Safety Car Reporter

[Cornys]

Hello, I was wondering if it would be possable for somebody to make a program that would alert admins when the running order under a SC changes. Usually this will be an easy task to do, but when a command is given the field should freeze and when the running order changes it will send out a message to alert everybody to the fact that a pass has been made under yellow. This also could be used during a regular race circumstance.

Is it possable? If so, could somebody make this for me? I have no programing experiaince sadly :( :x

[Jonathon.provost]

I have little programming experience but I will try.

[MadCatX]

That should be a fairy easy task. You'd just save the running order at the SC deployment and then compare it to current order using info from MCI packets.

[jason_lfs]

but you'll get some false alarms when, under yellow flag, any car goes into pits or is not able to continue forcing other cars to overtake.

[Bmxtwins]

but you'll get some false alarms when, under yellow flag, any car goes into pits or is not able to continue forcing other cars to overtake.
it will be quite obvious when different cars pass the same car, and quite obvious if you see someone simply passing other drivers.

Example:

Driver 1 passed Bmxtwins
Driver 2 Passed Bmxtwins
Driver 3....

versus
Bmxtwins passed Driver 1
Bmxtwins passed Driver 2
Bmxtwins passed Driver 3

[Mustangman759]

you do realize both of those driver A got passed B driver B is going to have the same # of readouts right? maybe have a list of car order by number then have a red warning light for was overtaken and yellow for overtook another car. or something ;)

[rageshgr]

But what about someone spins under SC, and may be only 1-2 people pass him coz he was at the back 2-3 places? But according to me even a blind comparison is OK. False +ves by the tool is ok, admin can review it IMO. Main requirement is admin don't want to miss any cheeky overtakes under SC I think. The proposed solutions(even the simplest one above) should do the job IMO.

[TFalke55]

I guess another problem is the way LFS detects the positions. Under Caution, due to the fact that noone really understands what gap sizes of 5 carlenghts are (usually gaps are 1 - 0,1 car lenghts...), positions are jumping back and forth. Only on track layouts with custom start-finish-line and costum splits it would work. On regular LFS tracks it would be rather spamy.

[Whiskey]

you do realize both of those driver A got passed B driver B is going to have the same # of readouts right? maybe have a list of car order by number then have a red warning light for was overtaken and yellow for overtook another car. or something ;)

Is not that hard to just show the driver who overtake, and not the message from someone loosing his position :thumb:

[Cornys]

Maybe even use such a program to force drivers to give proper distances with the false passing messages on standard LFS tracks. :shrug:

[boothy]

So the program says someone overtook under SC. Why would drivers do that? Do they think that they can get away with it? That says more about the admins, penalties applies for overtaking under SC and other drivers if they don't protest it.

But would you be entirely confident of the program's accuracy? I wouldn't and would probably feel the need to double check it before giving someone a race ruining penalty.

Generally with competent admins, hefty penalties and drivers that report passing under SC or who fall into line in close calls, there's no real need for this.

[rageshgr]

Aonio has this sound warning when cars are near, If Airio had such a thing then that could work too.

[Dygear]

Break down the problems.
InSim reports when a player is in the pits via a IS_PIT packet, so you add a flag when they go into the pits to make sure no one get's gigged for taking them over while they are in the pits and remove the bit onces the player moves out of the pits (that's another IS_PIT packet I think, I don't know any more, it's handled internally within PRISM so I don't have to think about it.). InSim also gives information about players who have crashed by using the IS_FLG packet, it's the case of allowing a car to pass another without penality while that car is CAUSING the yellow flag for that player.
If these two cases are not met then the player that over took the other player deserves a penalty.

[rageshgr]

Good strategy. I like it. But I assume the IS_PIT packet be reset once the player is out of pitlane. But he still can be overtaken in the gap between leaving pits and rejoining the track, as he is still accelerating and not yet up to SC speed (right?). So there may still be false alarms. But this is an edge case IMO

[Dygear]

Pit lanes entrance and exits are outside of a Nodes Road Limit, so you'll know when a client is rejoining the track and should be following the racing rules again by weather or not they are within the Node Road Limit. That should remove that fringe case.

[rageshgr]

Awesome :thumb:

[MadCatX]

Would something like this be acceptable?

- SC is deployed, application saves current running order.
- Each racer is displayed a position he has to be at and perhaps a min/max distance to the racer in front of him he has to maintain.
- When racer enters pit lane, he has to rejoin at the back of the field. When more than one racers pit, their order at the back of the field depends on the order in which they entered pit lane.
- When SC returns to pit, application checks if everybody is where he's supposed to and if not, it informs the admin or takes another action.

I _might_ be able to play around with this idea over the weekend (no promises, though), but I'd like to know specifically what would you guys want such an app to do.

[rageshgr]

When more than one racers pit, their order at the back of the field depends on the order in which they entered pit lane.


Interesting. I am wondering what the rule is for people overtaking in pits. Like if some guy enters first but has a huge repair. But another enters behind him but only has a some 4 sec worth of fuel. So should the guy who entered in front allowed to regain his poistion in front of the guy who entered behind but had only a small pitstop

[MadCatX]

That's a good point. Perhaps the running order should be determined by the order in which racers leave pit lane...

[rageshgr]

That is better IMO

[Cornys]

Order would be the order that they leave pit lane in :)

I beleive also, that when a car falls off the pace they shall not be given a position until they return to pace of around 80 km/h.

[rageshgr]

80 km/h.

So basically the for the cars to be subjected to SC order compliance. They should satisfy two conditions
1. Outside pitlane
2. Speed ~80 kph

Anytime the value of Outside pitlane AND Speed ~80 kph changes for any car, the reference list needs to be reset again.

One more condition is when the free pass car overtakes everyone :)