Zugg Software :: View topic

Newbie Joined: 10 Jan 2004 Posts: 4 Location: USA

In a recent patch to Horizons, they added an in game map similar to zExplorer. I would imagine that many of the people who contributed to the database in the beginning are now updating their information in the game itself.

While asking for zExplorer to import or export directly to the Artifact Entertainment map spec is probably way outside the scope of what zExplorer should do, I would like to ask that it be possible to import or export map points to a CSV, tab delimited text or XML format.

I would imagine this could be usefull for the other games/future games that zExplorer may support since it would allow for the average person to bulk import/update their map entries. It would also allow for the creation of detailed in-game maps (when/if the game vendor adds the feature)

Posted: Sat Feb 07, 2004 9:55 am

Cool, I guess I need to fire up Horizons again. I haven't had time to play in several weeks now. I'm interested to see what they came up with map-wise. Hopefully the in-game map won't kill zExplorer usage, but I was aware that they were going to eventually do this when I added Horizons to zExplorer. Back in December, I was desperate for a mapping program.

You probably won't like my answer, but the current way to do export/import is using the zMapper program. That's the program that I actually used to create the intial map database, set up the coordinate system, add the initial locations, create the different icons for the different object types, etc. Yes, it's a seperate program that has it's own cost, and it's still in beta status and has some bugs. But the export/import of the ObjectTbl (the table with the actual location objects) is pretty customizeable, and it supports CSV, XML, etc.

Or, since the map is in Microsoft Access format, any program that can read MS Access databases will work. Again, it's the ObjectTbl table that has the locations in it. MS Access format is the JET 4.0 format that you can use with ADO, so you can even access the database via VBScript or any other application that can create and use ADO objects.

Newbie Joined: 08 Feb 2004 Posts: 2 Location: USA

This is also a feature that I would enjoy having in Zexplorer. Currently the internal map doesn't show all the known areas, you are limited to only 6 layers, and on top of that you are limited to the number of 'flags' on any given map. Limits that Zexplorer doesn't have. Although the Zexplorer map is a little dated. =)

Writing an import routine for the Access Database wouldn't be to hard, my question would be if we where able to import the Map file directly into the the database would be still be able to publish the new data in one lump chunk?

Posted: Sun Feb 08, 2004 9:13 am

The zExplorer map is completely dependant upon submissions from players. So if it's out of date, that means that people are not adding new locations like they should. Anyone using zExplorer can add locations. Also, make sure you use the Update Datafiles regularly.

Newbie Joined: 08 Feb 2004 Posts: 2 Location: USA

I'm sorry Zugg, I meant the Jpg used for the background map is out of date. So some point look a little weird at the moment. Very Happy

The Data (so far) has been good so far minus a few duplicate entries, which I have been reporting when I see them. I also have been adding data when ever possible.

Posted: Mon Feb 09, 2004 7:08 pm

Really? What did they change in the landscape background? It's quite a lot of work to update the background image since we don't have any automatted tool yet to pull this information out of the client files. So, it might be a while before I can update the jpg file. But thanks for letting me know.