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  • Civ2 Beakers Counter

    I attached a program that counts beakers accumulated (and shows next Oedo years). Unfortunately the program don't read values from the computer RAM: before you use it you have to save a game into any .sav file.

    The Reload is automated now: the program detects if the file was changed. But this option can slow down old computers so you can turn this option off.

    In the game I use the
    Ctrl-S S Enter
    combination to save the game quickly to "s.sav" file. But the Civ2 program asks if you want to rewrite a file: it annoys. Therefore there is the "delete .sav file" option in the program.

    Every copy of the program (you can have different Civ2Beakers.exe files in different Civ2 folders) remembers a status of the last run: a window position, the last .sav file and civilization used.

    I also added more computations.

    corrections from the last version
    The pre-release of this program was firstly introduced in Calculating beakers needed for the next advance . It was made for my own use only and the program was not finished and had some errors. (I use 2 monitors and by default the old version loaded to my monitor that is on the left side. But my left monitor has the negative horizontal coordinates.
    You had to move the program to the visible part of the desktop (using alt-space etc. for example).
    Now the program remembers a position of the last run. )

    Special thanks
    Special thanks to SCG who complained to problems with earlier version and to SG[1] whose HutFinder gave me an ispiration to work.


    Version 0.3 had a serious bug! Throw it.


    New: version 0.4 is added. It can be downloaded from the page 2.
    Attached Files
    Last edited by SlowThinker; September 20, 2003, 19:29.
    Civ2 "Great Library Index": direct download, Apolyton attachment

  • #2
    looks nice seems to work too

    comments for future versions.
    - it doesn't recognize AD years properly
    - if you can get it to read the human player flag, you could give a toggle for viewing AI accumlated research, as some might consider that a minor cheat
    Insert witty phrase here

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by SCG
      - if you can get it to read the human player flag, you could give a toggle for viewing AI accumlated research, as some might consider that a minor cheat
      What's that?
      Civ2 "Great Library Index": direct download, Apolyton attachment

      Comment


      • #4
        when i load it, it defaults to the barbarian research instead of the human research, and I'm able to view each civ's accumulated research in succession, not just the human player. (i'm assuming you know what a toggle is as you have 3 programmed already )
        Insert witty phrase here

        Comment


        • #5
          SlowT,

          I loaded a save and picked my 'color'. The proggy correctly reads the number of beakers accumulated. I noodled around a bit and guessed the "multiplier" to be 26...and the "total needed" filled in. (This can be determined the "hard way" by resetting science to zero,etc.) This is what I mean by a user friendly helper.

          This is really sweet, ST!! Thanks for sharing this with us.

          If I am interpreting SCG's comments correctly, the year is displayed but not whether it is ad/bc. That's minor. Giving the details of AI progress is not minor, though. Using this information has to be a cheat. Hopefully, people won't be tempted to peak; it would be better, I think, if this element were not in future versions, if that is possible.

          Again I say, great piece of work!!

          Monk
          so long and thanks for all the fish

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by Bloody Monk
            Giving the details of AI progress is not minor, though. Using this information has to be a cheat. Hopefully, people won't be tempted to peak; it would be better, I think, if this element were not in future versions, if that is possible.
            hense my suggestion of IDing the human player (there has to be a flag in the save somewhere for which color is the human player
            If I am interpreting SCG's comments correctly, the year is displayed but not whether it is ad/bc. That's minor.
            not quite, see picture
            Attached Files
            Insert witty phrase here

            Comment


            • #7
              SCG,

              Your box/OS generates strange differences.

              It looks fine from here. The year is correct, just no designation bc/ad.

              Monk
              so long and thanks for all the fish

              Comment


              • #8
                Monk, Civ2 Planner is more user friendly...

                Originally posted by Monk
                If I am interpreting SCG's comments correctly, the year is displayed but not whether it is ad/bc.
                There is a sign '-' for BC years.

