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For Antares support, what I would ideally like to get from Athena would be a single file that was an archive of the resource data. For example, for the factory scenario, a good format would be a zip file which extracted to:

bsob/
    500.bsob
snro/
    500.snro
SMIV/
    499 question mark.SMIV
    500 Sprite Cursor.SMIV
    501 Shovelnose, Brighter.SMIV
    …
snd/
    500 Shot C.snd
    501 Combo Exp 11kHz.snd
    …

Note that resources from all of the Ares Data files are present. I don't care specifically about it being a zip file, though my guess is that it would be the easiest archive format to support.

I could deal with other formats. Notably, a zip file containing the four Ares Data files could also work. Dealing with the folder directly isn't an option, because Antares doesn't use the resource fork (zip files encode the resource fork into the data fork, which makes it OK). However, the format I outlined above is a much cleaner format, and I assume it's not much more work. It might even be a more convenient native format for Athena itself.

The condition editor needs to be finished.

Hera used combo boxes to select the race, net race flags, and player type (single human, single computer, or net human) of each player and it worked well. Other fields, like earning power and "no ships" text should be easier (or at least possible) to edit.

Add Importing and Exporting of images by drag and drop.

Icons are desired for the following:

• Application icon for Athena
• File icon for Xsera plugins

This can be done with a combination of step by step user instructions and an automated script.

1. Download the SheepShaver "Chubby Bunny" ZIP from here.
2. Unzip and move the folder to the desired location (Generally /Applications)
3. Select one of the three provided DMGs and unzip it to /Users/Shared
4. Download the Ares installer (possibly fix the type/creator codes)
5. Mount the chosen disk image
6. Copy the Installer to the disk image
7. Unmount the disk image.
8. Launch the SheepShaver app
9. Run the Ares Installer (this may not be scriptable) and install to the blank drive
10. Register Ares (probably unscriptable)

When the choose button is pressed, instead of whatever object type the object currently is being selected, some other object type is selected. This may be because in Hera the ID numbers of object types were temporary and arbitrary (they changed whenever the file was opened).

If nothing else, it could open the Hera Reference. The images are of Hera, but the information is still useful.

Also, since it doesn't seem to be in there, it would be nice to have a reference for formatting characters and substitution syntax in text strings. Maybe it could be a separate window that could be opened from the help menu or by clicking a button on windows with text fields.

I assume this is because you'd need to open up the object browser to pick the weapon, but it's already open to the ship that you want to change.

The inclusive and exclusive filter buttons are grayed out.

Changes to many fields are not saved. They revert to default values as soon as you close the window or select a different condition. This affects all of the fields under Parameters and Action that appear as a result of changing the condition or action and the owner radio buttons under Quantifiers.

When certain actions are selected, sometimes the application crashes or the fields don't change. I've seen this with alter absolute cash and alter absolute location.

It looks like it's alphabetizing them instead of treating them as numbers. So it goes:
10001
10002
1001
...
129
2000
...

These are the warp flares, energy, and player body. In Hera objects could be set as one in the basic panel of the object editor.

I approve of using buttons that bring up a list of the appropriate resources to cut down on window juggling and ID memorization (assuming they'll all actually work in the next version).

There are a few more places where this could be used:

• choosing portraits in the object editor
• the subject and direct object fields in the condition editor (at least for scenario conditions - and maybe you could choose which scenario's initial objects to look at for object conditions).
• choosing sounds for the play sound action
• choosing strings (or a text field) for the display message action
• songs and movies in scenario editor
• images inserted into text such as briefings and scrolling text

Make a hidden command line switch for generating mediawiki tables for http://ares.wikia.com/

Some Ares plugins have missing data because that data is supposed to be loaded from the base Ares data. Provide a system compatible with both Antares and Ares plugins for falling back to the base data.

Following the four Str255 objects in nlAG resources is a uint8_t[4] specifying the scenario version. It should be possible to set it from Athena. It might be useful to have some shared conventions on how to display it, too: in Antares, my plan is to always show at least two components but otherwise to hide trailing zeros. In the the 3 nlAG resources I looked at, all had 0 for the fourth component, though.

After the scenario version is the minimum Ares version, which I'm not planning to read. It's been "1.1.1" in the nlAG resources I've looked at, so I guess it'd be good if it stayed that way.

There should be a way to edit this text for each player for each scenario (although only the one for the player will ever be seen in single player and they're probably identical in multiplayer, so maybe only one is needed).

The following images were used in a pre-Ambrosia key configuration window, and are not used in 1.2.0 or in Antares:

520 Key Back.PICT
521 Key Accel.PICT
522 Key Stop.PICT
523 Key Rotate Counter.PICT
524 Rotate Clockwise.PICT
525 Key Weapon 1.PICT
526 Key Weapon 2.PICT
527 Key Special.PICT
528 Key Superlight.PICT
529 Key Commands.PICT
530 Key Computer Controls.PICT

This image is copyright Ambrosia, and should not be redistributed. I don't know what should be done about PICT 2002—Antares includes it for now, but removing it may be the appropriate course of action.

2000 Image 2000.PICT

I have no idea what this image is, but it certainly doesn't seem important:

44604 QT badge.PICT

Incidentally, I believe that resource IDs are int16_t-typed, not uint16_t-typed, and the image should really have ID -20932. That's irrelevant if it's removed.

I'm interested in the first batch of images being removed because they use vector drawing operations, which Antares can't currently extract. All other images are raster, which works fine. The third batch seems malformed and also isn't extracted properly. The second batch is only important for compliance reasons.

You seem to be able to read SMIV resources just fine, so I assume you don't need any documentation on the format. If that's not the case, happy to help.

In the Scenarios view, the strings for player names don't look correct. Chapters 1-6 claim that the player is playing the Cantharan Order against the Prophets of Salril when it should be the Human/Ishiman Cooperative against the Gaitori Union. 7-10, 12, and 14 should be against the Cantharan Order, and in 18 and 19, the player should play the UNS Resistance.

Is there an off-by-one bug somewhere? I think STR# resources are usually referred to with 1-based indices.

The race editor is currently not sorted in any obvious way. It would be nice to be able to sort by ID and/or name.

Sometimes it's useful to revert the changes made in a particular editor window without having to revert to the last save. So these types of windows typically have OK and cancel buttons to confirm or discard the changes. In Hera, some of them also had a revert button which reverted the changes without closing the window.

PICT files contain the header but not PICT resources.