Codesound wrote: ↑Sun Nov 14, 2021 13:07
I made a
simple step-by-step guide of how I made a small railway circuit regulated by traffic lights and interchanges.
Welcome to the world of AdvTrains :).
Let's review your guide. I won't point out minor grammar mistakes, mostly the ones that end up having a
totally wrong meaning in English, and railway terminology mistakes.
1 - no ballast makes me sad :(
2 - Is this a beginner tutorial? You haven't explain how to make the branch.
It's OK if it's not, but maybe point to prerequisite reading in the introduction.
4 - Railway exchange? The correct translation of 'Incrocio ferroviario' would be
passing loop (UK) or passing siding (US). 'Deviatoio' would be turnout
(international, jargon) or points (UK) or switch (US).
6 - At full speed the train may slow down too fast to get to the last node of
track before the bumper and make a successful stop. I'll test this later.
10b - There are only 6 actual sections. Colours green and grey are the same
section, as are magenta and blue.
15 - you have to right-click the TCB to open the menu not left
16 - Wrong use of identical. I would say "Note that the TCB is divided into two
sections, identified as Side A and Side B
17 - you cheated a bit because you have already named the section for Side A, so
it doesn't match my screen so far.
18 - I'm copying this name and we'll see if it's unique. It should be unique.
19 - I think we're lucky in this case that Side B on your screen matches Side B
on mine, because it's possible to place the TCB so Side A and Side B are
different in this case. It's more important that the end of track side and the
turnout side are the same.
21 - As I guessed, we have a difference. The TCB on the divergent track on the
left side of the screen - for me it has Sides A and Side B different from your
screenshot.
23 - Please always say railway/railroad signal. Signals can show a lot more than
just red/green like the signal type you use. In particular the latest version of
Ks signals which shows speed. Also you can't find the signals by searching
traffic light in creative mode/unified inventory.
A discussion about how to place each signal could take a long time. I would say
in this case just to prescribe the placement to save time. This wording seems to
imply there is a range of options, when there's really no other correct way
except deciding between Left or right hand traffic.
26 - Track Circuit Break. It divides the tracks up into sections. Again, I don't
know why you said left-click on the TCB. I think it's clear why you choose side
B here, although newbies still may not quite follow the reasoning. Hopefully it
becomes clearer later.
27 - Terminology: The trains that go to the passing track (instead of main
track).
30 - you have moved to a different signal from the one you were setting up in
steps 26-29, which confuses me. Also here is an important time to note that if
you don't have enough length on the ends of the tracks, that when the train
reverses that it may not pay attention to the influence point. If the new front of
the train is ahead of the influence point, it will never pay attention to the
signal. As a newbie, I think I will fail at this point in the tutorial because I
don't know that [insert screenshot]. To keep going, I'm going to fix what I have
done because I know how. The driver won't be able to see the signal but at least
the train will work properly.
34 - Like I said, these influence points are *really* close and it's probably
only got just enough room.
36 - ok but I didn't name my sections properly because you didn't give me any
good idea what to call them. I'm lazy so I'm not going to go back and name them
now.
37 - I called it signal from main line/main track
39 - I called it signal from passing track/passing loop
40 - not exchange, turnout (switch, points). Again, I don't know why punching
stuff is supposed to open the menu on your system, I had to right-click.
42 - turnout/switch/points, not 'exchange'
45 - no discussion of the fact that this actually means stopping at the next TCB
and thus the next signal.
49 - A correction to your reasoning: The train has to stop before the
magenta section (which as I said is actually the same section as the blue
section). It must not ever stop in the magenta/blue section or it will block
traffic. The next route will get it to proceed to the orange section because we
can't stop in that magenta/blue section.
52 - Awkward wording in English - "The ROUTE indicator that we saw before..".
Otherwise, good reasoning is given.
53 - turnout/points/switch again
62 - Go straight? No, we want to turn - confusion! Instead say we want to 'leave the
station' - not arrive at it.
63 - Travel on a different 'track' or 'path', not road. The signals will make
sure it doesn't collide, instead it would just deadlock or we would be limited
to one train. Send the train on the the passing loop, 'parallel route' doesn't
fit into English railway jargon.
66 - You could have gone and had them punch the other TCB for the main route, then
told them to use the NEXT section button here and explain how its the same.
68 - The menu sometimes fails to open after making a route. It didn't fail for
me so I skipped steps 68&69
72-74 - Again, signals not traffic lights
75 - The location where the route starts is shown.
76 - turnout/points/switch
78 - left-click. Shown.
79 - left-click
83 - I might say directions of travel
84 - You already had me place this
85 - Right-click. ARS rules are not self-explanatory really.
88 - I wasn't careful and placed two trains in the same section and they crashed
:(. Thankfully the trains all made their stops successfully!
In conclusion, I don't think it replaces my video, it is really just a shortened version of the same content in PDF format instead of a video. Maybe useful if you need to go offline or for quick reference. In general though I think video content is more helpful because you can see things happen, such as how you can see me going through each menu and punching stuff in the video. I intend to produce more videos one day soon(tm).
I would certainly help you learn more about AdvTrains and how to make your next setup, although timezones can make that difficult. As ever, I recommend playing on a server with trains such as LinuxForks server, because AdvTrains is still easiest to learn from other people rather than the documentation.