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Sequential Pickups Problem
tjbuege
post Feb 22 2009, 12:46 PM
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Hi,

I'm running version 4.2.11 of Activity Generator. In the documentation , it states that "if simple mode is NOT checked, you may be required to pick up the first, 5th and 8th cars on that spur". I am not finding that to be the case. More often than not, most of the pickups remain sequential, regardless of the state of this check box option.

Additionally, if I uncheck the sequential pickup option, I end up with an activity where cars are to be delivered to TWO destinations! Put another way, I am to deliver cars to both industry tracks, and to the final destination yard track. This is not a problem if I check the sequential pickup option.

What's going on here? Is this a bug? Or is there a problem with they way I've designed my template?

Thanks,
Tim
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nbeveridge
post Feb 22 2009, 10:32 PM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 22 2009, 12:46 PM) *
Hi,

I'm running version 4.2.11 of Activity Generator. In the documentation , it states that "if simple mode is NOT checked, you may be required to pick up the first, 5th and 8th cars on that spur". I am not finding that to be the case. More often than not, most of the pickups remain sequential, regardless of the state of this check box option.

Additionally, if I uncheck the sequential pickup option, I end up with an activity where cars are to be delivered to TWO destinations! Put another way, I am to deliver cars to both industry tracks, and to the final destination yard track. This is not a problem if I check the sequential pickup option.

What's going on here? Is this a bug? Or is there a problem with they way I've designed my template?

Thanks,
Tim


Depending on the template design, number of cars to work and the track selected, you might still get all sequential car for pick up. For instance, if the track only holds a few cars (say 3) and you allow more than that per move (say 5), then you will likely get all three cars from that track, and thus they are sequential. Or if the designer set up the track to be "unit" pick up, such as at a coal mine, then the cars will always be sequential regardless of whether this box is checked. Try generating the same activity multiple times to see if it sometimes will be non-sequential. The more capacity on a given track, the more likely that the cars will NOT be sequential.

As for the other problem, we have seen this in the past, but I don't remember the exact circumstances. I do remember that if this happened, it was due to some unusual set up of the activity and I could not get it to repeat. I.e. when this turned up, if I exited AG, and then restarted AG, then even if I set up what I thought was the same activity, it would not repeat.

If you somehow get this to repeatedly happen, then please run the diagnostics with the activity. Then gather all the activity files plus the diagnostic reports and send them to Steve.


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tjbuege
post Feb 23 2009, 01:24 AM
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QUOTE
Depending on the template design, number of cars to work and the track selected, you might still get all sequential car for pick up. For instance, if the track only holds a few cars (say 3) and you allow more than that per move (say 5), then you will likely get all three cars from that track, and thus they are sequential. Or if the designer set up the track to be "unit" pick up, such as at a coal mine, then the cars will always be sequential regardless of whether this box is checked. Try generating the same activity multiple times to see if it sometimes will be non-sequential. The more capacity on a given track, the more likely that the cars will NOT be sequential.

Yes, I realize that if I am asking to pick up 5 cars and the track only has 3, then they will always be sequential. But I am seeing this behavior on tracks where there are 3-4 cars and only one is being picked up. 9 times out of 10, the first car (car "0") is being picked up. So it's not 100% of the time, but it's not very random, either. Regarding the "unit" type of track, where is that documented? I've looked through the manual (pdf), but it only mentions that the designer can designate a track as "unit". It does not say how. This is a template I've written myself. Could I have inadvertantly set the tracks all to unit? I'm guessing that is not the case, since as I mentioned, every once in a rare while, a car will be requested for pick up that is not the first car on the track.

QUOTE
As for the other problem, we have seen this in the past, but I don't remember the exact circumstances. I do remember that if this happened, it was due to some unusual set up of the activity and I could not get it to repeat. I.e. when this turned up, if I exited AG, and then restarted AG, then even if I set up what I thought was the same activity, it would not repeat.

If you somehow get this to repeatedly happen, then please run the diagnostics with the activity. Then gather all the activity files plus the diagnostic reports and send them to Steve.

