Dominions II mapfile parser

[CJN]

Skolem said:
I wanted to test it and I receive the following error:
IndexError: list index out of range

File "mapinfo.py", line 156, in ?
fname = sys.argv[1]
What should I do?

Sounds like you didn't add the mapfile name when you ran it.
(sys.argv[1] = first command line argument)
Did you use IDLE to run in windows? Is it possible to add command line arguments when you use IDLE?

EDIT:
A new Version is now available, which has some improvements.
For details & download, see the first post.

[Skolem]

I tested it again with orania nasty ed. and it works great!
Last thing, he warned about one unknown command: #independents 9.
I'm pretty sure this maps use almost all possible map commands so it is indeed a good result. This will be surely very usefull for making maps
Thanks!

[CJN]

Skolem said:
I tested it again with orania nasty ed. and it works great!
Last thing, he warned about one unknown command: #independents 9.
I'm pretty sure this maps use almost all possible map commands so it is indeed a good result. This will be surely very usefull for making maps
Thanks!

Well, that command is not in mapedit.pdf. I will add it next time I update. I guess that it sets the strength of independent forces, right? Does anyone know of any other undocumented map commands?

[Gandalf Parker]

Nicely done. The format isnt as friendly toward further programming as I might want, but I can see where it would be useful for many.

[CJN]

Gandalf Parker said:
Nicely done. The format isnt as friendly toward further programming as I might want, but I can see where it would be useful for many.

I might be able to do something about the format if you post some details about the problem.

[Gandalf Parker]

Only my own comment. If others dont jump in then its not worth doing anything about it. It depends on what you program in..
Code:

---

<random>(46):

        NOSTART

        forest small

        neighbours: ['37', '55', '68']

<random>(62):

        NOSTART



        neighbours: ['58', '76']

<random>(82):



        neighbours: ['73', '78', '81', '84', '89']

<random>(100):

        forest mountain

        neighbours: ['85', '87', '91', '97']

---

Its a very readable format for user info which may be all it needs to do. But not good for programming. If there is no terrain you leave a blank line. Actually 0 terrain is plains (default) so you might want to make that change. But if there is no blankline for NOSTART. That means that in a program the code would be something like "find swamp, check next line for neighboring 32, back up one or two lines to get province number for including special site location".

Im not sure if everything can be placed on one line and still be good for user reading, but possibly the NOSTART and terrains could be on the same line as the province number. That would make parsing abit easier, and make the neighbor line always be in the same spot in relation to those.

[Gandalf Parker]

By The Way, your neighbor line could be used by someone for computing "quickest path from A to B" routines. Very nice.

DomMap added some info to its output for programming special sites and such..
Code:

---

#neighbour 49 50

#neighbour 51 53

#neighbour 52 53

#terrain 1 2    -- L-S0L2

#terrain 2 208  -- L-S0L1

#terrain 3 130  -- L-S0L4

---

If a province is L-S4L1 then its saying its Land with 4 Sea neighbors and 1 Land neighborsm or a penninsula. L-S4L0 would be Land with 4 Sea and no Land neighbors, or an island. S-L4S0 would be Sea with 4 land neighbors and no Sea neighbors, or a lake. Yoiu might want to do something like that but probably in a more user format like actually saying island and lake.

[CJN]

Gandalf Parker said:
Only my own comment. If others dont jump in then its not worth doing anything about it. It depends on what you program in..

Don't worry about that, I program it mostly to improve my programming skills.

Code:

---

<random>(46):

        NOSTART

        forest small

        neighbours: ['37', '55', '68']

<random>(62):

        NOSTART



        neighbours: ['58', '76']

<random>(82):



        neighbours: ['73', '78', '81', '84', '89']

<random>(100):

        forest mountain

        neighbours: ['85', '87', '91', '97']

---

Its a very readable format for user info which may be all it needs to do. But not good for programming. If there is no terrain you leave a blank line. Actually 0 terrain is plains (default) so you might want to make that change. But if there is no blankline for NOSTART. That means that in a program the code would be something like "find swamp, check next line for neighboring 32, back up one or two lines to get province number for including special site location".

Im not sure if everything can be placed on one line and still be good for user reading, but possibly the NOSTART and terrains could be on the same line as the province number. That would make parsing abit easier, and make the neighbor line always be in the same spot in relation to those.

How about:
Line 1: Name, id
Line 2: Terrain
Line 3: Neighbours
Line 4: NOSTART, START, VP, etc.
Line 5->: commanders, features, population, buildings

There is also the problem that there are two ways to add nostart. As a terrain flag and as a separate command. Should the output differ for them?

I will consider these changes and adding counting of number of land-sea neighbours to next Version. It will take to after Christmas before I have time however.