Null Spell Editor

Null · #1 06-04-2010, 04:54 AM

Greetings,

I started building this just as a clone of the Ailia & Bleh Editor (the GUI layout is almost identical) with a few minor changes to fit my needs. It kept evolving over a few months of work off and on to the point that I didn't feel embarrassed at the thought of releasing it. So here it is!

Screenshots
File Loading
Spell Editing

Features:

Supports read/write directly from a Database or spells_us.txt (Titanium or SoF/SoD) and allows you to write back and forth between the two.
Write the entire contents of the spell data in your editor to the database or only the spells that you have changed.
Parses (Most) drop down values directly from spdat.h and skills.h which can be loaded directly from the SVN or locally. This means that you can select custom spell effects in your source directly in the editor or have them automatically updated as the project gets updated.
The search field updates the spell list in real-time with search filters. You can also select that it only displays changes that you have made since the last save.
Revert a single spell or the entire spell file back to the last save.
Copy and Delete spells. Copied spells are appended to the bottom of the spell list and marks it as a new spell.
Optional Spell Effect videos (thanks George!) that play in editor. Spell Effect videos that are added to the videos directory are automatically loaded in, so you can fill in missing videos yourself or replace existing ones.
Icon Preview for new_icon field.

Install Directions

Download either NullSpellEdit.7z or NullSpellEdit_no_video.7z if you do not care about the videos.
Extract its contents somewhere on your computer.
If you want to access files remotely (like on the SVN) then run trustfall.bat which will add a security exception to your flash player for the directory that trustfall.bat is run from. This is entirely optional.
Run NullSpellEditor.html and enjoy!

Known Issues

Spell Data loaded from the database will always write to a spells_us.txt as SoF format.
A full database write takes a very long time...go get a sandwich long for SoF based files.
Stock Everquest spell files that are loaded and then saved without any changes are slightly different then they started. This is because some values in the original files (mainly the SoF file) have blank entries. I replace these blanks with zeros if the value is a integer, but it shouldn't break your spell file.

Disclaimer
I have tested this pretty heavily but I do not guarantee that it wont hiccup or even explode. Please make backups before using this, and please post here if you have any problems.

**trevius** · #2 06-04-2010, 05:33 AM

Wow, that looks pretty amazing! Nice work and thanks for sharing that

I have your first bug report though; I am unable to load the skills.h file by browsing locally. It just seems to ignore it, or maybe it is loading for the spdat.h file instead when I try to load skills.h. The spdat.h file seems to load fine though. Also, the spell file itself loads fine.

It's awesome you set it to be that flexible as well as for it to be able to automatically adapt for the future.

EDIT: Another bug seems to be that it will not connect to my database either. I created a new user to test it out, and verified I could connect with that new user via Navicat, but your tool just times out.

**GeorgeS** · #3 06-04-2010, 10:36 AM

Just ran it briefly this morning, and it works very nicely.
You did a good job on incorporating the movies and editing in one package, and my hat is off to you - good job.

GeorgeS

Secrets · #4 06-04-2010, 11:06 AM

I stickied the thread for the time being. Haven't checked it out but it sounds nice from what is described here.

Null · #5 06-04-2010, 12:56 PM

Thanks for the comments and I hope you get some good use out of it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by trevius

I have your first bug report though; I am unable to load the skills.h file by browsing locally. It just seems to ignore it, or maybe it is loading for the spdat.h file instead when I try to load skills.h. The spdat.h file seems to load fine though. Also, the spell file itself loads fine.

After you try to locally load all 3 files does the submit button still light up despite it saying that the skills.h file is needed? I might have just forgot to set the status for that file on a local load.

Quote:

EDIT: Another bug seems to be that it will not connect to my database either. I created a new user to test it out, and verified I could connect with that new user via Navicat, but your tool just times out.

Did you try running trustfall.bat? Is the database localhost or are you accessing it remotely? I am thinking it is either a flash sandbox issue (trustfall.bat will resolve this) or that my timeout is a little too militant for a remote database connect.

