Blueprints: Mirror/flip

[Enferax]

Hi,

thanks for the info. I have played on vanilla only for the time beeing. Looks like I should give the mod section a try.

Greetings Enferax.

[Gali]

When the Factorio dev team will start working on adding mirroring to blueprints (like viewtopic.php?f=92&t=15152 BluePrint flipper does already), chemical factories and refineries need to have switchable inputs. Otherwise, a simple vertical flip will mess up all inputs

[ssilk]

You're right, but it's not new.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=6162 Blueprints: Mirror/flip
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=8024 Swap input on chemical factory

[Rammix]

Subject speaks for itself.
Please make buttons in blueprint editing window which would mirror the blueprint horizontally or vertically. Mere rotation is not usable in some cases because it changes directions of items like belts and splitters.
Mirroring would be perfect for this purpose.

[HL65536]

+1
great idea

[bobingabout]

There are a few instances which make this a bad idea.

Factories with fluids:
currently, all factories which have more than one fluid input, or output have them hard wired to a specific pipe, if you flip this, the pipes will be swapped around. This is probably okay if your blueprint only had that factory, but a bad idea if it's a factory chain, because fluids will go the wrong way.

Train stations:
Train signals and stations function a certain way by being on a certain side of the track. if you flipped a train station, not only will the station itself be on the wrong side of the track, meaning the train will want to approach from the opposite direction, and not stop where your inserters are, but the signals will be backwards too, making the train want to go the opposite track down the line.


I'm sure there are other reasons too, but these are the most obvious.

[IV]

There used to be a mod for that: viewtopic.php?f=92&t=15152. I'm not sure whether someone is still working on that.

[ssilk]

I made a new list: viewtopic.php?f=80&t=37517 Blueprint-Mirroring, BP-Shifting, -Programming, -Iteration, -Editing, Ornaments and Recursion

[Rammix]

There are a few instances which make this a bad idea.

Factories with fluids:
currently, all factories which have more than one fluid input, or output have them hard wired to a specific pipe, if you flip this, the pipes will be swapped around. This is probably okay if your blueprint only had that factory, but a bad idea if it's a factory chain, because fluids will go the wrong way.

Train stations:
Train signals and stations function a certain way by being on a certain side of the track. if you flipped a train station, not only will the station itself be on the wrong side of the track, meaning the train will want to approach from the opposite direction, and not stop where your inserters are, but the signals will be backwards too, making the train want to go the opposite track down the line.


I'm sure there are other reasons too, but these are the most obvious.

Ok. It is NOT obligatory to press the button and mirror your blueprint. You only do it if you need to - just one more option.

[Grossen]

I endorse this

[<NO_NAME>]

There are a few instances which make this a bad idea.

Factories with fluids:
currently, all factories which have more than one fluid input, or output have them hard wired to a specific pipe, if you flip this, the pipes will be swapped around. This is probably okay if your blueprint only had that factory, but a bad idea if it's a factory chain, because fluids will go the wrong way.

Train stations:
Train signals and stations function a certain way by being on a certain side of the track. if you flipped a train station, not only will the station itself be on the wrong side of the track, meaning the train will want to approach from the opposite direction, and not stop where your inserters are, but the signals will be backwards too, making the train want to go the opposite track down the line.


I'm sure there are other reasons too, but these are the most obvious.

The possibility of mirroring blueprint could be just blocked if there is any of these objects in it.

Also, this is not that hard to make chemical plants accept fluids independently on which pipe it comes from. That's how assembling machines with inserters works.

[ssilk]

There are a few instances which make this a bad idea.

Factories with fluids:
currently, all factories which have more than one fluid input, or output have them hard wired to a specific pipe, if you flip this, the pipes will be swapped around. This is probably okay if your blueprint only had that factory, but a bad idea if it's a factory chain, because fluids will go the wrong way.

Train stations:
Train signals and stations function a certain way by being on a certain side of the track. if you flipped a train station, not only will the station itself be on the wrong side of the track, meaning the train will want to approach from the opposite direction, and not stop where your inserters are, but the signals will be backwards too, making the train want to go the opposite track down the line.


I'm sure there are other reasons too, but these are the most obvious.

[nemostein]

Blueprints can be rotated but can't be mirrored (flipped).
Horizontal and vertical mirroring can help with complicated blueprints.

[hoho]

it has been said by devs that they will not add such feature.

Problem being, when you flip things around, objects that aren't square or have fluid connections WILL be messed up.

[aober93]

I hope a mod will get made, i used killkrogs Blueprint mod before.

I found that flipping really worked 99% of the time, and i used it for rail planning most of the time where it always worked.

[Itori]

it has been said by devs that they will not add such feature.

Problem being, when you flip things around, objects that aren't square or have fluid connections WILL be messed up.

Needs more work, but to avoid this problem, it could be nice to be able to flip buildings too

[aober93]

i hacked a mirror mod to 0.15 compatibility, so thats still possible without official support

[Tekky]

it has been said by devs that they will not add such feature.

Problem being, when you flip things around, objects that aren't square or have fluid connections WILL be messed up.

Needs more work, but to avoid this problem, it could be nice to be able to flip buildings too

I have once read a suggestion that it should be possible to customize the fluid connections on chemical plants/refineries. So, if that suggestion were implemented, flipping would then also be possible.

EDIT: Here is the link to the mentioned suggestion thread:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=30390 Fluid Processing Poll for input sides

[malventano]

I've mirrored blueprints with piping connections without issue using Foreman in the past***. It'd be silly to have to add that mod just to be able to reverse blueprints when the rest of the functionality is now built into the game (maybe except for the lack of an easy way to dispose of all of the extra blueprint copies you end up with in inventory).

*EDIT* actually yeah that should not have been possible / worked actually, but I know that I have definitely mirrored blueprints for various reasons. Piping issues aside, it is useful.

[ssilk]

Added to viewtopic.php?f=80&t=37517 Blueprint-Mirroring, BP-Shifting, -Programming, -Iteration, -Editing, Ornaments and Recursion