DIF file specification?

#1 Devon,

I don't think any exist to be honest.
Though you could have a look at the loading code... but imo its just confusing...

A good place to start would be interior/interiorIO.cc

#2 Or check map2dif source code.

#3 Matthew,

The map2dif sourcecode uses the interior reading/writing code in torque :)

#4 Of course, hence the linking to Torque.lib :)
Some days I just can't seem wake up, no matter how much coffee I drink.

#5 I had a feeling this was the case. So basically I have to reverse engineer the reading process of Torque itself and then work the process in reverse to produce a dif formatted file?

#6 I coulda sworn I saw a document that detailed the DIF format, but maybe it was DTS. I can't seem to find it now. It was in a zip file someone had put together containing a whole crap of torque docs and resources.

#7 Maybe Tim Gift can to solve this problem. Tim, please :)
We need dif specs asap, please help !

#8 Yeah sorry it was this I was thinking of and its DTS not DIF thats detailed.

#9 Perhaps now would be a good time to start thinking about a new DIF format. The MAP format is rather dated, and I could very well be wrong (since I haven't put much effort into research of the MAP format and newer such formats, such as the Q3 map, which is also somewhat dated), but it might be good to improve a few things. I know DIF is different than MAP, but if we're converting from MAP to DIF, it would be rather amazing if automatic improvement were included in that conversion. I would find it very interesting to design such a format and create a cross-platform (even dare I say, in-engine?) editor for the new DIF. Yes, interesting it would be, but my priorities won't allow it. Got too many other things to worry about (school, work, fiancee, own game development). One thing I would love to see is Maya-like controls for navigating the engine in editor mode. For those who have no clue what I'm talking about, I mean things like ALT+left-click orbiting around the focus of the camera, then the way the move/rotate/scale widgets work. All the shortcuts/hotkeys surrounding the basics in Maya is what attracted me to it. This is the primary reason I despise Quark.

Well, I'm impressed that you've read this post-that-would-be-better-as-a-plan. I'll keep further thoughts inside my head. Have a nice day.

#10 You want to make an in-game editor?

So do a lot of other people.

Maybe you should hunt them down. It would be immensely useful to the community.

#11 Yeah I think the maya circular style menus are pretty kewl too but I think they have that patented.

#12 Nah, pie menus are used by a lot of games (eg. sims, NWN).
http://www.piemenu.com

#13 The menus aren't exactly what I was referring to... more the way you can _avoid_ using the menu for many common tasks. There's tons of little-known shortcuts, like when you have the move tool active (by pressing w), you can hold shift+middle mouse button, then drag in the direction you want to move, and it will move along that axis (constrained). There are many many examples. The pie menu is nice too though.

#14 I have made a couple of stabs at documenting the .dif format. It is a long tedious task that I have only managed to get about a 3rd of the way through. The bad thing about the format is that it is serialized so you have to know how to parse it in order. You can't just jump to the main sections, you have to account for all of the annoying little subformats all the way down through. Again...very tedious. If you are serious about doing it then check out the read/write functions as suggested.