User talk:Giles

Re: edit to trigger_changelevel

For transitions...what about new chapters?—ts2do 17:51, 24 Feb 2006 (PST)

Afaik, chapter changes are just level transitions where a chapter title is displayed, from a map building perspective. Source also demands a "return-trip" level transition regardless of whether the newunit worldspawn keyvalue is set or not. If it can't find one, the level load fails with the following message in the console:

Host_Error: Level transition ERROR

Can't find connection to <previous level> from <next level>

I've verified this by experimenting with my own maps and by looking at how Valve handled the one-way transition from d2_prison_08 to d3_c17_01 and d3_c17_01 to d3_c17_02 (which is the first map of the new chapter Anticitizen One).

Giles 01:24, 25 Feb 2006 (PST)

Re: Help Desk question (Generating output when player uses a locked door)

You got a point about that locked door triggering. Ill work on it. If you still need help. Cubedude 14:00, 26 Feb 2006 (PST)

I've got it, It's kinda like what you said "hacking around" But it works. What I did was I made a locked func_door_rot and then created a func_button that was also locked and invisable and as big as the door. I put the button just a unit or two in front of the door and I put an OnUseLocked output to trigger what ever I needed to, then I used the OnUseLocked Kill "Button" which i named the button. to get rid of the button. I also used a locked sound for the button so when you went to use the door "but actually used the invisable button" It sounded like a locked door. Hope this helped. If you want me to email you this map then email me at [email protected] Cubedude 14:31, 26 Feb 2006 (PST)

I didn't know func_button had an OnUseLocked output, but now I do. I whipped up a test map and it works fine. Thanks very much. Giles 15:13, 26 Feb 2006 (PST)

Re: Help_Desk question (Generating output when player is damaged)

Yo man, I couldn't figure out anything. I really tried, and now I really want to know how to do it. If you ever figure out a way to do it, I hope I'm the first person you tell. Cubedude 17:54, 3 Mar 2006 (PST)

If you turn on developer 2 in the console, when the player is shot, the following message is printed there:

Unhandled GameEvent in ClientModeShared::FireGameEvent - player_hurt

Kinda suggests I'm up the creek and if I want a paddle, it'll have to be made out of code. Giles 14:59, 7 Mar 2006 (PST)

Yah, this is something you'd have to do in code. --Spektre1 00:42, 10 Mar 2006 (PST)

I'm glad you finally figured out someway to do this, to bad I didn't figure it out first. Crap! LOL. Cubedude 08:38, 11 Mar 2006 (PST)

Archived question, since I took it off the Help Desk page:

Firing an output on player damaged

Some of the NPCs have outputs OnHalfHealth and OnDamaged, which do pretty much what they say on the tin - fire when the NPC reaches half health and when the NPC takes damage. Is there any equivalent for the player, and any way of hooking up such an output from within Hammer? Giles 10:20, 1 Mar 2006 (PST)

I'm going to guess that that sort of thing would have to be programmed in. --Spektre1 00:41, 10 Mar 2006 (PST)

VMF uploads

There are several issues, but one of them is that Mediawiki was not really designed to handle large uploads that VMF files can sometimes be. We have been looking into ways we can allow this down the line, but cannot at this time. --JeffLane 12:20, 7 Mar 2006 (PST)

One solution would be that a .vmf could only be a certain size, we could in that case have a prefab dedicated page. Wouldn't that be just ACES.--Deadity 12:33, 7 Mar 2006 (PST)

Okay, thanks for following that up. Giles 14:59, 7 Mar 2006 (PST)

Assaults article

With the exception of the "Limitations and Bugs" section, which I'm about to divide among the entities it concerns, I'm done structuring up the article, and I'm wondering if it needs anything else. I really didn't add much - just restructured things already there. The page is not a complete tutorial on its own, but the entity pages linked to it should be able to provide what's not mentioned on the page. --Andreasen 09:13, 9 Apr 2006 (PDT)

Grammar

Isn't it "I do, you do, it does.", like in "PNGs does"? I'm not 100% sure, so I'm asking. EDIT: Oh, never mind: It's "they do" - it's plural. --Andreasen 12:03, 20 Apr 2006 (PDT)

game4ever discussion from User_talk:JeffLane

I think the critical point to understand is that to him and to people of his age, txtspk is entirely normal, readable and proper. It's what he uses every day - call it a fad or the natural evolution of language, it's part of his culture. It's a natural instinct to look 'down' at "youth culture" and say "aren't they uncivilised, this upcoming generation", in the same way that it's a natural instinct to look 'up' at one's elders and say "aren't they out of touch, those oldies". Without suspending those prejudices and bridging that divide - by explaining why txtspk isn't proper rather than just telling him, in this instance - it's easy to just end up in a shouting match. Giles 16:13, 24 Apr 2006 (PDT)

If an individual freely enters a culture different from his own, it is common sense that he, in his own interest, respects the habits of this culture and does not try to force his own culture onto everybody else. This way he can become an accepted and integral part of a community. I'm not saying this individual should give up his culture, but open himself for a dialogue which is healthy for both sides. But this is not what I've been seeing here, rather the opposite. He blocks criticism. He asks others to "keep out". Basically he himself chooses to be an alien. This is what I criticize, not his culture. How he talks all day long with his friends is none of my business, I don't mind that, I don't judge that.

