GTAC enhancements

[Davin]

I'll use this thread to post changes that I make to the GTAC Assistant
program, so that y'all can keep up with what's new and what's useful,
so the game is easier to play.

For starters, here's a quick overview...

Galac-Tac can be played just fine with pencil and paper, reading your
reports on the screen or printing them out. But sometimes that takes
more time than you'd like to spend. GTAC helps to automate many
common tasks, such as working with customized and interactive maps and
helping you to enter your new actions and upload them to the web
site. So GTAC is certainly optional, but quite useful if you spend a
little time to get used to it.

When you first use GTAC (after downloading and unzipping the program),
you'll want to create a "game file". This is a plain file stored on
your hard disk in the same directory as the GTAC program itself.
You'll create this game file only once and it will keep up with your
play for the rest of that game. If you need to use GTAC on multiple
computers, just copy the most recent version of this file from machine
to machine (after having installed the base GTAC on each one). The
file is named "GTAC####.sf", where "####" is the game (galaxy) number
you're playing in. This contains a summary of all your Galac-Tac
reports (available for mapping or other analyses), any past, present,
and future actions you've entered, custom maps you've defined,
personal notes, and other customized information you may have
created. You don't want to delete and recreate this file since you'll
lose all this accumulated information.

If you want to get a whole new copy of the GTAC assistant, just
download the latest ZIP file and un-zip it into the same directory as
you already used for it, replacing files. Don't delete the directory
first -- this will preserve your game file (which will work with any
future version). Most of the time you won't need the whole GTAC
system, usually only one program file changes. There's an option in
the "Help" menu that will automatically download that one module when
you ask for it, making quick updates trivially easy.

GTAC's mapping system is designed to be THE PLACE you go to see what's
happening in your empire and to produce actions for your next turn.
It will be getting more and more sophisticated over time. So it's
worth spending some time to see how it works and get used to using it
in different ways. Don't forget to save any maps that you're going to
want to use again on future turns.

Good luck and happy gaming!

[Davin]

Now, as a review here are some things I added to GTAC last turn...

First, and rather helpfully, the MAP window and the ACTION window both
have "Instructions" listed on their menu bars. These instructions are
only one page long but give a good overview of how to use the screen
and helpful things you can do with them, so they're worth reading in
detail.

The ACTIONS window can now "sort" actions. Some of you may not be
interested in having the computer rearrange the order of your work,
but some of us are "neatness fanatics" and we want to see all our
CHARTs, etc. together in one place and sorted by ship # (or whatever)
so we can more easily spot problems or oversights. It makes sure that
actions fall in logical order, such as LOADs happening before
COLONIZEs, so getting them out of order shouldn't be a concern. But
some things aren't obviously order-dependent, such as what order ships
get built in (only if you run out of PI), so you may wish to double-
check your actions (and PI) to make sure it does what you want. Of
course, sorting is entirely optional if you'd rather just leave them
the way you entered them. Minor ordering adjustments can be
accomplished with the Move Action (or Insert/Delete Action) menu
choices.

The MAP window can now be printed so that you can plan your conquest
with pencil and paper. This can be very handy, but you might want to
watch out for colors (like Yellow) that look good on the black-
background screen but don't look as good on white-background paper.
If you'd like, you can always create separate print-versions of your
maps that use paper-friendly colors. See the "instructions" page for
more hints on color selections and how to build fancy maps that make
good printouts.

[Davin]

Also last turn I added the ability for maps to display stars' (base)
PV values directly! So you can now show stars, squares, and circles
for the places you own, but also show PV values to help guide you to
where you want to be. (To avoid showing numbers and usual symbols at
the same places, I'd suggest using the formula "Charted & Unowned"
with the new PV designation.) Don't forget to SAVE your mapping
masterpiece so that you can use it again next time you bring up GTAC.

[Davin]

A few new small items were added to GTAC this week...

1) A PRINT command for actions will now let you print the actions
you've entered in case you'd like to review them on paper or carry
them with you for further work.

2) Not only can you enter future actions to show up as reminders for
next turn, but you can now also view (only) all your actions you've
entered into GTAC on previous turns. Just turn on the option in the
ACTIONS menu.

3) The HELP menu has been activated with the standard "HELP > ABOUT"
choice to tell you what version of GTAC you're running. This will
help you decide whether or not you need to upgrade your version. It
will also help me diagnose problems if you'll tell me what version you
were running when you report a problem.

4) The HELP menu has also gained a new "Update GTAC program file"
option. This handy little option will go to the web site to download
and install any GTAC updates that it finds. Use it liberally to make
sure you've got the latest and greatest set of tools to play with.

And there will be more to come in the future, so keep an eye out here
for new updates.

[Davin]

Everyone please update GTAC before using it to download this turn. I
found a couple of download-related bugs in it and I don't want you to
crash in the middle of your download. (To update GTAC, if you don't
already have the version with Help > Update in it, you can pick up and
un-zip the whole zip file again [overwrite everything] or use <http://
www.talisman-games.com/galactac/Gtac.w3> to grab just the one file
that's changed and store it directly in your GTAC directory.)

If you've already crashed trying to download this turn, please also
restore your backup game file in addition to updating GTAC. I'll add
an automatic command for this later.

If you need to restore your backup file, go to the directory where you
put GTAC. Look for files "GTAC0004.sf" and "GTAC0004.bak". Delete
the current/bad ".sf" file and rename the backup ".bak" file to
".sf". Then (with the latest program) you'll be ready to re-download
this week's turn.

Let me know if you have any problems.

Good luck!

[Davin]

GTAC has gotten a few new options today. They're not critical, but if
you haven't downloaded the latest version from my last update you'll
still want to do that right away.

This time there's a new feature under Help > Restore from backup.
Backups are made immediately before downloading your turns from the
web, so if you have any fatal errors while downloading a turn, please
use this to restore your backup file before continuing.

GTAC's printing options (actions and maps) now ask for a printer
selection instead of always printing to the default printer.

Map printing has gotten some new margins to avoid the edges of the
paper and a title line showing which map it is (if you've named it)
and when it was printed.

And finally, for those of you that like to do your own empire
management outside of GTAC, there's now an "export" option that will
put your important information in a separate Excel or Text file for
you to examine however you wish. See the menu Game > Data Editing >
Export raw data.

Enjoy!