1768 replies to this topic

[roflplanes]

Outstanding app, very cool. How would I go about getting login information to store my mechs though? My MW:O username and password didn't work.

[Blark]

roflplanes, on 26 January 2013 - 12:18 PM, said:

Outstanding app, very cool. How would I go about getting login information to store my mechs though? My MW:O username and password didn't work.

Press on the "arrow down " button right next to "login", you'll get an option to register

[Megacromulent]

I love this tool. In fact I use it so much, that I decided to upgrade it. I use the Firefox plugin called Stylish. I wanted to make your mechlab more like an app instead of a web page. (ie, remove scroll bars, fixed positioned items, etc..) I couldn't easily get your "about" section to display as a menu, so I just hid it.

Note that I move the alerts to the bottom left, it's really annoying that the first thing that happens is your screen shifts because of an alert...

Here's how it looks:



Here's the stylish code. (lots of "!important" entries, only needed to overide your styles)

@namespace url(http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml);
@-moz-document domain("mwo.smurfy-net.de") {
 
body > div[class="container"] + div[class="container"]
{
/*About
position:fixed !important;*/
display:none;
}
body > div[class="container"] + div[class="container"]:before
{
content:"ASDF";
display:block;
outline:2px dotted #f00;
width:200px;height:200px;
color:#fff !important;
position:fixed;
top:50px;
left:255px;
}
/*Mech toolbar*/
.action-container
{
position:fixed;
left:100px;
right:300px;
top:0px;
z-index:10;/*on to of main nav*/
}
.action-container .dropdown .dropdown-toggle.btn.btn-flat.btn-large
{
/*Mech select menu*/
font-size: 12px !important;
	line-height: 12px  !important;
	padding: 8px 12px  !important;
}
.alert-container
{
position:fixed;
bottom:2px;
z-index:10000;
}
/*Top tool/navbar*/
.navbar-wrapper
{
position:fixed !important;
top:0px;
right:0px;
}
.navbar-wrapper-inner
{
margin:0 !important;padding:0;height:auto;width:auto !important;
}
.navbar
{
margin:0 !important;
}
.brand {font-size:12px !important;color:#fff !important;
padding:5px !important;}
.navbar .nav
{
float:right !important;
margin:0 85px 0 0 !important;
}
.navbar .nav > li > a
{
padding:12px 4px !important;
font-size:12px;
background:rgba(0,0,0,.2);
border-right:1px solid rgba(255,255,255,.2);
}
.nav li
{
line-height:10px !important;
}
.navbar-inner
{
min-height:30px !important;
display:block !important;
}
.navbar-inner:before, .navbar-inner:after
{
	display:none !important;
}
/*login menu*/
.navbar-inner .pull-right.dropdown.btn-group
{
position:fixed !important; float:none !important;right:10px;
}
.navbar-inner .pull-right.dropdown.btn-group a
{
line-height:12px !important;
}
body
{
padding:40px 0 0 0;margin:0;
}
}

Edited by Megachromulent, 27 January 2013 - 03:32 AM.

[Tenam]

Smurfy Thanks for putting in the work and creating an awesome site and tool!! ... wondering if there is a faster way to add armor values than holding down or clicking the up arrow buttons?... (I attempted to highlight and type in a value but that didn't appear to work). I haven't registered yet I was just goofing around with it not logged in, perhaps it is different when I create a log in.

[Jacmac]

Tenam, on 27 January 2013 - 06:04 AM, said:

wondering if there is a faster way to add armor values than holding down or clicking the up arrow buttons?

There is, select Armor on the right side (the Mech silhouette) and you can type the numbers in directly. I personally just use the +/- on each location directly, but if your computer is sluggish, entering the numbers directly could be better.

[Jacmac]

Smurfynet, add an export function please! I use the tool extensively and encourage everyone in my group to, but many are against it because of the lack of an export like the Java mechlab. If they knew your site was never going away, then they wouldn't worry about an export.

[smurfynet]

Jacmac, on 27 January 2013 - 10:42 AM, said:

Smurfynet, add an export function please! I use the tool extensively and encourage everyone in my group to, but many are against it because of the lack of an export like the Java mechlab. If they knew your site was never going away, then they wouldn't worry about an export.

