DomMap - new Version

[LintMan]

Arryn said:
Is the Windows .exe in your archive compatible with the already-existing Windows GUI front-end for DomMap (by Mark Garnett, available on my website)? If so, I can remove the binary I compiled back in late February in favor of your latest one.

I just dl'd the GUI, and it does work, but of course it doesn't have controls for the latest switches I've added, which means until/unless it's updated, you're stuck with the defaults for those settings. That probably won't matter much except that impassable borders is turned on by default, which some people may not want.

If you'd like, I can build a new windows exe with different defaults that may suit the GUI better.
In fact, let me do that right now and just attach it here...

Or not. For some reason it keeps telling me it can only attach files with certain extensions (including .exe), but I'm trying to upload a .exe file. Should I just email you the exe, Arryn?

-LintMan

[Arryn]

Yes, please email me the .exe and I'll update your archive with it before I host your archive on my site.

Perhaps, if we're lucky, Mark will update his GUI to include your new controls. (If he doesn't, and if there's enough demand, I could always write a new GUI myself, though I'd probably do it in Java so that everyone could use it.)

[LintMan]

Arryn: sent.

[Arryn]

Thanks. I've updated my site accordingly.

[mgarnett]

Hi Guys,

if you like I can modify the GUI to add the new switches. Should only take a couple of minutes. Let me know if you still need me to do that and I will get right on it and send through the new EXE.

Mark

[Arryn]

Please do, Mark. Then email me the latest file. Thanks.

[PhilD]

I tried downloading and running the new Version, and ran into something strange.

The Perl script (with no arguments) seems to freeze midway through a Gimp script-fu; if I Ctrl-C it, that kills the Gimp, and the script runs its course, but the resulting maps are way more blurry than I'd expect; the run_dommap.sh (shell script) gives, IMHO, a much better result.

Is that normal, or is this Version only intended to be used with more precise options?

[Gandalf Parker]

Actually I dont think the scripts are looked at. DomMap now has its own blur routine. Actually something like 5 of them. One standard blur written in, one shadow-terrain effect, one for shadow-roughness which does what bump and scatter were doing to the maps before, one which does the new capitals highlighting, and one which anti-aliases the borders. All of them have new switches to control them.

The easiest I think is to run it just as defaults, then change what you feel you need to.

[LintMan]

PhilD said:
I tried downloading and running the new Version, and ran into something strange.

The Perl script (with no arguments) seems to freeze midway through a Gimp script-fu; if I Ctrl-C it, that kills the Gimp, and the script runs its course, but the resulting maps are way more blurry than I'd expect; the run_dommap.sh (shell script) gives, IMHO, a much better result.

Is that normal, or is this Version only intended to be used with more precise options?

Sorry, the Perl script is a bit out of date... Using Gimp 2.0.2 in WinXP, I had to hack the script-fu script to get it to work called from within gimp, and I've never been able to get anything but a useless error when calling it from the command line. So I had long ago changed my copy of the perl script to skip the gimp part but left it as-is in the main distribution because presumably it worked OK for others. Then I forgot all about the difference.

But in any case, with the built-in blur in DomMap, the gimp stuff isn't really necessary (which was the point). I'm attaching a new perl script sans the gimp bit.

[Edi]

Gandalf, check your email. I ran a couple of quick and dirty tests on the colors I lifted from the Faerun map, the suggestions are in the text file I attached to the message.

Edi