small bumps in T1 that they said they would fix.

Quote from The Moose :

...and many of those positives brianmcd made about iRacing (nice community, nice sensible clean racing guys, using real names, accountability) are all great, certainly what i look for in sim racing, but I've had all that for the last 2 years of competing in GPC's netKar pro league, for the massive outlay of £25
Obviously that's all good stuff, certainly for people that haven't had that kind of experience before i suppose. It's not offering me anything new in that respect though.

It does show pings when you're in the sim. I think once the service launches you'll see racing all around the clock. Obviously during the beta there aren't many people racing, so the sessions won't be packed. That being said, the races from 7-11 PM EST always seem to have full grids.

Quote from The Moose :

No idea of the pings actually, that's something i didn't think about when i played it. I'm not sure it even says anywhere, as its not like a normal lobby system. You just sign up for the race you want to participate in and join it all from the browser interface.

I saw a car disappearing and reappearing a few times during races, so its not perfect. No warping or stuttery car movement at all though. The netcode looks pretty damn solid.

The main problem was the lack of racing in European evening times, so in 5 days i got to see very little actual racing. And the racing i did see had very few participants.

This is anther reason I'm hanging back for a long while before even thinking of taking the plunge. I want to see a massive European uptake before committing to monthly payments.

I can hotlap a top quality hardcore sim (nKPro) for free thanks

http://www.insidesimracing.tv/ ... amp;id=148&Itemid=206

An SRT review. Not sure if this is new? I'm watching it now, but it's pretty long, must be in depth.

I just ran the Rookie Solstice into the wall hard to test, and I don't think there's any body deformation. You can see the damage in the suspension though and that the wheels/shocks/control arms have obviously been knocked to hell.

Quote from SamH :

Oh, I've crashed lots in real life! I'm singularly responsible for ~20% of everybody's insurance premiums

Okay, how about body deformation? Have you crashed and written your car off in iR?

Small pieces:
Live groove: Don't know what that means, sorry.

Animated pit crews: Not yet, just a lollypop man. No pit stops yet outside of serving penalties.

What are the garage options on the different cars: Depends on the car. Rookie doesn't have any. Skip Barber lets you adjust ride height, camber, and tire pressures. I don't know what 1/2 of the stuff on the Radical means. I haven't played around with setups much because they haven't been that big of a factor yet, due to the cars I've been racing.

Are there day to night transitions: Not yet.

Is a spectator mode included: In practice/qualifying yes. In a race, I'm not sure because I haven't gotten out of my car during a race yet.

Weather - is rain included: Not at launch

Changeable weather: Not yet.

Clutch support: Yes

Driver changes: Not yet

Ability to join in qualy: Join what? There is qualifying if that's what you mean.

Ability to rejoin mid race: I believe so, if you get disconnected, but not positive.

Are non US character sets supported: unknown

Is telemetry included: Not yet.
What kind of driver stats can be displayed: In what sense? The sim keeps track of all official sessions, listing PBs for each car/track/session type (e.g. you have a practice, race, and qualify pb for each combo.) The sim keeps track of each race you do, and provides statistics like Starts, Wins, Top 5s, Poles, Avg Start, Avg Finish, Total Laps, Laps Led, Win %, etc. At the end of every official session (practice, race, qualify), you get a "scorecard" sorta thing. The sim keeps track of all of these and as far as I can tell you can retrieve the score card from any session you've ever done.

Can engines catch fire, drop oil etc.: No, there's currently no engine damage.

What Copy Protection System Is In Use? You launch everything from the website, so whatever you do has to be authenticated through there (including launching offline testing sessions).

---
How good are the pings and racing from europe? Can't comment personally, but haven't heard any complaints.

From what I can tell, yeah. It's harder to judge than LFS because you don't get the equivalent of the F10 readout (nor F9, for that matter). But if you hit a wall it damages the suspension, seemingly in a realistic manner (I haven't crashed enough in real life to know :P).

The damage model is one of the things I don't really pay too much attention to, outside of the fact that it exists. Maybe someone else can chime in with better info. I'm not sure exactly what sort of damage is simulated.

Quote from SamH :

What about the damage model? Is it good?

I am blown away with it.

The physics feel more realistic than LFS. You can really tell in the braking. In LFS you just slam on the brake pedal as hard as you can at first...that's not how it works in real life. Most people are using the max lock on their wheels, instead of the 240-270 people use in LFS. It feels natural in iRacing...it doesn't feel so great in LFS.

The service aspect of it is great I think. Once the game launches I think we'll see more frequent race sessions. The complaint about there not being too many people to race is more of an obvious statement than a complaint...the game hasn't launched and it's only beta testers. There's only so many of us right now. Once the game goes live I think we'll see full grids.

The fact that the sim is coupled with the iRacing service gives a strong community feel. Everyone is practicing the same combos and you can always compare yourself to the fast guys in your series.

The Rookie Solstice is a lot of fun. Look at the XFG/XRG in LFS. The CTRA server is one of the most popular servers out there, but it runs the "boring, slow cars." There are 2 versions of the Solstice: Rookie and Advanced. The Rookie is the car you race at first. It's fixed setup, so you can't change anything. It lets you focus on your driving and know how you stack up. The main point of the Rookie series is to build your safety rating and get acclimated to the sim.

Speaking of safety rating, that's partially how they judge which cars you can race online. If you run clean races, your rating will be high enough to run the Skip Barber car within a couple of weeks. You have a license in iRacing. Rookies start with a Rookie license. If your safety rating is high enough, you can "race up" to the next license level (for the Rookies, that's racing the Skippy). Periodically, they update the licenses and if your safety rating is high enough, you get the next license up. I'm not sure when they do the license promotions. The safety rating works great to encourage clean racing, and I don't think we'll see any problems with wreckers in iRacing. All of the people I've interacted with in the sim have been clean racers and nice guys (and girls). One thing I really like about iRacing is that you can't use a made up username - you have to use your real name. There's no hiding from your actions, and it really promotes accountability. Plus it's nice to see "Dale Earnhardt Jr." on the entry list and know it's really him.

Also, note that you can drive any car that you've purchased on any track that you're purchased at any time, but only offline until your license is high enough.

The tracks are great, by the way. It's very nice to be racing real cars on real tracks. They're laser scanned so they're very accurate.

I know the cost of the sim is going to be more expensive than what people are used to, but to me, it's worth it. As of now, this is the most realistic sim out there. There's lots of real racers out there using it, too. The development process is going to be similar to LFS. It will likely never be "finished", but instead will be continually improved over time.

I'll probably post more stuff as I think of it.

It's awesome and I don't think I'll play LFS seriously again.

"In the meantime, you are now officially released from the non-disclosure obligations of the Early Adopter Agreement you signed when you joined the test group. Not only are you now permitted to discuss the details of the service with your friends, we encourage you to do so."