[Kovarex] [0.16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

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Koub
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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Koub »

JareX wrote:I'm trying to find a word to describe when something wrong is made to seem normal because it is common.... that's what I think is happening here.

Having to "spent the last few days" trying to solve that problem (that shouldn't be a problem, even with a elegant solution) proves that is an unnecesary annoyance, specially for new players that already have a daunting experience with all the factorio features. Every item and asset in the game should work as intended and not to be counterintuitive. The fact that old players are used to those trickery doesnt mean it's normal or the right thing to keep.
This makes me think of a very old skech from a French humorist named Fernand Raynaud. I have looked for a translated version, but failed to fail one. I found a blog, however, that summarized the sketch pretty well :
As closing words, let me explain the link between the title and this post : Fernand Raynaud was a french humorist, and one of its most famous sketches, “Le tailleur” (the tailor) was the story of a man coming back to his tailor to complain about a bad suit. Of course, the tailor finds the suit perfect and puts the blame on his customer, who ends up admitting the suit is indeed perfect, once he has put his left shoulder a little higher, his right shoulder a little back, turned his hips a little, and raised one arm slightly…
(Source).
I don't have the slightest idea about what the blog is talking about, but that's how I feel my relation with the current belt system.

For those who can understand French, here is the full version, from French National Institute of Audio-visual.

I feel that if I have such efforts to do something that I feel should be natural, then the problem is maybe not in me.
Koub - Please consider English is not my native language.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by RobEVO »

The orientation of the belt loading in on the OTHER LANE can also affect it. Super weird.

https://youtu.be/WxdA9z6MpFg

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Zavian »

JareX wrote:
Zavian wrote:So I've spent the last few days working on belt based layouts. I'm not having any difficulty in getting a compressed belt with a splitter. In most cases I've been able to divert an output belt after it is about half full, tunnel under some inserters then merge it back into another output belt. I have yet to find a design that I can't fix to work with the new mechanics. The new designs aren't as elegant as the old practice of inserting into an underground belt was, but I wouldn't call them hard.

My next task will be experimenting with circuit controlled inserters viewtopic.php?f=5&t=55005 . That looks like an even more elegant solution than undergrounds.
I'm trying to find a word to describe when something wrong is made to seem normal because it is common.... that's what I think is happening here.

Having to "spent the last few days" trying to solve that problem (that shouldn't be a problem, even with a elegant solution) proves that is an unnecesary annoyance, specially for new players that already have a daunting experience with all the factorio features. Every item and asset in the game should work as intended and not to be counterintuitive. The fact that old players are used to those trickery doesnt mean it's normal or the right thing to keep.
Well when I said "spent the last few days" I meant spent my factorio playtime over the last few days. Very little time was needed to find working solutions. Most of it was spent on tweaking setups/trying to find more elegant layouts/trying to place power poles for a nice regular arrangement of power lines. (Harder in 0.16 since atm I'm tunneling some extra belts where I could have previously placed power poles. But for some layouts it would be trivial if I just switched to substations). And note that many of these layouts are compact beacon and module layouts that are quite complex. eg the green circuit build starts at 5 full blue belts of green circuits and tiles upto 20 belts. it took less than 15 mins to get a working solution to that, but it isn't as clean and elegant as the 0.15 version, so I've spent time trying different layout and solutions. I've also spent time a lot of that time working on a new layouts for smelting and other things that need to scale to over 20 blue belts of iron plates, and over 4 blue belts worth of steel. Working versions of smelters are quick to build, then I spend way too long tweaking them trying to get nice power lines, nice looking belt layouts etc.
Last edited by Zavian on Thu Dec 21, 2017 12:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Zavian »

RobEVO wrote:The orientation of the belt loading in on the OTHER LANE can also affect it. Super weird.