Anyway, I don't think this is the appropriate place to discuss this. You could move this to your talkpage, if you're interested in talking on. --Vaarscha 06:16, 25 Apr 2006 (PDT)

I think I made my original comment rather more complex than it needed to be, as a consequence of reading a couple of "OMG isn't MySpace the end of humanity as we know it" articles last nightthat were also decrying that style of speech, and then attempting to address a wider issue I perceived. I agree with what you say. A better summary of what I meant to say is that it was pretty clear he is young and so can't be expected to understand this kind of stuff without having it explained to him first.

Also agreed on moving this off Jeff's talk page. Giles 07:06, 25 Apr 2006 (PDT)

Well, my opinion is that if we have to explain everything to him in detail, even if it says right below the Save button "Please note that all contributions to Valve Developer Community may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you don't want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then don't submit it here." then he is most likely not able to contribute much to the wiki - yet. I don't claim I would have been at his age! Of course we could discuss why you have to reach a certain age to vote, get a driver license (or play shooters like HL2 :P ) but I'm not really interested in that.

However, I might say that a year ago, or so, I might have given him more time and tried to convince him like you do now - but leading a mod team for about 18 months (well, something like that) taught me that it's often better to stop a discussion at an early point, when you see certain reactions at the other side. Keep discussing and the other side thinks there is a chance he can win it - even if everyone opposes his opinion.

While I had the pleasure to work with people who are friendly, reliable and just fun to be with, I had to meet even more that are not during leading HEAT. Unreliability, or not working at all, is just the tip of the iceberg. Some of my experiences: A guy stealing other people's models, a claiming these are his own (yes, you can't imagine how much fun it is to find that out! Luckily I was the first one to notice it...), a guy coming back from a half year of inactivity and basically trying to destroy the mod, including telling other members that he didn't like behind my back to go work with other mods, and a schizophrenic guy (I don't mean this as an offense, he told me he'd get medical treatment).

This may or may not justify my quick reaction... but I believe my behaviour is based on the experiences I had to make. When people don't accept rules that are common sense, I will not discuss that anymore. It's a waste of time - a lot of time! --Vaarscha 23:37, 26 Apr 2006 (PDT)

I have improved a lot, and I cant believe I was ever like that. You are right, it is part of my culture, but I would gladly give it all up to be part of this community. I thank you all for your persistence and help in making my posts improve. Game4ever 02:13, 3 Jul 2006 (PDT)

What if you have done that in the beginning...? We would have been spaired thousands of typed letters en a couple of headaches... :P --CrabbyData 06:53, 4 Jul 2006 (PDT)

good point, but... it took me time to realise the error of my ways. Well, I suppose its not really the error of my ways, but my culture. You all have helped me to deal with people in real life a lot more politely, as you have made me see things from various points of view before jumping in and starting an argument (even though its fun). I will continue to improve, and eventually become on of you guys in every way(in the posts, not ME.). I thank you all for your persistence, and yes, if I had realised earlier, I would have saved us all (including me) a few thousand typed letters, and a few headaches. Game4ever 03:48, 7 Jul 2006 (PDT)

thanks

I thank everyone who has had to deal with me for their help and will hopefully, eventually stop needing help. game4ever

Thanks for cleaning up!

Thanks for the cleaning up of my tutorial ^_^ I really appreciate it! Please read my message on my own Talk Page for more 'info' and a also another question. I also see that you were talking about uploading .vmf files... I'm thinking of allowing people to upload (only) .vmf files, by a .vmf-upload-system, me and my friend are working on (PHP and MySQL-language). It will contain great features, like maximum file-size, mini-moderation by the uploader (deletion, altering, updating etc.) It is going to be a pretty big set-up, so I hope it will be much used after it's online ^^ I'll keep you updated! --CrabbyData 06:08, 14 May 2006 (PDT)

Thanks again!

Haha, and another thank you for Giles! :D Thanks for deleting the spam on my Sandbox-page. --CrabbyData 05:25, 15 May 2006 (PDT)

Cordon Tool

Your comment on the changes to the Cordon Tool page:

"That's not a merge. (Neither was ts2do's effort, but still, there's stuff in the second half that needs to go in the first half, like a proper Overview"

Other than the texture change paragraph, would you point out something in the second half that's not redundant with the first half? —BJ^(talk) 05:26, 23 May 2006 (PDT)

The Cordon Tool page(s) situation is mildly complex. In its briefest form: I noticed that there were two very similar pages: 1 and 2 so I put the merge tag on them both. ts2do then drew pretty much the same conclusion as you did - that one of the pages was redundant, so the simplest thing to do was to delete one of them. JeffLane then showed up and said that no deleting would take place. So ts2do "merged" the pages simply copying and pasting from one page into the other, slapping a TODO tag on it and then editing the links so they all pointed to that "double" page.

