Don't lock pastes to 4x4 grid.

  • 12Me21
    1st Oct 2017 Member 0 Permalink

    When working with really small things, the copy/paste grid is really annoying for several reasons. Obviously having to use the arrow keys to move less than 4 pixels at a time is a problem, as well as accidentally shifting parts of the paste outside the rectangle. Plus the border of the paste area gets in the way, since particles can be right next to the edge.


    I think that it would be better to just get rid of the grid system (for copy/paste/stamps) entirely, as well as moving the paste area border out 1 pixel so it doesn't cover up part of the stamp.

     

    And as for the problem of copying walls, well there are a number of possible solutions.

    You could just make walls align to the grid when moving the paste around, though this might look strange.
    Or lock it to a 4x4 grid when there are walls being pasted.

    I'm sure this system made sense when walls were a major part of the game, but now hardly anyone uses them anymore and it doesn't make sense to limit the copy/paste system just based on one mostly obsolete feature.

  • jacob1
    1st Oct 2017 Developer 0 Permalink
    I actually like how they snap to a 4x4 grid, it makes it easier to do patterns and other stuff, and the arrow keys aren't hard to use.

    I think there are two main problems you pointed out. One is that stuff gets deleted when you use the arrow keys and move stuff out. What it really should do is expand the size of the stamp when necessary so that it all fits.
    Also, the pixel borders cover up actual parts of the stamp. This shouldn't happen.

    If those two problems were fixed I don't think there would be any major issues with keeping the 4x4 stamp grid.

    One other thing to consider is that all stamps contain information that's on the 4x4 grid. Every stamp also has pressure and ambient heat. So your option 2 for walls won't work.
  • 12Me21
    1st Oct 2017 Member 0 Permalink

    It's not so much that the arrow keys are hard to use, but just that they're really slow. As for making patterns, yeah it's nice... as long as the size is a multiple of 4. (Maybe it would be better to allow snapping to ANY grid size somehow, though I'm not sure if there would be a good way to control that)

    Oh and I completely forgot about ambient heat/pressure. I'm not sure that copying pressure was an entirely good idea to begin with, but either way "option 1" for walls seems like it would work fine, where it just aligns walls and pressure cells to a 4x4 grid and lets other things move freely. Perhaps there could also be a key which locks the stamp to the grid to make working with walls (and patterns) easier.

  • jacob1
    1st Oct 2017 Developer 0 Permalink
    @12Me21 (View Post)
    Yeah it would be difficult to not snap it to the 4x4 grid. It's very ingrained in how stamps and saves work.

    There's an option to not copy pressure or ambient heat. Hold shift when loading to not load it. Hold shift when saving to not save it. I don't remember if this works for saves or not.
    And yes, "option 1" is basically what we already do. Just let the particles move freely and leave walls where they are. If I did these fixes, I would probably make walls move every 4 arrow key presses.

    I have considered these exact fixes before, I think it would have required some amount of effort to change and I never bothered.

    Edit: it looks like @mark2222's Subframe IDE mod does exactly that :O, i'll look at his code later, he said he would make a pull request to the official version with the changes. I tested it out and it is exactly what I want
    Edited once by jacob1. Last: 2nd Oct 2017
  • Potbelly
    3rd Oct 2017 Banned 0 Permalink
    This post is hidden because the user is banned
  • mecha-man
    4th Oct 2017 Member 0 Permalink

    @Potbelly (View Post)

    That sometimes cannot be done when trying to copy something out from inside something else.

  • basiliotornado
    4th Oct 2017 Member 0 Permalink

    @mecha-man (View Post)

     copy it then paste it then add the border?

  • jacob2
    4th Oct 2017 Member 1 Permalink
    I'm fixing this anyway, it's already done but I keep delaying pushing it to try to make walls shift by 4 every time you shift the stamp 4 squares.

    Stamps will still be on the 4x4 grid but will automatically expand when you move it in a way that would delete particles
  • zaccybot2
    5th Oct 2017 Member 0 Permalink

    If pixels no longer disappear when they go out the border of the stamp, how about stamps only saving the smallest area they need to, so that you don't get loads of stamps with 90% empty space? 

  • jeffluo35
    5th Oct 2017 Member 0 Permalink
    @zaccybot2 (View Post)
    It's hard to do that, since the pressure map is usually saved with it, even if it's zero.