No, I did not fail with the title. It is literally improvement suggestions for my improvement plan. :|

Anyway, short story short, a few months ago I started to ponder about lfs broadcasts having a few areas I'd like to improve. Actual video streaming aside (as multibc does/did that, and I can't argue with Martin because he is German), I decided I can improve on the overlays tv director makes. Being a network programming major I figured how hard it could be so I wrote a small insim program. The first version I gave wilko shortly before round 2. It had a small technical bug that made it completely useless. So I gave it another go and had the second version ready shortly before round 3.

Then, as we all know Wilko was being himself and it was never used. So by round 4 I had added a bunch of stability and some cool new features too. Sadly (again) because deko has alzheimer's and wilko is... special, I failed to get any feedback that time either.

So before the season ends, I'd like you all to tell me what, if any, improvement suggestions you can come up with. I intended to see how people liked the features in a broadcast but at the current rate it'll actually be used early 2009.

Endu race overlay machine - The Masterbator

This picture should tell you all there is to know what it does:



The Masterbator is a completely manually operated program that lets the user control the overlays. It has a computing power efficient text based user interface, and it features an innovative menu. The race classification is fetched from the tracker, making problematic time outs history.

So, besides naming issues, I'd appreciate input on what you would like to see. C&C&Q welcome!

Incidentally, the other day I was bored and decided to try if I could open sockets. That resulted in the birth of sheepshagger - The IRC bot.

As some may have noticed during last round #ndr had the bot running. Currently it only greets you, and prints the tracker info when requested. If you have any ideas on what it could do I'd appreciate input. I'm all out of ideas myself

Oh is that me on the picture?

YEEA ME IS FAMOUS o/

Looks nice

I was wondering though, does it show gaps at some point?

IMO team tags should replace those full team names to save up some space. But that's quite a detail.

A bit OT, but I kinda regret the 2010 Round 2 team info overlays, but I guess they were just too much of a pain to create/manage.

It should be marsturbator.

Quote from Timo1992 :

Oh is that me on the picture?

YEEA ME IS FAMOUS o/

you failed the corner honey

Looking at the picture, it looks quite cool, but a bit overloaded maybe.

Showing the line-up of a team is interesting though.

Quote from Swiss-Spirit :

Looking at the picture, it looks quite cool, but a bit overloaded maybe.

Showing the line-up of a team is interesting though.

true that. sometimes less is more

my suggestion:
- only show the current grid placement, track, weather condts. and commentator every now and then (like 5-10 minute intervall)
- position the "time left" on top of the screen
- when grid placement and other data was shown and hides again, only than show the current driver, team and lineup of a team as long as the grid placement and stuff will show up again

I don't think that all is shown at one time. It's more of a screenshot to see how much it does in general. So on stream it won't actually be that crowded.

Edit, er, what Angus says

Is this intended as a replacement for the TVdirector overlays, or to supplement them?

Looks like some of the things from the post above want some content that aonio has maybe you should look into some self/personal insims like aonio and relax and find some useful info from them.

Just my thoughts of progress.

Nice one

But I think there is too many informations on screen :s

Think it gonna be clearer if you have track position like what you have in NASCAR showing periodicly several informations (pit stop, current driver, start position...), maybe using different color when the car is on the leading lap, another one if it's not,and one other if it is in pits our in outlap, and one other at the bottom of the screen showing current track, track condition, time remaining, current commentator,...

And when you change car, put the team info as we can see in that screen, with more infos like what car is that team using, line up, name ofc season historic (current position and points) and maybe some more information about the team like a kind of historic (for example for teams who have changed their name, previous XxX Team).

lol @amp could be a good more information about a team usefull when some teams are fighting for the win or for the championship to make a small resume before the final rush to the flag.

For the record

The items show are all current things that can be shown. The program gives total control to the operator of when things are and aren't displayed.

Currently the following are separate items:

-Classification and Time Remaining
-Commentator
-Track &Weather Conditions
-Team Name & Drivers
-Race Control Message

Quote from GreyBull [CHA] :

Looks nice

I was wondering though, does it show gaps at some point?

IMO team tags should replace those full team names to save up some space. But that's quite a detail.

I actually thought of that myself. Then I decided the original names will have to do, as they don't take too much space. Also, it's not that hard to make the order go on and off with a timer: The only reason for me not doing that (yet) is because the commentators would get confused and start the same functions many times over - resulting in chaos That was the reasoning behind it but it's not really an issue to cover that as well.

Quote :

A bit OT, but I kinda regret the 2010 Round 2 team info overlays, but I guess they were just too much of a pain to create/manage.

