[Mod] MAPP - map for Minetest - optimized! [0.2.4]

[4aiman]

The same as in fly higher or lower.

That's exactly what I've asked. Or no?
Suppose I see 100x100 area while flying at y=100. Then I land and see only 30x30 area.
On a map this area would be shown using the same size of a formspec.
So, when on land this would be zoomed x3. On y=100 it would be x1. At y=200 it would be 0.5.

Sorry, I had not seen or understand the use of the left mouse button.
The only thing is that it is not very Intuitive I think.

It's not intuitive if you're a minecrafter :)
It was so for me, but not anymore. In MT some things work differently.

Anyway, it wasn't my idea to make a tool and to use LMB, but I like it.
Besides, how else would you be able to see a map?...
WAIT A SEC! I've just got a GREAT IDEA ))))

But then, it has to be made possible to change the Zoom of the Map in its active state.

How would you like to zoom it? I mean, name the way :)

For some reason I can't say that I have fully understood you. Could you explain what you expect to see in a new version like this:
I do this and the map zooms in.
I do this and the map zooms out.
I do this and the map changes it's size.
etc...

[JPRuehmann]

Hello
I´ve never tried MC because it seems suspect to me
MT is the first approach to such games for me.
And it is realy fun.
That I do say it is non intuitive doesnt mean that it is for everyone.
It only means that it is for me.

my thought was that if i took the tool by highlightin it in the toolbar the map gets displayed imediately and if I click right it zooms out and left zooms in for example or by left Clicking it rotates through the zoom modes. But I don´t want to force anyone to do my Ideas it works in the way as it is. If you think it is better the Way it is now, fine with me. Iff I desperately want this I have to learn lua and the MT API and do it myself I think.

It was only a thought.
Thanks,
JPR

P.S. I love this mod.

[mimilus]

With your idea all time you generate map, and for servers with a lot of people it's bad
Now like it is you choose definition of the map and after generate the map, servers like it as it

[UOAbigail]

Greetings ;)

I am not sure which context of 'zoom' is being discussed here.. but I will describe three possible versions..

In the first version, we click the map and see a 30 tile by 30 tile radius displayed (as an example)
When we zoom in.. we still have the same 30 tile by 30 tiles displayed.. just with bigger graphic images for the nodes.

In the second version, we start by clicking and get, for example, 100 tiles by 100 tiles with very small graphics. We click to zoom 'in' and get the center 50 tiles by 50 tiles with bigger graphics. Click again and it's now the center 25 tiles by 25 tiles with even bigger graphic representations of the nodes. Optionally, you could select a center point within the original 100 by 100.. but this would likely require a formspec interface.

A third version could be either of the two prior versions but with the additional ability to raise or lower the altitude at which the map gathers it's data. Since minetest does not use normal geometry (x/y being north/south and east/west with z being altitude) I wold assume this version would alter the 'y' axis up or down in order to center the map altitude. I know that seems about as clear as mud but I am truly trying to provide ideas and be helpful hehe.

In any case.. still love your mod as is ;)

Peace
UOAbigail

[4aiman]

Guys, I've struggled with opposite opinions more than enough to appreciate your kind attitude, so no need to apologise :)

I want to understand what's the context of 'zoom' here too.
It's not difficult to make another version of MAPP w/o deleting/affecting this one.
And I'm all for the changes to make it better. It's only a prototype, after all :)
Just make yourself a little bit clear ;)

Also, I like the idea to cycle through the zooms by LBM/RMB clicks. To show the map I can use HUD, so those clicks would be possible to make (currently this uses formspecs and locks any controllable input).

UOAbigail, I think it's the 2nd definition. At least it seems so to me. JPRuehmann, could you confirm?

mimilus has a point, though. And I see no way to fix that within lua...
For singleplayer it won't be too much. But for a server... I'm looking forward gsmapper. It's written in C and incorporated into the Minetest's and Freeminer's unofficial engines. If you wouldn't be able to find a link, I will help you.

[JPRuehmann]

Hello

Yes that is the Point.
But without the initial Click.
The map should be viewed imediately when its selected in the Tool-Bar.