Oh, this is very repeatable. Exiting out of AG does not help. Although, I have noticed that if I generate multiple activities during the same AG session (without exiting out between each generated activity), I'll start to see some strange results, such as fewer and fewer cars placed on the tracks, and included in the generated activity. Eventually AG will crash with an error message (which I cannot recall just now), suggesting there is some memory leak somewhere. Next time that happens I'll make note of it. Anyhow, I'll get the information you suggested and send it to Steve.

Thanks,
Tim
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nbeveridge
post Feb 23 2009, 07:03 AM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 23 2009, 01:24 AM) *
Regarding the "unit" type of track, where is that documented? I've looked through the manual (pdf), but it only mentions that the designer can designate a track as "unit". It does not say how. This is a template I've written myself. Could I have inadvertantly set the tracks all to unit? I'm guessing that is not the case, since as I mentioned, every once in a rare while, a car will be requested for pick up that is not the first car on the track.

Oh, this is very repeatable. Exiting out of AG does not help. Although, I have noticed that if I generate multiple activities during the same AG session (without exiting out between each generated activity), I'll start to see some strange results, such as fewer and fewer cars placed on the tracks, and included in the generated activity. Eventually AG will crash with an error message (which I cannot recall just now), suggesting there is some memory leak somewhere. Next time that happens I'll make note of it. Anyhow, I'll get the information you suggested and send it to Steve.

Thanks,
Tim


"Unit" is a track type, which would be designated in the SWLTDB file as a U. If you are creating your own templates, then you would have to put this designation in there yourself. Presently the track types available are I for industry, Y for yard, X for eye candy only, and U for unit. This is not well documented -- I think that Steve's manual has lagged behind a bit. Maybe we should clean it up. We pretty much thought that all the template developers were covered, but recently I have heard from several new people (now including yourself) who are working templates.

I recommend that you should exit AG after each activity is generated. I.e. my suggestion is that you should not generate multiple activities in a single AG session.

Since this is your own template. when you have this dual destination error, please package all the activity files plus the diagnostics file plus all your template files for Steve.


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Norman
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tjbuege
post Feb 23 2009, 09:11 AM
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QUOTE(nbeveridge @ Feb 23 2009, 07:03 AM) *
"Unit" is a track type, which would be designated in the SWLTDB file as a U. If you are creating your own templates, then you would have to put this designation in there yourself. Presently the track types available are I for industry, Y for yard, X for eye candy only, and U for unit. This is not well documented -- I think that Steve's manual has lagged behind a bit. Maybe we should clean it up. We pretty much thought that all the template developers were covered, but recently I have heard from several new people (now including yourself) who are working templates.

Yes, I think the documentation needs updating. I searched this forum for the word "unit" and found no hits that explained the track type. How would I know about this feature? What other features and enhancements are not documented? I will try to package up the diags file and my template files this evening.

Thanks,
Tim
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tjbuege
post Feb 24 2009, 09:43 AM
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Ok, I just sent Steve an email with what I hope are the files he needs. Please let me know if I missed something. Thanks.

Tim
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sgdavis
post Feb 24 2009, 04:45 PM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 23 2009, 01:24 AM) *
Yes, I realize that if I am asking to pick up 5 cars and the track only has 3, then they will always be sequential. But I am seeing this behavior on tracks where there are 3-4 cars and only one is being picked up. 9 times out of 10, the first car (car "0") is being picked up. So it's not 100% of the time, but it's not very random, either. Regarding the "unit" type of track, where is that documented? I've looked through the manual (pdf), but it only mentions that the designer can designate a track as "unit". It does not say how. This is a template I've written myself. Could I have inadvertantly set the tracks all to unit? I'm guessing that is not the case, since as I mentioned, every once in a rare while, a car will be requested for pick up that is not the first car on the track.


Oh, this is very repeatable. Exiting out of AG does not help. Although, I have noticed that if I generate multiple activities during the same AG session (without exiting out between each generated activity), I'll start to see some strange results, such as fewer and fewer cars placed on the tracks, and included in the generated activity. Eventually AG will crash with an error message (which I cannot recall just now), suggesting there is some memory leak somewhere. Next time that happens I'll make note of it. Anyhow, I'll get the information you suggested and send it to Steve.

