This tutorial is aimed for adding simple decorative slots. In the example I have used I will be adding 14 slots to a bookcase. Adding slots requires adding lines in the Resource Node (CRES), so I recommend reading The Resource Node (CRES) by Numenor for an explanation of the CRES structure. This is important if you want to add slots to a more complicated object or one with multiple nodes.

Also good reading prior to this is An Introduction to Slots by Numenor. And for more advanced slot reading, Creating Working Extendable Slots by fisheyes.

The file attached is a pdf so should be viewable by anyone. You can use Adobe Reader or Foxisoft PDF Viewer.

If you would like to view as a web page, that is available Here.

LOL and I JUST finished this......however, your tutorial is rather better than mine, so its good that you upped this.

Sorry Lee. I was supposed to do this months ago but was so busy that I figured I better get it done now.

If your differs than mine and you have better ways, then by all means post!

Thankyou so much. Unfortunately fisheyes tutorial was the one thing that I could never get a grip on and gave up years ago. I'm sure this will be very useful!

HL (or anyone else who can answer this) - In your tutorial, you use the Practical to add the Child Nodes to. In my case, the Practical (there is only one) has no existing Child Nodes. Would I still use that and just add lines (in my case- 6) and number them (16-1B)? Or is there another item I should/can use?

It took a lot of reading (after clicking links, lol) for me to understand your tutorial. Now that I do- THANK YOU! I can make OMSP's but I'd much rather add slots.

Yes, just add the child nodes to the practical. The numbering as in the cres is done automatically when you add the objectGraphNodes lines. I am guessing that your object then has no routing slots? Although I don't think it matters, I've added slots to decorative items that didn't have any routes through the practical.

When I add slots to something like a coffee table, I make the new deco slots as childs of the joint that has the current child nodes for the routing slots and not the practical. I do it for neatness and practicality and the practical in these case...doesn't seem practical. I also expand on whatever EAxis has already started.

Hmmm. Now I'm slightly confused. I'm working on a desk that I added some shelves to. Should I still add them to the practical?

The line numbers...are slightly irrelevant. Not quite sure how to say that correctly, but don't get caught up in the line numbers that my object had. This is because as you add resources in the cres it increments the line numbers, and they are relevant when you are linking and attaching as child nodes. But not so much that your object has to have the same line numbers. (This is partly in response to a pm)

From what I've seen a desk will have one joint(with child nodes) and one practical, sometimes the first joint is a practical as well. I am unsure why some objects use a joint and others use practical. If someone has a good explanation of some of the resources in the cres I would love to hear them, I find minimal info in the Wiki about the cres.

Desks (and tables) have a slot_desk_std_0 (or similar naming). This then has the routing slots and the one deco slot as child nodes. When adding a deco slot I add them as sibling nodes to the slot_desk_std_0 (or similar table one).

Note in the pic my decoslots are sibling nodes to the slot_coffee_std_0. They would probably work as child nodes to something else, but keep in mind that positioning is relative to the parent node.

Ok, I get it now. Since it's a desk, I'll add them to the slot_dsk_std_0. Which is what I thought because it's the one with the most entries in it, but I wanted to be sure. Thank you very, very much for being so patient with me. I'll name my first-born desk after you. Do you prefer HugeLunatic Desk, Lunie Desk, HL Desk, Lunatic Desk or Huge Desk?

Your welcome.

SimPE quit on me the other night, so I didn't get to finish this then. I got to finish it today and checked my desk in-game. The good news is that it didn't make my game crash. (Yay me!)
The bad-ish news is that the slots aren't in the right place. They're over one tile. In your tutorial, you have "x is left/right, y is front/back and z is top/bottom"
and then say that "x and y are transposed compared to your 3d editor". If I'm not mistaken, left/right is to the left and right of the center of a tile, front/back is to the front and back of a tile and z would be the height you want an object to be?
When I did OMSP's, y and z were switched. To get the height I had to put the y value in the z spot. So I'm a bit confused as where each value goes.
I use MilkShape and, if it matters, in the GMDC in SimPE it's not XYZ, it's out of order. I've seen mention of making sure it's XYZ or your mesh won't be in the right position in-game but mine always are so I never changed it. (Would that be why I had to switch y and z for the OMSP's?)
So, say the 3 values in MilkShape are: x- -1.024, y- 0.477 and z- -0.009. Can you tell me how those would be entered in the CRES in SimPE?
I actually have to check those numbers again because the height was off slightly, besides being in the wrong spot. But if I know where they go and how to enter them after I do that...it'd help.

