I just added new stuff to my TC and broke Nova (again- I've been through this a few times). Now, it crashes on the main title screen, as long as a pilot file is loaded. If I remove the Last Pilot alias, it's OK, but if I make a new pilot or open an old one, it chokes. Here is the final excerpt from my debuglog.

evaluating ncb set string 'S128 S130 B1000 B1004 B1011 b1020 b1032 b1048 b1064 b1080' (starting character Mercurian Trader's Guild Member)
beginning mission Wait a Day (128)
beginning mission Wait a Week (130)

I have checked the log thoroughly. If someone would be kind enough to post or e-mail me a debuglog from a working plug, that would be great. I corrupted the Nova scenario accidently, and I haven't had time to re-download it (damn dial-ups), so I can't get my own. This TC replaces the data files like all good TC's should, and it used to work perfectly. All I remember adding were about 20 systs, and copying the cargo-drone graphics from Nova, but there might have been alot more. Usually, this kind of crash is graphics-based I've found, but there are only a few graphics on the main screen, and it's hard to see how adding the cargo pod should mess up anything. Any ideas, folks?

------------------
~Charlie

It many not be the presence of graphics that is the problem, but the absence. Check to make sure that ALL the Cargo Drone's various sprites are in your plugin (rleDs 1004, 1404, and 1604, and the same-numbered rle8s) and that the shan (130) is present, too.

-Vaumnou

------------------
Did you know that 63.8% of quoted statistics are made up on the spot?
"He's too late. SEE?!? THE CLIFFS OF INSANITY!!! Hurry up!"
"You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. .... Radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat." - Albert Einstein

I checked that Vamnou- they are all there. It isn't a graphics problem, I've found.

I've done some more checking, and it seems to have something to do with the char resources. In the onStart field, they all have this:

S128 S130 B1000 B1004 B1011 b1020 b1032 b1048 b1064 b1080

Missions 128 and 130 just sit around being active, and I know they work- I haven't touched them in weeks. All the other bits control the planet rotations. Again, I haven't touched them in weeks. The systems I added actually don't rotate, they have no visbit control. The chars, for what it's worth, also haven't been touched in quite some time, and worked previously. This is very strange.

I've double and triple checked the new systems, everything is ordinary in them. I'm going to check the systems I used as templates, and make sure nothing is wrong with them.

Everything works fine when I take out the data file with the chars, and start a new character sans char, and remove the last pilot alias. In the pilot log, it always chokes right after loading pilot data 2- so probably pilot data 3 is having issues. Anybody know what is in data 3?

Oh, I (quite fortuitously) made a backup copy of the plug about a day ago, which works fine. I'm going to sift through the two versions and look for problems.

------------------
~Charlie

(This message has been edited by Masamune (edited 06-06-2003).)

I simply copied the new stuff into the older plug, and ditched the buggy version. Screw it! It all works- anything I did (and forgot I did) can be replaced.

So, the moral of this story is this:

KEEP BACKUP COPIES OF YOUR PLUGS.

I'm going to start making a backup every day, so if I ever screw things up like this again, poof, I only lose a day's work.
In fact, I'm going to take this lesson to heart, go get a few dozen CD-RW discs, and

MAKE A BACKUP OF MY HARDDRIVE.

This is especially important for us laptop owners (especially me- mine has already been through one motorcycle crash, had the logic board replaced, and the CD drive replaced.)

------------------
~Charlie

Strangely, I've had the same problem reported with my EV conversions... Three people have reported it so far, and it occurs just when a pilot is created. The topic is (url="http://"http://www.ev-nova.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1504&start;=120")here(/url), if you would like to confirm that. If I find the solution, I'll post it here.

------------------
Eat blazing electric death!
(url="http://"http://www.evula.org/infernostudios/ept/")Unofficial EV and EVO Ports(/url): Both currently in FC1.
Please post any bugs (url="http://"http://www.ev-nova.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=26")here(/url).