The Mana World Forums

The current map naming scheme (XXX-Y) is rather limited and cumbersome. It has 3 digits to identify the map, and another to identify the submap (outside, indoor, cave level, etc). We're using less than half of the characters available for this (5 out of 11 available). We also have each one of our 100+ maps in the same folder (not a big deal, but it gets annoying as we add more).

I'm proposing a new, more flexible system: R/[what ever up to 9 characters]. R is a region identifier (T for Tonori, A for Argaes, K for Kaizei, etc). Everything after that is open to use, up to 9 characters (which is the limit with the current network protocol). Some samples:

• T/Tul/S/o (South Tulimshar outside)
• T/Tul/S/inn (South Tulimshar inn interior)
• T/Tul/S/h1 (South Tulimshar, house 1 interior)
• A/Hur/o (Hurnscald outside)
• A/Hur/clinic (Hurnscald clinic interior)
• A/Dim/cave1 (FIrst level of Dimond's Cove cave)
• A/grave/o (Woodland graveyard outside)
• K/Niv/dck/o (Nivalis docks outside)

The source of the 11 character limit is the network protocol, which allows only 16 characters (null terminated) for map name. Add in the extension (period followed by 3 characters), we're left with 11: 16 - 1 (for null character) - 4 (for extension) = 11 (available characters).

For a first step, we could only reorganize the client-data and script locations, to avoid having to change the script content.

Jaxad0127 wrote:The current map naming scheme (XXX-Y) is rather limited and cumbersome. It has 3 digits to identify the map, and another to identify the submap (outside, indoor, cave level, etc). We're using less than half of the characters available for this (5 out of 11 available). We also have each one of our 100+ maps in the same folder (not a big deal, but it gets annoying as we add more).

I'm proposing a new, more flexible system: ...

The actual system is rather annoying when you try to find where is what, and this will accentuate with time as you underline it. Ithink that the / separators are useless and that the actual sub numbersare quite an easy way to figure map content. Also numeric numbering makes it easy to rerlease maps though names require a greater period of reflexion to keep the system consistent. Why not a mixed one such as many countries used for cars
Ist letter or frist twoletters ( tere is Argaes and Ancea): continent
2nd letter (maybe 2and3): sub-area (region)
then XXX-Y or XX-Y

examples: TT 01-2 Tonori Tulimshar map 01 (bazaar) inside
ArWH ... Argaes woodland hills....

We've confirmed that we can safely use 15 characters for map name. This is a hard protocol limit, so we can't get any more for now.

I still think we should use subfolders to better organize maps. Having hundreds of files in one folder gets very unwieldy. My basic proposal is still the same: [region]/[subregion/area]/[whatever]

Regions:

• A - Argaes
• T - Tonori
• K - Kaizei
• G - Gasaron
• _ - other

Things like botcheck can stay in the root.