I'm sure I'm not the only person who just downloads a lot of JJ2 levels and tilesets and just puts everything into his JJ2 folder. Then after a while you wake up with Homecooked level list too full to see all the levels you have (I believe the limit is 256 levels), and JCS tileset list that full that is extremely hard to move around that tiny scrolling bar... Additionally the alphabetic order is always somehow out of place, since the names of the tilesets which are written in small letters are placed after all the tilesets written in capital ones... And there are a lot of tilesets and levels which have the same name. In case of tilesets it is extremely annoying cuz you can see only one of them (it seems that after clicking on the other one with the same name you just get to veiw the first one).

Is there any easy way to deal with this kind of mess? To be able to view clearly all the sh** that one has? I don't want to just remove it all, I try to keep the interesting works.

Levels: Windows Explorer and command line arguments
Tilesets: MLLE

Originally Posted by Violet CLM

Levels: Windows Explorer and command line arguments
Tilesets: MLLE

Thanks, but MLLE takes ages to load a tileset... And I get a lot of errors when I try to click on the tiles. Too bad, because the tileset list is so much friendlier than in JCS.

And the first link you gave me doesn't give me idea how to do that in Windows 7. I know how to associate a file with a program. Whenever I click on J2L file it opens in JCS. But I have no idea how to make additional things described there. I tried but I don't have any of the mentioned options.

Maybe let me put it this way, how can I run the levels with JJ2+ without ging to Homecooked episode? When I open a level in JCS and click ctrl + R it automatically runs it in normal JJ2...

Originally Posted by incandescentembers

Maybe let me put it this way, how can I run the levels with JJ2+ without ging to Homecooked episode? When I open a level in JCS and click ctrl + R it automatically runs it in normal JJ2...

Go to your jazz2 folder and rename Jazz2.exe (smth like Jazz2-.exe). Then, rename Jazz2+.exe to Jazz2.exe. Now JCS will open plus automatically.

I begin to wonder... Am I really that stupid that I couldn't figure that out on my own?
Thank you so much!

So I'm still having a lot of trouble organizing my JJ2 stuff on my PC. I'm very sorry if I'm being annoying with my questions but I'm pretty fresh in this community and there are a lot of things that I just don't know and sometimes it's not that easy to find if someone already answered that question etc.

The thing is that I'm losing way too much time each time I just want to check out some level / tileset or find it on my computer. I think so far these are my 2 biggest issues:

1. TILESETS: FILENAMES & NAMES (that appear in JCS)
Levels go by filename of the tileset, so the tileset's name that appears in JCS doesn't affect the level in any way. Is there any way to change that name of the tileset?


2. MUSIC FILES
The JCS limit for Music File is 32 characters... Which isn't much for a person who keeps everything in separate folders. Is there any tool outthere which allows you to skip that limit and asign a music file that has more than 32 characters?



Speaking of tools, is there any tool that allows you to change properties of multiple levels at one time? In case of changing tilesets filename or moving your music file to a folder, the level which are using those files won't be able to find them anymore. In that case you can just go to the level, set the tileset, place the new directory of the music file and everything be good again... But what if the same music file / tileset is used by 20 different levels?

Changing tileset filenames would be a bad idea if you ever wanted to upload anything or host anything online. For music... don't keep them in separate folders.

I want to do all that for my own use only..

If you rename tilesets or music, levels that use them will not be able to find them. As far as I'm aware, this also applies to moving things to other folders.

Originally Posted by Robo4900

If you rename tilesets or music, levels that use them will not be able to find them. As far as I'm aware, this also applies to moving things to other folders.

That's what I said... That's why the question:

Originally Posted by incandescentembers

Speaking of tools, is there any tool that allows you to change properties of multiple levels at one time? In case of changing tilesets filename or moving your music file to a folder, the level which are using those files won't be able to find them anymore. In that case you can just go to the level, set the tileset, place the new directory of the music file and everything be good again... But what if the same music file / tileset is used by 20 different levels?

However, like I also mentioned, changing the JCS name of the tileset (NOT the filename) does NOT affect the level that uses that tileset in any way. So my other question was: how to change that name? Maybe it seems pointless to you guys, but I am personally pissed when I see all the stupid names which don't have anything to do with tileset's filename (like Dimensions for Sirius) and all the weird symbols preceding the name, so it messes up the alphabetisation (like *Dead*, - Pezrock 1, ----Outdoors, @_Strangeblocks, etc....).

Open the .j2t in a hex editor and overwrite (part of) the 32-byte string beginning immediately after DE AD BE AF.

