Why no "next unused" for 121 LINE IDs?

[Martin Howe]

DB keeps track of sector tags, TIDs and so forth, and offers a "next unused" button. However, it does not do this for LINE IDs (ZDoom/HeXen special 121). It is possible to do this manually, with a bit of discipline, but it seems a strange omission. Is there a reason why DB doesn't have this feature, or is it just something that is considered low-priority?

[Martin Howe]

Bump!

I don't expect to see it in DB anytime soon - this wasn't a meant as a feature request, because it is possible to live without it - but it was a valid technical question; since almost every other kind of tag does have a "next unused" button, it does seem strange that 121 doesn't.

What was/is the reason?

Codeimp?

[CodeImp]

Quite simple: The fields where you give the line ID are general purpose fields. The editor doesnt know its meant to be a line ID when its line type 121 and coding such exceptions is bad. Im already struggling with my personal coding guidelines while doing this just for the stupid slopes :(

[Martin Howe]

Heh :) Standards vs "what is needed". The horror of having to decide whether to add, or not to add, another dimension to a subsystem just to cope with a few cases that were hitherto seen as special. I know that feeling well :( :(

Thanks!

[Graf Zahl]

CodeImp said:

Quite simple: The fields where you give the line ID are general purpose fields. The editor doesnt know its meant to be a line ID when its line type 121 and coding such exceptions is bad. Im already struggling with my personal coding guidelines while doing this just for the stupid slopes :(

Since this is not the only linedef that defines line IDs you can give the parameter a special type and then based on this information find the next unused. That way you don't have to hard code special handling for one line type.

[solarsnowfall]

Eh, DB lets you do a search for Lines with a given tag type/number, so if your getting bogged down with too many tags to keep track of, you can use the search feature to check and see if a number is already in use.