[FM24] FM Auto Editor Project

[forameuss]

Please Note: This post will be pretty bare at the moment, but once I'm not at work I'll add some screenshots and examples to show what I'm talking about

I've mentioned it in passing, but I think I finally don't hate my current project enough to actually reveal it and hopefully get it into the sort of state where someone might find it useful.

The Background

In FM terms, I often have grandiose ideas of things that could change.  I like odd leagues with different structures, but there aren't enough of them anymore, so I've always had interest in changing things to make some.  Unfortunately, as you'll all know, the editor is...well, it's pretty awful.  Incredibly powerful, but often ugly, uncooperative and just generally pretty rough.  The thought of doing a large-scale edit using solely the editor seems like a daunting task, if it's even possible at all with my limited attention span.  So a few years ago I wanted to try and do something that could make that whole process easier, and give me a chance to actually put my plans into action.  Or, at the very least, get those plans to a point where they can be realised, then lose interest, and move on.  

The first iteration was pretty awful.  So much so that it never really came close to being finished.  I still have some of the early input spreadsheets, but they're hideous, and I'm not even sure they did anything.  So that was abandoned until about 6 months ago when I decided to start again from scratch, with a (slightly) more experienced head on.

The main aim of the project is to allow much larger edits to be built up extremely quickly.  So say you want to create a new league from scratch, including slightly custom players for each club, that would not only take a huge amount of time in the editor to create the objects (or clone and adjust existing ones) but as the edit gets larger mistakes aren't too obvious to spot.  With this, the idea is that you can see all your data at a glance, and creating a new object is basically a matter of adding a row.  1 competition, 10 clubs, 30 players for each, that can be created in full fairly quickly on a spreadsheet and then translated into something the editor can understand.  That's the idea.

The Implementation

I won't go into too many specifics unless people want them, but in FM tradition, basically it's a combination of a very structured spreadsheet alongside some background code, in this case in Python.  The vast majority of the work from a user perspective goes into the spreadsheet, which is where you'll be setting out your data.  There is a column for most data points for every object you can create in the database, as well as some you can just update like Nations.  I've not covered absolutely everything in the editor, as some of the objects have absolutely insane levels of detail that you won't need for most edits. They may be added in future. 

The spreadsheet has been designed in such a way that you can make use of everything Excel offers to make data entry easier.  You don't need to give each individual player a name, for example, you can ask it to do it randomly, and it'll pick a nationality-appropriate name.  You can use Excel formulas if you really want to and it makes it easier, the code will pick up whatever the value is and add it to the object.

Once your spreadsheet is spick and span, there will be a very simple Python interface where you can click a button, and it'll spit out an XML with all of your data in it.  That can then be imported into the editor, saved as an FMF and used in-game.  I think I'm clocking an edit with around 2500 distinct changes (not huge, but sizeable) taking about 30 seconds to generate, which is positively lightning compared to early versions.  And the way it's looking, it doesn't seem like adding loads more changes will affect things too badly, but unknown at this point.

(Current) Limitations

This could be a big section...

• As I mentioned earlier, there are a fair few data points in the editor that don't appear in this.  Usually this is because I simply didn't feel like I needed them, but that was down to the specific edit I was doing.  There's a few that are on the list to add, and I suspect there's a lot that people would be interested in having if this ends up being "released" in some way.  
• The spreadsheet could do with a few more functions to help people populate data.  Maybe some macros that would populate a basic player and let you fine-tune, maybe more fields allowing random input to stop needing to populate everything manually
• I can't add referees yet.  Because why wouldn't you want that?  Also can't add a few other person types, just strictly Players or strictly Non Players.  Could add more.
• This is strictly just for data changes currently.  Competition rules are not covered. 

Future Plans

• Well, this is the big question.  This project was started as largely a personal one, and as a result it's a bit of a mess.  But if people would be interested in having this to play with, I'm not too many steps away from it being able to be packaged and distributed.  So that's a tentative aim.
• I'm definitely going to investigate whether I could get Basic Competition Rules working using the spreadsheet.  Advanced Rules...no chance, I'd imagine, but basic rules might not be too bad.  It depends what the XML looks like.
• Ideally cover every editor field in the spreadsheet and leave no gaps as to what data can be represented.  Some of these are conditional on others being present, so there may be some omissions, but I'd like to get near-perfect coverage
• If there is interest, it would be good to know what people would like in a system like this to see if that's possible and make it even more useful

 

 

 

[forameuss]

Current Project Status

• v1.1 - Yarrow now released, see this post for details
• v1.0 - IT'S HERE!  Well, kind of.  Bear with me, as this initial release is likely to be a little rough while I iron out some of the kinks.  Please read below for an updated user guide of sorts, and any notes about any features or limitations.  I'm going to try initially hosting the exe file on a shared Dropbox folder, so if you're interested in giving the tool a go, drop me a PM and I'll reply with the share link.  I *think* at that point you can just download that file locally, then you're good to go.
• v0.1 - Working on packaging up the code into a working executable that can be distributed.  Once that's achieved, there should be some kind of "release" to anyone that's interested

Buymeacoffee Link

Honestly, I feel a bit dirty putting this in, but thought I may as well.  I am in no way expecting anything from this, but I'm really enjoying working on this, and have a long list of things I'm interested in adding to it.  If during this process you feel like you're getting use out of it and you want to contribute a few pennies, it would all be much appreciated.