Originally Posted by Violet CLM

overwrite (part of) the 32-byte string beginning immediately after DE AD BE AF.

What?

For instance, if you're using XVI32, select byte 188—one after AF—and click the "Edit" menu button in the top left corner of the window. From there click "Overwrite string." Choose "Text string," not "Hex string," and write the new name you want the tileset to have. Then click Ok, and save the tileset file.

SICK! It works, although it is annoying that you can only overwrite some of the letters at one time. And you have to put 00 in hex string if your new name is shorter than the original.
Thank you!

(SO sorry for double post)

Since Violet taught me how to change the JCS names of the tilesets I am completely satisfied with my new tilesets order and now I agree that changing tilesets filenames is a bad idea.

BUT I think that music is a different story. You see, all the tilesets are made by the people in here, so the names most of the time make a reasonable composition. There are no doublets with different names, there are not too many different tilesets with the same name either. Music, most of the times, comes from outside, from bunch of different artists and websites. There are TONS of doublets with different names (to not search too far, JJ1 songs are good examples: SONG14.s3m, scraparap.s3m, scrap.s3m, binary-song.s3m, scraparap.it, JJ1SONG14.s3m, j1sng14.s3m, JJ1 Scraparap.s3m - all that is the SAME song) and TONS of different pieces with exactely the same filename (I believe I have 6 different songs under the filename castle.it)... The names a lot of times don't make any sense, and it is very hard to identify which music is that. There is no standarization, people making their episodes / level packs a lot of time rename the music files (like for example Agama did for his Night episode - each song, although existing under different names, is named "Night" + a number (Night1, Night2, etc.)).

Additionally tilesets have only 1 file extension. Music has a lot... .s3m, .xm, .it, .mod, .mp3, .ogg, .669, j2b, etc. All that creates a huge chaos in my folder and I never can find any music that I want to find.

I may be a weirdo that I'm bothered by things like that, but who knows, maybe I'm not the only one. I really try to find some solution to this situation, and so far the best idea I had was to move everything to seperate folder in JJ2 directory. At least that way all my music is in one place and I can sort that place by the filename, so the deal with different file-types messing up the searching goes away.

As a community we could easily come up with a nice standard for music. Let's say, we all would have a folder called "Music" (or just "M" - even shorter) in our JJ2 directory and each upload would include all the music files in the folder with the same name, so the music would jump there automatically. Adding "Music\" before the filename in the level properties in JCS isn't that big deal in case of a single level... And I'm sure someone could easily come up with an idea how to change that massively (draging all the level files to some program that adds that for you). The question is, is there any will to do that at all? Is that a problem in case of AngelScript (when loading music files for some scenarios)?

If there was some way of making JJ2 also search a given folder for music files, that would be great, and I would be on board with that. As for naming conventions, that would be hard, and it wouldn't be retroactive, but it would be nice to have a guideline.

Originally Posted by incandescentembers

As a community we could easily come up with a nice standard for music. Let's say, we all would have a folder called "Music" (or just "M" - even shorter) in our JJ2 directory and each upload would include all the music files in the folder with the same name, so the music would jump there automatically. Adding "Music\" before the filename in the level properties in JCS isn't that big deal in case of a single level... And I'm sure someone could easily come up with an idea how to change that massively (draging all the level files to some program that adds that for you). The question is, is there any will to do that at all? Is that a problem in case of AngelScript (when loading music files for some scenarios)?

Changing the levels is a very bad idea because you're gonna have different settings in level files that are otherwise the same, you're gonna end up with both levels using the subfolder and levels not doing so, and JJ2 will be confused and not know what to overwrite and what not and in general it's gonna be more of a mess if anything.

JJ2+ could have a game-wide setting to look in a subfolder for music rather than the main folder, though, which would be rather trivial. You'd still need to make sure all music for both old and new downloads ends up in the correct (sub)folder, but if you're so obsessed with organization that you find this important in the first place maybe that isn't the biggest of problems.

There's so many other options to filter music from the folder though... sort by file type, search, filter by extension, et cetera.

And generally people use the original file name for module music; Jazz2Online actually takes advantage of this and saves only one copy of the file on its servers, even if there's a lot of uploads that contain it. Besides, how would you want to "standardize" this? Either you use the original filename - or the filename under which you originally acquired the song, at least - or you don't. In the latter case you're probably too oblivious to heed any such "standard" anyway.

Originally Posted by Stijn

Changing the levels is a very bad idea because you're gonna have different settings in level files that are otherwise the same, you're gonna end up with both levels using the subfolder and levels not doing so, and JJ2 will be confused and not know what to overwrite and what not and in general it's gonna be more of a mess if anything.