https://youtu.be/WxdA9z6MpFg
I'm guessing that belt update order matters, (and changes when you build or rotate belts). That is something they probably need to fix, because you can't control what order bots with build any particular layout. As an aside, I've been using a fair bit of sideloading and haven't noticed any weirdness when loading sideloading a yellow belt onto a yellow belt, or a red belt onto a red belts. Pretty much all the examples I've seen have been people sideloading yellow belts onto red belt. Whilst I agree that sideloading yellow onto red should work, I think you can avoid most of those problems by sideloading from a red belt onto a red belt

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Zavian »

Koub wrote:[
I don't have the slightest idea about what the blog is talking about, but that's how I feel my relation with the current belt system.
...
I feel that if I have such efforts to do something that I feel should be natural, then the problem is maybe not in me.
I haven't felt that anything I've been doing with my new belt layouts has been unnatural. It just been a matter of accepting that some things that used to work in 0.15 no longer work the same way in 0.16. None of it is unnatural, it's just a matter of accepting that things have changed. And accepting that adding a few more pieces of belt and another splitter means that new layouts aren't as simple and elegant as old layouts.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Engimage »

Noone is saying that it is impossible to live with current limitations.
People are saying that it is much less comfortable to live with them. And without proper sideloading behaviour so many really creative designs are impossible to implement.
Splitters are pretty srtaightforward and are not nearly as creative as sideloading tricks.
Also things like lane balancers, priority lanes etc are just broken with no way to fix them.
I am a fan of "mechanical" solutions without adding circuit network control. And this direction as a whole has got a major hit with this changes.

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Sideloading belt compression

Post by killerbees »

I like all of the changes in '16 that I've seen so far apart from sideloading won't compress belts anymore. I think this is a step backwards, and here's why.

Watch this short video, see how the side-loaded bottles force their way into the flow https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOzwQeOE1VI

So, I reckon sideloading belt compression without a splitter is a real thing, only irl it is called "merge" or "accumulation" and I think we need to either re-enable sideloading compression or introduce a "accumulation table" or "merge" behaviour, currently Splitters with two inputs and two outputs don't even-out the flow over four sides of two belts, they distribute the flow in a mirror pattern. If side loading compression isn't going to be a thing I would expect the total input rate from four sides to be divided by four and one 1/4 assigned to each output side, this would allow splitting, re-combination, to mimic the behaviour of real accumulation tables/merge-thing-oids. That would have the cost of requiring extra space to achieve compression, something which also mirrors reality.
WDYT?

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impetus maximus
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Re: Sideloading belt compression

Post by impetus maximus »

welcome to the forums Killerbees.

there is a thread on side loading in progress. ;)

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Re: Sideloading belt compression

Post by Engimage »

This is a known issue and it is discussed much all over the place.
This behaviour was casued by belt optimizations to decrease CPU load of belt based factories.
The main thread here on forums is following
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=54627

Klonan has developed a mod to mitigate some of compression problems
https://mods.factorio.com/mods/Klonan/belt_buffer

Reddit thread for mod
https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comme ... uffer_mod/

Devs are developing some sort of a solution for the matter and I hope sideloading will make its comeback. But we have to wait until they can do it as currently most of their attention is turned to stabilizing 0.16.

Personally I do not play 0.16 until this issue is resolved.
Last edited by Engimage on Thu Dec 21, 2017 10:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Koub »

[Koub] Merged into side loading in 0.16 thread
Koub - Please consider English is not my native language.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Koub »

Zavian wrote:I haven't felt that anything I've been doing with my new belt layouts has been unnatural. It just been a matter of accepting that some things that used to work in 0.15 no longer work the same way in 0.16. None of it is unnatural, it's just a matter of accepting that things have changed. And accepting that adding a few more pieces of belt and another splitter means that new layouts aren't as simple and elegant as old layouts.
I insist on the fact that I'm not against the change. Actually, I approve the fact that inserting in the input/output of an underground belt doesn't achieve magic compression any more. I just feel that belt compression upon insertion should not need tricks to be achieved, and should happen naturally by itself. It seems you don't share my opinion, and you think compression shouldn't happen by itself, but must be achieved. It's OK for me, people have the right to disagree with me and be wrong (just joking :mrgreen: ).

