Topic: Enable info window of player buildings

[Freahk]

As mentioned in an other thread https://forum.simutrans.com/index.php/topic,19078.0.html, Most players on my server, including me, had some staff_shortage problems and didn't know at all where all these jobs in the city came from because there were no shops, offices or industrial buildings anywhere in town except of the iron works which suffered staff_shortage. Later on we found out that many people were commuting to the docks and some were also commuting to the coaching inns. Most (if not all) player buildings, for example any kind of stops, depots, signal boxes, HQ and so on provide "hidden" jobs, that means there is simply no info window showing that there are jobs availiable and how many.

I will remove any of these noInfo flags in the dat files and use that modified pak  on my server. If disabling these info windows was not a design decision of pak128.britain, i would like to commit these changes to the pak.
Hos is this done? Normally I would simply fork the git repo and create a pull request. Is this the way you work in here too or do you use patches/any other way to handle this?

[jamespetts]

I think that these windows were disabled to reduce clutter. Before we commit to this change, I should be grateful for other feedback from users on whether this would be a positive change overall.

[Matthew]

This is definitely a positive change for the reason given - understanding the jobs generated by player buildings is now quite important for micromanagement of stops and lines.

[Elemental]

There should be at least some way to see this info. If this information window would be reenabled, it should probably be the last to open though, so first click stop info, then convoy info if there is one in the tile, then building. Then it wouldn't get into the way much. If it was the first window to open, it would be really annoying.

[Vladki]

I'd like to see that info too. And also I'd prefer to see first convoy info and then station info. Or at least have the window not to cover the tile that was clicked on.

[Freahk]

It seems that many people want this so I'll clone it this evening and create a pull request.

[wlindley]

Per Vladki's comment, clicking on a Depot where there is a visible convoy brings up first the convoy, then the depot; would be nice if stations worked the same way.  Ctrl+Click I believe brings up the Depot directly, so likewise with stations?

[Freahk]

I just created a pull request a few hours ago adding the info window to stations, depots and the HQ in the dat files.
There seems to be a bug in simutrans-extended that prevents depots showing the info window. I did some quick research in the code but couldn't find the reason for this yet.


I can only enable or disable the info window in the dat files. I guess window-order is hard coded so it has to be changed in the simutrans-ex sources.
For me, current window order feels inconsistent and bad ordered.

Current state of window-order:
using left-click only

• stations: station, marker, vehicles, pdestrians, building info, road/track
• depots:  marker, vehicles, depot, road/track, don't know about pedestrians, building info does not seem to be working!
• for HQ: marker, finances, building info, base

using ctrl-left-click

• stations: building info, vehicles, pedestrian, private cars, marker, station, road
• depots: depot, vehicles, marker, road, don't know about pedestrians or private cars, also no building info here
• hq: finances, building info, marker, base

So this feeels pretty inconsistent and chaotic.
I would suggest the following for consistence reasons.
1st: Window order is always the same, no matter what is built on the tile.
2nd: key modifiers allow "skipping" some windows but don't change the order.
3rd: the remover tool should also use the same order, for sure skipping steps that are not removable (player vehicles)

Order:

• Vehicles: (left click) player vehicles, private cars
• Building: (ctrl-left-click) depot, station, finances, marker
• Ways: (alt-left-click) signals, tracks/roads/canals, crossing
• Other windows I have never used yet: pedestrians

So when you use only left-click, you will first open vehicle windows, then building infos, then way infos and in the end pedestrians and all the other annoying stuff.

[Ves]

I would think that Ranrans station detail window could have another tab featuring all these static things of a station. Other than employment and visitor stats, you have the station maintenance which in turn could be split into multiple categories:
Stops/platforms
Building
Underlying roads/tracks
Etc....

Although I do also think that it is good with a building info window as well, thanks!

[Freahk]

Indeed, I didn't have ranrans new tabbed ui in mind.
However, this doesn't change much about the requirement for a consistent window order, in that case 1. vehicles, 2nd tile info for whatever is statically coupled to that tile, 3. the annoying pedestrians and maybe other stuff and there should be a shortcut (ctrl-left-click) to skip vehicle windows and some key to open the next tab (maybe tab key -> forward, shift+tab -> backward)

[jamespetts]

Thank you for this feedback and update: I have incorporated the update to the pakset. My apologies for not having had the chance to deal with this earlier or look into the reported bug; I have been very busy in work in the last few weeks, and have not been able to build the new computer that I need to make it other than painfully slow to work on this owing to lack of components.

I do agree that it might be helpful to have a consistent order for window opening. The GUI is not something that I have looked into or much changed in Extended from Standard.