The force errors option on lotdebugger only seems to affect sims. Using TCE to force errors on individual objects doesn't remove references.

Charity type unlockcareerrewards into the cheatbar. They will all become available for the selected sim.

I moved a family into a previously occupied lot from another hood and used the scanner. It detected the last used sims as squiggles. So previously owned community lots would require changing to residential, moving a family in and out to remove all objects. Sheesh. ie if there is not other sim references per lot. In SimPE there is sim relations data (which all lots have even lots in empty hoods). Perhaps these contain info. I have a grocery store from a previous hood which had over 1000 sim relations resources, which is much higher than most lots. They always appear as "unknown towards unknown".

More unfortunate news. So, at this time we don't know of any way to remove sim references from objects.

The Clean Installer now has an option to remove furnishings, and I'm working on a new version of the LotAdjuster which will do the same thing. No more need to move a sim in to remove all of the objects. This will work on community lots without the need to change them to residential. IIRC, only dorms need to be changed to residential before cleaning, because dorms normally retain all furnishings when a sim moves out.

SimPE can't find the user data because it is looking for a Characters subfolder, which doesn't exist for the Lots subfolder. If SimPE would look up one level, then those would probably contain valid sim data, at least for the original neighborhood.

This is another example of data which we know is in the lot package, but we don't have any evidence that it's actually used. When a lot is installed, these records are not copied to the neighborhood and don't actually seem to affect the real sim relations.

I put the lot into another neighborhood, and I scanned for prints. I got a squiggly line. Checked it with the HoodChecker and got Sim does not exist complaints.

That's really interesting. I've never seen this. Can you attach the HoodChecker report?

Are you sure that those errors weren't in the hood before you ran the HC?

What if you remove the furnishings before installing the lot?

There are two different Sim not existing complaints, looking in SimPE gives me no clue on which is the correct missing Sim. I have no idea if they were there before. I'll try removing everything before binning and implanting the lot.

Did that, checked it. All missing Sim complaints except for character ID 30 are gone. It seems out of all the things EA did wrong, they did something right (sort of).

An initial report is an absolute requirement. We can't conclude anything from a HoodChecker report unless we have a basis of comparison from before the lot was installed.

I'm trying to verify your results now, with a completely empty and clean neighborhood. If your results can be reproduced, that would convince me that these lots can corrupt a neighborhood.

I was thinking. What about community lots or hotel lots or dorm lots. Somehow, they have to clean any Sim references between visitors/vacationers/students. They do not remove the furniture though. So, how do they do it?

With community lots, changes made during a visit are not saved. It reverts to its original state when the lot was built. So it doesn't need to be cleaned. When a business owner visits the lot, then changes are made permanent. So non-sim-owned comm lots are possibly fine to move to a new hood. I suppose that would be easy to test by checking if the lot file has been modified. Otherwise it should have the same date as the day it was created. All my comm lots are owned so it would be easier for someone else to check up on that. Given that the lot hasn't been moved at some point.

There are DEFINITELY quite a few lots here that have been play-tested on the same lot. There are the obvious ones with sim-induced objects around (leaves, plates, newspapers) that we know of (remember simmer22 from your other thread who mentions cleaning lots from such objects before using?) and then I imagine there are more that you can't tell because those people were thorough enough to remove those objects. That's why I intend to use lots for models from now on, because I can't be sure how that creator did things and until I know for sure if it's safe or not, I'm not risking my hoods again (which has a lot to do with having been trying to avoid corruption for the past 7 months and constantly restarting).

The fact that people do it that way has always surprised me a bit, because to me that seems kind of inefficient. What I did was place lot in bin and then place a second version and play test there. That way, when I found things that needed fixing, I wouldn't have to move out family to fix it, I just switched over to the original lot and fixed it in that one. Easier for me, and somehow felt more right.

@Discussion: Very interesting to hear the results of everything. I'm glad this is finally getting looked at thoroughly, because it is something I imagine a lot of people do and I for one felt really unsure about it when re-creating my hood. Having a definitive yes/no helps, regardless of what the answer is. And if it's no, then high time it's found so people can start avoiding it.