But as I said it´s only an Idea.

Yes gsmapper would be the best solution but God knows if and when it wil be merged and it won´t work standalone. So it could be that we have to live with the two solutions that we have now (map and mapp) and mapp is much better until now, since it is faster and has at least zoom at all.

So let I hope that I don´t make you to Angry, so that you will develop this mod further.
Thanks,
JPR

[cHyper]

I'm looking forward gsmapper. It's written in C and incorporated into the Minetest's and Freeminer's unofficial engines. If you wouldn't be able to find a link, I will help you.

please ... a playable version for win...

[Inocudom]

Hello

Yes that is the Point.
But without the initial Click.
The map should be viewed imediately when its selected in the Tool-Bar.

But as I said it´s only an Idea.

Yes gsmapper would be the best solution but God knows if and when it wil be merged and it won´t work standalone. So it could be that we have to live with the two solutions that we have now (map and mapp) and mapp is much better until now, since it is faster and has at least zoom at all.

So let I hope that I don´t make you to Angry, so that you will develop this mod further.
Thanks,
JPR

Gsmapper's mapping feature better make it into Minetest. I will tell everyone that right now.

[4aiman]

Gsmapper's mapping feature better make it into Minetest. I will tell everyone that right now.

Which one of gsmappers do you prefer?
Freeminer has it's own version of gsmapper ;)

[dgm5555]

Perhaps I'm missing something, but I've not found mapp to produce very good quality maps, as they're very small and only take account of terrain. minetestmapper (https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?id=49) or it's much faster numby sibling (https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=8730) is much more like I'd expect. Are there some settings I'm missing (and yes I'm running the latest version from github).
If server speed is an issue, would be a simple way of using the png output from something like minetestmapper as the map, and update it with player location icon. This could give a really fast and overview of the minetest continent. It could either be updated on world load/shutdown/background cron/user request if needed.

I have no idea what gsmapper does, as the post starts with a bunch of people flaming each other, and doesn't contain any screenshots.

[Morn76]

I have no idea what gsmapper does, as the post starts with a bunch of people flaming each other, and doesn't contain any screenshots.

The screenshot is hidden in the "spoiler" tag of the first post:.viewtopic.php?p=128514 I don't think gsmapper draws buildings either.

Wouldn't it be possible to use OpenGL to render an overhead, far away shot for the map: OpenGL render to texture and then paste it in the top right corner. Of course this would only show map blocks that are loaded in, but at least buildings and proper lighting would be there. Then again maybe this is impossible because we are using OpenGL via Irrlicht, who knows. And of course this approach might run into problems when the camera goes above the cloud layer.

[dgm5555]

I made a quick mod for displaying a minetest mapper png (basically by copying the MAPP code then deleting bits), which is why I've posted briefly here to say thanks for the idea. My proper post (with a zip of the mod) is at https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=9219
Cheers David
An example (with optional purple underground caves) is:-

[dgm5555]

This may have been fixed by now, but the copy I downloaded last night from the github has an error which means the arrow points incorrectly for the 180-270 degree quadrant. The code should read

Your phone or window isn't wide enough to display the code box. If it's a phone, try rotating it to landscape mode.

Code: Select all

           elseif yaw < 180 then
              rotate = 180
           elseif yaw < 270 then    -- NOT 170 as is currently
              rotate = 270                 -- NOT 170 as is currently


[4aiman]

@dgm555:
Where did you get your version?
The mod wasn't updated for a year and there's no such problem:
https://github.com/4aiman/mapp/blob/master/init.lua ;)

Minetest mapper has one little problem, AFAIK: it doesn't work out-of-box. Or were there improvements?

Also, I've been able to read the map with LVM (to find a good spawn position, if anyone's interested) and it's possible to use it to create a map even in realtime (with kaeza's "yield" approach used). I have no time for this ATM, but for an old-good-MC-like maps this may be the answer. Anyone care to rewrite this using LVM?