I don't think that would be such a big deal. There are a lot of lvls getting upgrades etc. Also when u use passwod removal it modifies the lvl file. Whatever you do. I just always overwrite the older version of the lvl with the newer one.

Originally Posted by Stijn

JJ2+ could have a game-wide setting to look in a subfolder for music rather than the main folder

That's actually a very good idea.

Originally Posted by Stijn

There's so many other options to filter music from the folder though... sort by file type, search, filter by extension, et cetera.

None of that really works...
Sorting by name -> music is mixed up with all the other files that is not music (JJ applications, j2t, j2l etc...).
Sorting by flile-type -> like I mentioned: there are too many filetypes of the music. s3m, xm, mod, it, 669, mp3, ogg, j2b.... You end up with 10 different sections of music files while sorting like that...

Originally Posted by Stijn

And generally people use the original file name for module music; Jazz2Online actually takes advantage of this and saves only one copy of the file on its servers, even if there's a lot of uploads that contain it. Besides, how would you want to "standardize" this? Either you use the original filename - or the filename under which you originally acquired the song, at least - or you don't. In the latter case you're probably too oblivious to heed any such "standard" anyway.

For example, forest.it, the one by Alexander Brandon (because there are AT LEAST 3 different "forest.it" out there) is really a Carrotus Forest or Greenland. I named it "Alexander Brandon - Greenland (Carrotus Forest)". Problem with that is that the name now has more than 32 characters (which is another big issue), but it could at least be called "Greenland (Carrotus Forest)" so it would stay out of confusion with other music named "forest".

Originally Posted by incandescentembers

For example, forest.it, the one by Alexander Brandon (because there are AT LEAST 3 different "forest.it" out there) is really a Carrotus Forest or Greenland. I named it "Alexander Brandon - Greenland (Carrotus Forest)". Problem with that is that the name now has more than 32 characters (which is another big issue), but it could at least be called "Greenland (Carrotus Forest)" so it would stay out of confusion with other music named "forest".

But now all levels looking for forest.it no longer work.

Just load all your music in a player like XMPlay, it will show you the actual title and you'd have to start it anyway if you want to play the music. You can even have XMPlay monitor a folder so new files are automatically added to the playlist.

I mean, it's not like you're (potentially) inconveniencing anyone but yourself, so if you really think this works better for you, no problem. But it seems to me that it'd create more problems than it solves while there's alternative solutions for most of your problems.

Originally Posted by incandescentembers

Sorting by flile-type -> like I mentioned: there are too many filetypes of the music. s3m, xm, mod, it, 669, mp3, ogg, j2b.... You end up with 10 different sections of music files while sorting like that...

Filter by extension, not sort. If you use Windows Explorer for browsing your files, which most people for some reason appear to do, use

*.j2b OR *.mod OR *.s3m OR *.it OR *.xm OR *.mo3 OR *.mtm OR *.umx OR *.669 OR *.mp3 OR *.mp2 OR *.mp1 OR *.ogg OR *.wav OR *.aif OR *.aiff

in your search field to hide all files that aren't music formats supported by JJ2+.

Admittedly, that's an incoveniently long search string (though you could probably skip a few rarely used formats or save it to a text file).

In Windows 7, Explorer allows you to save search criteria, as do other decent file browsers, in one way or another. Then you can open them with one click, couldn't possibly get more convenient than this.

Originally Posted by Stijn

But now all levels looking for forest.it no longer work.

They do work, because there is another forest.it, which is a completely different track. They one that I renamed was actually forest (2).it (since I already had forest.it Windows asked me if I want to replace it or keep the both files - I kept both).

Problem is that it uses different music, so now I should investigate on the J2O which level uses which forest.it etc.

Originally Posted by Sir Ementaler

Filter by extension, not sort. If you use Windows Explorer for browsing your files, which most people for some reason appear to do, use

*.j2b OR *.mod OR *.s3m OR *.it OR *.xm OR *.mo3 OR *.mtm OR *.umx OR *.669 OR *.mp3 OR *.mp2 OR *.mp1 OR *.ogg OR *.wav OR *.aif OR *.aiff

in your search field to hide all files that aren't music formats supported by JJ2+.

Searching is not the solution for me, since it loads very slow. I don't feel like waiting 2 minutes to load the search result for all the 1500 music files that I have in my JJ2 folder each time I want to check them out.

If that's really the efficiency of your machine, the first thing I'd like to suggest is upgrading. But when it comes to less expensive solutions, you could check whether indexing the files helps - it should make a major difference given your base search speed.