I've been really digging into the way the journal and quest log works and I think I've come up with a robust or more correct messaging system. Firstly, I've made it much more reliable at finding entries (when working with strings in lua there are some special characters that cause problems when searching), and secondly in my new release (probably ~1 week away) instead of just 'journal updated' in the textflash popup that appears there will now be 4 different titles:
1 - "Important Events", this is the primary or main storyline 'quest' that appears at the top of the quest log. 2 - "Quest Updated", this is for side-quests or non-primary quests that appears in the quest log. 3 - "Important Information", this is for standard journal entries that aren't tied directly to quests. 4 - "Information", this is for textflashes that don't have an associated visible entry in the quest or journal.
For me, this represents a truer reflection than just 'Journal Updated' which can be misleading. Clicking the popup takes you directly to the relevant section of the quest log/journal, but in the case of item (4) it adds the information presented as a user entry so that information is no longer 'lost'.
Right-clicking the popup adds the information presented regardless of title (in case you want to save the text and add your own notes to it later).
I still need to do some testing, but so far it works really well...
Cant wait for the new version to be released. The journal bugs really annoys me. Thanks for the hard work. One question: I have Peccas Gui mod installed. Can I install this mod, when released, on top of it, or should I wait it to be incorporated on that mod ?
Looking forward to the new version as well. Although despite my map notes/journal entries being all whacked out, the latest version has been working pretty well. The main issue has been a few more quests not popping up correctly as I mentioned before (often because BG2 marks them done before they are) and hopefully your new version will fix that.
Quick question - will you have instructions on how to update you UI Menu if you've already installed an earlier version of this mod? I have so many manual changes at this point that I really don't want to start from scratch.
Yeah - they will do... most of the changes will be function-based - eg you are replacing whole functions.
I'll do my best to make sure it's clear how to do it all manually @Ratatoskr589 - however if you need any help when I eventually do update, then you know where I am, buddy.
@Mr2150 Glad to hear it. And don't worry, I will totally ask. I appreciate all the help so far, it's made my game so much better even with my personal glitchy weirdness. I'm still hoping to that a clean reinstall will fix that and I'll throw my UI Menu back in afterward.
I've played through the whole of BG1EE + Reached chapter 9 of SOD as part of my testing the new changes on a full playthrough and so far I've found only 1 bug in my code so it's looking pretty solid.
@Mr2150 I just got a strange glitch. When I loaded my ToB game just now, all my filters were gone like I didn't have your mod and the last saves from SoA didn't have them either.
But when I started a new game, they reappeared there and now they're back on my other saves as well. I'm not sure if this was an issue with your code or just the fact that my game has problems, but I thought I should mention it. I'll let you know if it happens again.
Not so far. It really just happened on my most recent load - and I'm not sure what caused it. I'll let you know if I manage to do it again. Of course, I can recreate my journal/map note issue even though no one else can.
I do wonder if after this play through you might benefit from a full reinstall, buddy, as it seems you have a few minor glitches and a fresh start might help. Don't forget to backup your UI.menu first.
If you do manage to repeat it or can work out what happened, let me know.
Yeah as soon as I beat ToB I plan to wipe my game and do a clean reinstall. Although, I really don't know how it got messed up in the first place so I'm sort of worried that I'll just end up with the same unrepeatable glitch again.
And I will let you know if I manage to get this glitch again.
Ok, I need a little bit of help here (If ever I find the solution I'll post it, so that you can add it to your file)...
Here's the problem: I hate the black background of the box where your name/hp is (aka box2.pvrz), so I just replaced it with a blank/transparent one (found it somewhere on the web). However, now, the titles of the journal are all blank (cause titles were white on a grey background)
I'm searching currently if there's a way I can change that! Change the text color, for example). I'm not new to modding but totally new to UI.MENU (BGxEE) modding and so, I dunno even where to start...
So, in short, where to find the quest titles in UI.MENU and how can I change the color?