Thanks,
Tim


I first need to separate whether this is a problem with Activity Generator, or the template you created. So, I'd like to ask you to download another AG4 template, and generate an activity. Let me know if you still experience the behavior you describe. If you do, the problem is related to Activity Generator and we'll figure out what it is and issue a fix. If you don't experience the same problem with another template, then the issue is with the template you wrote.

For more information on creating your own templates, beyond what's in our manual, you might try our Video Tutorials, available at on our Video Tutorials page, http://www.skylinecomputing.com/video_tutorials.htm

Thanks,

Steve


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tjbuege
post Feb 24 2009, 11:41 PM
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QUOTE(sgdavis @ Feb 24 2009, 04:45 PM) *
I first need to separate whether this is a problem with Activity Generator, or the template you created. So, I'd like to ask you to download another AG4 template, and generate an activity. Let me know if you still experience the behavior you describe. If you do, the problem is related to Activity Generator and we'll figure out what it is and issue a fix. If you don't experience the same problem with another template, then the issue is with the template you wrote.

For more information on creating your own templates, beyond what's in our manual, you might try our Video Tutorials, available at on our Video Tutorials page, http://www.skylinecomputing.com/video_tutorials.htm

Thanks,

Steve


Per the email I sent you, I've tried generating activities using both the Niagara Corridor template and the Sandpatch template found online here in the template library. I see the same problem with cars billed to be setout at both industries AND at a final track...two destinations. So the problem goes beyond just my own template I've written.

I did look at the video tutorials when I first purchased AG last year. They were helpful.

Thank you,
Tim
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sgdavis
post Feb 25 2009, 05:33 PM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 24 2009, 11:41 PM) *
Per the email I sent you, I've tried generating activities using both the Niagara Corridor template and the Sandpatch template found online here in the template library. I see the same problem with cars billed to be setout at both industries AND at a final track...two destinations. So the problem goes beyond just my own template I've written.

I did look at the video tutorials when I first purchased AG last year. They were helpful.

Thank you,
Tim


That is interesting. Norm says he believes this can occur when a user has high numbers for the train (such as 99 for pick up and set out) AND when the user generates multiple activities without exiting AG in between generating those activities.

You mentioned a "memory leak". There is not actually a memory leak because we don't allocate memory on the fly, we allocate a fixed amount of memory to store all the data. However there IS behavior very similar to a memory leak and I have not yet been able to identify the cause. Some variable or variable, somewhere, is not being cleared or re-initialized between successive runs of activity generation. I do need to fix this and will continue to try but my best advice right now is to generate an activity, then exit Activity Generator and enjoy your activity (or restart then generate another). You can save your settings between runs as you know by using the "save settings" feature.

When I generate activities on my own I don't get duplicate destinations.

Any other users out there seeing this behavior?

Thanks,

Steve






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tjbuege
post Feb 25 2009, 06:25 PM
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QUOTE(sgdavis @ Feb 25 2009, 05:33 PM) *
That is interesting. Norm says he believes this can occur when a user has high numbers for the train (such as 99 for pick up and set out) AND when the user generates multiple activities without exiting AG in between generating those activities.

You mentioned a "memory leak". There is not actually a memory leak because we don't allocate memory on the fly, we allocate a fixed amount of memory to store all the data. However there IS behavior very similar to a memory leak and I have not yet been able to identify the cause. Some variable or variable, somewhere, is not being cleared or re-initialized between successive runs of activity generation. I do need to fix this and will continue to try but my best advice right now is to generate an activity, then exit Activity Generator and enjoy your activity (or restart then generate another). You can save your settings between runs as you know by using the "save settings" feature.

When I generate activities on my own I don't get duplicate destinations.

Any other users out there seeing this behavior?

Thanks,

Steve

Just to be clear, when I gen'd activities using the Niagara and Sandpatch templates, it was not a "multiple" session. I started AG, generated the activity, and saw the duplicate destinations.

