Marias Pass explore activity fails to start

[Graham Gill]

Marias Pass explore fails to start because of a path fail. Either longhale.pat or long-haul west(blizzard).pat will cause the failure. I don't see where these paths are used but when removed the sim runs OK.
  I am using V.9 on an XP machine

[Peter Gulyas (pzgulyas)]

Could you please download a more recent version of OpenRails from http://openrails.org/experimental.html ? The version you use is very outdated.

[Graham Gill (ggill)]

  Hello Peter
The version I am referring to in this bug is the recommended latest version
that is not 'experimental' on the website. V0.9.0.1648. Why is such an old
version as you call it still the recommended one? Do you recommend the
experimental versions instead?
  I have less trouble running V0.8.0.1251 but do like the improvements in
V0.9 so I have just removed the offending paths from MSTS.

Thanks
Graham
----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Gulyas" <email address hidden>
To: <email address hidden>
Sent: Friday, March 07, 2014 7:07 AM
Subject: [Bug 1285472] Re: Marias Pass explore activity fails to start

> Could you please download a more recent version of OpenRails from
> http://openrails.org/experimental.html ? The version you use is very
> outdated.
>
> ** Changed in: or
> Status: New => Incomplete
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
> report.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1285472
>
> Title:
> Marias Pass explore activity fails to start
>
> Status in Open Rails Tracker:
> Incomplete
>
> Bug description:
> Marias Pass explore fails to start because of a path fail. Either
> longhale.pat or long-haul west(blizzard).pat will cause the failure. I
> don't see where these paths are used but when removed the sim runs OK.
> I am using V.9 on an XP machine
>
> To manage notifications about this bug go to:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/or/+bug/1285472/+subscriptions
>

[Peter Gulyas (pzgulyas)]

"Why is such an old version as you call it still the recommended one? Do you recommend the experimental versions instead?"

Yes, please. There is a good chance this bug was already fixed.

[Graham Gill (ggill)]

   I tried the lated version (x2096) to no avail so I did come
investigating. The error appears to be caused by a blank 'TrPathStart' and
'TrPathEnd' line in the path files. When I add locations to these lines all
is well.
   I wasn't selecting a path for my explore route at the start of the sim
either so I guess the default would try to use one from the existing paths
and produce an error if its chosen one was one of the incomplete files (just
a guess). MSTS actually fills in a valid path when selecting Explore Route.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Gulyas" <email address hidden>
To: <email address hidden>
Sent: Sunday, March 16, 2014 5:45 AM
Subject: [Bug 1285472] Re: Marias Pass explore activity fails to start

> "Why is such an old version as you call it still the recommended one? Do
> you recommend the experimental versions instead?"
>
> Yes, please. There is a good chance this bug was already fixed.
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
> report.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1285472
>
> Title:
> Marias Pass explore activity fails to start
>
> Status in Open Rails Tracker:
> Incomplete
>
> Bug description:
> Marias Pass explore fails to start because of a path fail. Either
> longhale.pat or long-haul west(blizzard).pat will cause the failure. I
> don't see where these paths are used but when removed the sim runs OK.
> I am using V.9 on an XP machine
>
> To manage notifications about this bug go to:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/or/+bug/1285472/+subscriptions
>

[Peter Gulyas (pzgulyas)]

OpenRails lists the wrong paths at the beginning of the list, thus it almost always fails with the default selection.

It is not a bug, it is by design, although I don't know the reason, and it also annoys me. :)

[Graham Gill (ggill)]

Wonder why they don't put a window up to tell you to to select start and end
points instead of the window that suggests there is a bug and report it.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Gulyas" <email address hidden>
To: <email address hidden>
Sent: Tuesday, March 18, 2014 8:21 AM
Subject: [Bug 1285472] Re: Marias Pass explore activity fails to start

> OpenRails lists the wrong paths at the beginning of the list, thus it
> almost always fails with the default selection.
>
> It is not a bug, it is by design, although I don't know the reason, and
> it also annoys me. :)
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
> report.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1285472
>
> Title:
> Marias Pass explore activity fails to start
>
> Status in Open Rails Tracker:
> Incomplete
>
> Bug description:
> Marias Pass explore fails to start because of a path fail. Either
> longhale.pat or long-haul west(blizzard).pat will cause the failure. I
> don't see where these paths are used but when removed the sim runs OK.
> I am using V.9 on an XP machine
>
> To manage notifications about this bug go to:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/or/+bug/1285472/+subscriptions
>

[jeroenp (j-paasschens)]

I do not think the problem is in the empty names. The basic problem is that the path is broken. This means that it defines points on the path that are not on tracks. The path simply cannot be used. Period.

MSTS would not show you the path in the first place. OpenRails, however, does not actually parse the full path to figure out whether it is broken or not. It only does this when you start the runactivity. And then it is too late. The reason that OpenRails does not parse it is simply because to do that it would also need to parse the trackdatabase, for all available routes. And this simply is a waist of effort. I understood that this is also one of the reasons that MSTS is real slow when too many routes are installed!

Some of the paths in the standard MSTS installation are broken and unfortunately, they were not removed upon release. The fact that the start and end name are empty are simply indications that the MSTS/Kuju team simply did not finish these paths.

The broken paths tend to have no name. A name is then substituted in OpenRails, starting with "<unnamed:". Unfortunately, when the menu sorts the start names, these names appear first. It is very annoying for first-time users that start to use OpenRails and the first thing they try happens to crash. It happened to me as well, only a few months ago. I would therefore suggest simply changing the sort order. Perhaps only cosmetic, but very helpful for our new users.

Possible code could be (in MainForm.cs, ShowStartListAt:
foreach (var place in Paths.Select(p => p.Start).Distinct().OrderBy(s =>
                    { string s2 = s.ToString(); if (s2.ToCharArray()[0] == '<') { return "zzzzzzz" + s2; } return s2; }
))
(I am open for improvements here, it is not particular nice code).

Note, that re-ordering the paths does not change the fact that broken paths (either from MSTS or from other route builders) will simply crash OpenRails.
Jeroen.