Edit: python mapper is not a sibling of this mod and never was. This was made public a whole year and some months ago and hasn't been updated ever since. As for speed... just try to imagine that at the time of "release" lua in Minetest was at least x40 slower in some cases! Anyway, this was just a concept to help myself and people.

[dgm5555]

Strangely, I've deleted the mod and re-downloaded it and it's now as should be. The gremlins must have been having fun (or I managed to somehow replace text without realising it)...

Minetest mapper has one little problem, AFAIK: it doesn't work out-of-box. Or were there improvements?

Generation of the map worked out of the box on my system (Ubuntu 14.04), but I (think) I had to install numpy to use the latest fork of the original (the numpy-ised version last updated 6 weeks ago). However both are command-line python scripts (tho I'm wondering about using shell.run to integrate it into a mod)

python mapper is not a sibling of this mod and never was...

I take it python mapper = Minetestmapper. I didn't mean to imply they were linked originally except by me creating a mash with the mapp code. Don't get me wrong, I think the mapp concept is awesome, and I agree that Minetestmapper is certainly not for everyone, and mapp is a much more user-friendly solution. Essentially I've just pinched the mapp code (thus my thanks/acknowledgement) and converted it to display a .png (which could be any .png, but I happen to use a map). Also, unlike mapp's almost instantaneous display, the latest version of minetestmapper-numpy.py still takes 10secs to generate a map for an generated world of 1500x1500, so much too slow to be created live, but does give a much better overview of the "continent", whereas on my system maap shows a much smaller area than I can see, and in less detail than I can see it, so I didn't find it to be so useful for getting myself unlost (which is what I needed if I didn't want to use teleport all the time).

[4aiman]

What can I say... I'm glad this was of any help to someone :)

worked out of the box on my system (Ubuntu 14.04)

But what about Windows? Maybe Minetest should bundle local python? Just like Blender does. At least if there would be an installer it could be made into an optional stage.

[Excalibur Zero]

I put together a video on this mod here:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iq-f_8DXJJA

[philipbenr]

What can I say... I'm glad this was of any help to someone :)

worked out of the box on my system (Ubuntu 14.04)

But what about Windows? Maybe Minetest should bundle local python? Just like Blender does. At least if there would be an installer it could be made into an optional stage.

I second that.

[dgm5555]

Maybe Minetest should bundle local python?

I agree would probably be helpful for some mods, but the problem is also what libraries to include. PIL would be an obvious one, but numpy just for a map mod that most people don't use? or tkinter to enable gitsync? etc...
Would it be possible to have a lua script to install them, then the only thing to update is links to the executables for installing on windows?

[dgm5555]

@4aiman, could you please explain the .. ".png^[transformFYR".. rotate .. bit of your code. I want to be able to zoom in and move around to view different portions of the png for mapit, and I think this is likely to be the secret, but I can't find any documentation of what you are doing? Thanks, David

[spootonium]

[transformFYR90 is a texture transform function that flips a texture element upside-down and the rotates it 90 degrees. It's in the dev wiki. I suspect the part of the code you're thinking of is where the little, green, direction cursor is added.
This mod generates its map on-demand, centered on the player's location. You can't "pan" the map without re-generating it. You might be able simulate map-scrolling by passing the mapping function a shifted (relative to the player) centre location and forcing a re-draw. I'm not sure exactly how you'd go about zooming the map, but it would involve changing the default 16x16 mapping area.
Hope that helps.

[4aiman]

Mapp couldn't be helped. the only way to speed up a little is to use get_ground_level(pos) but that didn't improve things for me. Besides it goes up, not down. Problem is in the formspec generation. Otherwise the cycle with get_node() is quite fast. Still didn't try to use LVM to read nodes. That should be faster than get_node().

[dgm5555]

Just wondering if it would be too challenging to use MAPP when not playing minetest to generate an offline map of the entire world, then reload it when needed (like mapit but without the dependency on python). This shouldn't be too difficult (just very slow). Are there any functions which provide the bounds of the world?

[Inocudom]

https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=8489
The community seems to need a reason to care about gsmapper, so I am wondering if it would help out the mapp mod any if it was added to Minetest.