Planting mystery

[braden1308]

Colin, can you go back to a previously saved file and try planting on that, Sometimes going back to a former save that works, if so you can think about what you may have done since then and figure out the problem. Could be some work though.

Glenn

I got sick of all those (20 or so) back-ups taking up so much space. So, when doing this course, I deleted them all. I have just been using 4 files which I rotate and save over. The oldest of them would only be about 7 days and was still affected by the same mystery.

Your post got me thinking tho Glenn. So, as a long shot, I checked my Recycle Bin. All of the 20-or-so old CRZs were still there! Restored them all and then test-planted one from a few months ago, and it actually seems fine. Hard to believe. Yes, there's now alot of catch-up work to be done (my little tennis stadium will now need to be rebuilt) but I think I will do it. Should be much quicker second time around anyway.

Thanks mate!

Glad that worked, now as you progress keep checking to see if something caused the change. PITA, but better than losing the entire file.

Glenn

[dorse72]

that was going to be my advice, open a old save, glad it worked. I keep old back-ups that OPEN and PLAY in Links, I check this like every week or before I do alot of work, like planting. I learned my lesson from Winged Foot when the course crashed when opening in Links for some reason, and I was ignoring a message from the APCD that the course may not be playable, a message I repeatedly ignored. Because if it doesn't open and play in Links, its no good. Keep an old BU, just save it to your Google drive, it takes up no space, I call it 'playtest' or something. Good luck, love Royal Sidney. When planting, like do a hole, playtest, move on if all is OK. just my advice, I'm sure others do it differently. Good to see someone else taking it on.

[EJ55]

Glad you have it worked out.

I bought USB storage devices on Ebay very cheap. and have a monthly save on personal storage. I do daily saves and label them for instance Sem8.6, if I get more than a few hours on the course in a given day or something I don't want to lose it would go to Sem8.6a and so on.

I would like to add I do believe the issues with 2D planting are using duplicate objects that are in the 2001/2003 libraries and using both, I also believe these issues can surface from importing the same object from different courses and using them. I have no scientific evidence for this other than to state the only time I've had an issue with 2D is when I was using the same object with slight changes. I am very organized with my planting set.

Best of luck the rest of the way!

[Colin Jones]

The final word.

It keeps coming back as new random sections of the course suddenly become unplantable (or what is planted is gone or replaced with garble).

At least I have now discovered that it only ever happens when I save a copy (either save, save as or validate) at the time when I have all 2D objects displayed. That discovery means that I can probably contain the damage now until course completion.

Maybe there is a combination of factors in my laptop settings and the original file is causing it. Maybe its just inexplicable. One thing I do know is that it probably can't be totally fixed once you have it (as have tried everything).

I am working feverishly to finish her asap and put this one behind me. So, at least, its proving to be good motivation to get Sydney finished and released.

[Duck Hook]

Great that you got it sorted somewhat Colin and found a probable, although no-one can probably explain why cause.

I have never experienced this problem but will definitely be turning off 2D objects before each V & S now. No need to give the APCD an excuse...


T

[braden1308]

The final word.

It keeps coming back as new random sections of the course suddenly become unplantable (or what is planted is gone or replaced with garble).

At least I have now discovered that it only ever happens when I save a copy (either save, save as or validate) at the time when I have all 2D objects displayed. That discovery means that I can probably contain the damage now until course completion.

Maybe there is a combination of factors in my laptop settings and the original file is causing it. Maybe its just inexplicable. One thing I do know is that it probably can't be totally fixed once you have it (as have tried everything).

Very odd Colin, garble I have seen related to the 2001 objects, but un-plantable sections are very unusual. I would be very suspect of my object library, there could be a corrupted object in there that is causing the issue. I know that can definitely cause the garble, but as far as the objects not showing or even being able to be selected

Hang in there
Glenn

[Lez Marwick]

If I'm remembering correctly (which I may not be due to my memory problems!) I had this issue on my first APCD course. I could find no fix and had to go back to an older save. In my case I determined that it was caused by the overuse of the forest planting option that lets you remove a certain percentage of planting in an area by typing in the amount you want to remove. I never used this feature again... instead I would just undo and replant with a larger distance number if I ever overplanted a shape and the problem never returned. This may not have been the cause of my issue... it may have just been a coincidence that the issue started after I used this feature, but I always went on the 'better safe than sorry' policy when using APCD because we all know how buggy it can be!! I imagine the memory leak issues of APCD are at the route of most problems including this one, because a lot of the problems with APCD seem to only happen when you have been doing something multiple times.... turning verts, planting crowds, scrolling screens etc, which sometimes makes it harder to trace the causes!

I did come across this issue one other time, when I was updating Crouching Beast. The designer of that course must have had the same problem because there were some shapes drawn on it that had no planting and could not be planted on. Fortunately those areas are not really noticeable when you play the course.

[Colin Jones]

Thanks Lez. I didn't use the % removal tool, but I was using the forest tool on the course. So I definitely think its use is related to this somehow, now you mention it.

The wierd thing is that the unplantable areas appear as squarish. They don't seem to have anything to do the shape I was using to test some forest planting - although they might have been within or adjacent to those shapes. Another APCD foible.

Well, at least it has also happened to the best of us tho!

[Danny D]

Thanks Lez. I didn't use the % removal tool, but I was using the forest tool on the course. So I definitely think its use is related to this somehow, now you mention it.

The wierd thing is that the unplantable areas appear as squarish. They don't seem to have anything to do the shape I was using to test some forest planting - although they might have been within or adjacent to those shapes. Another APCD foible.

Well, at least it has also happened to the best of us tho!

Hi Colin. I have had a similar issue with the large square shapes showing up in the "TOP" view. The problem was that the images that are compressed together in the "bxt" file became corrupt on one of my 2D objects TOP views, and the large square shadow was coming from that planted object.

Hope that made sense,

Dan

[Adelade]

I have been using the feature to remove certain % of one type of object in all the courses I've done mass planting on (6 courses) and I never had this problem (at least not that I've noticed). The feature does make the APCD crash after a certain number of uses, but it has always worked for me to go back to the last save, or restart APCD with common intervals while doing it. Not saying this means it cant be the reason for the issue at hand, but I have had good use of the feature. The reason I stick with it is because planting densely then removing a % makes for a more even spread of objects in areas of the shape that are thinner. Otherwise, if planting with a sparse area setting, APCD just wont plant much if any objects in the thinner areas of the shape. Plus, if planting several times with a sparser area setting, the higher the chance of objects ending up on top of eachother - which is admittedly still going to happen when planting several different objects.