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/fmautoedit

User Guide

First, download the exe from the provided Dropbox link.  I advise saving it to its own folder, and then creating input, output and database folders alongside it in an easy to find location.

On opening the exe, you'll see the below screen

First, select your input, output and database folders that you created one-by-one using the Browse components above.  This will tell the tool where to save everything to.

Once that's set, you can enter your desired project name in the Active Project field, and click Check.

If you're starting a completely new project, you'll see the red text below, telling you that it's new.  

If you're wanting to work on an existing project that you've already gone through this process with, you can perform the same process, but you'll see green text.

Once you have your desired project name, whether new or existing, click Load and you'll see a popup like below.  This will point you to where your input spreadsheet is, and where you add your edits.

Follow the notes below for how to edit the spreadsheet, but this is likely something just to have a play around with for now.  I'll probably not cover everything I should say and forget some bits, but some notes I can remember off the top of my head

• The names database for people only has names for Scotland, USA, Italy, Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland, Wales, Russia, England, Spain and France.  If you try to use the RANDOM keyword for any names in a nation outwith this list, the field will go red.  If you go ahead with that edit, the tool will likely crash when you generate a file, or at best create a player called RANDOM RANDOM.  Adding a whole nations names is a long process, but I do intend to get some better coverage of this in future versions
• Any field that is an Object type has no validation on it in the spreadsheet.  So say you want to make sure that a City's Nation is Scotland, but you constantly type Scoland because your t key is broken.  The spreadsheet will accept this, but the tool will throw an exception later on telling you that it can't find the object.  This is something that will be improved later on
• Please note that every object type has a "Guide Row" at the top.  This gives you the type of the column (if it's a standard one like String, Number, Object or whatever) or the dropdown menu if it's a dropdown in the editor.  In these cases, make sure you either fill down the value to the row you're editing, or copy the entire cell.  This will keep using the dropdown and make sure whatever entry you put in doesn't crash the system.
• Dates are of the format DD|MM|YYYY, and need to be in that format.  This may improve in future to make it a bit more flexible for different formats
• Colours need to be of the format R|G|B (so like 255|255|255 for white).  Again, I've got it noted down in future to make colour choosing a bit more obvious for people that don't want to deal with meaningless RGB numbers all the time
• I can't see anything else obvious, but I expect there are some other niggles I've forgotten.  Important thing is to get a lot of eyes on it to notice any of the snags, then I'll get working on getting those sorted

Once your spreadsheet is completed, you're ready to generate your project file.  Return to the tool and you'll see this screen.

The three "Open *" buttons are pretty self-explanatory (although for some reason it just navigates to the folder rather than opens it, annoyingly).  The one you really care about is Generate Project File.  When you click that, you'll get a popup warning you that it may be a long-running operation, but that's safe to click through.  You'll see a (janky) spinner while it loads, and see the logging ticking away in the background.  None of the log messages are particularly important, but it will give you a running tally of what objects have been added.  Once it is complete, you can go to your output folder, and your XML will have (hopefully) been created.  Use the steps in the Examples below to load it into the editor and inspect the results.

 

 

 

Examples (slightly out of date)

As a fairly basic example, we'll create a fictional club (Somewhereshire United) from a fictional city (Somewhereshire) with a squad of 23 players.  The steps we'd go through for that are as follows

• Open the FMAE program and create your project with a meaningful name.  Enter the name into Active Project, click Load, and then click Create Project.  This will create a config file to point to the correct locations, as well as an Excel file that you can start to populate

• Open the spreadsheet, and find the template for each object.  For things in the editor that have a dropdown to select your value, the excel will have a dropdown too to make sure you can't select something that won't work.  
• Start with creating the city.  For any existing objects, you can just type the name and the back-end will link up the IDs as long as they're spelled right.

• Then create the club.  You can add your new City into that field, as when the editor file is created, it knows which IDs to use

• Then create your players.  I've put the bare minimum of data in there just to get working, but it gives you an idea.  As you can see, RANDOM has been used for names, so the code will check the nationality and pick a random name from all the current names in the db with English nationality.  Please note, these names only cover a few nationalities currently, but more will be added.  I think all UK nationalities are there, along with the US, Italian, and maybe a few others.  The date of birth is also semi-random.  You input an age, and it'll pick a random value during the year that would make that true based on the current date.  It was really, really tedious putting in random dates manually, after all.  Finally, worth noting the CityOfBirth field.  Every city currently in the database is supported, but if you make a spelling mistake, the process won't work (that will be improved).  There's a few edge cases for when there are multiple objects with the same name.  For example, there is more than one stadium named Wembley in the world.  In those cases, you're kind of stuck, so that's an improvement that also needs to be made.

• From here, you've got enough data to generate the file.  Load in your project, click Generate Project File, and it'll go and churn through your data.

• Once that's complete, you can find your XML file, a sample of which is shown below.

• You can then import that XML into the Editor itself and make sure all your changes went through OK.  You can also see the names that have been chosen.  Please note, because of the way the random works, if you regenerate the file, the names will change I think.  So if you want to keep Trovarn Bamborough (because why wouldn't you?  Brilliant name) then you could go back to your spreadsheet and change the random to the fixed name.

• And that's it really!

 

Feature List

The below is a non-exhaustive list of everything the system currently does.  

