Alpha: 2.0.1 alpha 30

Hi all,

the latest patch version is now again available at http://www.ttdpatch.net/src/

Please note that this one is a little more experimental than the previous 
ones, particularly the new "articulated engine" feature.  Please read all 
of this message to find out the precautions you need to take if you want to 
test it.

Articulated engines are train engines that are made up from several 
vehicles.  This might be a steam engine with a tender, or something more 
complex.  Previously, you had to buy all pieces individually and assemble 
them yourself, hoping that you got them in the right order in 
orientation.  For .grf files using articulated engines, the patch will now 
do that automatically, and it will treat such engines as a single 
entity.  This means that the AI players will now be able to use such 
engines properly as well, in particular they will buy tenders along with 
steam engines as appropriate (if so enabled in the .grf file).

Please note that there are still some problems associated with articulated 
engines, particularly when they are multiheaded.  When adding or removing 
additional heads of a articulated engine, you currently have to make sure 
the game would not "automatically" attach or detach these additional engines.

To buy additional articulated engine head:
- buy the real engine first (without Ctrl)
- buy all additional engines (with Ctrl)
- buy the wagons

To sell a train with articulated engines?
- sell all additional engines first
- then sell the train

It should be safe to move engines around in a depot, however.  To be really 
sure, save before rearranging trains.

Other new features are the new "newgrfcfg" switch (-Yn on the command 
line), which allows you to choose a different file name for the 
newgrf(w).cfg file.  This way you could have a different newgrf.cfg file 
associated with a different configuration, and switch between them.

It is now possible to turn off .grf files by default, by adding a "!" 
parameter after the filename.  For example, the line "newgrf/bla.grf !" 
would make bla.grf be loaded and available for savegames that need it, but 
it wouldn't be enabled by default.  You can still enable it manually of 
course by opening the Graphics Status window from the tools menu.  Along 
with this change, I've disabled the "loadallgraphics" switch, because a 
better mechanism exists now to enable/disable graphics.  An updated version 
of Graphics Manager that can take advantage of these changes is available 
at http://www.ttdpatch.de.vu/ .

I've changed the multihead switch slightly, in that it now always buys two 
heads of normally two-headed trains like the T.I.M.  You can still sell the 
second head if you don't like it, however.

Finally, I've fixed a bug in TTD, which caused it to forget the mail 
capacity when refitting a plane.  This was most noticable when refitting a 
plane to carry only mail, in which case it would be only half the passenger 
capacity, instead of half the passenger capacity plus the original mail 
capacity.  Now the original mail capacity is properly taken into account.

And that's all for now, I hope to bring out another alpha fixing the 
articulated engine issues soon!

Have fun,

Josef.


All changes in 2.0.1 alpha 30:
- fixed bug with multiple actions 0 setting prop 08 not working
- fixed bug with custom vehicle names not getting saved if it had
   shared orders
- fixed bug with different acceleration setting for regular and
   electric railways
- prevent crashes from division by zero or overflow on division
- new switch "newgrfcfg" (-Yn) allows specifying an alternate
   newgrf.cfg file
- if veh can't be autorenewed because the model is obsolete, the
   "getting old" message now says so
- improved resilience of the newgrf.cfg parser (now less confused by
   spaces in odd places etc.)
- removed "loadallgraphics" functionality, instead individual .grfs
   can be disabled by default by adding a "!" parameter in
   newgrf(w).cfg
- added independent random trigger chains, now only the bits which
   actually get triggered will be re-randomized
- new station prop 12 to set cargo types that should trigger
   re-randomizing
- added station triggers for re-randomizing
- had to reduce random station bits from 16 to 8 because of the
   above changes
- when refitting aircraft, take original mail capacity into account
   too
- make sure train and road vehicle refit costs are accounted in
   proper category
- implemented callback 15 for all vehicle types
- allow setting refit cost for all vehicle types
- force redraw of depot window after refitting
- selling and re-buying a vehicle now copies the service interval,
   refitted cargo type and current destination as well (with
   generalfixes or sharedorders)
- allow articulated train engines, using callback 16
- changed multihead: by default buy both heads of dualheaded trains,
   and changed what the Ctrl key does when arranging trains: forward
   with Ctrl, backward without
- powered wagons work even with multihead off
- fix incorrect values of dualheaded engines with multihead on
-- 
Josef Drexler ([email protected])
http://publish.uwo.ca/~jdrexler/

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