This version includes a number of small functional changes, a couple of bug fixes and documentation changes.
Small Functional changes:
In response to Bill78’s supporting program to merge two .dev railway files there was a need to check that two locations didn’t have the same name so as to prevent the merged railway being saved as a .rly file. There is an existing check but this is made on entering a name, and this prevents two locations having the same name, but with two separate railways being merged each might have a name that appears in the other railway. A new check is now made on loading a railway file, and if the same name is found a warning is given to say that the railway can’t be saved as a .rly file. The check and warning is repeated if an attempt is made to save as a .rly file.
When gap setting the existing arrangement marks gaps to be set, but in a detailed railway these can be hard to find. Now the marks flash in both zoom-in and zoom-out modes and are easier to spot.
During operation, after taking signaller control of a train, it was easy to click ‘step forward one element’ inadvertently if two clicks were made in quick succession. The position of the pop-up menu has now been moved slightly so that the mouse does not lie over any of the options so as to prevent this nuisance.
If a train was removed by the signaller there could be a short stub route left over ahead of the removed train. This is now removed up to the next signal (similar to route removal behind a train that has changed direction).
Bug fixes:
Androeker discovered an error & notified it via discord on 16/12/20. The error was that if a location name containing a continuation was changed then a timetable that included it would validate and therefore allow the program to load and operate, the reason being that the list of continuation names [ContinuationNameMap] wasn’t updated in these circumstances [it’s only updated in TryToLinkTrack, so if that isn’t called, as it isn’t for a name change, then the error wouldn’t be seen by the program]. When the program was exited and later restarted and an attempt made to reload the (flawed) timetable the continuation name list was updated (as it is whenever track is linked), so the program saw the error and the load failed. This correction rebuilds ContinuationNameMap whenever a name is entered or changed so the timetable validator now gives an appropriate error message.
It was noticed in the ‘Actions due’ panel that the time to act was sometimes too short for trains that were approaching a stop location. The time corrected itself when the train stopped. What happened was that when running early the time calculator didn’t take account of the extra time needed at the next station before reaching it. This version updates the time calculator to take account of the dwell time.
Additional changes:
User manual and on-screen help updated in line with latest program changes.
The file specification document has been expanded to include session files, timetable files and the configuration file as well as railway files. It now also incorporates the earlier ‘Changing a timetable in a session file whilst retaining routes’ document.
Download it here