Harn Styles for CC3+ Finally Ready for a test drive
roy.denton
Traveler
I have finally finished tinkering with my Harn style for CC3+ by Profantasy. I uploaded the zip file to my web page. If you have CC3+ and want to give it a try here is the link to my download page with the file.
http://theharniac.net/downloads/other_downloads.htm
http://theharniac.net/downloads/other_downloads.htm
Comments
The correct way to handle this is to embed your custom palette into the templates that need it.
That answers the Harn specific issues.
Since this is the first time I have done something like this I appreciate the ideas for setting up the zip file and will look at updating it to do so.
Why limit the TOC? Just curious.
I'm not sure limiting to thee levels will shorten it much, though. There's just a lot there.
To take an example from your documentation, if you look at the very end of the TOC, there are multiple appendix entries, that have sub-entries for step 1, step 2, etc. These are not very helpful to have in a TOC, because they don't really tell the user anything. There is no indication what step 1 is anyway.
The TOC works best when it is a high-level overview of the main sections in the document, not every single heading in the document. Remember, it isn't very helpful if people skip over it because it is to large to quickly find what you're after.
- You should consider putting all your templates into the Wizard templates, especially since you don't have that many. Remember, a Wizard template can be locked down so that users can't change the dimensions. The advantage here is that this is where people look for templates these days, and not everyone will be reading the manual from cover to cover to see what is available. I often forget to check the predefined templates myself.
- Maybe it is just me who drew the vegetable plot far larger than anyone making a real Hârn map would do, but I noticed it uses the escarpment command to make a fence around it, and the default limit of 1000 entities wasn't enough to go around the area. If you expect people to draw large such areas, perhaps up this setting in the stored config.
- @Symbols\Harnic Interior BW\HI_Odds and Ends.FSC (with corresponding All catalog) also have this issue for the log and charcoal symbols
- Same with @Symbols\Harnic Interior Color\HI_Goods and Tools.FSC for the anvil and tools symbols
Just note that with bitmap path errors like these, make sure you fix it correctly and don't take any shortcuts. the reason for this is that once a bitmap file has been released with a given path, it is impossible to change it later without breaking peoples maps, so it is important that you update the catalogs to use symbol inside the existing Harn directories you are already distributing, rather than just simply release the images in the User folder where the catalogs currently point, that will just make this more difficult to maintain in the long run.
I can do that with the templates. How or where do I look to lock them?
Can you explain the last paragraph a bit? These were tied to that directory location on my computer and display correctly.
Again, thank you for the constructive feedback.
For example, the Nivik - 30' symbol from the HL_Coast symbol catalog is using an image located at:
@Symbols\User\Ships\Nivik_VH.PNG
But you don't distribute anything to the User subfolder in your .zip file.
That Image, Nivik_VH.png, don't seem to be part of the package at all.
My last comment was meant to indicate that it is important to keep your images together in the actual harnic folder, so you should copy the missing images to the appropriate harnic folder (like @Symbols\Harnic Local\Harnic) and update the symbol catalog to point there, as opposed to just distributing the content of the User folder, as this will spread your images out over multiple places in the system, which is messy. Just including the User folder is the easy option, but it is not the good one. And if you do that, you need to keep them like that for all eternity, because you cannot move images of released products, that breaks maps made with previous versions, which is bad.
Thank you
As a post script to this, there is nothing that prevents a user from modifying a template to meet their own needs. Like I did with the horizontal local template. Every Harnic local map I have seen has always been vertical. That was not an option for the map I was working on. The default vertical maps are because most of these are designed to be printed on letter sized paper in a binder and most people like an image they don’t need to turn sideways. But that was too limiting for me.
TOC ?
I'll second the suggestion to limit the TOC to three levels, and add the following: eliminate the space between lines in the TOC (all it does is add ~50% to the length) and make it two-column. If you can get it down to three sides (or better still two) it will actually be much more useful. I tried to find the TOC link for part 2 (since I'm most interested in local maps) and scrolled past it twice, then found it when I was on the verge of searching instead, so at the moment it's just too much.
The installation instructions were clear, and a glance at Part 2 makes me think you've been clear and thorough describing the tools. The start of a major new section could do with being more obvious, I think - e.g., "Special Agricultural Fills with border elements" on p.81 kind of gets lost.
Are the structures compatible with any of the City Designer tools, e.g., smart aligning to roads or usable in random streets?
Anyway, thanks again!
Just saying it may take me a bit to get all this addressed.
Thank you all for your ideas and comments.
http://theharniac.net/downloads/other_downloads.htm
I fixed the file name, so it works now.
Thanks.