Anyway, if anyone could help, would be cool! P.S. Nearly found it... I'm near but I still need to find the exact position...
Done it! Very easy! You just need to find where what is! Love UI.MENU and bgee.lua! label
{
enabled "questEnabled(rowNumber)"
area 8 0 -1 -1
text lua "getQuestText(rowNumber)"
text style "label"
text color 5 -- added for journal color black on white
align left center
}
So, I added to the "label" (aka quest title) the color 5 (instead of style label usual color B (light blue) And now the quest title is black on white and my name/hp (with tab) isn't black in the background! Happy me! To find it fast, search: text lua "getQuestText(rowNumber)" It's the only one!
@SkarpHulduson You need to create a folder in your game's directory called "override" and put the modified files inside of it. The game will then use those files instead of the default ones.
Wow, this is pretty great. I was wondering though, would it be easy to post just the code that hides completed quests. I'd like to incorporate it with this journal page, from this awesome UI mod. If it's not too much trouble, thank you.
I have sadly found a bug with this fantastic mod. I'm playing BG2:EE, and I'm in chapter 2. I've been ignoring Imoen and have been doing all the side-quests, so my Journal is quite large.
But the bug is that the chat box stops scrolling to the bottom. It stays at the top, which is incredibly frustrating. I can manually scroll it, but it does not scroll on its own.
The problem started when I entered the Umar hills, after completing most other quests in Chapter 2.
Removing the M_JFlang.lua UI.menu files from \Override immediately fixes the problem, and putting them back immediately re-creates it.
I will remove the files for now and put them back in Chapter 3 to see if the problem persists.
I used the manual install. I found something else this mod broke - the Reveal Details button. After I removed this mod, the Reveal Details button would STAY ON!
I must have spent 50+ hours constantly clicking that sucker because it would turn off whenever I did anything with the UI - open the map, open trade, open inventory, etc.
@lefreut I originally installed via quick install, and due to issues after updating to the 2.5 patch (main text box not scrolling) I want to do the manual install as per your suggestion. However, the manual install instructions say "if you don't have a UI.menu then use the QUICK INSTALL." I don't have a UI.menu file since I had no other mods besides this one. Any idea where I can get a "clean" UI.menu file so that I can go through the manual install process? Thanks.
Hi guys, I installed this mod from EEUI Tweaks on a BG2EE 2.5 version. However, the Journal tab does not show any entries at all anymore. I'm already at chapter 2 and there are 0 entries in the journal. But the the Quests tab has no issues, it shows the quests as expected.
I used this same mod while playing BG1 & SOD and did not have any issues(but it was v2.3). I'm not using any other UI Mods. Can anyone please help?
I just started playing BG2EE and the original journal in this game is just atrocious (my eyes were burning trying to distinguish which quests were active and which completed), so thank you so much for this lifesaving mod. However, I had the same problem as mentioned a few posts above - I play the game without any modifications to UI, so I didn't have the file in my override I could edit and using quick install sadly creates a bug, where the main text box is not scrolling properly (it constantly jumps to the top message and you need to scroll it down manually). But! I managed to extract a clean UI.menu from the game, tweaked it the way you described in the manual install section and voila, the bug is gone!
So in case someone has the same problem (game ver. 2.5) and is struggling, but is too stubborn to play with the vanilla journal, I'm adding my UI file to this post - you can try it out and see if it helps (M_JFlang.lua still needs to be copied to the override folder, so don't forget it... like I did and then wondered why some text isn't displayed correctly )
Comments
RE: Textflashes and missing journal entries,
I've been really digging into the way the journal and quest log works and I think I've come up with a robust or more correct messaging system. Firstly, I've made it much more reliable at finding entries (when working with strings in lua there are some special characters that cause problems when searching), and secondly in my new release (probably ~1 week away) instead of just 'journal updated' in the textflash popup that appears there will now be 4 different titles:
1 - "Important Events", this is the primary or main storyline 'quest' that appears at the top of the quest log.
