Editing Population Cache

[mrjrdnthms]

With the ability to save a cache of an object population the tantalizing prospect of more control of population distributions is raised. Is there any way to edit a population cache file (.pop) outside of Terragen? In my case I would like to automatically generate these population files based on data stored elsewhere and load them up in Terragen.


Whatever the case, to PS staff, is the ability to load point cloud data as the basis for a population distribution coming in the near future? Seems like your work to include population caching has gotten us almost there.

[jo]

Hi,

Technically you could edit a population cache file, if we were to publish the format, but it's not feasible in a practical sense. It would be much easier all round if we had some way to import data. That's something we want to do but it's not scheduled at the moment.

What sort of format would you be interested in importing?

Regards,

Jo

[mrjrdnthms]

My use cases involve real world data so any GIS format would be fine by me (.kml, .shp, etc.)

Any chance PS might give us the format in the mean time so we can work around this limitation? Does the format need to be obfuscated?

[jo]

Hi,

I don't think we'll be publishing the format in the near future. It's not just positions, it's a bit more complex than that. We will look at adding the ability to import positions to the development schedule so it's a bit more concrete.

The data isn't actually obfuscated, in the sense that it's being deliberately obscured. It's just being stored in an efficient and XML safe manner.

Regards,

Jo