Standard: Official Model Repository (OMR) Filenames and Headers

[Willy Tschager]

Hi folks,

before the OMR starts to grow I'd like to discuss this comment by Orion:

http://forums.ldraw.org/showthread.php?t...d=78#pid78

reading through the specs and I also think they need to rewritten. Especially the "Filenames for the Official Model Repository files are restricted to the MS-DOS compatible 8.3 name length" is ridiculous.

Thoughts?

w.

[Roland Melkert]

I agree taking the current spec to heart takes a lot of fun out of drawing and replaces it with annoyances, It's to restrictive.

On the other hand I do understand where it's coming from, uniform naming etc opens the door for batch processing and such.

Maybe it just needs a minor 'modernization', or instead of naming the models 'weird' and human unfriendly introduce some specialized model file meta's.

[Willy Tschager]

Roland,

it would be ideal if you could take this to the LSC, which always came up with something reasonable beside being the place where new metas are standardized. I also agree with you that making a model should be a light as possible and ruled as little as possible.

w.

[Michael Heidemann]

The OMR had as main idea the possibility of making the same instructions as the original. So there is a need for to be restrictive in this case.
If you do not have fun in building according the specs. - build it your way. But then it is not conform. Thats all.

[Orion Pobursky]

Hmm, I disagree with the idea of being able to recreate the official building instructions. I think this would needlessly complicate the file. What I do want is a uniform hierarchy of filenaming and MPD files mentioned in the spec.

P.S. Moving this topic out of general and into parts standards.

[Jude Parrill]

SUGGESTION: Create a standard to put sythesized (e.g. LSynthed) parts into seperate subfiles.

My reasoning is thus: Creating synthesized parts is often difficult and typically involves a fair amount of trial and error as one attempts to mimic the shape shown in the instructions as closely as possible. Doing this in a subfile makes it much easier because you can see the whole part easily, and can manipulate/change/delete parts easily and effortlessly. However, attempting to do this in large file can oftentimes be difficult due to them often being placed in hard to reach/hard to see areas.

Additionally, in instruction manuals (as well as real life), your typical synthesized part (hose, chain, rope, etc...) is treated as a single part. However, as we all know, synthesized parts are often made up of dozens and possibly even hundreds of smaller parts. By putting all these parts into a subfile, we can then treat the synthesized part as a single part in the main file.

As for naming conventions, I suggest using something like "-sX" where X is nth synthesized part for the model.
Some examples:
m-1-s1.dat -- First synthesized piece for first model
m-1-s2.dat -- Second sythesized piece for first model
m-1a-s1.dat -- First synthesized piece for first submodel of the first model.
m-1ab-s1.dat -- First synthesized piece for for second submodel of first submodel of the first model.
mf-1-s1 -- First synthesized piece for the first minifig.

[Alban Nanty]

Why not using the naming convention used by peeron and Bricklink which is: SSSS-I where SSSS is the set number and I is an index when several sets have the same number?

Using the release year, specially on 2 digit (TLC may soon have 100 years), can be risky, for example for promotional set.