Written at 13:14 on Monday, 17 May 2004 by Delphy

Have you done any work on actually decoding the .package files themselves?

Written at 13:55 on Monday, 17 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)

Nope - they're a lot harder than the Sims2Skin files, and I only have a limited amount of time for hacking them.

C-yAh,

ChEeTaH

*************
Webmaster of this site
The Neighborhood Handler: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/tnhh
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Written at 18:15 on Monday, 17 May 2004 by Delphy

Okay just checking.

I've done quite a lot of work decoding the file format - almost to the point where I can extract files but having problems with the filenames list.

Was wondering if you had done some work, but ah well :)

Written at 10:34 on Tuesday, 18 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)

Specifications of the Sims2Skin file format are included in the program (since version 0.2). They can also be found at TheSimsWorkshop.

C-yAh,

ChEeTaH

*************
Webmaster of this site
The Neighborhood Handler: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/tnhh
*************

Written at 11:12 on Tuesday, 18 May 2004 by Delphy

Thats fine but I'm interested in the .package files :D

Written at 20:27 on Tuesday, 18 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)
\nEdited at 20:55 on Tuesday, 18 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)

D'Oh! Could you perhaps e-mail me what you've found out so far, I got a couple of things but I'm not getting very far yet (too little time). Thanks.

Edit: Just found out the same file format is used for SimCity 4 (BAT stuff at least). Perhaps the SimCity community has some more info already, so I'll be e-mailing some people in the SC scene later today.

Edit 2: I just found something else interesting: file specifications of the file format! http://www.watto.org/extract/program/dat_dbpf.html for more details. The Type/Group/File ID (in the "Directory Entries" part) seem to be the Type/Group/Instance values as described at http://www.simtropolis.com/modfiles/content.cfm?section=Specifications&detail=144. If you find anything else interesting, let me know!

C-yAh,

ChEeTaH

*************
Webmaster of this site
The Neighborhood Handler: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/tnhh
*************

Written at 23:05 on Tuesday, 18 May 2004 by Delphy

k I checked the SC4 .dat files and they are similar to the Sims 2 Body Shop .package files.

The Watto Game Extractor Sims Online class *can* extract the .package files but there are no filenames.

Thanks for the heads up

Written at 10:40 on Wednesday, 19 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)

Mind you, there are no filenames stored in the package files at all. It takes autodetection to find out what kind of file you're opening. Since most filetypes have default (and unique) headers that shouldn't be too hard really.

I'll be working on a tool to extract/combine package files this weekend, that should be out pretty soon (give me a couple of days, perhaps a week and a bit) :-)

C-yAh,

ChEeTaH

*************
Webmaster of this site
The Neighborhood Handler: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/tnhh
*************

Written at 11:15 on Wednesday, 19 May 2004 by Delphy
\nEdited at 13:24 on Wednesday, 19 May 2004 by Delphy

If you look at some of the actual extracted files though they do contain filenames but no extension. This combined with the TGI information should give the complete details.

I already had 75% of the code for that DBPF file format already done up, so it wont be a huge leap to provide a proper extractor... should have it by the end of the weekend :D

What language do you program in? VB6 is my choice

Edit: I'm looking at the code for the format_DAT_DPBF.class file from the Game Extractor program now and it should be fairly easy to change this to match the Sims 2 TGI information. Have to brush up my Java though - haven't programmed in it for a few years :)

Written at 18:21 on Wednesday, 19 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)
\nEdited at 17:59 on Thursday, 20 May 2004 by ChEeTaH (TSZ Webmaster) (ChEeTaH)

I program in C++ mostly (Borland C++ Builder). I've e-mailed WATTO, he said he had problems opening the TS2BodyShopStarter.package file with his tool. I can't check that out at the moment though (not at home). What I have seen briefly, is that it seems that Body Shop packs XML files in the .package files - I guess those contain useful information about the included files. Please e-mail me, perhaps we can work on something together and get some more information. Thanks :-)

Edit: TS2BodyShopStarter.package file loads up fine for me. I'm gonna check out some more things tomorrow.

Edit 2: The file format is slightly harder than it seems to be at first. Don't expect a tool from me in the near future after all. Instead, get DatGen from the Mod section at SimTropolis to edit package files - SimCity Dats are in the same format.

C-yAh,

ChEeTaH

*************
Webmaster of this site
The Neighborhood Handler: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/tnhh
*************

Written at 17:38 on Tuesday, 24 August 2004 by Alex Jhin (DmGoober)

Have y'all had any more luck decoding what the actual files within the package do? Viewing them using DatGen reveals a couple of XML files, which are easy enough to parse, some files that appear to contain deltas to the skeletons, which are easy to parse, and some files which seems to contain the actual mesh data (contain the string cGeometryDataContainer) which are nearly impossible to parse.

Written at 00:42 on Sunday, 29 August 2004 by DarkMatter

A new home for my program DatGen has been created at www.datgen.info. Hop on over and take a look. This new version aims to be more flexible and extensible than the first. Hopefully, it can be extended to better support TSO and TS2 data files, in addition to SC4 files.

Author of DatGen - DBPF File Editor

Written at 15:26 on Monday, 7 March 2005 by can (candace19804)

how do i upload the files to website like this on sims2.com and simsnetwork.com thats my question anyone know please help me