2 - "Quest Updated", this is for side-quests or non-primary quests that appears in the quest log.
3 - "Important Information", this is for standard journal entries that aren't tied directly to quests.
4 - "Information", this is for textflashes that don't have an associated visible entry in the quest or journal.
For me, this represents a truer reflection than just 'Journal Updated' which can be misleading. Clicking the popup takes you directly to the relevant section of the quest log/journal, but in the case of item (4) it adds the information presented as a user entry so that information is no longer 'lost'.
Right-clicking the popup adds the information presented regardless of title (in case you want to save the text and add your own notes to it later).
I still need to do some testing, but so far it works really well...
Although despite my map notes/journal entries being all whacked out, the latest version has been working pretty well. The main issue has been a few more quests not popping up correctly as I mentioned before (often because BG2 marks them done before they are) and hopefully your new version will fix that.
Quick question - will you have instructions on how to update you UI Menu if you've already installed an earlier version of this mod? I have so many manual changes at this point that I really don't want to start from scratch.
I'll do my best to make sure it's clear how to do it all manually @Ratatoskr589 - however if you need any help when I eventually do update, then you know where I am, buddy.
I appreciate all the help so far, it's made my game so much better even with my personal glitchy weirdness. I'm still hoping to that a clean reinstall will fix that and I'll throw my UI Menu back in afterward.
But when I started a new game, they reappeared there and now they're back on my other saves as well. I'm not sure if this was an issue with your code or just the fact that my game has problems, but I thought I should mention it. I'll let you know if it happens again.
If you do manage to repeat it or can work out what happened, let me know.
And I will let you know if I manage to get this glitch again.
Here's the problem:
I hate the black background of the box where your name/hp is (aka box2.pvrz), so I just replaced it with a blank/transparent one (found it somewhere on the web). However, now, the titles of the journal are all blank (cause titles were white on a grey background)
I'm searching currently if there's a way I can change that! Change the text color, for example). I'm not new to modding but totally new to UI.MENU (BGxEE) modding and so, I dunno even where to start...
So, in short, where to find the quest titles in UI.MENU and how can I change the color?
Anyway, if anyone could help, would be cool!
P.S. Nearly found it... I'm near but I still need to find the exact position...Done it! Very easy! You just need to find where what is! Love UI.MENU and bgee.lua!
label { enabled "questEnabled(rowNumber)" area 8 0 -1 -1 text lua "getQuestText(rowNumber)" text style "label" text color 5 -- added for journal color black on white align left center }So, I added to the "label" (aka quest title) the color 5 (instead of style label usual color B (light blue) And now the quest title is black on white and my name/hp (with tab) isn't black in the background! Happy me!
To find it fast, search: text lua "getQuestText(rowNumber)"
It's the only one!
"- Drop the two files into your override."
Somebody want to give me a clue what "my override" is?
But the bug is that the chat box stops scrolling to the bottom. It stays at the top, which is incredibly frustrating. I can manually scroll it, but it does not scroll on its own.
The problem started when I entered the Umar hills, after completing most other quests in Chapter 2.
Removing the M_JFlang.lua UI.menu files from \Override immediately fixes the problem, and putting them back immediately re-creates it.
I will remove the files for now and put them back in Chapter 3 to see if the problem persists.
If you don't want to edit the UI.menu file by hand, the easiest way to install this tweak is to use EEUITweaks.
I must have spent 50+ hours constantly clicking that sucker because it would turn off whenever I did anything with the UI - open the map, open trade, open inventory, etc.
I used this same mod while playing BG1 & SOD and did not have any issues(but it was v2.3). I'm not using any other UI Mods. Can anyone please help?
So in case someone has the same problem (game ver. 2.5) and is struggling, but is too stubborn to play with the vanilla journal, I'm adding my UI file to this post - you can try it out and see if it helps (M_JFlang.lua still needs to be copied to the override folder, so don't forget it... like I did and then wondered why some text isn't displayed correctly