                Originally posted by SCG
                when i load it, it defaults to the barbarian research instead of the human research, and I'm able to view each civ's accumulated research in succession, not just the human player.
                Originally posted by Monk
                AI progress is not minor, though. Using this information has to be a cheat.
                I see I have to hide the initial show of barb beakers.
                Also I thought I could force people to set the color before choosing the .sav file...But then I decided that it is not so hard to pick the right color... (Maybe later...)
                You know, there is 1000 better ways how to cheat .
                But I agree that a player wouldn't have to choose the color if I would choose it automately by the human player flag. A good idea, SCG.
                Civ2 "Great Library Index": direct download, Apolyton attachment

                Comment


                • #9
                  in this case, i think its just a difference might be that the program is assuming an integer is a word, where my Pentium 4 is probably using a longword. 65535 would read as -1 using a 2-byte integer, and reversing the sign would show +1, as I assume it does on your computer. I'm not so sure that would explain the minor commodity list differences seen in a different thread though.
                  Insert witty phrase here

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    SCG,

                    I guess I have a different view of minor. You get a different list of commodities. To me, that is major and problematic. This Civ Beakers problem seems like something else, though. Could there be a Control Panel setting that needs attention?? Seems like something is missing or corrupted. Good luck.

                    Monk
                    so long and thanks for all the fish

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      just as a side note on using double-size numbers, here's a picture of my computer with the windows calculator and 2^106 (2 times itself 106 times). On my Pentium I, it goes to scientific notation at 2^44, or around 10^13. We'd have to check with ST to see if he's using an int, short int, etc for storing the year, but i suspect that is the only problem there.

                      As for the commodity lists, I might try reinstalling at some point to see if that makes a difference. I have over 20 GB of stuff (a lot probably Civ saved games ), and haven't done a lot of backing up for a while, so that probably won't be done this week.
                      Attached Files
                      Insert witty phrase here

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        SCG,

                        Well, Sir, that's a neat little dance but I can't see it as ST's problem. It is you, after all, that keeps getting snarky results. I am surprised you haven't done a remove/reinstall yet. Hardly seems fair to offer a review of someone else's work when you know you are looking thru shattered glasses.

                        I am no expert, but I bet there is a way to move all those saves, etc to another directory, temporarily, while you reinstall the game. I know you will be relived when it all gets straightened out. Good luck.

                        Monk
                        so long and thanks for all the fish

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          its no problem to move the saves; I've already reinstalled the game (and the commodity lists became a little more consistant, but are still different - i attribute that to when i tried to move my ver 1.07 in the same directory at one point). I was refering to reinstalling the Operating System and all the other programs. there is some other stuff i need to weed through before doing that. I will eventually.

                          And I'm not saying the problem is the size in bytes of the integer being used, i'm saying that it is a possibility. If it is, other people may well have similar problems date problems. Since other players don't have problems with the year when my saves are loaded, I consider it the most likely with the given information - ST should be able prove/disprove that easily enough.
                          Insert witty phrase here

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            I am very sorry I didn't tell you immediately I noticed the same problem with AD years.
                            The problem will be corrected in the next version (coming somewhere this week).

                            In the Delphi6 notation i used
                            Integer –2147483648..2147483647 signed 32-bit
                            and should use
                            Smallint –32768..32767 signed 16-bit
                            I was stupid, I thought Integer works as signed 16-bit.

                            But I don't understand why Monk was OK with AD years. In fact I had the ADs working correctly with my early version too, but not now...Could you post a save, Monk?
                            Civ2 "Great Library Index": direct download, Apolyton attachment

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by SlowThinker
                              But I don't understand why Monk was OK with AD years. In fact I had the ADs working correctly with my early version too, but not now...Could you post a save, Monk?
                              use his early landing game 1 save - it reads the year correctly. Incedentally, i took a game created on my pentium I and it read the date correctly (running on the pentium 4) Also, i took a game created on my Pentium 4 and read it from my Pentium I computer, and it read the date correctly.

                              I would guess Bloody Monk's computer has an older processor, and using the smaller int and short int definitions.
                              Insert witty phrase here

                              Comment

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