That is the history of it, and the motive for my "that's not a merge"-revert was mostly from the fact that Jeff intervened, which I read as him feeling there was content that was distinct on both pages.

To answer your question more directly, what is there that isn't duplicate? Basically I felt the bits you removed did a good job of providing a "beginner's guide" to cordons, whereas the bits that were left were more of a "technical reference" style. Without the "beginner's guide" bits, I felt the page would read pretty bluntly to anyone encountering the term for the first time. --Giles 06:04, 23 May 2006 (PDT)

Okay. I appreciate the explanation. And, given the explanation, it's really a rewrite. I was originally looking through the TODOs for a relatively short one. Guess not [chuckle] I'll see what I can do about the page. Thanks for your time. —BJ^(talk) 06:58, 23 May 2006 (PDT)

Spammer??!?

Are you sure they're a spammer?—ts2do 11:48, 13 Jun 2006 (PDT)

Well no, I can't say with absolute certainty. I can however point to the high degree of similarity between his/her edits and these guys. This leads me to conclude they are bot accounts and not real humans, probing to find out what Wiki version is running or what account security there is or whatever. It's quite possible that I'm wrong, but if I am, then I'm sure he/she knows how to complain or remove the tag, given he/she has demonstrated a good understanding of Wiki syntax. :) --Giles 12:43, 13 Jun 2006 (PDT)

Game4Ever

Why do you keep un-spamming him? He simply isn't suited for the job of contributing to this Wiki...(!) --CrabbyData 11:28, 22 Jun 2006 (PDT)

He isn't a spammer. He hasn't spammed. It's a simple misuse of the tag.

If you have a problem with another user, there are four options available to you: Ignore them; modify their edits so they are more to your liking; provide positive suggestions to the user to help them make edits that are more to your liking; take the issue up with a moderator.

A fifth option, which in my opinion isn't acceptable, is to be unpleasant or negative towards the user. Calling a user a spammer, declaring that you don't think they should be contributing (only a moderator has the right to make that decision), mocking their mastery of their language: these things are neither pleasant nor productive. --Giles 11:42, 22 Jun 2006 (PDT)

Shall I, or you, change the spammer things to a {{Minor Spammer}}-tag? (for closely watching of his posts)

Next to that, your points are clear, but after spening thousands of useful letters, sentences and phrases to the wrong posting-style he uses and trying to make something of him, he still isn't improving... --CrabbyData 11:48, 22 Jun 2006 (PDT)

In many situations, putting labels on people only succeeds in getting them to live up to the label. I disagree with the use of any tag in that manner, but since it's only me versus you, I have no strong basis for forcing my opinion on you (nor do I find it an issue worth pouring lots of my time into). He asked for the spammer tag to be removed previously, so it is clearly upsetting him, and you (and Jeff as moderator) are well aware of his previous problems, so I would question what the benefit in using the tag is.

As I posted on Jeff's talk page, I see little evidence that he isn't improving. He has a right to talk how he wants on talk pages, and his Wiki edits are much better than they were, in the ways I described there. I would suggest to you that perhaps the problem (or at least part of the problem) is your perception of the situation. --Giles 12:03, 22 Jun 2006 (PDT)

Weapon Cubemap

Sorry I was having problems with the Image options. Couldnt get it to resize properly. Thanks for cleaning it up. --Prejudice 16:12, 15 Jun 2006 (GMT)

Reply from Hovis about the 'max distance' parameter on light entities

I have no clue if this is the way i'm supposed to reply to your message, i am very new to mapping and VERY VERY new to wiki-style sites.

In answer to your question, i was regretfully forced to redesign to fix my lighting problem. It seemes to me that 'max distance' should be exactly what we need to keep the light from where we don't want it, but i can't get it to work. I've used values as small as 2 for max distance and saw no limiting effect whatsoever. I'm _assuming_ this is a bug, as the having a max distance parameter would be very useful, and the name is rather specific.

I thought that maybe i could find a 3rd party RAD and see if it works, but after a major redesig that's on the bottom of my stack.

BTW::------------- I've found something else that's rather interesting, as soon as i hammer out the details of this bug i'll be doing a major edit to my "Light passing through brushes" post in the helpdesk. I've found a neat theory that matches why it's happening, but i'm still hammering out a workaround.

--Hovis 16:44, 13 Jul 2006 (PDT)

FAQ items

Thank you for putting your answered question into the FAQ. The more often this is done, the less likely people will have to answer the same question repeatedly. We'd like to funnel people through the FAQs whenever possible. --JeffLane 19:59, 28 Aug 2006 (PDT)

Ambient Generic

Isn't ambient_generic still preferable for sound effects such as continuous fire? Thelonesoldier 16:58, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

env_soundscape is only an abstraction, but a useful one. There's no reason why you can't do it either way, but I think Valve's intention is that anything that loops and that you don't need precise script control over should go into an env_soundscape. Their motivation was creating a data format that meant their sound guys could work independently of their level designers, but it's generally an elegant and clean way to go. env_soundscape is also more powerful, since it makes randomisation of various parameters much easier. --Giles 17:37, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)