• Projects can be separated out with different config files and input spreadsheets, should just be a one-click thing rather than needing much work on user side
• Objects that can be created and/or amended
  • Agreement
  • Award
  • City
  • Club
    • Club League History
  • Competition
    • Competition History
  • Derby
  • Injury
  • Language
  • Media Source
  • Person (Player and Non-player)
    • Person history
    • Person plans
  • Stadium
  • Stage Name
  • Weather
• Objects that can be amended but not created
  • Continent
  • Nation

Edited November 30, 2023 by forameuss

[Wolf_pd]

I am listening....

[magicmastermind124]

This is something I would be incredibly interested in.  I have masses of data that could use something like this to simplify research and speed up the process of getting the data in an importable xml format for FM.

May I ask why you are unable to add officials?  Is it due to time constraints or a limitation in generating the xml files given the person type?

EDIT: For context, the parts I would be interested in being able to use would be the ability to remove, add and change team league and cup histories, along with competition histories.  Stopping there would be amazing, but long term I'd like to see the ability to add referees (yes this is actually something I want), an ability to add a player or players in bulk (with the bare minimum information required to given them sufficient data in game to be playable, or more if necessary), the ability to add, edit or change club competition boundaries for regional leagues, and likely much more that I cannot think of yet.

I've still collated data over the years since the last EEE release and although I have no current plans to release that project as is given it would take a lot of work to bring it back to the level it was once at, I would like to have a data pack full of histories, cup runs for not only England, but Wales and Scotland too - possibly N.I. and ROI down the line.  A sort of Almanac for Football Manager - with the ultimate goal of having all the additional data content creators can use to then start building their own releases with - while being open to community members to collaborate.

Edited November 20, 2023 by magicmastermind124

[TroubleMan]

I used excel and mail merge to import players and staff en masse.  I had this all done in FM23, but I lost the data.  I just recently rebuilt it for FM24.  I'm going to finish the database that I'm working on in maybe week or two, but then I'll go into it more.  However, here is the post that lead me in the right direction:

Right now I have the UID for all attributes, plus a few other basic things like biographical data.

My process could probably be improved with some script or python, but I'm very very comfortable in excel, so that's why I've been doing it like that.

Edited November 21, 2023 by TroubleMan
grammar

[phnompenhandy]

As a total dork using the editor, I'd very much welcome this. I haven't got anything smart to contribute, but just a brief answer to a small question you raise - why bother adding referees?

I don't like seeing the same PL refs I see on TV every weekend coming down to ref a friendly between my Level 20 village and team or bumpkins next door. It would be even better if a fat, slow referee would make loads of mistakes at the level too.

[magicmastermind124]

4 hours ago, TroubleMan said:

I used excel and mail merge to import players and staff en masse.  I had this all done in FM23, but I lost the data.  I just recently rebuilt it for FM24.  I'm going to finish the database that I'm working on in maybe week or two, but then I'll go into it more.  However, here is the post that lead me in the right direction:

Right now I have the UID for all attributes, plus a few other basic things like biographical data.

My process could probably be improved with some script or python, but I'm very very comfortable in excel, so that's why I've been doing it like that.

I have used Excel in the past too and am very comfortable using it, which is why I am keen to use something like this project.  Sadly I just don't have the time to set up the data myself to import and test, and frankly it would be more useful for the community to have a project like this one available.

I did notice on the link you send that large unique id's are still being used in xml files - you can change these to integer and get the normal value.  It will make everything much easier when working in Excel.  So instead of:

<large id="db_unique_id" value="606306713973603730"/>

You would use:

<integer id="db_unique_id" value="2002042258"/>

 

[forameuss]

14 hours ago, magicmastermind124 said:

This is something I would be incredibly interested in.  I have masses of data that could use something like this to simplify research and speed up the process of getting the data in an importable xml format for FM.

May I ask why you are unable to add officials?  Is it due to time constraints or a limitation in generating the xml files given the person type?

Oh don't worry, it isn't an "unable", I just hadn't really gotten around to it.  The initial edit I wanted to try didn't really have any need for it as it built on the existing Scottish system.  My next one will need pretty much everything created, so I'd planned to flesh things out then.

14 hours ago, magicmastermind124 said:

For context, the parts I would be interested in being able to use would be the ability to remove, add and change team league and cup histories, along with competition histories.  Stopping there would be amazing, but long term I'd like to see the ability to add referees (yes this is actually something I want), an ability to add a player or players in bulk (with the bare minimum information required to given them sufficient data in game to be playable, or more if necessary), the ability to add, edit or change club competition boundaries for regional leagues, and likely much more that I cannot think of yet.

So taking those in turn, team league and cup histories is something I added recently.  Might not be absolutely perfect yet, but it's pretty much there.  It's not quite as swish as I wanted it to be because of the way the XML is structured, but you can remove specific rows and add ones to replace it (I've "inserted" my made-up club into the Scottish Premiership history to win a few trophies) or just clear everything that's there and start again.  

Referees, like I said, shouldn't be too difficult.  I expect they'll just have a few extra fields that other Person objects don't have, then share the rest.  Shouldn't be too bad.

Players adding in bulk is pretty much one of the main reasons why I did it, so that's good.  

You can edit existing objects fairly easily too, just add the unique name of the object (usually just the name although that might change) change one field to tell it you're dealing with an existing object, then update the fields you want to change.  I used it to change the competition of a couple of clubs so I could replace them with my new ones.