Also, I don't need to have high #'s for the train. even with a max cars to handle set at 15, I saw duplicate destinations.

I'm willing to try anything you think might help you troubleshoot this. Maybe something you might do is find a clean installation of Windows, and install a clean copy of AG, the same one on the website. Could there be the possibiliity that you have a version that has been worked on? Just a thought.

Thanks,
Tim
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sgdavis
post Feb 25 2009, 06:53 PM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 25 2009, 06:25 PM) *
Just to be clear, when I gen'd activities using the Niagara and Sandpatch templates, it was not a "multiple" session. I started AG, generated the activity, and saw the duplicate destinations.

Also, I don't need to have high #'s for the train. even with a max cars to handle set at 15, I saw duplicate destinations.

I'm willing to try anything you think might help you troubleshoot this. Maybe something you might do is find a clean installation of Windows, and install a clean copy of AG, the same one on the website. Could there be the possibiliity that you have a version that has been worked on? Just a thought.

Thanks,
Tim


Thanks, based on this I am really puzzled. I always post the latest version so what I have on my machine is the same as what is on the web site. Also I tend to get new laptops fairly frequently and I always install MSTS and AG on them so I can test on a clean install. I am running Windows XP currently.

I will take the Niagara template and generate activities and see if I get duplicate destinations. I may not be able to get this done for a few days though. If I can duplicate this problem I am confidant that I can solve it.

Thanks and sorry about the problems,

Steve


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sgdavis
post Feb 25 2009, 07:34 PM
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QUOTE(sgdavis @ Feb 25 2009, 06:53 PM) *
Thanks, based on this I am really puzzled. I always post the latest version so what I have on my machine is the same as what is on the web site. Also I tend to get new laptops fairly frequently and I always install MSTS and AG on them so I can test on a clean install. I am running Windows XP currently.

I will take the Niagara template and generate activities and see if I get duplicate destinations. I may not be able to get this done for a few days though. If I can duplicate this problem I am confidant that I can solve it.

Thanks and sorry about the problems,

Steve


Update to this. I cannot duplicate the "non-random" problem. As I mentioned in my email direct to you, but repeat here for the benefit of others who might observe the same behavior, because of the way AG4 places railcars into the "world" on an as-needed basis (to minimize drag on the program and frame rates and try not to hit the MSTS ~500 car maximum), pickups from any tracks you select as "source tracks" are always sequential regardless of the setting of the "simple mode" check box. It is only the industry tracks that are randomized. To get the most variety either start w/ cars already on your train and work only Industry tracks, or just make sure there are a lot of industry tracks checked to work. As a reminder, "Industry Tracks" in AG are tracks on which cars might be set out, and from which they might be picked up. Further, cars picked up on "Industry Tracks" may be set out on "Destination Tracks" if any of those are selected. "Source Tracks" only supply cars and will not have setouts. So if you want to do yard work, it is probably better to have a track or two in the yard as a source track, and the rest as industry tracks, to get movement and variety.

However, I am surprised to report that I WAS able to duplicate the "duplicate destinations" issue you reported. It is not related to your specific template, it is apparently caused by unchecking the "simple mode" box. I need to review my algorithm for non-simple mode activity generation and correct this.

Once I have this figured out and resolved I will post an update to AG4 for all.

Thank you for reporting and identifying this bug and your patience in working with us on narrowing down the issue.

Best,

Steve


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tjbuege
post Feb 25 2009, 11:57 PM
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I can confirm that I do see randomness in the industry tracks worked. When I first disabled Simple mode a few days ago, I was working with a route with relatively short sidings and industry tracks, with enough room for anywhere from 1 to 5 cars. And these tracks were not always full. So, the chances of seeing a car other than car zero were not as great as if the tracks were longer, such as in the Sandpatch route, or the Niagara Corridor route. I would like to see the option of randomizing the source tracks. Not something that would be turned on all the time, but something that could be selected. This would make it possible to generate a yard job to build a local freight, then switch the cars out at the local industries, and finally deliver the pickups to the destination tracks.

