Posted: Mon Jun 15, 2009 9:37 pm Post subject:
Question on Ecaches
Subject description: do they need XX
Well its a simple question, times I see Ecaches without XX and instead like EcacheBlah so my question is do you have to put a number or just something. QUICK_EDIT
Ignore xovvo who despite my best efforts to educate the community and the fact that modenc explains it correctly insist on clinging to the old myth that you need to use the format ecache##.mix where ## is a number between 00 and 99. This is not true, the correct format is ecache*.mix where * is any string. For example, ecache02.mix will work because 02 is a string, but ecachexovvoisanidiot.mix will also work just fine because xovvoisanidiot is also a valid string. For an example of where such a mix is used in a real world community project, the assault map packs are named ecacheassault01.mix and ecacheassault02.mix.
Why I am I being a bit of a dick about this? Well, it could be that every time this question gets asked, some moron who has never tried it decides to tell people its only the ecache##.mix format and its almost always me that corrects them (there are a few others now that correct as well thankfully). That any string works after ecache has been known for years and IMO ignorance is no excuse any more and neither is it justifiable to answer incorrectly such a question when you haven't even f**king tried it yourself! QUICK_EDIT
Actually I was thinking about the Assault mappacks in this case, I guess the community just looks for a standard in fact I believe that you cant overwrite things by putting Ecache99 over Ecache87. I saw it on Modenc but I just wanted to check my logic on it. Thanks a ton. According to ModEnc, Expand does still need numbers though right, and I could just suddenly decide to use ElocalBlah not EcacheBlah? QUICK_EDIT
You can get over this question of what to name/place files by using xcc mod creator from the start and organising your files into apporiate folders. _________________ QUICK_EDIT
Sorry for reviving this but I tested it on Tiberian Sun and ecacheblah doesn't seem to do anything, didn't test elocal## because there really is no reason (whats wrong with a little conformity in the modding community), ill test it with RA2 in a bit.
EDIT: Yeah it works fine, strange how it didn't in TS. QUICK_EDIT
hmm, thats wierd why it didnt work, TS Firestorm Exp uses the expand01 and inside the expand01 is the ecache01 file, so maybe try making a expandblah then put ecacheblah inside of expandblah. QUICK_EDIT
Could be the mix handling code for TS is different and does indeed work the same as expand##.mix. Ask hyper in the TS forums or someone else who has hacked about with the TS executable. QUICK_EDIT
It's also not that hard to find out yourself.
Open TS's game.exe in a hex editor
Open RA2's game.exe in a hex editor
You'll notice that TS uses ECACHE%02d.MIX, with %02d being a joker that accepts only numbers.
And you'll notice that RA2 uses ECACHE*.MIX, with * being a joker which accepts any string.
In TS do ecacheXX, expandXX, moviesXX, mapsXX, eXXscdXX.mix, sidecdXX, sidencXX, eXXsncXX, sidecXX, eXXscXX, speechXX and eXXvoxXX use this technique (XX being %02d here)
In RA2 do moviesXX, mapsXX, expandXX, sidencXX, sidecXX, use the TS like enumeration with %02d
and elocal*, ecache*, movies*, maps* the RA2 string identification with * (movies and maps appear twice in the exe, one for each technique) _________________ SHP Artist of Twisted Insurrection: Nod buildings
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Question on Ecaches
