Incyclopedia

[Sparky]

I'm almost done importing the full maps' tags... and now I see why Bungie likes the number 7 so much

EDIT: Yes, Olly, I plan to put all my new tags into the collection.

[(KHC) Shadow]

and now I see why Bungie likes the number 7 so much

What???

and feel free to use the tags from my mods.

[Sparky]

and now I see why Bungie likes the number 7 so much

What???

and feel free to use the tags from my mods.

Thanks, Shadow.


EDIT: Oh no! Maximum tag count is 7820?!?

[(KHC) Shadow]

and now I see why Bungie likes the number 7 so much

What???

and feel free to use the tags from my mods.

Thanks, Shadow.


EDIT: Oh no! Maximum tag count is 7820?!?

ohh hhaahaha.

OH SHAT!!
thus ends your genius idea...well im sure a smart person here could figure out how to fix that.

[Sparky]

Due to tag count limitations, Incyclopdia will be separated into several volumes.

Vol 1 - Halo Full tags, except for some snd! tags --- finished
Vol 2 - Completes the snd! tags from Part 1 --- unfinished
Vol 3 - CE tags: (TBA) --- unfinished
Vol 4 - CE tags: (TBA) --- unfinished
Vol 5 - MGM tags --- unfinished

[(KHC) Shadow]

aww. You should find a way to get rid of the tag limit. With all those different maps,
it defeats the purpose of the incyclopedia.

[Sparky]

Sorry, but according to Altimit, I've "reached the known edge of Halo modding" and cannot add any more tags to that particular map file... yet. But what I'm doing here is not releasing multiple times, but including multiple books in the bookshelf, so to speak. Like encyclopedias go by letter in alphabetical order, these tags are also released in multiple volumes, sorted generally as I've listed them above. The incyclopedia will be released as several volumes (map files) together, and will be named as "Part 1" and so on.

EDIT: Wait, that was even more confusing.

What I'm doing is including several map files, named "Part 1", "Part 2"... inside the Incyclopedia Mod folder. So the mod is the folder with all these parts, like a bookshelf with all the books. The index is a text file listing every tag included in the Incyclopedia reference.

Let me know if I need to explain further.

[Monoman]

You should use volumes for the names instead of parts. Vol. 1, Vol. 2 instead of Part 1, Part 2. It keeps with the encyclopedia theme.

[(KHC) Shadow]

ya^ good idea. But i still think you should research the tag limit a little more before you give up on it.

[Sparky]

It might be possible, but I won't be able to continue using Eschaton to import the tags - it might work with HHK...

Tag ID values follow these rules:
Minimum value: 3782475776
Step size between values: 65537
And because it's a 32-bit unsigned integer the max value by that step size is: 4294909579

What this means is that there are 7820 unique values that are legal. It is theoretically possible to use values that don't conform to that step size. It has never been tested. I could look into it at some point to see if it still works. Start at minimum value + 1 and increment by the step size if there's an overflow.

So, essentially, I won't be able to add more tags unless I make a program that can squish all the tags together, back-to-back. And Eschaton is the program to do that with (since it's memory-based rebuilding). If you take a look at the hex data chunks for each tag, you can get a better idea of what the tags really look like to see if that might work. I know there are a lot of zeros still in there between tags, and it might result in another few hundred instances, but I'll need probably about 1000 or more for all these extra snd! tags, and I doubt there's any way to include all the CE content in there with those. (We're talking still at least 2 volumes, one for full, one for CE). Using a smaller map to start with seems like it might theoretically allow more tag references, but I would assume I'd get the same tag limit even with a larger map. The only foreseeable benefit to using a smaller map base would be that the map's size would be slightly smaller (i'm not including sbsp or scnr tags in this collection yet).

I'm only including our known plugin tags, not the tags that are unlisted like machine control tags or scripts. The scripts are handled in the sbsp, if I remember correctly, and Alt didn't make it possible to extract that yet. Besides, I might extract the sbsp tags non-recursively to prevent people from being able to swap in and play any map from Halo Full or CE within Halo Demo. So the actual scripts wouldn't be included, just references to them in the files that you would already have to own in order to use them... and if you already owned Halo Full, you could just recursively extract them yourself if you wanted to move them somewhere. We'd effectively have a list of some machine control group tags and scripts, but we wouldn't be able to really use them. I consider that the more legal option.

[Modzy]

You could import all the tags into a map with no tags, although the map would not be playable.
But if this is just for importing tags into, and getting tags from, then that should be just fine.
If you want I could make you a map with no tags in it.

[Sparky]

That would be awesome, although I don't think that would solve the problem, would it? I mean, it just wouldn't have the sbsp and scnr tags, and everything else would be the same anyway.

By the way, HHK allowed me to add tags beyond the 7820 limit, and they're being handled well by Eschaton for internalization purposes. However, E won't let me add more tags after that...

Considering this, I could probably get all the tags released into one map file, and have everything internalized the right way. However, I'd like to revert back to my map that doesn't have any of the hundreds of extra snd! tags, and then add those snd! tags using HHK after all the harder stuff has been added.

Here's a little summary for y'all:

10.map has all of the tags from the Halo Full maps.
--- almost done with a50 sounds.map also includes those dialogue snd! tags not referenced by the lsnd tags. (there are hundreds)
I'm going to revert back to 10.map and add all the multiplayer maps' supported tags, then I'll work on the sound tags again.

Volume 1 will therefore contain all the tags we can currently reference from all the full maps. I suppose that leaves Volume 2+ with CE tags, and a subsequent volume with our Halo Demo tags. Still multiple volumes. The limitations discussed prevent me from using Eschaton to fill these maps to their max, I think.

EDIT: I dunno. The multiplayer maps add 709 new tags, meaning that I would have to use HHK to import about 400 tags. So for now, Volume 1 is the full single player tags and Volume 2 is the full multiplayer tags. I might combine these later on. I'm open to volunteers, too

[seabeast]

Volunteers for what? Testing? Importing?

[(KHC) Shadow]

i would assume importing, especially with HHK this will take FOREVER...beleive me, i tried..

[seabeast]

>_> OK you import this and you import this and you import this. *Done* OK now they're all done in different maps. Fail. Unless there's a way to combine maps. >_<