I also noticed that if you do not select source tracks, but only select industry tracks to work, you cannot do setouts, but only pick up cars, then deliver them to a final destination. This is not realistic to me. There are some industries that have cars moved between tracks at that industry, as well as receiving new cars, and shipping cars out. It doesn't appear possible to generate this sort of activity.

But I digress off of my original question on sequential pickups.

Tim
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sgdavis
post Feb 27 2009, 11:19 AM
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QUOTE(sgdavis @ Feb 25 2009, 07:34 PM) *
Update to this. I cannot duplicate the "non-random" problem. As I mentioned in my email direct to you, but repeat here for the benefit of others who might observe the same behavior, because of the way AG4 places railcars into the "world" on an as-needed basis (to minimize drag on the program and frame rates and try not to hit the MSTS ~500 car maximum), pickups from any tracks you select as "source tracks" are always sequential regardless of the setting of the "simple mode" check box. It is only the industry tracks that are randomized. To get the most variety either start w/ cars already on your train and work only Industry tracks, or just make sure there are a lot of industry tracks checked to work. As a reminder, "Industry Tracks" in AG are tracks on which cars might be set out, and from which they might be picked up. Further, cars picked up on "Industry Tracks" may be set out on "Destination Tracks" if any of those are selected. "Source Tracks" only supply cars and will not have setouts. So if you want to do yard work, it is probably better to have a track or two in the yard as a source track, and the rest as industry tracks, to get movement and variety.

However, I am surprised to report that I WAS able to duplicate the "duplicate destinations" issue you reported. It is not related to your specific template, it is apparently caused by unchecking the "simple mode" box. I need to review my algorithm for non-simple mode activity generation and correct this.

Once I have this figured out and resolved I will post an update to AG4 for all.

Thank you for reporting and identifying this bug and your patience in working with us on narrowing down the issue.

Best,

Steve



I have resolved the "dual destination" issue and sent you a fix. If it is satisfactory, I will post this as an update.

Thanks,

Steve


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sgdavis
post Feb 27 2009, 11:37 AM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 25 2009, 11:57 PM) *
I can confirm that I do see randomness in the industry tracks worked. When I first disabled Simple mode a few days ago, I was working with a route with relatively short sidings and industry tracks, with enough room for anywhere from 1 to 5 cars. And these tracks were not always full. So, the chances of seeing a car other than car zero were not as great as if the tracks were longer, such as in the Sandpatch route, or the Niagara Corridor route. I would like to see the option of randomizing the source tracks. Not something that would be turned on all the time, but something that could be selected. This would make it possible to generate a yard job to build a local freight, then switch the cars out at the local industries, and finally deliver the pickups to the destination tracks.

I also noticed that if you do not select source tracks, but only select industry tracks to work, you cannot do setouts, but only pick up cars, then deliver them to a final destination. This is not realistic to me. There are some industries that have cars moved between tracks at that industry, as well as receiving new cars, and shipping cars out. It doesn't appear possible to generate this sort of activity.

But I digress off of my original question on sequential pickups.

Tim

You can generate this sort of activity by setting some tracks, located at industries, as "source" tracks. I didn't intend for users to always use the "Industry" track for every industry. Rather, by having three types of tracks, the idea was to give control to the user over what type of activity he/she wanted to create. For those things that just can't be done with AG, once could always still generate an activity using AG, then go in with the MSTS Activity Editor to make some changes to the work order -- still a lot less work than creating an activity from scratch.

With AG4 you can have industries deliver to other industries either by making some industry tracks "source tracks" or making some industry tracks "destination tracks", or a combination of the two. You can enable deliveries within the same region if you check the "Allow pickups from source tracks in one region to be set out in that same region" box.