5 hours ago, magicmastermind124 said:

I have used Excel in the past too and am very comfortable using it, which is why I am keen to use something like this project.  Sadly I just don't have the time to set up the data myself to import and test, and frankly it would be more useful for the community to have a project like this one available.

I did notice on the link you send that large unique id's are still being used in xml files - you can change these to integer and get the normal value.  It will make everything much easier when working in Excel.  So instead of:

<large id="db_unique_id" value="606306713973603730"/>

You would use:

<integer id="db_unique_id" value="2002042258"/>

 

That's quite interesting actually, I didn't know you could do that.  I don't think I necessarily need to (although it would be cleaner, certainly) but the range of unique IDs that the editor uses has been a main source of pain in the project.  I think there's 4 for most objects, the "long" db_unique_id it mostly uses, the sequential 200******* one, the db_random_id (which the editor uses, but doesn't seem necessary) and the short db id (which again doesn't seem to be needed).  

9 hours ago, TroubleMan said:

I used excel and mail merge to import players and staff en masse.  I had this all done in FM23, but I lost the data.  I just recently rebuilt it for FM24.  I'm going to finish the database that I'm working on in maybe week or two, but then I'll go into it more.  However, here is the post that lead me in the right direction:

Right now I have the UID for all attributes, plus a few other basic things like biographical data.

My process could probably be improved with some script or python, but I'm very very comfortable in excel, so that's why I've been doing it like that.

I've recently dragged most objects in by parsing the XML you can export from the editor.  If you change the name of an object, that will generate one XML entry.  Turn that into the dictionary in Python, parse out the unique_id and the old value  of the name, and you have what you need.

8 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

As a total dork using the editor, I'd very much welcome this. I haven't got anything smart to contribute, but just a brief answer to a small question you raise - why bother adding referees?

I don't like seeing the same PL refs I see on TV every weekend coming down to ref a friendly between my Level 20 village and team or bumpkins next door. It would be even better if a fat, slow referee would make loads of mistakes at the level too.

To be fair, that was more a flippant comment than anything.  Really, the "why bother" question is really a matter of preference.  Like I've said, my initial edit really didn't need the vast majority of fields.  I think I've probably touched maybe 20-30% of them.  But my plan for this is to try and avoid just providing something that does this narrow amount of functionality and try and cover all the bases so that any kind of edit is possible.  Lofty goals probably.

[TroubleMan]

6 hours ago, magicmastermind124 said:

I have used Excel in the past too and am very comfortable using it, which is why I am keen to use something like this project.  Sadly I just don't have the time to set up the data myself to import and test, and frankly it would be more useful for the community to have a project like this one available.

I did notice on the link you send that large unique id's are still being used in xml files - you can change these to integer and get the normal value.  It will make everything much easier when working in Excel.  So instead of:

<large id="db_unique_id" value="606306713973603730"/>

You would use:

<integer id="db_unique_id" value="2002042258"/>

 

That is a good point.  That's what I was doing, because excel doesn't like numbers with more than 13 digits.  At first I had to use the & function, but after some experimenting last year, I found you could look up the last UID for that type of data and then start from the that number plus 1.  I start my players at 2002042203 in FM24.

Edited November 21, 2023 by TroubleMan
grammar

[forameuss]

I've added a section on the second post about current status of the project.  Last night I delved into the packaging up of the project, and then went down a rabbit hole related to that.  Still a few things to iron out, so hopefully get some time on that later.  Once I've achieved that, I'll take a call on whether there's anything else I'd like to fix first, but I suspect it'll be good enough to distribute at that point to let people have a play around with it if they're interested

[xbenjaminx]

Well this has my undivided attention. Definitely wanting to download this. 

If it makes mass editing the database easier then that can only be a good thing

[\'Appy \'Ammer]

This sounds fascinating. So I've got this clear in my head, and I'm really not sure I have. Say if I wanted to change the substitution rules in a cup competition from 7 to 5, would your program allow me to make one change and then it would implement it into each round? If so that would save me doing it say 6 or 7 times for however many rounds there are. Likewise if I wanted to remove VAR from all competitions, would your program make it easier to do? I hope I'm not coming over as Mr Stupid 🤪

[ianvou]

That's great news for creators!

Huge applause 👏👏👏 @forameuss

Just a (maybe silly) question.

Eg. I made a French history fix file where I added nothing, I just made changes, connected clubs, fixed foundation years etch.

Let's say I use that app and create 2-3 more levels on pyramid and also the teams and the cities where they play. Will it be possible to merge the 2 files without problem, so as to have all the fixes I made, plus the new created stuff through your app in to a single FMF file?

 

Thanks in advance 

[forameuss]

1 hour ago, vourtsio said:

That's great news for creators!

Huge applause 👏👏👏 @forameuss

Just a (maybe silly) question.

Eg. I made a French history fix file where I added nothing, I just made changes, connected clubs, fixed foundation years etch.

Let's say I use that app and create 2-3 more levels on pyramid and also the teams and the cities where they play. Will it be possible to merge the 2 files without problem, so as to have all the fixes I made, plus the new created stuff through your app in to a single FMF file?