I attached a pic of the desk but there's no objects on "my" slots.

urg....LoL I typo'd. Y and Z are transposed. And now that I'm looking at the neg/pos values I am thinking I typo'd those too...

In your 3d editor x is left/right, y is up/down and z is front/back
In SimPE x is left/right, y is front/back and z is up/down

Typos happen and it's a really good tutorial.

The tutorial is excellent as are all the tutorials on this site. I was confused about the xyz coordinates as well until realizing that those days of banging my head against the wall in Physics Class paid off. Numenor points out in The Resource Node (CRES,) Xyz in the modeling software are for static objects while xyz in the game are for movement. If you push an object, it is forced in the opposite direction...creates motion (reactions in game.) Sometimes things don't sink in until I see it from all directions...

Thank you! All of you!!!

HL, I had to come back to this to tell you that I added another slot to my desk with NO problems at all. It did take 2 tries to get it in the right spot height-wise. But I didn't even need to look at your tutorial to do it.

Good job! The positioning can be a giant pain, but do a few more and it wil be easy.

cksim - glad you found the tutorial useful. Can't say I understand anything about physics though.

In the STR, if the needed instance # isn't there (80 I think) what do you do?

The shelf I did is begging for slots- and it was cloned from a painting because I wanted it to be able to go down with walls. (Of course, now I'm rethinking that because it looks kind of silly..no shelf but there's objects hanging in mid air..lol)

Add it. You may also need to add the SLOT as well, can't remember if the painting already has one for the view interaction.

Add it? (Where's the nail-biting smilie?!?) Heehee..I kind of thought you'd say that but I wanted to be sure. About the SLOT- there is a routing slot that I know of, does that have to do with sims viewing it? I didn't really look at it after I saw the STR wasn't the way it's "supposed" to be.

Yes. Clone an existing STR, change the name (Model - Bones or whatever and commit). Go to Resource tab plugin and change the Instance for 90. Click commit. Now you have a Instance that do you have. (I presume that's the instance #90 that you want, because it's link the CRES line with the SLOT line - necessary for doing a "usable slot"). I've made pictures.

And for the routing, yes. That's used for "going close" of the painting (I think used for an "like or not" animation too). I can add a alot as well. Just keep these routing there and add one that you want.

This is an excellent tutorial, HugeLunatic! Well explained and easy to follow Thanks very much for this effort.

I need a little advice about how to add slots to a chest of drawers - or if it's possible at all. I've been trying all evening with the inevitable result that the game crashes when the chest of drawers is placed. I've used HugeLunatic's method and I've also tried Fisheeyes' more complicated method. Can't get any of them to work.

I suppose the problem is in the CRES file, possibly in what node I'm attaching the child nodes to. The dresser obviously doesn't have any slots to begin with, so I have so far tried attaching to the [joint1] node, the slot_dresser_0 node and one of the two Practical nodes. With no luck.


Any suggestions to how to solve this? Thanks in advance for any help.

It can be done on dressers, I've attached mine to the Practical node of a two tile dresser which was originally cloned from the designer dresser. This is typically a child node of the Joint1.

If it is crashing then something probably isn't linked correctly. Was it working prior to adding slots? Because the GMND will also cause crashes if something is missing. If you remove your slot resources in the CRES will the game load?

I have a two tile dresser at BPS (Exotic Elements match) that I added slots to if you wanted to look at it. If you want more help you can post the problem package and I will take a look at it.

That makes me hopeful. I'm cloning from the designer dresser, so I'll study your BPS dresser and see if I can make the connections. It worked fine before I began adding slots. With the slots the game loads, but crashes the moment I place the dresser. Which is why I think the problem must be in the CRES.

I'm a little too tired to give it all another try tonight, but will work on it tomorrow. If I still can't make it work, I'd be really happy if you might take a look at it. Looking without seeing, you know ...

Thanks again for your help.

HugeLunatic, you're a saviour! I basically copied the parameters from your package into my own, and when I had that working adjusted the placement of the slots to fit my mesh.

It now works perfect:


Thanks again for an excellent tutorial and some much needed help.

Awesome job moune! I'm glad the tutorial helped, and being able to look at a dresser. Your dresser looks gorgeous too. :lovestruc