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J. M. Pescado
Fat Obstreperous Jerk
#26 Old 6th Aug 2009 at 2:04 PM
This is an encoding issue: Nonstandard characters have a pile of odd encodings that appears to differ between the 8-bit representations stored in NOTEPAD and the 16-bit representations used in-game. As most of the programmers here use standard keyboards and simply do not have keys for such characters, we cannot reproduce them easily. I can hack them into stblc if you could tell me where they appear in the game normally, but otherwise I have no idea how to even produce such a letter: No such button exists on my keyboard!
Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I cannot accept, and the wisdom to hide the bodies of those I had to kill because they pissed me off.
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kattol
Test Subject
#27 Old 6th Aug 2009 at 2:29 PM
Quote: Originally posted by J. M. Pescado
This is an encoding issue: Nonstandard characters have a pile of odd encodings that appears to differ between the 8-bit representations stored in NOTEPAD and the 16-bit representations used in-game. As most of the programmers here use standard keyboards and simply do not have keys for such characters, we cannot reproduce them easily. I can hack them into stblc if you could tell me where they appear in the game normally, but otherwise I have no idea how to even produce such a letter: No such button exists on my keyboard!


Yeah, I thought it would be something like this. When I travelled to German, in business, for a while, I had to use alt + the ASCII Dec code punched in on the numeric keypad, to be able to use them. I have no idea if this helps but the Dec ASCII code for the letters are as follows:

Å: 143
å: 134
Ä: 142
ä: 132
Ö: 153
ö: 148

So, keeping the alt key down and punching these numbers on the numpad should generate these letters.

I'm wondering if there's a way of replacing these letters with their ASCII code (in the correct ASCII format, whichever that might be here, of course) in the csv files, or something like that. I might be totally off here, but, as I said, I am a bit clueless when it comes to this.
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#28 Old 6th Aug 2009 at 3:39 PM
Try setting the Encoding to UTF-8 in Notepad's Save As dialog.
kattol
Test Subject
#29 Old 6th Aug 2009 at 5:42 PM
Quote: Originally posted by channTL
Try setting the Encoding to UTF-8 in Notepad's Save As dialog.


I thought I did that, but as I fiddled about with missing quote marks quite a bit, somewhere along the line I must have missed it. Duh! It looks perfectly fine in S3PE now, so I'm sure it will in the game as well.

Thanks a bunch! I feel like such an idiot... *laughs*
jordi
Instructor
#30 Old 6th Aug 2009 at 9:37 PM
Quote: Originally posted by channTL
EDIT 2: A breakthrough! I finally got my name mod to work with a new instance and have uploaded a new version of it. Only took about a week to work out what was wrong

Anyway, as a side effect of this work I've upgraded the TS3 String Importer to compile new STBLs from CSVs instead of just importing them. Now the tool is even more user-unfriendly I will upload this newer version soon after I streamline it a little more.

Awesome work man. I reverse-engineered your updated mod, I see how you did it. But still looking forward to the completed tool.
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#31 Old 7th Aug 2009 at 2:51 AM
New version uploaded.
Motoki
Instructor
#32 Old 7th Aug 2009 at 5:36 AM
Okay, clearly I am doing something wrong here but I opened the default string table, saved it to csv, opened the csv, changed what I want, yanked everything else out, saved it under a new name, now when I try to compile that csv to a stbl I get:

Loaded. Adding to STBL...
ERROR! An item with the same key has already been added.