 

Thanks in advance 

That's a very good question actually.  So the short answer, I'm not really sure to be honest.  The app is currently assuming (with the way the IDs start) that there have been no changes to the database, and I've yet to try it with any other editor files.  However, there is the Merge Editor Data option in the editor, which I assume realigns all the IDs so they're not clashing, so perhaps it would work.  Someone with more experience of that side of things would have to opine.

[ianvou]

39 minutes ago, forameuss said:

That's a very good question actually.  So the short answer, I'm not really sure to be honest.  The app is currently assuming (with the way the IDs start) that there have been no changes to the database, and I've yet to try it with any other editor files.  However, there is the Merge Editor Data option in the editor, which I assume realigns all the IDs so they're not clashing, so perhaps it would work.  Someone with more experience of that side of things would have to opine.

That's why I ask, in my case changes are only as I described so nothing is added or deleted from the original db. I never tried merge files though and I'm curious to know if....

If merging doesn't work properly that means I should start from scratch doing all my  original db changes (since I will have my new file from your app created already).

Anyway great news in general!

Bravo once again! 

[forameuss]

2 minutes ago, vourtsio said:

That's why I ask, in my case changes are only as I described so nothing is added or deleted from the original db. I never tried merge files though and I'm curious to know if....

If merging doesn't work properly that means I should start from scratch doing all my  original db changes (since I will have my new file from your app created already).

Anyway great news in general!

Bravo once again! 

Ah, if nothing is added or deleted, then I don't think there should be any issues, but I wouldn't want to say absolutely for sure.  Definitely one that would require testing.    

[oJMPx]

This looks amazing

In terms of stadiums

I have around 120 teams that i need to create stadiums for. I want them to be named "nickname stadium" eg. Huskies Stadium

Would this be able to do that?

[forameuss]

3 hours ago, oJMPx said:

This looks amazing

In terms of stadiums

I have around 120 teams that i need to create stadiums for. I want them to be named "nickname stadium" eg. Huskies Stadium

Would this be able to do that?

Absolutely.  You could manually put all those names in, or, if you fancy mucking about a bit in Excel, I'd imagine you could just pull the nickname field of your club through into the stadium field and do it that way.

[forameuss]

One more slight update, I've been working to try and identify as much stuff as I can see is currently wrong with it, and the stuff I really want to add, and I've sectioned off what I want to do before initial release, and good news is there's only a couple of things.  I've managed to get it packaged up which was a big hurdle, so shouldn't be too much longer before version one.  I'll keep you all posted

[Wolf_pd]

@forameuss I am a professional tester if you need help.

I do have some (just a little bit of) experience with the editor as well.

[forameuss]

36 minutes ago, Wolf_pd said:

@forameuss I am a professional tester if you need help.

I do have some (just a little bit of) experience with the editor as well.

I look forward to you pointing out the thing is an absolute turd in the first five minutes then! 

That would almost certainly be very helpful.  Testing is a real skill.

[Wolf_pd]

1 hour ago, forameuss said:

I look forward to you pointing out the thing is an absolute turd in the first five minutes then! 

That's an unfortunate side-effect of my work

[grade]

This is excellent. This sort of thing really helps me out. Thank you, forameuss.

I was wondering, this only works for Windows, right?

Also, The biggest pain of larger databases, (when we have hundreds of created clubs is the graphics IDs (these change from FM to FM, don't know why we can't have sort of unique IDs for created stuff in the editor, rant over)) and kits... more in terms the adding the kits to the newly created clubs. Will this be able to generate kits for the newly created clubs, if we input RGB numbers for background, foreground, and outline?

And also, can we create for example Local Region for a nation?

and also, is there a way to input the general info on stadium screen, the attendance (also min and max), and the facility info?

and also... no that is it for now.

[forameuss]

1 hour ago, grade said:

This is excellent. This sort of thing really helps me out. Thank you, forameuss.

I was wondering, this only works for Windows, right?

 

I would imagine so, for now.  It certainly hasn't been tested on anything else, and I'd imagine some of the path stuff maybe isn't as flexible as it could be.  Certainly one for the future if people really want it.

1 hour ago, grade said:

Also, The biggest pain of larger databases, (when we have hundreds of created clubs is the graphics IDs (these change from FM to FM, don't know why we can't have sort of unique IDs for created stuff in the editor, rant over)) and kits... more in terms the adding the kits to the newly created clubs. Will this be able to generate kits for the newly created clubs, if we input RGB numbers for background, foreground, and outline?

Yup, there's support for adding a home, away and third kit for all clubs and nations.  There's still the issue in the editor itself that you can't see the kits, but the changes themselves work in-game.

1 hour ago, grade said:

And also, can we create for example Local Region for a nation?

I believe that's one of the ones you can't add and only modify existing ones.  I'd need to check for sure, but almost certain that's the case.  Although that's purely because the Add option is greyed out - maybe there's a way to mod the editor to be able to add?  Not sure.

1 hour ago, grade said:

and also, is there a way to input the general info on stadium screen, the attendance (also min and max), and the facility info?

That's already there on the Club object I believe.

[Weiry]

This looks like excellent work, will definitely save me lots of time in the editor  

Will it be possible to add a player's position and CA/PA? 

[forameuss]

2 minutes ago, Weiry said:

This looks like excellent work, will definitely save me lots of time in the editor  

Will it be possible to add a player's position and CA/PA? 