There are a lot of different users with different needs and we try and meet them all as best we can. Some just want to run trains from an origin to a destination, but see railcars sitting on spurs and encounter AI traffic (which isn't possible with "Explore a Route"). For those folks we have the feature of starting with cars already on the train, and the destination track feature. Use a large enough destination track (large enough to hold an entire train) and you can generate an activity with no switching. Then in the middle are those who want to simulate modern local trains, which are often turns. For these we provide the source, industry, and destination tracks plus the "path region order" so the program knows the order in which towns/regions are reached. These folks will likely use "simple mode" and pick up a string of cars put together by the yard job, head down the line doing setouts and pickups along the way, and returning their pickups back to the yard -- or for non-turn locals, hauling them to the terminating yard or track. Then finally for switching afficianados there is the full randomization which can create some major switching challenges of the type you might find in heavy industrial carload-oriented shippers.

But your suggestion is a good one, and for a future version update I will look at adding an "intra-industry" move capability to the program. I don't think it would be that hard now that the program knows the order in which towns are reached. It would be an option available via checkbox. That would be a version update though not just a minor update since it is a basic change to the car placement and routing algorithm.

Thanks,

Steve


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tjbuege
post Feb 27 2009, 01:14 PM
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QUOTE(sgdavis @ Feb 27 2009, 11:37 AM) *
Rather, by having three types of tracks, the idea was to give control to the user over what type of activity he/she wanted to create.

And for even more control, allow the option of randomizing source tracks. smile.gif
QUOTE
For those things that just can't be done with AG, once could always still generate an activity using AG, then go in with the MSTS Activity Editor to make some changes to the work order -- still a lot less work than creating an activity from scratch.

Good point. It's easy to get caught up in trying to automate everything (something I do a lot with my job), but there always is the Activity Editor to fall back on for polishing up and fine tuning.
QUOTE
With AG4 you can have industries deliver to other industries either by making some industry tracks "source tracks" or making some industry tracks "destination tracks", or a combination of the two. You can enable deliveries within the same region if you check the "Allow pickups from source tracks in one region to be set out in that same region" box.

I'll play around with this idea. This might be a good way to generate yard jobs, too.
QUOTE
Then finally for switching afficianados . . .

And that would be me! I bet you couldn't guess. smile.gif When I'm participating in operating sessions on model railroads, I'm the one that will take the most difficult switching job, or the yard job. I'm a problem solver, and I like challenging puzzles. One of the primary reasons I puchased Activity Generator was to generate an endless supply of switching activities.
QUOTE
But your suggestion is a good one, and for a future version update I will look at adding an "intra-industry" move capability to the program.

That would be great (along with a check box to randomize source tracks! smile.gif)
Seriously, I appreciate the conversation we've had here. It has digressed somewhat from my original post, but I think it has been worth it. Not every developer is as interactive with their user community. I do not envy your position of trying to please everyone. It can become a challenge, I'm sure. So, thank you very much.

Tim
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sgdavis
post Feb 27 2009, 09:31 PM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 27 2009, 01:14 PM) *
And for even more control, allow the option of randomizing source tracks. smile.gif

Good point. It's easy to get caught up in trying to automate everything (something I do a lot with my job), but there always is the Activity Editor to fall back on for polishing up and fine tuning.

I'll play around with this idea. This might be a good way to generate yard jobs, too.

And that would be me! I bet you couldn't guess. smile.gif When I'm participating in operating sessions on model railroads, I'm the one that will take the most difficult switching job, or the yard job. I'm a problem solver, and I like challenging puzzles. One of the primary reasons I puchased Activity Generator was to generate an endless supply of switching activities.

That would be great (along with a check box to randomize source tracks! smile.gif )
Seriously, I appreciate the conversation we've had here. It has digressed somewhat from my original post, but I think it has been worth it. Not every developer is as interactive with their user community. I do not envy your position of trying to please everyone. It can become a challenge, I'm sure. So, thank you very much.

Tim

Thanks! At the end of the day it's people like you, who are passionate about this hobby, that I created this for. I too do a lot of model railroading, and am a member of a club near Tulsa that operates monthly with a dispatcher and full CTC, working yard, locals, turns, etc. See www.csrailclub.com I originally developed this program as a hobby, for my own use, because I wanted to have fun switching at the end of a hard day at work. WRITING a switching activity wasn't any fun because a) it took to long and cool.gif since I wrote it, I already 'solved' the puzzle before I ran it. So I needed something that would GENERATE challenging activities on the fly.

