vtc(6D)
vtc - vroom track compiler
Showing IRIX 6.5.7. Unchanged since IRIX 6.5.
NAME vtc - vroom track compiler SYNOPSIS vtc infile outfile.vct DESCRIPTION Vtc takes an ASCII file representing a vroom(6) race course and outputs an optimized binary file that vroom(6) can read. The first argument is the name of the ASCII file describing the race course as outlined below. The second argument is the name of the desired output file. Note that the output name should end with the .vct extension in order to be recognized by vroom(6). FILE FORMAT Comment lines can be used anywhere in the file. Comment lines are indicated with a # character in the first column of the line. The first non-comment line is expected to contain a single integer value between 1 and 99 inclusive representing the number of laps in a race. The remaining lines describe the track sections used to make up the race course. Here are the recognized track sections and the syntax for their specification: STRAIGHT_TRACK lanes length L_CURVE_TRACK lanes angle radius R_CURVE_TRACK lanes angle radius MERGE_TRACK lanes length The lanes field indicates the number of lanes the track has. Valid values are 2, 4, and 6. Except for MERGE_TRACK, the number of lanes of one section must be the same as the previous section. For the MERGE_TRACK, the number of lanes must either be greater or less than the previous number of lanes by 2. The length field indicates the length of the track section. The length must be at least 600 units. Greater lengths may result in multiple track sections in order to optimize the rendering. In the case of the MERGE_TRACK, only the first section will be of type MERGE_TRACK. The remaining sections necessary for the specified length will be STRAIGHT_TRACK sections. The angle field specifies the turn angle, in degrees, of the curve. The value must be between 0 and 360, exclusive. The radius field specifies the turn radius. The minimum radius can be no smaller than the radius necessary to cause the length of the inner track to be 600 units or greater. The first track section must be a STRAIGHT_TRACK piece to serve as the starting location. The starting line will be at the end of the track section. Note that if the track section is broken up into multiple pieces, the starting line will be at the end of the first section. EXAMPLE The following example produces a simple oval track. # 10 lap oval track with merging 10 STRAIGHT_TRACK 4 800 L_CURVE_TRACK 4 180 1200 STRAIGHT_TRACK 4 800 # # Widen into 6 lanes # MERGE_TRACK 6 800 L_CURVE_TRACK 6 180 1200 # # Merge back into 4 lanes # MERGE_TRACK 4 800 NOTES Vtc requires IRIX 5.2 or greater. Getting a good race course (ie, one that matches at the end and beginning) is arduous, currently. The best method is to launch vroom(6) after the initial track compile. Go into solo mode and preview the track. If the ends do not match within expected tolerances, a error message will display the gap distance. While still running vroom(6), adjust the input file, recompile the course, and preview the course again. Loop through this procedure until an error message is no longer displayed when previewing the course. At some future date, a graphical track designer may be available. There is no restriction on have track segments overlap. However, the characteristics of the robot vehicles in vroom(6) should be kept in mind when designing new courses. The robot vehicles check for other vehicles only on the current track section on which they are traveling and immediately connected track sections. Therefore, if there is an extreme amount of track overlap, the robots may spend most of the time crashing into each other, presenting somewhat less of a challenge to beat, since they are not aware of robots on overlapping track sections (until they collide). SEE ALSO vroom(6). AUTHOR Chris Fouts, Silicon Graphics.