Me again viz: system names.

[Elowan]

Don't know who came up with these. Don't care for most of them - so I compiled my own list from actual star names and added in the best (IMHO) from the default list.

Question though: there are only 100 names in the default list. It's possible to add 256 systems to the large map -- hence it must be possible to add more names to the list. Yes?

I ask before I screw things up - being the cautious type.

Wanted for SEV: larger map - say ... HUGE.

Thanks for putting up with me.

[Phoenix-D]

You can add as many names as you like.

Don't put the limit to 256 though, I'm 95% sure that'll crash. Use 255 (and why isn't that big enough?)

Phoenix-D

[Captain Kwok]

You can add as many names as you want. The game will choose randomaly which ones it uses when setting up a map. If you don't have enough - some systems will have no names!

The max systems can be set in settings.txt to no more than 255.

[Fyron]

It's 255 cause of programming limits. There can be up to 256 variables (or something like that) there, and 0 counts as the 1st.

[Elowan]

I'm just and old programmer and probably don't understand these things but 256 items is still 0 to 255. Hence there can be 256 systems; 256 names and so on.

[Captain Kwok]

In this case though, zero is not included in the max number of systems, hence the 255 limit.

[Puke]

number 256 is significant (0-255) because MM has used a single byte as the variable that represents the number of systems. one bite has eight bits. between 00000000-11111111 there are 256 destinct combinations of numbers, thus that many unique values. in any binary system, everything is realted to a power of 2. in this case, 2^8.

i hate how accessable technology has become. everyone should have to know things like this. people complain that windows isnt reliable or is to hard to use, but they can use it without knowing how a computer WORKS. it kills me, and im not even a programmer.

back on topic, lots of lists of (real) star's names are available. heres some:

http://www.ras.ucalgary.ca/~gibson/s.../starnames.lst

http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/con...name_list.html

edit: typo

edit: pardon my general rant, im sure everyone on this board is bright enough to know whats going on. im sure those of you who dont abhor my attitude and poor manners (and maybe even some who do) are competant and qualified persons, in whatever field you represent. cheers.

[ July 12, 2002, 05:51: Message edited by: Puke ]

[Elowan]

Originally posted by Captain Kwok:
In this case though, zero is not included in the max number of systems, hence the 255 limit.

Right you are! Just looked at the Settings.txt.

[Fyron]

Well Puke, I knew the effect, just not the technical reason.

[Gryphin]

I'm just wondering:
Since it takes 10s of hours to play a game, why would anyone want more than 255?