As for the dialog, I enjoy the dialog too, this is a hobby for me and I do it for the fun, I do have a "real job" outside this MSTS venture. Yes I charge for the program but I do that to limit my interaction to only those who are interested enough in the program to plunk down $15, and also to pay for my web hosting and other services and expenses I incur monthly. I just filed for my 2008 income tax so I can honestly say that I LOST a little money on this business last year. But no big deal, I'm not really in it for the money and anyway I needed the deduction. My biggest problem is that my job entails a lot of travel so it sometimes takes longer than I'd like for me to get back to folks. I couldn't keep this site or the business alive without contributors like Norm Beveridge, Denis Gionet, Peter Mulvey, and many others. Nor would I want to.

As for the source tracks I'll see what I can do, but you need to know, although you will usually have to pull a contiguous string of cars on each yard track worked, if you don't check simple mode, those cars are NOT in order. To explain better, let's say there is an industry to be worked in simple mode. AG will then place cars on that industry track, and always call for you to pull a sequential subset from that track (if there are 5 cars on it you may need to pull the first 3, first 2, etc.). Also AG will place your setouts to that track, on a "source track", all together in a single string (unless it runs out of room on the source track). Now in "complex" mode (simple mode not checked), as you have seen AG will call for various cars to be picked up from that industry track, not necessarily in order. Also, it will randomply place each of the setouts, each on it's own source track. You will see this behavior more if you put 4 or more source tracks in the mix when generating. Now you WILL need to pull a string from each source track, because AG will keep adding cars to each track as needed to fulfill the setouts, but, in complex mode if you have 4 setouts for a given industry, it is likely that at least some of those will come from different yard tracks. In fact that is one reason that we print the "destination" on the workorder next to pickups from source tracks: so if you want, you can do the yard job too and put the train in order (block your train) for the coming setouts. So in other words if you have 4 setouts, one may be the fourth car on source track 1, another may be the first car on source track 2, the third might be the fifth car also on source track 2, etc. The program generates a random number between 1 and the number of source tracks you have called for, EACH TIME it needs to place a pickup to be set out later, to determine which of the source tracks to place that individual pickup on. Not so with simple mode, then, it tries to put the cars in order (it assumes the yard job has already blocked the cuts).

Since you clearly have an inquisitive mind, you can gain some insight into how the program really "works" by generating diagnostic files (such as the ones you sent me which helped me to resolve this latest problem), and then reading those files using WordPad. There is some stuff you can skip through, but eventually it will "talk you through" every decision the program makes: what tracks it checked, why it chose a certain one, why it stopped scheduling setouts or pickups on that track (typically because a numeric limit you set was reached), etc. It's a pretty good "peak under the hood" and can give you some good insight.

Thanks,

Steve


--------------------
Steve Davis Skyline Computing SteveDavis@SkylineComputing.com
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tjbuege
post Feb 27 2009, 10:30 PM
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QUOTE(sgdavis @ Feb 27 2009, 09:31 PM) *
As for the source tracks I'll see what I can do, but you need to know, although you will usually have to pull a contiguous string of cars on each yard track worked, if you don't check simple mode, those cars are NOT in order. To explain better, let's say there is an industry to be worked in simple mode. AG will then place cars on that industry track, and always call for you to pull a sequential subset from that track (if there are 5 cars on it you may need to pull the first 3, first 2, etc.). Also AG will place your setouts to that track, on a "source track", all together in a single string (unless it runs out of room on the source track). Now in "complex" mode (simple mode not checked), as you have seen AG will call for various cars to be picked up from that industry track, not necessarily in order. Also, it will randomply place each of the setouts, each on it's own source track. You will see this behavior more if you put 4 or more source tracks in the mix when generating. Now you WILL need to pull a string from each source track, because AG will keep adding cars to each track as needed to fulfill the setouts, but, in complex mode if you have 4 setouts for a given industry, it is likely that at least some of those will come from different yard tracks. In fact that is one reason that we print the "destination" on the workorder next to pickups from source tracks: so if you want, you can do the yard job too and put the train in order (block your train) for the coming setouts. So in other words if you have 4 setouts, one may be the fourth car on source track 1, another may be the first car on source track 2, the third might be the fifth car also on source track 2, etc. The program generates a random number between 1 and the number of source tracks you have called for, EACH TIME it needs to place a pickup to be set out later, to determine which of the source tracks to place that individual pickup on. Not so with simple mode, then, it tries to put the cars in order (it assumes the yard job has already blocked the cuts).