Yup.  Not got it in front of me so may be a few differences, but there's definitely a field for CA/PA.  For positions, you have a separate field for every position as listed in the editor with 1-20.  You also have the field where you can add the role you want the player to have attributes filled out for if you don't provide specific attributes yourself.  The players I created I wanted them to have specific obvious traits to them, like the hyper-aggressive central midfielder, the forward that's about 8 feet tall, his tiny strike partner.  Each of those players have specific attributes filled in with either extremely high or extremely low values, then you provide a role that the game can fill the rest of the attributes in for.

[oJMPx]

21 hours ago, forameuss said:

Absolutely.  You could manually put all those names in, or, if you fancy mucking about a bit in Excel, I'd imagine you could just pull the nickname field of your club through into the stadium field and do it that way.

Amazing, looking forward to this releasing. Good work

[\'Appy \'Ammer]

On 22/11/2023 at 16:43, \'Appy \'Ammer said:

This sounds fascinating. So I've got this clear in my head, and I'm really not sure I have. Say if I wanted to change the substitution rules in a cup competition from 7 to 5, would your program allow me to make one change and then it would implement it into each round? If so that would save me doing it say 6 or 7 times for however many rounds there are. Likewise if I wanted to remove VAR from all competitions, would your program make it easier to do? I hope I'm not coming over as Mr Stupid 🤪

@forameuss will I be able to do things like the above with your super dooper program?

[grade]

5 hours ago, forameuss said:

I believe that's one of the ones you can't add and only modify existing ones.  I'd need to check for sure, but almost certain that's the case.  Although that's purely because the Add option is greyed out - maybe there's a way to mod the editor to be able to add?  Not sure.

Krlenjushka's generator was able to do this. Check his thread out

[forameuss]

2 hours ago, \'Appy \'Ammer said:

@forameuss will I be able to do things like the above with your super dooper program?

I believe that stuff is contained within league rules, so currently no. It is on the list for the next couple of versions though to at least experiment on what can be done with the basic rules.

1 hour ago, grade said:

Krlenjushka's generator was able to do this. Check his thread out

Aha, on looking into it, I was only mirroring what the editor allowed within reason. On the base you can't create local regions for some reason, so I couldn't create them to get all the ids I'd need to get it working (or at least didn't try). However with the new editor skin that unlocks a lot of stuff, looks like I can now add. I'll probably get it in for the next version

EDIT: Actually, looked into it in more detail, and looks like it would have worked anyway.  I moved away from a certain way of doing the objects a while back that put a big divider between things you could add and things you couldn't.  Just checked, and if you add to the spreadsheet, it'll add it in the editor.

The only bit that's missing is the cities for each region, as those completely slipped through.  I'll get them on the list to add for the next version

Edited November 24, 2023 by forameuss

[forameuss]

And with that, I'm going to say that we have a v1.0.  I've updated the second post with the details, so have a read there for further details.  In case I didn't stress it enough elsewhere, please be aware that this is very much an early version and I don't expect that it'll be fully working for everyone.  If you see anything obviously wrong, or just have some suggestions for how it could be better, feel free to fire them over to the email I've added to the footer.  I'll be gathering everything and looking to fix any problems as soon as possible, and start on the many new features I'm planning on adding.

[forameuss]

As a bit of a window into what's up next, I've split all the stuff I want to do so far into two separate releases.  v2.0 and v3.0.  That'll probably get split further later on, particularly if everyone using the tool starts to find stuff wrong or stuff they would like to see.  However, in terms of what's up next...

• Club League and Cup Histories
• Add Referees
• Add Journalists
• Add dropdown to let you choose existing projects rather than type them in each time
• Add validation to the spreadsheet so that when you put in an object, it'll tell you if the object doesn't exist (for mistyping etc)
• Add ability to add Media Policies to Competitions
• Add more fields from the Finances section of Clubs
• Add more fields from the Ownership section of Clubs
• Add ability to add Reserve Teams to Clubs
• Add more nationalities to the names database
• Add better ways of changing colours in the spreadsheet

Good news, the two bolded ones are already in and just need a little more testing.  I know they're ones that have been specifically asked for.  I'll need to take a look at some point through the editor and make a note of everything I haven't included, then sort through which ones are realistic or not.  

As for when this would be available, I'll need to see what works best.  However, given that the exe is on Dropbox, it's a fairly easy one to release.  I'll try and commit to updating pretty regularly, even if that's just small amounts of stuff added each time.  

[griffin99]

It's probably because I'm using OpenOffice and not Excel, but I can't save progress as an xmls (I have a lot of created info so need some saves as I add it) - and if I try to save as XLS it doesn't seem to do that. Does it work if I save the file elsewhere (or, say as a csv?) then move it back to the Input file to complete the xml creation?

The other thing is that due to the RGB and multiple pieces, kit creation is a nightmare enough without having to remember that kit style 56 is called "3 Central Vertical Stripes (Middle Different Colour)" and type all of that in, when it's only going to convert it to "56" in the xml anyway. A rare time when entering the numbers might work better for the user than the description?

Nice tool though, have enjoyed using it so far even if it refuses to save my interim changes (which admittedly also makes it difficult to test).

Edited November 30, 2023 by griffin99

[forameuss]

7 hours ago, griffin99 said:

It's probably because I'm using OpenOffice and not Excel, but I can't save progress as an xmls (I have a lot of created info so need some saves as I add it) - and if I try to save as xml it doesn't seem to do that. Does it work if I save the file elsewhere (or, say as a csv?) then move it back to the Input file to complete the xml creation?

