The Full Thrust Portable Format v0.2

version 0.2 3 August 1996

Introduction

With the increasing number of FT ship designs being made available on the Net, it seems to be time to standardise on a record format that's readable by humans and machines. The latter seems particularly important, given the number of ship design spreadsheets and programs available for various systems; surely it's to everyone's advantage if they can interchange details.

This format is not designed to be used internally by a design system, but rather to be portable and legible. Once my own design system is available, I shall write converters to and from this format; I urge other programmers to do the same.

Portability is the main priority: so the file is flat ASCII, and can be edited by hand if necessary.

The format is as follows. Line breaks should be whatever is standard on the originating system, since file transfers can be made in ASCII.

Derived characteristics, such as damage track, may be placed in comment sections; these are prefixed with a " and may be used anywhere in the file. They're not essential, since the host program (or player) can work them out from other information.

The " character toggles comment status; by default, this is OFF at the beginning of each line.

Each line in this definition should be terminated by a single line break.

Changes from v0.1 to v0.2

Definition

Class name (free string)
Class type (e.g. Missile Cruiser) (free string)
Designer's name (free string)
Comment
Military (0) / Q-Ship (1) / Civilian (2)
Hull mass
Thrust (0-8)
FTL type (0 for none, 1 for normal, 2 for tug)
Screens (0-3)
Armour (0-2)
Streamlining (0, 1, 2)
Point value (optional, should be <=0 if not known)
(Possible future ship parameters will go here)
# (denotes beginning of systems)
[(number) system (arcs)] (as many as needed)
(blank line to mark EOF)

Note that military FTL tenders are considered military ships with an FTL rating of 2, which should automatically give them the lower damage rating and available mass.

Sample

"Class name" Light Cruiser
"Class type" Light Cruiser
"Designer" GZG
"Comment" Standard design from the book
"Military" 0
"Hull" 22
"Thrust" 6
"Normal FTL" 1
"Screens" 1
"Armour" 0
"Streamlining" 0
#
3 B FPS
2 PDAF

system lines: (not case sensitive)

a A battery
b B battery
c C battery
aa AA megabattery
pdaf PDAF
adaf ADAF
fighter Fighters (default type)
fighter-f Fast fighters
fighter-h Heavy fighters
fighter-i Interceptors
fighter-a Attackers
fighter-l Long-range fighters
fighter-t Torpedo fighters
needle Needle beam
pulse Pulse torpedo
nova Nova cannon
submunition Submunition pack
minelayer Minelayer
minesweeper Minesweeper
firecon Firecon (only log extra firecons)
missile Missile (default type)
missile-e EMP missile
missile-n Needle missile
wave Wave gun
ortillery Ortillery
reflex Reflex field
cloak Cloaking field
weasel-a Weasel generator (cruiser)
weasel-b Weasel generator (capital)
sensor-1 Enhanced sensors
sensor-2 Superior sensors
ecm-i Individual ECM
ecm-a Area ECM
dcp Damage control party
r1 Railgun 1
r2 Railgun 2
r3 Railgun 3
scattergun Scattergun

arcs: {F|P|S}*
System limitations take precedence over the specified arcs.
If arcs are unspecified, default to FPS and apply system arc limits.
Unrecognised systems should be ignored or reported to the user.

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