Problem with blank walls in Vista

[Nick]

Didn't help Walls and floors all blank, can see items, monsters, stairs, that's about it, oh, and a few other things like fountains, gates, those are visible...

OK, this could be a ToME-specific problem. Have you tried any other variants, and if so how do they work?

[critofur]

OK, this could be a ToME-specific problem. Have you tried any other variants, and if so how do they work?

In my post that you originally replied to I said this:

"All the dif. Angband varients I tried seem to have this problem on Vista, rebooting, "compatibility" mode, etc, all don't seem to help."
________
marijuana trichomes

[Nick]

In my post that you originally replied to I said this:

"All the dif. Angband varients I tried seem to have this problem on Vista, rebooting, "compatibility" mode, etc, all don't seem to help."

Oh, you expect me to remember what I've read/posted before

I'm out of ideas, I'm afraid, as this does work for me in Vista. I will try and work out what's going on at some point, but don't hold your breath.

[Nick]

OK, so I've checked the effect of modifying font-win.prf in Vista for ToME 2.3.4, the nightly build of V3.0.8 prerelease, and FA0.2.3, and it works for all of them for me.

Do you have any pref files in the lib/user folder? These get loaded in preference to the lib/pref ones, so that could be causing the problem too.

The root of the problem seems to be that ascii 127 used to be a solid block, but Vista doesn't treat it as such.

Another thing you can try (in ToME) is hitting '%' to go into the 'interact with visuals' menu, '8' for features, and 'n' to go through all the features. Then change all the ones which are showing up as blank to something else (like the default character).

[pgraham]

fix I think.

I used softy to discover that ascii code 4 is a dark grey block.

in font-win.prf I replaced all instances of 1/127 (which should be light grey block but isn't for some reason) with 1/4

and the walls are now dark grey blocks in Vista.

[pgraham]

I used softy to discover that ascii code 4 is a dark grey block.

in font-win.prf I replaced all instances of 1/127 (which should be light grey block but isn't for some reason) with 1/4

and the walls are now dark grey blocks in Vista.

update: - you may have to play with it a bit.. I missed a few codes for "earth walls" and things in the NPP varient I am playing.

should be obvious in the font-win.prf file though. its well commented.

[ctate]

I used softy to discover that ascii code 4 is a dark grey block.

in font-win.prf I replaced all instances of 1/127 (which should be light grey block but isn't for some reason) with 1/4 and the walls are now dark grey blocks in Vista.

Huh! That's awesome, although quite surprising. This is with 3.0.8 or 3.0.9?

(127 is not drawn under Vista because Windows now understands that character code 127 is not supposed to be printable, so it doesn't even try -- even though the font supplies a glyph for that code point.)

--
ctate

[pgraham]

Huh! That's awesome, although quite surprising. This is with 3.0.8 or 3.0.9?
ctate

Its actually in NPPangband but it should work with anything. - Silly vista.

Anyway this fix works great. in NPP there are coloured varients of the walls as well -- like darker grey for magma, brown for dirt, etc... and the colours all work fine with the ascii code 4, so its all good. Just look for any 127's in font-win.prf and replace them with "4" and you are set to go.

[pgraham]

Its actually in NPPangband but it should work with anything. - Silly vista.

Sorry for the confusion... I guess NPP actually does have a different font set... if you want this to work in vanilla you would have to use the NPP font directory (uses 8x12 instead of 8x13 and some other changes) ... most of the ascii table is identical so I don't think this would affect display in vanilla .. (a "p" is still a "p", etc)... however I have not tested this extensivly so there may be some character substitution in vanilla.

anyway... a fix if you want to try it for vanilla

1. swap out your vanilla fonts folder for NPP's fonts (you may need to copy any vanilla fonts currently in use into the new fonts folder and then switch to NPP's version after your first game start-up. i.e. if you are using 8x13.fon which NPP dosn't have)

2. in font-win.prf change any reference to "127" into "4"

[Madoka]

I just got a copy of Entroband 1.7.1. It uses the system's Courier font, I think, but is able to show blocks in Vista. Not smart enough to know why Entroband does that and not, say, Hengband 1.6.2.

Although I must admit that the Courier font is not as nice as the default font in Heng 1.6.2. The "." seems too small.

Edit: Ah, it can use the font that the other *bands use, and still show the blocks.

[binkley]

What about a custom .fon file to solve this?

Looking at the top of font-win.prf in Anbgand 3.0.9:

# This file is used by Angband (when it was compiled using "main-win.c")
# to specify simple attr/char remappings using a standard font, allowing
# the use of special pseudo-graphic pictures for walls and such.
#
# Note that this file is extremely similar to the "font-ibm.prf" file,
# but it uses different codes, since it uses the special pseudo-graphic
# symbols defined in the "lib/xtra/font/*.FON" files, and there is only
# one special wall type, so we have to use special "colors".

I realize that perhaps the reason the wall characters to not appear is that perhaps the .fon file I use (10x20) is not a complete character set.

Cheers,
--binkley

[takkaria]

I realize that perhaps the reason the wall characters to not appear is that perhaps the .fon file I use (10x20) is not a complete character set.

That font does have the wall tile, but Vista doesn't like displaying it.

[fink]

This came up as well for us in MAngband (tho keep in mind we are based on a very ye olde version of Ang) - a number of Vista users were reporting a number of display related problems. One user tracked down the problem she was experiencing, and posted some comments on what she ran into, and how she fixed it in the following thread. Give a peek and see if it sounds like it might be up your alley:

http://www.mangband.org/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=Version1;action=display;num=1189894722

[d1sc0nnected]

Suggestion above to delete font-win.prf does semi-solve the problem by making walls # and %, like old school moria, but I would love to fix it to show colored solid blocks again.

Graham's suggestion to manually change the ascii code from 127 to 4 switched my walls to subscript f's..so 4 is evidently not the correct ascii # for solid block. It seems that if I know what the default font set is for vanilla the correct code could be found.. anyone know what it is?

Or am I missing the root of the problem?

[Kadoles]

Has anyone found a replacement char for 127?

also what exactly does this line do in the font-win.prf file?

F:52:2/127