The other thing is that due to the RGB and multiple pieces, kit creation is a nightmare enough without having to remember that kit style 56 is called "3 Central Vertical Stripes (Middle Different Colour)" and type all of that in, when it's only going to convert it to "56" in the xml anyway. A rare time when entering the numbers might work better for the user than the description?

Nice tool though, have enjoyed using it so far even if it refuses to save my interim changes (which admittedly also makes it difficult to test).

Cheers for the feedback.  

I'm not sure what you mean by saving progress of XMLs.  You as a user shouldn't really be saving XMLs manually.  If you drop me a PM with exactly what you're trying to do I can try and help.

The colours stuff...yeah, I kind of get where you're coming from, although I felt like having the names was more user-friendly than just having a number, as a general editor who just dabbles probably isn't going to know what 56 means.  I guess it could accept both a number and the string one potentially.  I do agree on the RGB ones though.  At the moment I'm kind of using the editor to pick a colour and know what the RGB is, then putting that in, which kind of defeats the point of avoiding the use of the editor really.  It is something I'm planning on working on though to make choosing colours a bit more intuitive, so it is noted.

[blaxkkkkk]

cool dude

[griffin99]

9 hours ago, forameuss said:

Cheers for the feedback.  

I'm not sure what you mean by saving progress of XMLs.  You as a user shouldn't really be saving XMLs manually.  If you drop me a PM with exactly what you're trying to do I can try and help.

The colours stuff...yeah, I kind of get where you're coming from, although I felt like having the names was more user-friendly than just having a number, as a general editor who just dabbles probably isn't going to know what 56 means.  I guess it could accept both a number and the string one potentially.  I do agree on the RGB ones though.  At the moment I'm kind of using the editor to pick a colour and know what the RGB is, then putting that in, which kind of defeats the point of avoiding the use of the editor really.  It is something I'm planning on working on though to make choosing colours a bit more intuitive, so it is noted.

Sorry, my 2am typo = now edited -  I meant saving as XLS not XML - the created file is an XLSM which I can open and edit but (presumably as it's the OpenOffice app not the Excel one) doesn't seem to allow me to save the edit spreadsheet anywhere else (which would allow me to set it up with the info in a spreadsheet, then just import it across when I want to create the XML) - it might just be a formatting thing with OpenOffice.

EDIT: Have now saved a copy in the native OpenOffice .ODS format which I can copy into the XLSM file in the Input folder when I've got all the info in the right format and can save that as I go. Will just need to update the XLSM in one go and that should work fine.

Would be great if you could add the style number (although a kit interface that's much easier to use than the Editor and provides all the XML output is probably the only way to improve on the RGB faffery).

Edited November 30, 2023 by griffin99

[forameuss]

39 minutes ago, griffin99 said:

Sorry, my 2am typo = now edited -  I meant saving as XLS not XML - the created file is an XLSM which I can open and edit but (presumably as it's the OpenOffice app not the Excel one) doesn't seem to allow me to save the edit spreadsheet anywhere else (which would allow me to set it up with the info in a spreadsheet, then just import it across when I want to create the XML) - it might just be a formatting thing with OpenOffice.

EDIT: Have now saved a copy in the native OpenOffice .ODS format which I can copy into the XLSM file in the Input folder when I've got all the info in the right format and can save that as I go. Will just need to update the XLSM in one go and that should work fine.

Would be great if you could add the style number (although a kit interface that's much easier to use than the Editor and provides all the XML output is probably the only way to improve on the RGB faffery).

Aha, that makes more sense.  I did wonder as I was typing it whether you meant that, should've assumed.  So yeah, OpenOffice I've no idea whether it'll work.  Been a while since I've used that, so might need a bit of an awkward work-around.

The kit/colour stuff is up in the release after the next one, so I'll have a think about what I can do for that.  I do want to enhance the spreadsheet with macros and functions (hence why it's currently an xlsm file) to make data entry a bit easier, so maybe there's something there I could do.  Leave it with me

[forameuss]

Version 1.1 Release - Yarrow

I was looking at everything I had planned for version 2, and it was clear that that was a hell of a lot of work that I couldn't really put any type of timescale on.  So in true Agile fashion, I've broken it all down into more achievable chunks, with the very tentative idea that I release at least something weekly.  I expect this will fall apart at some point when something ends up being more tricky than I first thought, but I think it's achievable for now.  This release is named Yarrow, because I put "exotic colours" into Google and decided that would be my naming scheme.

In terms of what this update includes, here's the list

• The opening screen now has a drop-down menu for projects which will scan whatever input folder you've chosen and return all the ones created there.  This should mean you don't need to type in the full name each time.
• The Person sheet has now been split out into specific types, so you've got a Player sheet, a Non Player one, and one other which will be covered in the next point.  It means that every column in the sheet can be filled in, rather than having this awkward "fill this in for one, but not the other"
• You can now add Referees.  They have their own sheet, as above
• You can now specify the cities you want in each Local Region, as you can in the editor.  This was missed for some reason initially
• Club league and cup history can now be added
• You can now edit - I think - how your stadium will look in-game.  With the brilliant work done to open up some of the editor's hidden features, a lot of information about the stands popped up in the stadium. Please note, these aren't quite adding quite how they should, but they are getting added.  Worth playing around with, might end up giving a bit of customisation to stadiums
• You can now add all three flavours of goalkeeper kits if you're so inclined
• Kits now have two separate tabs - Nation and Club Kits - for adding that data, rather than being part of the specific Club and Nation sheets.  This is an interim step for the future when I'm hoping to make adding kits a lot nicer to deal with.

