Tool #

[formlesstree4]

A few of you probably remember the older Tool # version I had created awhile back. I'm back (and posting in a new topic to prevent necro-bumping) to bring you the newest launch of Tool #!

There are many feature changes to Tool #:


Plug-in System
Complete File System Watcher (for Tag Directory, real-time updates on your shader modifications!)
More thorough shader scanner that, combined with the Watcher, keep track of all the shaders in your halo custom edition tags directory
Remember previously scanned Tags (faster startup time)
Generalized Save System (for the Plug-in System)
Remember previously opened Windows (for Plug-in System*)
Tool Manager (allows for using multiple Tool.exe and variants)
Almost no forms are embedded into the program


And probably more that I have forgotten to list.

Included in Tool # right now:

A bitmaps plugin for processing bitmap tasks with Tool
A plug-in manager for easily installing, uninstalling and updating plug-ins.
A Tool Manager for adding and removing different "tool" programs (such as Toolio, Toolpro, and OS_Tool).


What is to come:

More Plug-ins for the other features of the default tool
Documentation for writing plug-ins
A JMS Editor for editing map, model, and weapon JMS files (another plug-in)
Implement the saving and loading modules to actually save and load batch files
Finish a few quirky bugs with the GUI


Any questions, comments, criticism, or concerns may be posted here or you can contact me on Xfire by adding the username: ccchaos

Now, download links!

You may download Tool # here (http://www.mediafire.com/?ey1yzyi0ik77w4l)!
Now, so you actually have something to do, here (http://www.mediafire.com/?hyc6c9qnphe00n2) is a plug-in that you can install. It's the bitmaps form for processing bitmap folders.

Installation Notes:
Place ToolSharp.exe and all files in the zip in the root HCE directory. You might need to run this with administrative permissions.

Notes about the Plug-in System:
If you uninstall one plug-in that is part of a DLL, the entire DLL is unloaded. This means you could have some quirky behaviors from Tool #. I recommend you make one plug-in per DLL until I can sort this out at a later date (if you do choose to develop plug-ins).

Of course, we need to see some screenshots:
http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/6973/toolmanager.th.png (http://img39.imageshack.us/i/toolmanager.png/)http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/1570/toolmain.th.png (http://img145.imageshack.us/i/toolmain.png/)http://img31.imageshack.us/img31/4836/toolbitmaps.th.png (http://img31.imageshack.us/i/toolbitmaps.png/)
Image one is the Plug-in Manager. Image two is just the main screen and Image three is the bitmaps form.

Enjoy and, as I said earlier, please post any bugs, questions, comments, concerns and criticism!

[Patrickssj6]

First I was like, "not another Tool Wrapper" but then I remembered this! Really cool stuff.

We need more programmers on this forum (people that contribute for that matter...right now it's more chatdacity than anything else). 60% of the old Halo programmers are still working on Prometheus (and have babies) so they are basically not here.

Expect more from you in the future!

[Cortexian]

Looks like a very cool program, I don't recall the original version of this but then again I never got good enough with the HEK to need anything except the standard Tool... The tag watcher sounds like a great feature that would make alterations and tests on new tags and such much faster and less awkward!

Good work!

[formlesstree4]

First I was like, "not another Tool Wrapper" but then I remembered this! Really cool stuff.

We need more programmers on this forum (people that contribute for that matter...right now it's more chatdacity than anything else). 60% of the old Halo programmers are still working on Prometheus (and have babies) so they are basically not here.

Expect more from you in the future!


Looks like a very cool program, I don't recall the original version of this but then again I never got good enough with the HEK to need anything except the standard Tool... The tag watcher sounds like a great feature that would make alterations and tests on new tags and such much faster and less awkward!

Good work!

Thank you both! I'm hoping to keep Tool # updated and lightweight enough for most PC's to run it. When finished, I'll post the source code for any curious developers that don't want to bother with de-obfuscating/decompiling the program.