I'd be interested to know the vision of the devs on that subject :
- Should inserting onto a belt (by inserter, or side loading) be something that happens naturally if you provide enough items to saturate a belt and achieve compression ?
- Or should compression be something not natural, something that should be sought after, using contraptions (with combinators, splitters, UG belts, ...) to be able to place max density of items on a belt ?

It's a game design choice first, and an implementation problem after :)
Koub - Please consider English is not my native language.

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Re: Sideloading belt compression

Post by killerbees »

impetus maximus wrote:welcome to the forums Killerbees.

there is a thread on side loading in progress. ;)
Thank you! 8-)

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Zool »

All the scenarios people have shown here dealt with the combination of yellow with red belts - can you simply fix it by replacing the single last yellow belt with a red one?

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by killerbees »

If you're not using blue belts, put a faster belt as the "recieving" section for the slideloading belt to load onto. This has the effect of "opening" gaps in the flow, allowing the side belt to put items on, before the slow belt compresses the flow again. But if your belts are all blue you're kind of stuck.
I think splitting a blue belt into two, inserting onto a split section and merging again should have the same result, but only if splitters can still compress,which I think is in doubt too.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Engimage »

I also like the idea of differentiating common inserters (yellow, blue, red) which should not compress belts and stack inserters which SHOULD. Would be really intuitive.
So to sum up my list:
- Sideloading: YES (obligatory)
- Undergrounds: NO
- Miners: YES
- Inserters (common): NO
- Stack inserters: YES

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by looney »

I know there's a lot of weirdness due to belt optimisation changes. I just found something quite odd.....
Screenshot from 2017-12-23 20-52-56.png
Screenshot from 2017-12-23 20-52-56.png (495.58 KiB) Viewed 6762 times
(All inserters set to only drop one item)
The three end inserters will always compress the yellow belt, not surprising since the red belt can easily push to compress everything.
However, depending on the build order of the belt, or perhaps the exact tick of the first item dropped. Either the next three inserters, or as in the picture, every third inserter can fill the holes and compress the red belt.

The other inserters will just sit there holding their item and not drop it.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by looney »

This trick also works with blue belts (non functioning inserters removed to make the picture clearer);
Screenshot from 2017-12-23 21-11-23.png
Screenshot from 2017-12-23 21-11-23.png (450.44 KiB) Viewed 6757 times

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by killerbees »

This, I agree with this.
PacifyerGrey wrote:I also like the idea of differentiating common inserters (yellow, blue, red) which should not compress belts and stack inserters which SHOULD. Would be really intuitive.
So to sum up my list:
- Sideloading: YES (obligatory)
- Undergrounds: NO
- Miners: YES
- Inserters (common): NO
- Stack inserters: YES

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by SunriseEU »

Koub wrote:- Should inserting onto a belt (by inserter, or side loading) be something that happens naturally if you provide enough items to saturate a belt and achieve compression ?
- Or should compression be something not natural, something that should be sought after, using contraptions (with combinators, splitters, UG belts, ...) to be able to place max density of items on a belt ?
This is the most important question. I would vastly prefer that compression is something that's achieved naturally, and I would prefer some new item to fix it for me, like a compressor belt or a buffer belt, because then compression could be achieved already at the mining outpost without using underground belts, which was an unintuitive way of achieving compression. I'm not interested in dealing with belt compression. I want to build machines and factories.

Also the fact that you can't sideload a belt into a belt of double speed doesn't make sense to me.

This problem is currently keeping me from playing. I just don't want to do the ugly workarounds presented in this thread.

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Re: [16.0] Sideloading works completely different now

Post by Tyrindor »

The fact this still isn't fixed is very saddening. I was so excited for 0.16, but my experience was ruined because my designs weren't working as expected. I now find myself waiting for a fix so I can enjoy playing 0.16.
SunriseEU wrote:
Koub wrote:This problem is currently keeping me from playing. I just don't want to do the ugly workarounds presented in this thread.
You and many others, I don't understand why this wasn't deemed top priority. I really hope something good comes from this (like inserters being able to compress belts natively).

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