Interesting, I hadn't noticed that behavior. I'll definitely have to study the diagnostics files. But for now, I think I have enough to think about and try, and should be kept busy for a while.

You know, I think the way you have the source tracks setup, where you pull a continuous string from each source track, is prototypical of a trim job at a yard. It's the trim job that builds outgoing trains. What I've been trying to make work is the class job, the guy that takes the incoming trains and breaks them down, classifying each car to its own track. I'm probably trying to combine too many steps into one activity.

It would be interesting to create a special activity template designed to simulate a classification job. You could specify certain yard tracks as the source tracks (arrival tracks for incoming trains). Then, you could treat the classification tracks as individual industries, where they required certain cars only.

Maybe that check box I'm begging for isn't necessary. Much to think about and play with. smile.gif

Thanks again!
Tim
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tjbuege
post Feb 28 2009, 12:36 PM
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A true yard classification job takes a string of cars (dropped off by an inbound train) that is in random order, and sorts those cars out to destination tracks. The key here is that the source track must be scrambled. I've been wracking my brain, but I cannot find any way of doing that with AG. Any ideas?

Here is what I tried, using the Niagara Corridor templates as an example (SWLACTDundasWBTemplate.csv) to generate a class job in the Hamilton Yard North:

1. All the yard tracks for Hamilton North are set to Any. I left tracks AA1, AA2, AA3 and AA4 set this way, to represent arrival and departure tracks.
2. I changed the types of cars wanted and supplied for tracks AA5, AA6, AA7 and AA8 to represent the class of cars to be stored on them. I did not include EVERY car type. For example, I did not include any of the TOFC or COFC types.

Test #1:

SOURCE: AA1, AA2
INDUSTRY: none
DESTINATION: AA5, AA6, AA7, AA8

1. Two strings of cars on AA1 and AA2 consisting of a variety of car types, including those that are not wanted for tracks AA5, AA6, AA7 and AA8.
2. A work order where the cars are all sent to tracks AA5, AA6, AA7 and AA8, including the car types that are not wanted!

It appears that AG ignores the car types on a track when that track is selected as a DESTINATION track. Is this intentional? If so, why?

TEST #2:

SOURCE: AA1, AA2
INDUSTRY: AA5, AA6, AA7, AA8
DESTINATION: none

1. The number of cars placed on the two source tracks was much smaller (8 cars per source track as opposed to 22 cars in my previous tests). I tested this several times, and saw the same behavior each time.
2. I was unable to set the number of pickups per industry track to 0. A value of 1 appears to be the minimum. Why? My resulting work order had me picking up one car from each class track. Not what I wanted.
3. The source tracks did not contain cars of ANY type...they contained cars of the types requested by tracks AA5, AA6, AA7 and AA8 only. In my first example, there were truly cars of any type. I suppose it makes sense that cars that cannot be classified in a yard would not be dropped off there.

In both tests, the cars on the SOURCE tracks were not random, but blocked by the destination class track. This should not be the case for a realistic class job. I could almost use the scenario in TEST #2, if I could set the number of pickups to zero, and if the source tracks were populated fully, not sparsely.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,
Tim
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nbeveridge
post Feb 28 2009, 01:58 PM
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QUOTE(tjbuege @ Feb 28 2009, 12:36 PM) *
It appears that AG ignores the car types on a track when that track is selected as a DESTINATION track. Is this intentional? If so, why?



Yes, this is intentional. Otherwise a train crossing a route will not drop the entire train at the "destination". It would instead be limited to the car type(s) wanted by the destination track(s).




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Norman
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