I have actually done some research on 'a bit more advanced graphics'. The problem with last years overlays was that it was done with a 3rd party software. It also meant someone had to prepare the overlay pictures on advance and they are completely static. Also, someone has to keep running them. So this program is meant to just simplify things for the broadcast team.

As I said, I have done some research. In theory I know how to make a window appear on top of a lfs instance without lfs loosing focus. Problem is I've got no idea how to implement a function that calls a window and sets it's location and content. Also getting rid of the window is a bit tricky, after all we don't want the graphics to stay on forever. I also tried transparent windows for even more 1337 effect but I scrapped that because the library in question is apparently written by an ape and thus makes no sense.

It's WIP so to say .

Quote from amp88 :

A long list

I might take that as a plan for the future

Some of them easier, some of them harder. I do not plan to write my own race tracker (even though I think I could improve on the one used now) so some data depends an awful lot about the tracker and how it stores data.

I'm trying to learn something new everyday on the way. WIP indeed.

Quote from A lot of people :

Too crowded

Quote from PMD9409 :

I don't think that all is shown at one time. It's more of a screenshot to see how much it does in general. So on stream it won't actually be that crowded.

I thought I said that...

Quote from hyntty :

The Masterbator is a completely manually operated program that lets the user control the overlays.

Great progress you made Timo really improved a lot from the preview version you showed me

EDIT: Looking through amp's imrpovements suggestions, a championship calculation would be awsome, that you can show them the championship standigs as they would be if the race ends now^^

Thanks Thilo.

As a matter a fact I have now made some more progress, I've compiled a standalone version of the program (which is more difficult than it sounds :P), in case anyone else wants to give it a go.. it's downloadable at http://koti.phnet.fi/hynrau/timo/masterbator.7z

I've also been having a go with a qualifying result table. I'm also going to try making a simple F1 (or more like motogp) style real-time timing to go along with it.

Also, since fetching the race standings from the tracker is quite a simple thing, I have thought of making another version aimed at the racers - something that takes less screen space. Perhaps also (when I manage to spare the time) a blue flag detection that tells you weather the blue flag your getting from lfs is legit or not.

As you might imagine I am doing other stuff as well, namely being confused with the C syntax that makes no sense, and logic ports that are a pain in the arse to design. That along with industrial management assignments that consist of creative writing and slight hangovers every now and then. So you'll see I can't give anything any release date more accurate than early 2009.

Quote from hyntty :

I've also been having a go with a qualifying result table. I'm also going to try making a simple F1 (or more like motogp) style real-time timing to go along with it.

Fascinating someone remembers this...

Quote from TFalke55 :

Fascinating someone remembers this...

Speaking of that, I actually find the insim requests section completely pointless. No one ever gets help from there. Most of the requests are "zomg lol someone code me a tom cruise server 1!1!1!". Occasionally there are a few good requests (like yours there) which no one wants to help with even though for a real programmer it would only take a jiffy to do. Weird imo.

So a bit of a progress report. Not that anyone cares but since I like to boast

So in stead of doing something useful like driver / team / laptime statistics I have decided try something else that is really of no relevance regarding the actual data in question. As some of the people blessed with the gift of reading might remember Yann was earlier all jelly for the old, fancy graphical overlays. We all know how irresistible he can be with the sad-puppy look he makes with his face, so I couldn't decline the request.

So I've made a small proof of concept I intend to work on next week. Whether it makes it into a broadcast anytime soon I don't know. Also I haven't really put any effort into it since I discovered no one was willing to actually use this app for anything, apparently because it's too difficult to use (Currently you have to run it and press two buttons, I'll try and make them easier next time...)

So I've made a small app that creates a cunning borderless window, and makes the race order (according to the tracker) appear. The overlay window will be on top of everything else. It will appear after running the program and close after 10 seconds (this is because you can't close a window that has no button for closing it :P ).

Anyway, this proof of concept: In case you are interested to test how it works and / or give feedback on the possibilities you see in this, you can download it here.

Or from a mirror here

Disclaimer:
By downloading this application you acknowledge the fact that downloading applications from the internet may cause distress in the user. Viewer discretion is advised. Therefore you wave any right to be offended by the content.

download: internal server error

A mirror (even though the original one works fine :| )

http://koti.phnet.fi/hynrau/timo/exe.win32-2.7.zip

meh, so many files and code for reading tracker and showing it in window?
TCL/TK heared about it, never used it, what is it about
+ python
you really are into scripting I see

Quote from hyntty :

I like to boast

I made this http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=73621 meanwhile

:|