I'm afraid you will have to update the spreadsheets you're using. I know, I know.  I can almost hear the groans now.  That is something I'm looking to avoid, and I'm hoping there's not too many changes needed, but on some structures you'll need to realign things.  Again, I'm hoping to have something in future that maybe converts existing spreadsheets.  By the next version I should at the very least have a way of saying what changes will need to be made.

I've just copied the updated application (v1.1) to the link you all had earlier.  Fire in.

 

[grade]

I haven't started using the spreadsheets, still doing the graphics on my fantasy league.

[griffin99]

Awesome sounding update (especially exploiting the hidden stadium section editor) - I haven't seen whether it reflects the 24.2 database first new IDs yet (or indeed if there are any Db ID changes)?

OpenOffice works fine as an interim measure btw, I take a copy, update that to save changes and then move all the data back into the original

[grade]

Just wondering, can we add a local region to the existing nation, yet?

I have no hurry with it...

[forameuss]

Nation has a region parameter rather than local region, and I'm not quite sure what that connects up to.  For example, Argentina has South America (South) as its region, which sits in a list of other larger regions, but that looks like it comes from a hard-coded list rather than any list of regions we can actually edit.  With the editor mod skin, I can change the region, and it's down on my spreadsheet as something you can edit, but I expect we can only change to one of the existing ones rather than change it to something completely different.

[grade]

2 hours ago, forameuss said:

Nation has a region parameter rather than local region, and I'm not quite sure what that connects up to.  For example, Argentina has South America (South) as its region, which sits in a list of other larger regions, but that looks like it comes from a hard-coded list rather than any list of regions we can actually edit.  With the editor mod skin, I can change the region, and it's down on my spreadsheet as something you can edit, but I expect we can only change to one of the existing ones rather than change it to something completely different.

I was confused for a moment there... then I looked in the editor, I think you misunderstood me (or I didn't explain better if so I apologize).

You are mentioning the region of the nation. No, I'm not referring to that. I'm talking about Local Regions, for cities. I want to create a new Local Region (there is no add button).

For example, if I want to create a new USA State (Local Region), and set the number of created cities in it.

I'm mentioning this tab:

 

[Yuko]

Yes, please.

 

 

[cleiria]

@grade You can add local regions with this

 

[forameuss]

20 hours ago, grade said:

I was confused for a moment there... then I looked in the editor, I think you misunderstood me (or I didn't explain better if so I apologize).

You are mentioning the region of the nation. No, I'm not referring to that. I'm talking about Local Regions, for cities. I want to create a new Local Region (there is no add button).

For example, if I want to create a new USA State (Local Region), and set the number of created cities in it.

I'm mentioning this tab:

 

 

43 minutes ago, cleiria said:

@grade You can add local regions with this

 

Yeah, as @cleiria says, if you install that mod, you can add them directly from the editor.  Personally, I'd say that mod is an absolute must for the editor anyway.  However, the tool will allow you to create local regions in the same manner but in bulk.

[grade]

Thanks both of you.

[djdomo]

amazing work 

[forameuss]

Not much update recently, but I've still been hard at work.  Thanks to all those who have been having a look at the tool and given some feedback, and the stuff I've got...well, not all been good!  But all perfectly valid, and it's been really useful for me, so thank you again.

I'll hopefully be releasing a new version by the end of the week.  It won't really have many new features, but I've been concentrating on making it a little easier to use.  I'll also make an effort to provide more detailed step-by-step documentation.  If that stuff's out the way, I can properly start on the new features without worrying about stuff being broken behind it.

[forameuss]

Made myself a liar with that last post...

Almost two weeks later, still no updated release unfortunately, but don't chalk that up to me abandoning it or anything, because nothing could be further from the truth.  Those that have been using it - again, thank you to anyone that has provided feedback so far - have made two things pretty clear.  It's brittle and prone to break, and it's confusing.  On the second, it's absolute understandable.  I built this as something I wanted to use, and as a result it was never really built from the start as this easy-to-use product for everyone.  It was very much "well, I'll put that there, and I'll know it's there".  So at the very least, I'll be delivering full documentation with the next version that will hopefully make everything a little clearer and get rid of the confusing part.  

On the former...well, that's where most of my time has gone.  I won't go into great detail about the development because it bores even me, but testing is a skill I often struggle with, and it's clear there's a number of parts of the system that either don't work correctly or just don't work at all.  So I've been spending all my time adding unit testing around as much of the system as I can.  Every single field of every single object should be tested, along with all the stuff around it.  This is...well, it's absolutely tedious.  But it's already exposed a few bits that didn't work, so it's definitely worth it.  

As for when the next version will arrive...I'll tentatively say by Christmas Day, but I'll emphasise tentatively.  Still working all the way up to Friday, so just getting evenings, but I'm hoping that'll be enough to at least level things out a bit.  Then I can start working on the more fun stuff again towards the new year.