I hadn't tried adding a focus/worn/click effect since this change was made apparently. Trying it now, it seems like this might not be the best way to sort the list. Since the list is now sorted by ID number instead of spell number, it means I have to open the spells file in a notepad and search for the spells I need to find the ID number of it, and then scroll down to select it from the list in the item editor. I think it was better before when it was sorted alphabetically. Or, is there some other way I can search this list without having to look them up from an external source? I used to just scroll down to what I needed and select it when it was alphabetical.

And, if possible, I think it would be nice to have a simple search box on the main screen for searching for name or item ID. When searching for multiple items to edit them 1 by 1, it takes quite a while to click "Advanced", highlight the 0 and click paste the item name in, then click "SET FILTER" then "OK DONE", then "Run Queru", then select the item. It would be nice if you could just paste an item ID in there and it would automatically load it up and view it. Or, if you could search by name and it would load up the first match on the list automatically. I think this would make the tool more useful when editing multiple items and not using the grid editor.

Also, this is something that is purely cosmetic, but IMO it would be nice to swap the location of the Delete Item and Edit Item buttons. If I had my preference, I think it would be nice if they went; "Edit Item" then below that "Grid Item Edit" and at the bottom would be "Delete Item". Maybe I will get used to the way it is now, but I keep almost clicking "Delete Item".

Ok, thanks for the report.

I'm working on your suggestions and the new item editor will have the following added for fast item searches -

You will be able to find items by partial name %bronze%
and search for items by item#. Allowed searches by number can be delimited by a comma such as -
1001,1004,1060,1865

Found items can either be appended to or replace current main item list
There will be a button to clear the big list.

This should be done later tonight.

GeorgeS
..also changed the layout of the edit/delete buttons as suggested.
:D

As promised -
Everquest Item Editor and Character Inventory Editor


- 13.9.4 - Added ability to find items by either partial name or a list of comma delimited id's - Click on advanced button to access the panel

GeorgeS

woot! i love you george! lol thanks again

Thanks again GeorgeS. The buttons being moved seem much better IMO.

The search I was asking for was meant to be on the main screen though, instead of in Advanced. That is one thing I have always wanted since I first used your tool. Perhaps if you made the item search list slight shorter, you could put the item name and ID searches in above or below the Run Query button. The idea is to be able to search for an item name or ID with minimal clicking to increase efficiency. By having them in the advance box, it is basically the same as it was before.

And if it is possible, it would still be nice if the search could auto select the first item in the list once the search was done. That way, if you are searching by exact name or ID, it will pop right up there and be ready for editing. Just 1 less click really, but still an enhancement.

Personally, I think your NPC Editing Tool is now amazing and I can't imagine how it could get much better. The item editing tool is really nice too, but I can still think of ways to improve it some. I made a post on a pretty major overhaul for it in your section of the forums here. I know you like to get pretty much every request done, but I can certainly understand if you don't want to setup the individual Item Editing window to look like the suggestion I posted. I was just trying to think of a way to optimize that part of the tool so that the entire item could be edited quickly and easily. Also, if there is a way to have mouse-overs, I made a bunch of notes for many of the settings so people can have an idea of how to set them and what they are for without having to read through wikis to find them. If anything, maybe the list I made can come to use somehow. I think an important part of item editing is getting the fields organized so that the fields relating to each other are close together.

Oh, and I am going to edit the spell file the tool uses so that it is sorted by spell name instead of spell ID. Sorting by spell ID makes it hard to find spells without some kind of search feature for them. If you want the spell file when I am done, I can post a link to it.

LOL, one more thing; The eqitems.exe seems to hang in the processes after the application is closed out. This isn't major, but I know you fixed it in the past for some of your tools.

it is missing a quick copy button it used to have =)
still trying to convince George to put it back in =)

I appreciate the responses. Some features are only a click a away and I want to keep the main screen uncluttered as possible. Certain features will be added as needed and by PM requests, other's which are a requested convenience feature will not likely be added when funcitonality exists a menu away. I may add those in at some later time.

I will fix the issue of killing all the tasks when I find the memory leak, and the spells are all delimited by "^", and that was done for all the tools and required extensive work. I forgot the reason I changed it, but it must have been important then...lol

GeorgeS

honestly George, the new way of copying SIGNLE npc is a pain.

I have to:

click the file menu on the tab
select the proper sub menu
type in beging range
type in closign range
click Use this range
clicky copy

VS
old way of:

click copy
type in id

how about this, when COPY on main pannel is clicked a WINDOW will open and ask:

1) multyple npc copies- type in how many (with range in mind)
2) single npc copy - type in range

thought again a Single Copy button on main panel will hardly clutter the interface =)

I won't mention this again so I don't seem ungrateful for everything you allready have done for us, but I hope you change your mind eventualy =)

Chaos, unless I am mistaken, once you set the range, it retains that range and all NPCs copied from that point will then be placed in the next available slot in that range. That seems to make it easier than having to chose an ID every time.

