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FSX Hidden Costs of Complexity

taguilo said:
As FS treats the VC .MDL file as it is was a single gauge, all of its animation's script sections are probably grouped also in a single, huge script. I didn't make any test on this issue so far, but it is possible that if a "complete" script exceedes ~ 50 Kb problems would start to rise, like in 2D gauges.

Tom
Click to expand...


So far;
X-File.................27KB
Xanim...............126KB
MDL file............11.5MB

I opened the Xanim with Notepad and saw that animations are in big paragraph sections; one for each animation. I guess I could start counting those up. I didn't see anything on total animations in the model log or Xanim files.
 
Also, all parts are showing up. Nothing is 'not' exporting. Only parts losing their mouse-rects and animations failing.

I wonder if my ModelDef hit is limit. I know I prophesied this and hope its not coming true. Its a huge ModelDef now. 0.99 MB :S
 
Just as a reference, PMDG J41 VC's modeldef (extracted using Arno's Modelconverter X) is 992 kb, similar to yours, and so far works perfectly...:rolleyes:

Tom
 
As a thought Bill, do you start with a blank modeldef and paste/write in such code as you need, or do you start with the default one and add to it as necessary? If the second approach, you may be carrying a lot of unnecessary code (unless the compiler discards that automatically).
 
Tom, I have been using the same modeldef for years. I add to it. I like it. That shouldn't matter should it? Is it the modeldef that is possibly crashing this?

I did take out some animations (deleted them from the sheet) but that made no difference, the AP button codes are still hidden from 3DS Max.
 
You have something wrong in your modeldef.xml file then. That's the only reason why they are not appearing in either the Attachpoint tool or the Animation Manager.

As a test, I'd recommend renaming your modeldef.xml file to get it out of the way, then create a completely new modeldef.xml file with only your AP button scripts in it. See if they show up in the tools then!

For every project I now begin with an empty modeldef.xml file and only copy/paste from the 'stock' org_modeldef.xml file what is needed for that project, and add any new entries as needed as well. If nothing else, it makes it really fast to find visibility, mouse, and animation entries!
 
Thanks Bill. I'll try them again. I had also linked in the AP buttons with a hidden gauge that managed the AP system so perhaps all of that combined to cause a glitch like this.

Last month, I do remember having a sudden issue where if I added my 3 way landing/taxi lights to the model (attach point rects and animations), then the model became invisible in FS/P3. So perhaps this is something similar.

I am hoping and praying that this isn't from too many animations. Man oh man.


How did you find out how many animations you have? Do you count them manually in the Xanim?
 
oh man... yikes..

Well, good news. I added a dummy animation with totally different name and L:var and it shows up, so you were right, XML issue, not a limit. So I am redoing the AP's from scratch, totally pure. Good so far.
 
All is working.

Sadly, one part of this issue was that the AP buttons were named differently; lj24b...... instead of learjet24b....... so in alphabetical order, the AP buttons were in the back, lower down the list. Then I made more mistakes, changing names on the top GUID area's, I forgot the second 'name' slot when renaming them, so only one was working and the others suddenly weren't. Goodness.... Mondays... and Fridays... :S
 
Well, I was nearly certain that you'd find the problem. There are three places where "partnames" must be perfectly matched; two in the top <Animation...GUID.../> section, and of course the actual <Name>partname</Name> <PartInfo> section.

I've done that once or twice myself. Missed one of 'em that is! :banghead:
 
Well, its back. While I got the AP switches to working again (they did malfunction to begin with, losing their mouse-rects and animations), now that I have fixed them back again with new ones, all of my audio panel switches are now no longer working.

Oddly, 'one' of the duplicate switches is working on the far side of the panel and that's it. 3 knobs and 8 switches (approximately) on both sides, each.

So I think I can assume that I have hit a barrier of sorts here. damn...
 
I found I can look at a detailed sheet of the scene (project) in 3DS Max via File/Properties/Summary Info. There in that screen, you can scroll through it as well as export a TXT version. This shows all details, all materials of your project. Interesting.

I have parused the model export log. The parts that aren't animating show that in the log, the exporter 'did' export the animations, so something is up. The parts do not animate nor have a mouserect. There appear to be no errors. Some warnings that I do not understand, but that's it. The warnings cover parts that work fine.
 
Well... I created a short version ModelDef, ran the compiler, did nothing.

I did find one set of codes wrong for the transponder dials, but even with fixing that, it changed nothing. Still broke. :(
 
Bill, all I can suggest at this point is that you create a modeldef.xml file with only one of the "problem objects" included. Export/compile and test that in the sim. Work on the XML script until it works properly.

Once 'fixed' then proceed to add one animated object at a time and go through the export/compile/test process again, making sure to test the previous objects to make certain they are still working.

While that may sound like a lot of work, it is the only guaranteed path that will allow you to find and fix whatever is wrong in a methodical manner.
 
I actually did 'some' of that with the autopilot buttons, deleting their code, creating fresh new code, which got them to work fine, but then other buttons stopped working, which sounds like the system is maxing out.
 
Don't stop at "some." Do the whole project that way. There is something in your bloated modeldef.xml that's killing some of your scripts.
 
n4gix said:
Don't stop at "some." Do the whole project that way. There is something in your bloated modeldef.xml that's killing some of your scripts.
Click to expand...

Bill, I don't think so. I could be wrong, but I don't think so. For instance, how big is your 737 ModelDef file size? I'll bet mine is much smaller as you had at one point over 500 animations where I have only 148.

Its just a gut feeling.
 
I was pondering on this (cultivating gray hair in radical amounts) and remembered the FSDS days. We would have to copy/delete/paste parts to make them new again (top of the stack of parts order in creation). This brought back their visibility if they started to disappear. I think Plexi was doing this. (Its been quite a while). All of that was with FSDS though, but I wondered about the draw order in Max, if it had one, and searched the files, data on the scene, etc, and found no particular similarity that FSDS had. It generally goes by names. My switches are all called basic names per objects, like Sphere014, Sphere121, etc. (Thinking on this, I should change the name of the objects in question and see if that 'does anything' ).

The buttons in this case are all on the Audio Panel. The others that I repaired, which then caused the new ones to faulter, the Audio Panel switches) those were all the AP buttons. So they are happening in sets, stacked by each other, not spurattic choices, but groupings. Except for one, a flip switch on/off spring-back switch for the annunciator which also was working nicely and is now frozen in Frame zero.


I tell you... I don't know if I can handle much more of this. I have lived through the FS2004 Unlimited. I have gone through the limits of FSX via 3DS Max. I have just gone through the V2.1 code issue. I want to build planes, not face obstacles. I am tired.... I bend Polygons, not diagnose platforms.
 
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