Editing the TDB file

I have run into a problem with two pieces of Dynamic Track in ATSFMAR. The Auto-Rebuild function will not work on this route and my previous work of manually rebuilding the TDB/RDB took a LOT of time and energy.Does anyone have an understanding of the TDB format enough to be able to help me identify the track section and edit it out of the TDB file?By doing this I hope to avoid having to completely rebuild the track database (which I WILL have to do by hand!) for two errant pieces of dynamic track.It would certainly save a lot of time if I could eliminate the particular section of the track database that is affected.

Jim Duncan
Midwest Rail Group

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RE: Editing the TDB file...., OTTODAD, Feb-10-04, 09:57 AM, (1) RE: Editing the TDB file...., jdtrainman, Feb-10-04, 10:33 AM, (2) RE: Editing the TDB file...., OTTODAD, Feb-10-04, 05:12 PM, (3) RE: Editing the TDB file...., jdtrainman, Feb-10-04, 06:25 PM, (4) RE: Editing the TDB file...., rjdiii, Feb-13-04, 09:16 PM, (5) RE: Editing the TDB file...., OTTODAD, Feb-14-04, 08:28 AM, (6) RE: Editing the TDB file...., griffinmt, Feb-14-04, 10:24 AM, (7) RE: Editing the TDB file...., robertreedy, Feb-14-04, 10:46 AM, (8) RE: Editing the TDB file...., OTTODAD, Feb-14-04, 11:25 AM, (9) RE: Editing the TDB file...., robertreedy, Feb-14-04, 08:54 PM, (10)

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Jim,are you having a problem trying to DELETE these DYN track pieces in the RE, like "The adjacent....." ? Sometimes deleting the adjacent tracks, doing a Rebuild and then deleting the offending pieces afterwards have helped me.Make sure you BACK-UP the Route first before doing anything !!! Information of DYN Track Pieces is recorded in the Route's Tsection.dat and obviously also in the WORLD Files and TDB. There are ways to work around that I have read in previous Threads and manually remove the offending pieces, do a Rebuild and re-lay them, somebody will be able to tell you about soon, I am sure ! O t t o

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Thanks for the input, but like I said the Auto Rebuild will NOT work on this route. Yes, I'm getting the adjacent track section problem in both places. I was hoping to find a way to manually edit the TDB file entry for the offending track section but, so far, have had ZERO success with that method.I've successfully identified the offending track entry in the TDB file but when I delete that entry and try to load the route I get a "failure reading track database" error. So, as it stands it looks like I'll be deleting all the signals and interactives again and doing a section-by-section database rebuild at some point..... YUCK! It took me 10 days worth of work the last time to go through that process (part of the reason that I went with the new signals in the 1.0 release....JBD

Jim Duncan
Midwest Rail Group

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Jim,like Mike Vone suggests, lay all your tracks first and if the TDB-Rebuild is happy and your Test Activity works then BACK-UP and start adding Signals, other Track Objects and Roads ! O t t o

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LAST EDITED ON Feb-10-04 AT 06:28 PM (EST)

Did all of that, Otto. I think the reality is that this route is considerably bigger than most routes out there. It also crosses TWO of the dreaded regional data boundaries. Consequently, I think that the auto-rebuild utility just can't handle it.Same situation with GM&O Northern Lines. It actually has tracks in two different regions and the auto-rebuild function will only rebuild the tracks in one region! (the one where the starting tile is located)I had found one other bad piece of DT west of CA Junction on the N&W line and couldn't delete it so I re-routed the track enough to get the TDB path away from the DT, left it alone, then deleted the track object in the world file. That one worked!JBD

Jim Duncan
Midwest Rail Group

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Unless that exact path is needed I just delete the offending world file entries and leave the TDB alone. Then I place a nearby correct path. Even 1/2 of a meter difference is enough in X,Y,Z or arc.It's easier said than done following Michael's advice. In my case it was fine through all the track laying. Then I started laying roads and a save of road pieces screwed the RDB. So TDB rebuilds don't work because the RDB flunks the process out. So now there is a place high in the Sierra Nevada mountains where, in the RE, there are 20 or so blue poles all over the place around roads. But you can't see anything when playing the sim so I don't worry about it.I've also noticed TDB corruption involving Y's. Not sure about that one but deleting Y's in a string of track rather than separately with a save causes crashes and TDB problems.Mr DEMEX is knowledgable of the TDB files and intimated there is no easy way to edit them manually. I'll that that as a hands off warning.If you have figured out a way to do it at all manually I'd be interested. It never worked for me. One silly cross reference number out of place and eeeehhhh "failure to load track database". My TDB is just under 5MB, so there are MANY places to make errors you can't even see.Richard

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A TDB Rebuild is being processed by "Visiting all the World Tiles".If there is a problem it would be great if the TDB could announce in which World Tile the error occurred and what the Line Number and Co-Ordinates of the offending Piece are.Would it then be sufficient to just remove that piece in the World File and run another "Rebuild", re-laying that piece afterwards ?In the case of offending DYN Tracks, what role does the Route's Tsection.dat play in Rebuilds ?O t t o

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The routes tsection file plays the same role for rebuilding as does the global tsection. The difference being that the global version is for fixed and known quantities, whereas the routes verstion is for EACH occurrence of DT that you have added and uses unique incremented shape and section numbers.On a 'clean' route, you can get some interesting results by editing the content of the route tsection, including S shaped curves.Martyn T. Griffin
griffinmt@chartermi.net
http://www.geocities.com/tcmrrc/
http://www.midlandrc.org

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>A TDB Rebuild is being processed by "Visiting all the
>World Tiles".
>
>If there is a problem it would be great if the TDB could
>announce in which World Tile the error occurred and what the
>Line Number and Co-Ordinates of the offending Piece are. Otto, basically the RE does exactly that. Wherever the error occurs, if you will look at the co-ordinates window and a majority of the time it will tell you the exact spot where the problem is. Just jot down the world file plus co-ordinates and you have all the information there. That's how I managed to bring my route back from the dead after doing a series of no-no's for over a year. It still will not do a complete rebuild for the average person unless you know exactly what you're doing, but it can be done with a little 'friendly' coercion.RobertR .. ADF-M&RM at http://www.adfrr.com

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Thanks Bob !It seems that in many cases the offending piece is a DYN track, as happened to me a couple of times, improving the N.&.J.C. ! Is it necessary to also amend the Route's Tsection.dat after removing DYN track from the world file. Didn't find it easy identifying the exact section in either. O t t o

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That's one I'm not really sure about. Contrary to most peoples experience I had no problems with the dynamic track .. it was the track crossing 2 or 3 tile corners that bit me combined with a bad road.RobertR .. ADF-M&RM at http://www.adfrr.com

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