I really wish I didn't need to leave for work in half an hour, or I'd be all over the game and the print-checker. SecuROM will have to wait, this is more interesting.

Hotels don't reset in any way between visits. It's one thing that used to really bug me about hotels, because by the third visit they'd be utterly filthy, until I downloaded a mod to make the housekeeper and bellhop do their damn jobs. Dorms I'm less sure about, mostly because mine always seem to get corrupted after graduation, but I do know communal areas save changes. I don't know if what happens behind dorm doors changes, but I suspect those changes are saved too.

There's something that people seem to be forgetting: There's no need to clean sim references from a lot which is in the same neighborhood with the sims who are being referenced. It's only when you move one of these lots to another neighborhood that problems might occur.

So, it usually doesn't matter that hotel isn't cleaned properly between vacations, because the remaining sim references are still valid. Same for dorms: it doesn't matter that a dorm isn't cleaned properly between sims as long as it stays in the original neighborhood.

Our primary concern is lots which are moved to another neighborhood, via the Lot Bin (either placed in the Lot Bin directly, or packaged and then installed).

Ran the test with some interesting but unexpected results:
- Packaged occupied lot.
- Before install lot: Neighborhood had no HC errors.
- During install of lot: Removed Sims and CC using the Clean Installer, but did not remove furniture. There were no Clean Installer errors.
- Ran HoodChecker: Neighborhood had no errors.
- Move in test sim: The game displayed one error: Missing neighbor for data access on Collection - Bug Box. I chose the "Delete" option on the error message, but you probably won't get those kinds of errors unless you are running in Debug mode. Question: does Reset remove the invalid sim reference from the object?
- Run HoodChecker: One HC warning: Sim with no character data.

The unexpected thing is that the missing sim data does not belong to a sim from the original neighborhood. SimID 0x7FD96B54 is the TemplatePerson from the objects.package. Note that this is the same exact sim which was added to Port_A_Build's neighborhood and may not indicate corruption (since the user data exists in all games).

Note that the additional sim is added to my neighborhood:
- Even if I remove the bug box before packaging the lot.
- Even if I remove all of the furniture when installing the lot.
- Even with base-game lots.

However, when I use the Stay-Things Shrub to keep the furnishings, move my family out, then edit the lot and use the Stay-Things Shrub fixer, the TemplatePerson was not added to my new neighborhood. This makes me suspect the SIMI record. Port_A_Build, did you use the Stay-Things Shrub and / or the Stay-Things Shrub fixer to create your furnished previously-occupied lot? If not, how did you create it?

I think I may wait until we have some answers before I start my new hood. I have many lots that I've saved from previous neighbourhoods with the stay shrub.

Just a question though, if I empty out the lots and resave them with no furnishings then the lot will be fine?

I don't understand where to look for references in SimPe, so everything was done with the ScanningGun career reward. Original users of a few objects in the house according to the gun were written down, many various sims used them.

Gun results:

Stay-things-shrub used, sim moved out and moved back in – same sim faces

(in all subsequent cases shrub was already used)

Binned and placed into the same subhood - same sim faces
Binned and placed into another subhood\downtown\main hood - same sim faces
Binned and placed into another hood altogether - squiggly lines
Packaged and placed into the same hood - same sim faces
Packaged and placed into another hood - squiggly lines

Forcing errors on these objects via boolprop mode changed nothing in any of these cases.

Where do we stand now on this whole thing? I'd love to help test, but I'm not sure what to test at this point since the original suggestion by Mootilda has been done by several players.

The Stay-Things Shrub. (Not the fixer.)

Port_A_Build, please try the fixer and see whether that makes a difference.
Interestingly, I don't believe that anyone's tested the standard move-out logic yet. It depends upon whether there are non-moveable objects which have sim references. I'm particularly interested in orchard trees and garden plants that are planted by sims (rather than by the user).
You could test lots that use the standard move-out logic (ie, no Stay-Things Shrub). Hot tubs, wishing wells, orchard trees and garden plants, etc. What about garden gnomes and flamingos?

After reading all here I have a ?. Are the clean and empty templates that have all the lived in house in them still ok to use.

