[MOD 0.14.x] Left-Right Load Balancer

[Qon]

Conclusion: It takes all the incoming items from the input belt and puts it on the output belt, splitting it 50:50 unless one output side is blocked. If the output is partially blocked so that the input is filling up then it takes from a random input side.

Well that is pretty clear. He described it as "pretty random" and not random though which was a bit confusing and was missing exactly the detail that I was asking about. But I'll stop asking then since it seems impossible to get a definite answer.

I just clarified a misunderstanding in how OP interpreted someone elses question. Are you saying I should download the mod and try it out and read the source and explain OP's mod to the one who originally asked because the mod author doesn't want to do describe what it does himself?

You were pretty aggressive towards OP trying to clarify this misunderstanding. Why are you even trying to clarify it anyway, as you don't seem to have any interest in using this mod?

Also, Razorin, how sure can you be that I don't already have it or even want it? q:

Are you actually proud of making the mod author remove the download link, just because the description set by the mod author and his replies to this thread were not explanatory enough for you?

I have an interest in using this mod, if it actually replaces an input balancer. Since I'm pretty sure now that it takes items randomly from input and not alternates like a splitter build, I know it is not for me.
I didn't make the author remove the link. He operates under his own free will and I did not suggest anything like it. But I'll let that slide if you don't want to push it.
I was suprised and disappointed that he removed it, hence the comment. I thought it was silly to remove it and showed him that it wasn't me who was hurt by the link removal, but his fans.
And why would I be proud that he removed it? That is not what I meant at all.

@Qon
Don't make posts that are aggressive towards the mod author in the future. Although most people would prefer it, he is not under the obligation to answer every little question you have about the mod. Asking questions is fine, but don't get upset if the answer isn't as detailed as you'd like.

Being frank isn't the same as aggressive. I never insulted anyone, even if I might have stepped on some toes. Which I do apologise for. But if you read it that way I can tone it down.
Of course he isn't obligated to answer it, but if he does answer then I assume he has an interest in explaining it. And if his explanation isn't clear then I at least have to tell him that so he can clarify the parts that are confusing. It doesn't mean I'm upset, it means I don't understand his explanation and that I'm requesting clarification.
He said "my mod is described enough", does that mean the same thing as "I don't want to describe it further"? I didn't extrapolate that far, wasn't obvious to me that it meant that he didn't want the mod described in detail. I interpreted it as "I think everything is crystal clear to everyone" which wasn't true for me.
And I'm not upset that he called me lazy or shitty. I just pointed out the flaws in his logic when he started with the insults, not because it hurt, but because it was factually incorrect and logically fallicious.

@Razorin. I'm sorry for calling your explantion "worse than useless", I will search for a nicer way to describe explanations that I find confusing. I didn't mean to be rude, I was just writing what I felt in words that I didn't consider enough how it would sound to the reader.

[SoulForge]

Please re-add the download link OP.

I already have it but it is a good mod. Don't let one person spoil your view of the community.

[Razorin]

Ok i must admit, i’m surprised how kind people can be. I am so sorry for calling you guys a shitty community... shame on me...

While I think that the description is enough for this mod, the rules also state that mods in this subforum must contain a working download link.

Sorry daniel34 i made a decision while being angry, which is a bad idea in most cases..

He described it as "pretty random" and not random though which was a bit confusing and was missing exactly the detail that I was asking about.

Qon will hate me for that but "pretty random" is a poor choice of words by me. See my new Long Description:

Balances the left and the right side of a transport belt by taking items alternately left and right from the input belt. If one side is empty it will be skipped. Output goes the same: one left and one right, if one side is blocked it will be skipped.

If you need i could make some flowcharts or write some pseudocode.

Please re-add the download link OP.

Wait... I wanted this.... I've been looking for something like this and you had it.... please give it to meeeeeee >.<

It's a pleasure for me to do this. I put the download link back on and edited the description to something more specific.

[Qon]

Balances the left and the right side of a transport belt by taking items alternately left and right from the input belt. If one side is empty it will be skipped. Output goes the same: one left and one right, if one side is blocked it will be skipped.
If you need i could make some flowcharts or write some pseudocode.
It's a pleasure for me to do this. I put the download link back on and edited the description to something more specific.

Thanks, now I understand what it does, and that it does what I want. I don't think I will need any further description.
And thanks for the download link, now that I know it's useful for my purposes I'm interested in trying it. Glad we could solve our misunderstandings.

[Leafy Greens]

Moved from Bug Reports to this thread, as this looks like a modding error.
-- daniel34

If this is the wrong place for this, sorry. I'm going to be posting this on the mod's thread as well, but I thought that I might as well post my bug report in the bug report section.

A few seconds after combat starts, I get an error:

Screenshot 2016-05-03 16.32.43.png (109.27 KiB) Viewed 7219 times

and then the game closes.

I have duplicated the problem twice. Each time, my laser turrets start shooting and then shortly afterwards, the error shows up. Oddly, this did not happen when I did the same thing earlier, even though the mod was installed then as well.

I have attached the log file. I can give more details about the circumstances if needed.