[formlesstree4]

Excuse the double post. I had sort of screwed up the release. The updated zip includes a new EXE and a required DLL file for the program to load as it wouldn't get past the scanner screen. Go me.

Anyway, the link has been updated and more bug-fixes are on the way.

[Hr3shy]

sweet man! great to see this come to the point its gotten to. i'll check this out ASAP. intresting to see this as the outcome of the first thing you sent me ha that thing was generic. good luck on updates and stuff. youve earned props sir.

[formlesstree4]

sweet man! great to see this come to the point its gotten to. i'll check this out ASAP. intresting to see this as the outcome of the first thing you sent me ha that thing was generic. good luck on updates and stuff. youve earned props sir.

Thanks Hr3shy. You should get on Xfire more often. I'm trying to get some people that actually can test the plug-ins to test them so I don't release a bugged up version, or as buggy version. Currently Tool # and Gurella Bitmaps are rather buggy. The entire system is buggy, and I'm going to be rewriting (sort of) the plug-in system to fix the enable/disabling of plug-ins. It'll fix several issues I've got with this system and make it a bit more reliable in the end.

[formlesstree4]

With the help of Dwood, the JMS Explorer is now fully functional. It is able to read any JMS file and give a detailed result back out to the user. The JMS Explorer is used mostly for debugging purposes if Tool gives you an error on your JMS file.

I'll post the plug-in sometime tomorrow. Would enjoy if some people would test it on some rather large JMS files and see how it handles it.

[Dwood]

As a note: Blitzkrieg-exported files look just fine, while those exported by TheGhost's exporter, though nothing wrong with them, may look different inside the explorer because of a few things the community did not know (and probably still don't know entirely about)

[Dwood]

Here's a link to the plugin since formless tree has yet to return:

Link removed because that version of the plugin was pretty bad

[ShadowSpartan]

As a note: Blitzkrieg-exported files look just fine, while those exported by TheGhost's exporter, though nothing wrong with them, may look different inside the explorer because of a few things the community did not know (and probably still don't know entirely about)
What are you talking about, what stuff in the jms files was not figured out at the time Bluestreak was created? As far as I know, the format is already entirely mapped out, and has been for years.

[Vicky]

Nice.. but Gurella?

[Dwood]

What are you talking about, what stuff in the jms files was not figured out at the time Bluestreak was created? As far as I know, the format is already entirely mapped out, and has been for years.

In the bluestreak, in the materials section of the file format, he auto-inserts "<none>" after every material. From formlesstree's .jms files we found out that blitzkrieg sometimes uses the paths for that material instead of <none>. I don't know how we got it to store the path, but it's in max 8 somewhere. >.>

[ShadowSpartan]

In the bluestreak, in the materials section of the file format, he auto-inserts "<none>" after every material. From formlesstree's .jms files we found out that blitzkrieg sometimes uses the paths for that material instead of <none>. I don't know how we got it to store the path, but it's in max 8 somewhere. >.>
That doesn't mean the format wasn't completely known then, he just didn't bother with writing the material path to the jms file. I don't think that path is even used by tool, especially since he is just writing "<none>" in it's place.

[Dwood]

That doesn't mean the format wasn't completely known then, he just didn't bother with writing the material path to the jms file. I don't think that path is even used by tool, especially since he is just writing "<none>" in it's place.

That could be another reason as well, but most of the time Blitz doesn't even put the material places down either, so perhaps he did assume, perhaps he didn't.. I wish he was here more often to tell us. I'll go poke at Ghost's Visitor messages just because i'm curious if he knew at the time.

Edit: Also, yeah, gurella is kind of funny. He needs to run a find//replace on Tool # pretty bad, heh.

[Dwood]

Here's some stuff I did and has been languishing without many updates lately. Enjoy. also included is my JMS explorer of which you can get the JMS class formless and I worked on. I need to optimize it a bit as it's not the most wieldy.

Also included is a CSharp Example project so hopefully someone will find this of use.

http://www.mediafire.com/?cbzv3867a5b37re