**trevius** · #6 06-05-2010, 01:10 AM

Yeah, the DB is on another PC on my LAN. I was finally able to get it all working by using IE instead of Firefox. I may still need to mess around with the Firefox settings to get it working properly. Either way, the tool is pretty impressive

**Akkadius** · #7 06-05-2010, 02:10 AM

Wow this is very impressive. Thank you so much for this!

Null · #8 06-05-2010, 02:25 AM

I fixed the local skills.h load and put up a new version, enjoy!

**trevius** · #9 06-05-2010, 03:19 AM

The new version works great, thanks! I got skills.h to load locally just fine this time. You may want to specify on that screen that it wants zone/spdat.h and common/skills.h, because there is also a zone/skills.h file.

I can connect to my DB after running your .bat file, I just had to restart Firefox.

One minor detail is that the most recent upload seems to contain your assets and history folders outside of the NullSpellEdit folder as well as within it. Not a big deal, but thought it might be worth mentioning to reduce possible confusion.

Also, would it be possible to have a config file to save your file/DB loading settings so you don't have to set them each time you start up the editor? Another minor suggestion would be to set the default URLs for loading spdat.h and skills.h to use the trunk instead of the spells branch.

I haven't used the tool much yet, but so far I am impressed. I like how it automatically updates the icon and effect video as soon as you start altering either of those fields. Does the tool use the new icon types or are they an older version of icons? I don't know if spells might use a different gem icon and buff icon offhand, but if so, it might be nice to show both types.

Null · #10 06-06-2010, 05:10 AM

I put up a new version that will save your loading preferences. I also added a button to reset them and a check box for password inclusion. The default remote location for spdat and skills are now pointing at the trunk instead of the spellsbranch.

The additional icon previews will take a bit more time then I have at the moment, but its definitely something I can work in eventually.

Thanks for the requests Trevius!

edit:

I spoke too soon, small problem with the spdat and skills file preference saving, ill have a new version up soon.

Null · #11 06-06-2010, 06:28 AM

So apparently the object I am using to bring up the file browser window doesn't expose the absolute path of the file that is selected...

This means that I cannot save off the path to use later. You can enter a local file path in the URL field then click 'Load URL' and it will load the file for you and save the path.

Ill look into it some more and if I think of a better option ill put it in later on.

**trevius** · #12 06-06-2010, 08:09 AM

Thanks for the changes/fixes so far

It looks like the skills.h is still being a bit flakey, though. I am able to load from URL like you suggested by putting my local path in there for spdat.h, but it fails for skills.h:

F:\EQEmuServer\zone\spdat.h

F:\EQEmuServer\common\skills.h

Probably related to the problem with browsing for the local file that was happening before.

Null · #13 06-06-2010, 04:17 PM

Ok, I finally reproduced the error that you are getting. The only way I could get it to react the way that you are describing is to extract the zip to a new folder and not run trustfall.bat for that folder. The bug is that the status label is getting set to complete for spdat.h even though its getting a flash player error in the background preventing it from loading.

Try running trustfall.bat and see if that doesn't clear up the problem.

**trevius** · #14 06-09-2010, 07:07 AM

Thanks. It looks like everything is working great now. All of the information is saving properly with 1 exception; The spell file location doesn't save. I think if you added a field for the location like the other files, it could be saved.

AudioGarden21 · #15 07-09-2010, 01:25 AM

When I try to load the spell file from the database I get an error that says, "Database Error". I can load the spell file locally, and I can connect to the database, but if I click "From Database" it gives me the above error.

I also have an issue with writing changes or full write to database. The former does nothing and the latter just drops my entire spells_new table.

I'm not sure what the issue is. I've tried it out on two different PCs, neither worked right.

I'd very much like to get this working because for one, it's sexy, and for two, since I'm rather anal retentive about making sure every detail is complete, importing spell files after minor changes to one thing (which I do a lot, ugh) takes up quite a bit of time and having the option to apply the changes directly to the database would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.