Unless you are only copying 1 NPC at a time every now and then, the new way should be much more efficient. And if you are only doing one every now and then, a few extra clicks won't hurt. It is when adding multiples all in 1 sitting that the extra clicks start to build up. That is why setting the range beforehand and then that being auto-assigned is the most efficient. I haven't tried this out yet, but I believe that is how it works. If so, then that is already about as good as it can get IMO.

Actually that method does sound better than whats there now. Thanks for showing your workflow - I'll prioritise it now.

GeorgeS

LOL, if you use excel, you can make changes like this in a matter of seconds. Last night, I renamed your spells.txt file (didn't delete in case I had to roll back to it) and then took the spells_us.txt that my server runs which has about 20k lines, and converted it to replace the spells.txt in your resource directory. It took about 5 minutes. After all of the spell file work I did in the past, I learned to use textpad instead of notepad and also to use Excel when needed.

In order to convert the spells_us.txt file to the spells.txt file for your tools and to sort it alphabetically, all I had to do was open the spells_us.txt with Excel and import it as ^ delimited so that it separated the ID, Name and other columns. Next, just delete everything in columns C through HH or whatever it goes up to. Then, do a sort on column B (the name column) to sort them alphabetically. Then, just save the file as TAB delimited txt. Last, open the file up with textpad and do a replace on all TABs and change them to ^ again. Save the file and Viola!

Note that I use textpad (search google for it, it's awesome) for doing huge replaces like this because notepad takes FOREVER on the spell file lol.

Personally, I would move the Class/Race pull downs as well as the Weapon, Armor, Magic, ALL/ALL radio buttons to the Advanced window and replace that section on the main window with the new Name and ID search fields. With the item tables being as large as they are, those settings aren't really enough to find what you are looking for and could easily be moved to advanced to create a refined item list. But IMO, it is important to be able to search for a certain ID or Name.

I did notice that hitting the go button on the advanced window when searching for item names or IDs doesn't close the window. At first, I thought this was a bad thing, but then I found that you can keep searching for item names and instead of replacing the entire list, it just adds the newly searched item to the existing list. That feature was handy. If you ever did consider moving the item and name searches to the main screen, it would be nice to keep that feature so it adds all searches to the list. If that was the case, you might want to consider adding a clear button to clear the search list out in case it gets too full.

Sorry if I am beating this to the ground. I don't want to sound like I am nagging you to get this changed. I just wanted to let you know my take on it. I use your tools alot (almost every day) and so, things like this are pretty noticeable to me and I always aim for efficiency :) The most important factors for tools IMO are ease of use and efficiency when making a large number of changes.

note this: the RANGE stays the same which BAD.
know why? cuase once you copied something into that RANGE, the begining range is still the same BUT that ID slot is allreday take, and if you try to copy again- you will get "Id allready exists" error and SQL will crash =)

so logicly if range was set for 101 to 200 and then 26 npcs were copied, the range MUST self increase to 127-200 to be fool prove or self reset to default

NOW, my problem is that I make LOTS of copies of single npcs.
For emxaple, I need a copy if npc 16, 29, 97, 231, 81, 33, 77 etc etc

they ALL singles, and they ALL need to go into SPECIFIC #ID. (I may need copy of 16 in 17, copy of 231 in 91, copy of 77 in 44 etc etc)

now you realise the pain of trying to set Range for EACH single copy every time =)


PS. Oh yeah I totaly support Trev on making Spell alpha-sorted or (even better) a sort option inside the spell chosing windows by # or alpha.

IDEALY, it would be nice if I could just drop my own spell file into editor folder and programm would automaticly read from there what I have =)

You can do that easily if you use the method with Excel that I mentioned above. That is exactly what I did and it took no more than 5 minutes to do.

As for the ranges you are using, that is not the way that most people add new NPCs. I am not really sure why you would want to do it that way. I just use a range that is far above anything currently in PEQ, so in case I ever wanted to add someone else's database to mine, it would make at least that portion of doing it easy without worrying about multiple of the same ID trying to overwrite each other. Like for my database, I started at 2700000, and go up from there. I am up to about 2700700 or so now. It makes it easy for me to find any of my custom NPCs when I need to look for them. Is there a particular reason why you would want to fill in NPC IDs around where the current ones from PEQ are? Sounds to me like you would be better off by a "use next available ID" like what the item editor does when creating item ID numbers.

So that I understand, do you think most people would prefer to use the new Name and ID search fields? It's a big change as you can tell - but I can do this in the next revision no problem. I'll have a go at the coding and see if I can get this to work. Should'nt be very hard - but I'll start a big revision now.

Regarding the npc editing id's , I will think the matter over some over the next few days.

GeorgeS