ectizen's SP:WAW Map Thing just hit version 1.0

ectizen · Post by **ectizen** » Mon Apr 02, 2001 8:29 am

And how do I know? Well, the map (scen004, Wild Bill's The Moment of Truth) looked so good, I took a disk around to the local copy shop, where they charged me an exorbitant $23 to print it out on A3 paper and laminate it! If that doesn't mean it's earned the 1.0, I don't know what it'll take!

Map Thing 1.0 is ready for downloading. It's about 169kB of zipped archive, containing Map Thing, its configuration file and documentation!

For those that don't know, Map Thing is a tool for converting SP:WAW maps, scenarios and saved games to PDF format. These PDF maps can then be viewed and printed with your PDF viewer (eg. Adobe Acrobat). They are very customisable, with most features able to be turned on or off and have their lightness indivdually adjusted. Depending on your selected options, the PDF maps can be anything from a blank page, up to something reminiscent of the maps I used when hiking around the nearby mountains. You think that's an outrageous claim? Maybe some kind of April Fools nonsense? Well, check this out! It's an almost fully optioned PDF of the above mentioned scenario - the one that I had printed and laminated, and which now adorns my wall! It's zipped PDF, requiring about 211kB of downloading.

Here are some of the new features in this version:

Faster PDF generation
Fully functional contour lines
Map labels (place names, compass points, etc...)
Reads scenarios and saved games
Victory hexes
Known minefields and other obstacles
PDFs of regions smaller than the entire map
Page orientation matches the shape of the map
Contour lines! Did I mention the contour lines? They're very nice.
Reinforcement locations

All in all, I'm quite pleased with it. What do you think?

ectizen.

RAlfons · Post by **RAlfons** » Mon Apr 02, 2001 8:54 am

Hi ectizen,

thanks a lot for the cool tool

For those who have not tried it out, it's an absolute must for planning your battle

and then see how it goes wrong

(well it does most of the time for me, but thats my fault not mapthing's

)

Thanks Alf

skukko · Post by **skukko** » Mon Apr 02, 2001 9:24 am

This is great tool

Thank you for doing it. You have set up whole gaming back to its roots: Just print map to A0 -size paper and start to play

mosh

ectizen · Post by **ectizen** » Mon Apr 02, 2001 10:13 am

Originally posted by skukko:
Just print map to A0 -size paper and start to play

I actually wanted to print the map to A2, but it would've cost about $80

and taken a day to do!

If you're willing to do a bit of work with the scissors and some tape, you can build 16 PDFs of small pieces of the map, print them to A4 and then assemble your A0 from that. If you make sure that all the pieces have a few hexes overlap, you don't have to be accurate with the cutting. I can't help with home made lamination for this, but since you really would want to protect it, the best suggestion I can make is to varnish it to your dining room table*.

[edit: the rest of this message was a result of severe sleep deprivation - please forget it ever happened]

*Disclaimer: Don't do this.

slehtine · Post by **slehtine** » Mon Apr 02, 2001 3:48 pm

Something I've been waiting for..Thanks!

-Sasa

Wild Bill · Post by **Wild Bill** » Tue Apr 03, 2001 6:46 am

This is a fantastic tool done by the old Ecitizen!

A lack of this handy type of tool has been felt strongly by a lot of us. Now we can PRINT those maps.

Very nice program and easy to understand instructions and interface. I am enjoying it!..Wild Bill

Black_Watch · Post by **Black_Watch** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 12:12 am

This tool is awesome!

This should be included in the tools that comes with the full install version of SPWAW that comes on the CD.

David Heath · Post by **David Heath** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 3:46 am

Well funny you should say that..... Ectizen was nice enough to give us premission to include Map Thing in SPWaW v5.0 I must say this is a great program.

ectizen · Post by **ectizen** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 4:31 am

And that's a good thing in more ways than one! I'm sure that without the incentive of being included on the cd, I would have been slower developing this, and the quality would be a little more questionable...

Thanks for the encouragement, guys!

And remember: you too can improve Map Thing by reporting those bugs, and making suggestions.

BruceAZ_MatrixForum · Post by **BruceAZ_MatrixForum** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 7:27 am

Hi ectizen:

Every class has to have a "Dunce." :rolleyes:

Can you go over loading the maps one more time (without using Fred WAWMap) and how do I view it again?

Bruce
Semper

Redleg · Post by **Redleg** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 7:44 am

Shop for the printing, guys. I had some very large maps printed on 11x19 photo quality paper in color for less than $2.00 each. No lamination though. B/W 11x19 on crummy paper was about 35 cents.

Not a fluke - I found 2 places in our backwoods little town that did this work.

ectizen · Post by **ectizen** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 9:04 am

5thRecon:

Try this:

Click this button. This will bring up a dialog where you can select the scenario. Browse to the SCEN sub-directory in the SP:WAW directory, and double click on the scenXXX.dat for the scenario you wish to load. After loading check the title to make sure you have the correct one. If you don't, keep trying until you do.
Don't try this at first, but after you've successfully used Map Thing a couple of time, try changing the options to suit your needs. But as I said, for now, leave the options alone.
Click this button. This will build the PDF, and save it to wherever you saved previously - if this is the first time, it will default to C:\map.pdf. If the PDF already exists, you'll be given the option to overwrite it, or cancel.
Find the PDF using windows explorer, and double click it. This should start whatever PDF viewing utility you've got - usually this will be Adobe Acrobat. From here, you can view and print the map.
[/list=a]
Note - I presume that most SP:WAW players will have some kind of PDF viewer installed, as all of the SP:WAW documentation is in this format.

Does this help?

Redleg: I've done some shopping around, and got the price down substantially. For the first one, I neglected to check the price beforehand - oops! Remember also, that my $ are Australian $, so you should probably halve any prices I throw into the conversation

ectizen · Post by **ectizen** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 4:35 pm

Eek! Bugs!

A couple of bugs in Map Thing have been found and fixed.

Version 1.0a is available for downloading now!

Ordinarily, I wouldn't've released a new version so soon, but I've found a bug that made Map Thing produce corrupt PDFs in some countries! (I was accidently using the local settings for number formats - PDFs don't

)

As well as fixing an issue with 100 x 140 size maps, some optimisations have been made, so that smaller PDFs are produced.

So, if Map Thing works for you, you probably don't really need this. If Map Thing doesn't work for you, try this. If it still doesn't work, let me know.

DoubleDeuce · Post by **DoubleDeuce** » Thu Apr 05, 2001 8:56 pm

Ectizen's SP:WAW Map Thing! Color Map Printing!

Some dreams really do come true!

Thanks Ectizen.

BruceAZ_MatrixForum · Post by **BruceAZ_MatrixForum** » Fri Apr 06, 2001 5:21 am

Thank you! Thank you! That was real simple (blush) but more importantly I can see a real use for these! How do you increase the font size on the test so you can read it?

Bruce
Semper Fi

P.S. I didn't say I was smart, just I could shoot straight!