Hi,

what exactly do you mean with export?
* text file?
* human readable?
* importable?
* textual summary to post to the forum?

[BertyBargo]

Smurfy, is there a limit to how many mechs you can save in the lab? Entries have stopped appearing when I try to save them. There's a success message but I never see it in the list.

[smurfynet]

BertyBargo, on 27 January 2013 - 01:55 PM, said:

Smurfy, is there a limit to how many mechs you can save in the lab? Entries have stopped appearing when I try to save them. There's a success message but I never see it in the list.

There should be no limit, i have only 5 builds saved, but in my dev version > 20.
Can you pm me your username in my lab and i can have a look. you also can try a different browser.

[MasterBLB]

smurfynet, on 27 January 2013 - 11:17 AM, said:

Hi,

what exactly do you mean with export?
* text file?
* human readable?
* importable?
* textual summary to post to the forum?

Hi mate

Some .txt file similar to those majora incarnate's mechlab creates would be the best I suppose.

[SaintPeter]

Love the App! Thank you so much for taking the time to make and support it!

Suggestion:
Pre-Made Mech Library. Allow people to flag their favorite loadout as "Share" or similar and organize a "library" of mechs. Maybe a text field for a description of the loadout. Possibly add a vote up/down for loadouts. Maybe not a comment area, though, since that's a pain. Alternately, choose some "authorities" to pick from some "common" loadouts - IE: Splat Cat, etc.

As a new user I'd like to be able to look through some mechs to see what others have done or what some "best practices" are. My buddy is new to the game and just flailing around with builds that are horribly impractical, but I don't know of a good source for alternates.

Does a "Mech Library" already exist?

[smurfynet]

SaintPeter, on 28 January 2013 - 11:13 PM, said:

Pre-Made Mech Library. Allow people to flag their favorite loadout as "Share" or similar and organize a "library" of mechs. Maybe a text field for a description of the loadout. Possibly add a vote up/down for loadouts. Maybe not a comment area, though, since that's a pain. Alternately, choose some "authorities" to pick from some "common" loadouts - IE: Splat Cat, etc.

A global mech library does not exist.

With the next update naming YOUR mechs in the mechbay.

I also thought about the following things for some time in the future (or not):
* Rating of mechs (already started)
* Searching for mechs based on filters
* The ability to share your mechbay readonly with friends
...

[ArcDemon]

Armor Weight Rounding bug

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...5f0e12abb6a9cdc

Load up that configuration and you'll see that it shows a total weight 34.0 tons, free weight 1.00 tons. There are 4 available slots. Now on the parts tab try to equip one more heat sink. You can't because it's marked in red and can't be dragged. If you remove 1 point of armor from anywhere on the mech (now displays 1.03 free) you can equip the heat sink. I tried this in Firefox 10.0.12 ESR and latest Chrome with the same result and I tried this out in my own lab and was able to equip the last heat sink without reducing armor though I don't have a real Raven in my mechbay to see which program is doing the math right.

[smurfynet]

ArcDemon, on 30 January 2013 - 12:11 PM, said:

Armor Weight Rounding bug

grml.. i will check it tomorrow, have a raven 3L

[ArcDemon]

MasterBLB, on 28 January 2013 - 07:51 AM, said:

Hi mate

Some .txt file similar to those majora incarnate's mechlab creates would be the best I suppose.

A challenge is a format that can handle new additions (like if PGI adds ER Medium Lasers to game). I think any universal format would to use the same item ID numbers that PGI uses in their own files and avoid any invented standards or conventions. Fortunately everything (even the upgrades) have an ID value so those can be used and recognized by any program. I would also suggest a format that has an existing and easily available parser to avoid people writing their own.