[daniel34]

@Razorin
In control.lua line 98 the variable is named event, but in line 99 you're trying to call _Event, which then is a nil value.
The same is also true for line 104-105, where it can cause the same error.

I have duplicated the problem twice. Each time, my laser turrets start shooting and then shortly afterwards, the error shows up. Oddly, this did not happen when I did the same thing earlier, even though the mod was installed then as well.

The error is not related to combat, it happens when a robot tries to build or remove the modded splitter/balancer.

[Leafy Greens]

@Razorin
In control.lua line 98 the variable is named event, but in line 99 you're trying to call _Event, which then is a nil value.
The same is also true for line 104-105, where it can cause the same error.

Thanks for processing this so quickly. I'm no coder, but from what you just said, it sounds like I could fix the problem by either renaming the variable in line 98, or changing lines 99, 104, and 105 to call the correct variable?

The error is not related to combat, it happens when a robot tries to build or remove the modded splitter/balancer.

Ah, then it might have been my construction robots trying to repair conveyor belts that the biters were damaging. That's odd, though, since they're only conveyor belts and not the modded item.

[daniel34]

@Razorin
In control.lua line 98 the variable is named event, but in line 99 you're trying to call _Event, which then is a nil value.
The same is also true for line 104-105, where it can cause the same error.

Thanks for processing this so quickly. I'm no coder, but from what you just said, it sounds like I could fix the problem by either renaming the variable in line 98, or changing lines 99, 104, and 105 to call the correct variable?

Yes you could, just rename event in lines 98 and 104 to _Event (like it already is in lines 92 and 110)

[Leafy Greens]

@Razorin
In control.lua line 98 the variable is named event, but in line 99 you're trying to call _Event, which then is a nil value.
The same is also true for line 104-105, where it can cause the same error.

Thanks for processing this so quickly. I'm no coder, but from what you just said, it sounds like I could fix the problem by either renaming the variable in line 98, or changing lines 99, 104, and 105 to call the correct variable?

Yes you could, just rename event in lines 98 and 104 to _Event (like it already is in lines 92 and 110)

I made the edits, and it works fine now. Thanks!

[Razorin]

In control.lua line 98 the variable is named event, but in line 99 you're trying to call _Event, which then is a nil value.
The same is also true for line 104-105, where it can cause the same error.

ah sorry for that pretty noobish mistake ... it's fixed in Version 0.0.2 .

[Qon]

God news: It works great. Handles blue belt speed with no problems and does exactly as described.

Bad news: I only had to add 25 of these for this mod to be the most cpu-hogging mod in my collection of 84 mods. If you are using these temporarily and only in a few small scale production lines it's nothing to worry about. But if you want to make a megabase then you will have to avoid this and use a vanilla splitters to build your input balancers you this will quickly add up and kill your UPS. I wasn't going to use this in blueprints anyway but this is a bit too much. Hope you can figure out how to optimise this becasue it is neat when you don't want to rebuild your entire factory to insert a lane balancer q:

Btw: I like the colour

[Razorin]

Hey Qon,

thanks for your feedback, i've uploaded Version 0.0.3 which should decrease the CPU usage. Please try it out.

[Lurkily]

Sorry. I didn't come back to check on these, though I did try them out. They do seem to pull from both sides of the input when only one output is being utilized. The vanilla solution is this:

This allows only one output to be used, but utilizes mines and resources behind it evenly, rather than having mining production drop off one group at a time, as mines are exhausted and new mines get access to the belt.

EDIT: The posts after mine may have already addressed this, but I saw some screenshots posted trying to explain what the requirement and solution might be.

Here is an Imgur gallery with examples of other balancers for both output and input, including 1, 2, and 4-belts, showing how to expand the 2-belt concept out as you need to. The 4-belt images have animations that I can't embed here, because [img] tags don't work with .webm files.

[Razorin]

wish granted in version 0.0.4:


greets Razorin

[TheSAguy]

Cool mod,
Seems like it still works, even if it does not have power.

[Razorin]

Seems like it still works, even if it does not have power.

see my known issues. Iam still looking for a solution that the annoying energy icon does not appear

Known Issues:
-Splitter signals that it needs electricity but also works without it
-Transport belts are getting rendered above the splitter

[Wyrframe]

@Razorin; was studying your mod as part of self-education on the mod API, and wanted to point out a very useful optimization you could make; caching the known input and output belts near each splitter. In my own testing, with 300 Single Splitters set up on fifteen separate belt loops, this cut the per-frame update time used by the Single Splitter mod by nearly 60%.

Find attached; ZIP containing v0.0.4 control.lua before and after. Licence: same as your own.

splitter-patch.zip

(3.48 KiB) Downloaded 167 times

[Razorin]

thanks for your contribution.
It's now part of version 0.0.5

[Sander_Bouwhuis]

This mod is such a good idea, this could be in the main game.

[Qon]

God news: It works great. Handles blue belt speed with no problems and does exactly as described.

wish granted in version 0.0.4:

greets Razorin

Lol, yeah. Obviously my testing was baaad. I didn't even test the thing I asked for properly. I was tired, ok? Well thank you for fixing it before I noticed the errors in the mod and my testing!