Added to what? It didn't even save my file to a STBL yet.
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#33 Old 7th Aug 2009 at 6:32 AM
That was my noob mistake. I've uploaded a new version that probably fixes it - now it checks whether the STBL already contains the key it's trying to add.
Motoki
Instructor
#34 Old 7th Aug 2009 at 8:05 AM
Ah okay. Works fine now. Thanks!
Xane123
Test Subject
#35 Old 12th Aug 2009 at 7:36 AM
I can't really change the THOUSANDS of STBL entries, but I managed to change the opening text (for example, "Texture compositing teddy bears..." to "Getting ""BeatWave"" by Sidewinder because it rocks!" (Supposed to look like in-game: "Getting "BeatWave" by Sidewinder because it rocks!", but looked like this in-game: "Getting ""BeatWave"" by Sidewinder because it rocks_" Does Sims 3 not support exclamation marks with this tool's help? )

It is still pretty cool, and next time, I'll be using once again, Excel, to get a more advanced STBL using your tool. Thanks! ( Should be a thanks thread, rrgh! )
Visit my website: Xane.com, please! This is Xane123, signing off!
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#36 Old 12th Aug 2009 at 8:41 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Xane123
I can't really change the THOUSANDS of STBL entries, but I managed to change the opening text (for example, "Texture compositing teddy bears..." to "Getting ""BeatWave"" by Sidewinder because it rocks!" (Supposed to look like in-game: "Getting "BeatWave" by Sidewinder because it rocks!", but looked like this in-game: "Getting ""BeatWave"" by Sidewinder because it rocks_" Does Sims 3 not support exclamation marks with this tool's help? )

It is still pretty cool, and next time, I'll be using once again, Excel, to get a more advanced STBL using your tool. Thanks! ( Should be a thanks thread, rrgh! )


As I said above it's important that the character encoding is set to UTF-8. Excel mangles the files and doesn't let you set the right encoding. I found out the hard way too :\

You might be interested in trying Stubble. It's a self contained STBL editor (unlike this tool which only converts text files to a STBL format). I'm sure that it is much easier to use, especially if you only want to make a few small changes.
Xane123
Test Subject
#37 Old 12th Aug 2009 at 12:06 PM Last edited by Xane123 : 13th Aug 2009 at 11:48 AM. Reason: Had to thank (again :rolleyes:...)
-trying Out...-
Quote: Originally posted by channTL
As I said above it's important that the character encoding is set to UTF-8. Excel mangles the files and doesn't let you set the right encoding. I found out the hard way too :\

You might be interested in trying Stubble. It's a self contained STBL editor (unlike this tool which only converts text files to a STBL format). I'm sure that it is much easier to use, especially if you only want to make a few small changes.


I'm already on trying it out...

And, it's SUCESSFULLY DOWNLOADED! I believe it might do its job... I can edit them directly in it. Thanks for the reference to it, channTL!

It is so easy to use! I don't know if it works, but I am trying to make my custom book be linked to a real phrase and NOT

Code: 
****GAMEPLAY/EXCEL/BOOKS/BOOKSGENERALmy book title goes here)

Anyways,IT WORKED! It changed Gameplay/Excel into the book's actual title! This is so awesome! (screenshot shows how easy it is to use and change)
Screenshots
Visit my website: Xane.com, please! This is Xane123, signing off!
dashboard00
Test Subject
#38 Old 21st Aug 2009 at 9:10 PM
Ok, I'm trying to create my own name lists for my own personal use, and I was wondering if I could get a little noob help. I edited the csv files with my own names and created a new stbl from the csv files. Ok, I'm on track right? But now I'm not sure what to do?
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#39 Old 22nd Aug 2009 at 4:42 AM
I read your other comment, it sounds like you haven't created a new package yet (so yeah, File > New).

There is an FNV generator under Tools > FNV Hash so plug some unique text into that (like your name followed by "name list mod" or something) and copy the "FNV64" value to the clipboard. Then import the STBL, and set its type to "STBL 0x220557DA" and for the instance paste in the generated one.