Here is one example of a way to save mech information. The remark attributes are are ignored by the program loading the file.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<mech id="32" name="Stock Awesome 9M" remark="AWESOME AWS-9M">
  <upgrades>  
	<item id="3002" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINKS" />
  </upgrades>
 
  <head armor="18">  
	<item id="1012" grouping="6" remark="SML PULSE LASER" />
  </head>
 
  <centreTorso armor="60" rearArmor="40">  
	<item id="3362" remark="XL ENGINE 320" />
	<item id="1011" grouping="5" remark="MED PULSE LASER" />
	<item id="1032" grouping="4" remark="STREAK SRM 2" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
  </centreTorso>
 
  <leftTorso armor="48" rearArmor="20">  
	<item id="1006" grouping="1" remark="ER PPC" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
  </leftTorso>
 
  <rightTorso armor="48" rearArmor="20">  
	<item id="1006" grouping="3" remark="ER PPC" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
  </rightTorso>
 
  <leftArm armor="52">  
	<item id="1032" grouping="4" remark="STREAK SRM 2" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
  </leftArm>
 
  <rightArm armor="52">  
	<item id="1006" grouping="2" remark="ER PPC" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
	<item id="3001" remark="DOUBLE HEAT SINK" />
  </right_arm>
 
  <leftLeg armor="68">  
	<item id="2029" remark="STREAK SRM AMMO" />
  </leftLeg>
 
  <rightLeg armor="68" />	
</mech>

A more compact but less human readable way is as a URL parameter. A danger is that it is tempting to write your own code for encoding the url instead of a standard library.

Mech=33&Upgrades=3002&CentreTorso=3357&CentreTorsoArmor=29&CentreTorsoRearArmor=15&RightTorso=1001,1032&RightTorsoArmor=21&RightTorsoRearArmor=11&LeftTorso=3001,3001,3001&LeftTorsoArmor=21&LeftTorsoRearArmor=11&LeftArm=1032&LeftArmArmor=24&RightArm=1001,1001&RightArmArmor=24&LeftLeg=9006&LeftLegArmor=32&RightLeg=&RightLegArmor=32&Head=&HeadArmor=13

Finally some thought needs to be given to allowing some programs to support features that others might not. For example in the XML file you can see that there is a grouping attribute used for weapons and a name attribute used for the overall mech. This way a saved mech also includes the weapon grouping for better damage and heat analysis. Another item would be the efficiencies which runs into a little snag - there is a difference in heat performance between a mech with all 8 basic efficiencies, and a mech with all 8 basic efficiencies in 3 variants of the same chasis (elite unlocked). This could become worse over time if the true pilot trees, the ones that actually have a tree like structure which where shown last year, are introduced.

[smurfynet]

@ArcDemon about Export formats.

Thats why i asked the purpose of the export

For users to simple share the file with friends its need to be human readable to reimport them maybe both.
So here is the way i probably will go:

1. An simple text based export. human only readable, using the translated weapon names like on my site, which are directly from the gamefiles too.
2. The original game loadout format which the game uses and my parser can load. (with probably some comments to make it human friendly)

I already use the original gamefiles for everything and have no database/own ids for components, mechs or whatnot.

[LarkinOmega]

I think the second option would be ideal for an entire Mechbay Export. Of course, having a sharing option for our Mechbay would be excellent as well.

[BertyBargo]

smurfynet, on 27 January 2013 - 10:58 PM, said:

There should be no limit, i have only 5 builds saved, but in my dev version > 20.
Can you pm me your username in my lab and i can have a look. you also can try a different browser.

Thanks for getting back to me! Yeah, it's just my ****** work browser. When I went home, all my saved builds appeared.

[Jacmac]

smurfynet, on 27 January 2013 - 11:17 AM, said:

Hi,

what exactly do you mean with export?
* text file?
* human readable?
* importable?
* textual summary to post to the forum?

A CSV file export of mech builds would be awesome as well as a human readable summary. The CSV file would be great for importing into spreadsheets, ect. Your site is great anyway, but the ability to compile the information in one place for our unit would be helpful in many ways that I can't describe here.

Also, are you able to calculate and display the maximum reverse speeds (speed tweak included) in the summary? I noticed while playing that Centurions have a very high reverse speed potential.

Edited by Jacmac, 31 January 2013 - 10:09 PM.

[Psiclone]

Could you add an option where people could save a loadout to a database along along with a spot where one could provide a description on how to use the mech, what its strengths and weaknesses are and other general thoughts that went into the build? With this database players could rate and comment on uploaded builds as well as various search functions (rating, variant, type, ect...)