I used the fixer. When scanned with the gun, it made no difference. I saw the squiggly lines when implanted into a completely new neighborhood. I saw the Sim's face when the lot was in the same neighborhood. However, I'm not getting the HoodChecker complaints. (Or I'm missing them.) I'm attaching the HoodChecker reports.

This seems like an interested experiment. I've been making notes about the lot package files and any relations it has to the neighborhood files. So far, there doesn't seem to be any relationship with SREL entries in the Lot packages and the SREL info in the neighborhood packages. I've made a couple of test neighborhoods, and I've been experimenting with making a lot, closing the game, and inspecting it through HoodChecker and SimPE to see what's going on.

Has there been a comprehensive set of instructions to follow for those who would like to participate in this experiment? Or is it still free-for-all?

Yes, a few pages back.

The houses should be completely safe in their original neighborhoods.

We're concerned about what happens when you move previously-occupied lots (furnished or not) into a different neighborhood. It's clear that objects on the lot keep their references to the original neighborhood. We just don't know yet how risky that is.

Of course, the scanner test is checking only one reference. As Quatchi pointed out to me today, there's a possibility that objects contain more than one sim reference. And then there are the person objects on the lot, and the sim relations, and the sim scores, and ... who knows how much else.

That's difficult to believe. I would have expected the SREL in the lot to duplicate the SREL in the neighborhood exactly (i.e., to have exactly the same instances, which reflect the Sim Description instances of the two sims involved in the relationship).

To see the actual sims, I would try copying the lot package to the folder that contains the neighborhood folder. With any luck, SimPE would then be able to find the appropriate user data from the Characters folder.

Other than testing the objects left behind on unfurnished lots, I think that we've learned about as much as we can from the scanner test.

Very interesting. That seems to match my tests.

Next question: what happens if you use the Stay-Things Shrub to keep the furnishings, then edit and save the lot (without using the fixer) before packaging the lot? In other words, is it the fixer, or just the act of editing and saving the lot, which removes the game's need to create a reference to the TemplatePerson?

That's what I thought too. But based on the tests I've done, there's none. And this is only from the initial creation of both the neighborhood, and then the lot, with no sim living on it. Basically:

1. I went to my game folders, and "turned off" any creation of university, downtown, vacation, etc. subhoods, and let the game create some character files (e.g. I renamed the NeighborhoodTemplate folders). There were 87 character files created. EDIT: Apparently, I didn't turn off the "User Data/Neighborhood" folders from the game files.

2. There's no lots, and no families/lots created from choosing a terrain and making the neighborhood.

3. I placed a 3x3 lot, and built a small home. Then exited the game.

4. I inspected the Lot1 package file (the first and only lot in game), and found 1 SIMI entry. Then, found 25 SREL entries, all are 'Unknown towards Unknown', all set to Daily:1, Lifetime:0. Then, found 62 SCOR entries, all are Sales Info related, varying Hex number.

5. I closed the Lot1 package file. Then opened the neighborhood package file.

6. There were no relationship entries in the neighborhood package, nor any SIMI, nor SCOR entries.

I haven't even reached the phase of creating a Sim in game to play with for the testing I conducted. The purpose of this testing was to see what happens when a player creates a residential home prior to having any Sim occupy the lot. I believe that this should be considered into the testing experiment as part of finding out what sim references are leftover. I created a list of objects that was placed onto the residential lot, and did not test what references were leftover from the initial placement of the empty 3x3 lot. I only recorded the references of the lot after building the premises.

Just edited and saved the lot. Imported into neighborhood, checked using the HoodChecker. I didn't see it complain about any missing Sims (aside from those present during preliminary testing).

So if I DL a house, and it contains signs of being occupied - e.g. newspapers, puddles, one lot I DL'd even had a pizza box on the table! - this could corrupt my hood, am I right? I'd always wondered about that... and so, by the time I put the lot in my hood and open it to check, it's already too late?

We're trying now to collect data for a certain answer to this, but my hypothesis is yes. But again, we don't know for certain. Mootilda's posted some ways we can help with the collection of said data.