Finally, change the first 2 bytes of the instance to 00 for English. Select the last 8 bytes of the instance, change the first two of those to 00 (to ensure your STBL is not overwritten by the original one when it loads; the last 8 bytes have to be a lower value than the game's) and save the package in your Mods\Packages\ folder.
dashboard00
Test Subject
#40 Old 22nd Aug 2009 at 7:42 PM
ok, I followed your instructions but when I go to change the bytes of the instance, the "ok" button grays out and my only option is to "cancel"? Am I missing a step, or is the instance not right or something?
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#41 Old 22nd Aug 2009 at 9:55 PM
I'm not sure why it would do that except if the instance was too short. Do you have the latest s3pe?
TigerM
Lab Assistant
#42 Old 22nd Aug 2009 at 11:53 PM
If you're using s3pe, you need the 0x on the start - those aren't the first two digits. It's the two digits after the x.
dashboard00
Test Subject
#43 Old 23rd Aug 2009 at 12:47 AM
Ah, I am so dumb. haha I was replacing the 0x. That was the problem. I saved the package in my mods/packages folder, so hopefully everything works. Thanks so much for the help. Sorry I'm programming illiterate.
KnowledgeInPlatinum
Test Subject
#44 Old 13th Sep 2009 at 6:19 AM
How do I unpack the STBL files?
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#45 Old 13th Sep 2009 at 7:12 AM
Look in Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\GameData\Shared\Packages. If you have a DeltaBuild0.package, open that in s3pe. Otherwise open FullBuild0.package.

The English STBL is named "Strings_ENG_US_0x...". You can click the Name column to sort the list alphabetically; just look for that name.

Then it's just a matter of exporting it to a file (not a package) and saving it somewhere.
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#46 Old 26th Sep 2009 at 6:39 AM
I've uploaded a new version with string-key support, along with some career templates.
Klinn2
Field Researcher
#47 Old 12th Dec 2009 at 2:29 PM Last edited by Klinn2 : 12th Dec 2009 at 2:30 PM. Reason: Typos
Very nice STBL utility Chann, it's much handier for many things than that simple editor that you may recall I made and posted in the Custom Sims forum.

Anyway, one small problem seems to have reappeared, the "ERROR! An item with the same key has already been added" message when attempting to export the US English STBL extracted from the DeltaBuild0.package .

I've successfully exported to CSV the English STBL extracted from the original FullBuild0.package and even the FullBuildEP1.package for the WA stuff, but the one extracted from DeltaBuild0.package is causing the error message.

Thanks again for a very useful tool, it's much appreciated. Keep up the good work!
chann
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#48 Old 12th Dec 2009 at 11:12 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Klinn2
Very nice STBL utility Chann, it's much handier for many things than that simple editor that you may recall I made and posted in the Custom Sims forum.

Anyway, one small problem seems to have reappeared, the "ERROR! An item with the same key has already been added" message when attempting to export the US English STBL extracted from the DeltaBuild0.package .

I've successfully exported to CSV the English STBL extracted from the original FullBuild0.package and even the FullBuildEP1.package for the WA stuff, but the one extracted from DeltaBuild0.package is causing the error message.

Thanks again for a very useful tool, it's much appreciated. Keep up the good work!


I hate that error. I think it cropped up in a version of the s3pi library after the patch/EP came out. I've uploaded a new version to the original post which should fix it the problem with DeltaBuild0.package.

Cheers for the compliments
Klinn2
Field Researcher
#49 Old 13th Dec 2009 at 5:12 PM
Quote: Originally posted by channTL
I've uploaded a new version to the original post which should fix it the problem with DeltaBuild0.package.

The new version works just fine for me too. Interesting that the STBL in DeltaBuild0.package contains so many strings from the WA EP, I would have thought they would all be located in the FullBuildEP1.package, but they're split between the two.

Anyway, thanks very much for the quick update!
BaXiM
Lab Assistant
#50 Old 17th Jun 2010 at 9:51 AM
Just in case channTL is still watching this threat and maintaining this very usefull tool:
Really nice work and very helpful. In fact it's the best tool I could find for my needs.
It would be perfect, if one could just drag one (or even better a list of) stbl/cvs file and get a cvs/stbl file with the same name back.
Could this feature be implemented?
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