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[mickel]

A new option that would be useful besides "repeat" and "suspend" would be "automate". If you want your kitchen to automatically make basic meals whenever something is available to cook, you make the appropriate task and set it to automate. It differs from repeat in two ways - it doesn't disappear when there's nothing else to cook, and it has lower priority.

Whenever you make a new task, it automatically gets put above the automation task in the queue, just as one-shot tasks should automatically rise above repeat tasks.

[Haedrian]

This is very much needed, especially for fishcleaning and ore smelting

[irmo]

quote:Originally posted by mickel:
<STRONG>A new option that would be useful besides "repeat" and "suspend" would be "automate". If you want your kitchen to automatically make basic meals whenever something is available to cook, you make the appropriate task and set it to automate. It differs from repeat in two ways - it doesn't disappear when there's nothing else to cook, and it has lower priority.</STRONG>

For this to work, jobs need to be smart enough to sit and wait for resources instead of auto-canceling.  (The way "Tan hide" and "Butcher animal" do now.)  At that point it makes sense to allow all jobs to do it, and what you're talking about is just a repeat job.

[Capntastic]

I think some shops have this- but it would be good if it were more consistent.

[Lightning4]

quote:Originally posted by Haedrian:
<STRONG>This is very much needed, especially for fishcleaning and ore smelting</STRONG>

Well, ore smelting isn't as good of an idea, because moods can demand raw ore. Wouldn't be pretty if there isn't any left.

[Deathworks]

Hi!

Irmo: I think your description seems incorrect. There are no tan or butcher jobs if there is no raw material available. They are generated when it becomes available and get cancelled when it isn't (for instance when the dwarves wait so long that that deer corpse begins to rot).

In addition, repeat jobs get cancelled when you run out of raw material and they are not regenerated. And they don't change their position in the queue. Instead, once they are done, a new job is created at the bottom of the queue.

As I mentioned in another thread, there are a few jobs, like fish cleaning or fat rendering that would work really well with automatization. With others, like milling, the still, the farm workshop, and the kitchen, because there are different possibilities (like will you brew the pig tail or make cloth out of it, or what kind of meal should be produced once food becomes available). Thus, another interface as suggested by Mickel seems to be necessary if these are to be automated.

Deathworks

[irmo]

quote:Originally posted by Deathworks:
<STRONG>Hi!

As I mentioned in another thread, there are a few jobs, like fish cleaning or fat rendering that would work really well with automatization. With others, like milling, the still, the farm workshop, and the kitchen, because there are different possibilities (like will you brew the pig tail or make cloth out of it, or what kind of meal should be produced once food becomes available). Thus, another interface as suggested by Mickel seems to be necessary if these are to be automated.
</STRONG>

OK, I think I see where the confusion is.

The tannery wasn't the best example, as it detects the presence of material and then creates a job.  This obviously doesn't work if there's more than one thing to do with that material.

What I'm suggesting is that all jobs should be set up to wait, instead of canceling, if they're missing materials.  Then repeating jobs act exactly like the automated jobs you're describing.  You build your fishery and add a repeating "Clean a fish" job to the queue.  That job runs until you're out of raw fish, then it goes into waiting mode.  As soon as a new fish becomes available, the job resumes and claims the fish.  The end result is the same, but without any new interface stuff and with a general improvement to the behavior of jobs.

[mickel]

The "wait" mode would be new interface stuff, so I don't see what you're getting at there.

An improvement on the "automate" would be a separate menu for workshops, where you may set what tasks may or may not be automated and what priority they should have. It would be like the kitchen menu where you set what may or may not be cooked, except with sliders.

If, for example, "cook easy meal" had automation priority 1 and "cook fine meal" had automation priority 1 as well, a "cook easy meal" job would get generated as soon as two ingredients were available. Crank "cook fine meal" up one notch however, and it'd "wait and see" for a bit if more ingredients turn up so it can generate a "cook fine meal" instead.

[Deathworks]

Hi!

Now I understand what you were trying to say, Irmo. I thought you were talking about the current state and not about a suggestion of your own. Sorry.

Indeed, improving the 'r'epeat function so that wait is used instead of cancellation would be a very simple and effective approach to the automatization issue.

Deathworks

[hactar1]

This sounds pretty much like what the Manager noble is for...  just make sure there are some meals in the Manager queue, and the kitchens will keep trying to cook meals until they succeed.  What would be a nice improvement is allowing Manager jobs to repeat automatically, instead of requiring that you renew the job every 30 work units.

[irmo]

quote:Originally posted by hactar1:
<STRONG>This sounds pretty much like what the Manager noble is for...  just make sure there are some meals in the Manager queue, and the kitchens will keep trying to cook meals until they succeed.  What would be a nice improvement is allowing Manager jobs to repeat automatically, instead of requiring that you renew the job every 30 work units.</STRONG>

What would be a really nice improvement (once this waiting-state thing is in) is the Manager noticing that jobs are waiting for materials, and putting in workorders for those materials (assuming they're things that can be manufactured).  Then you could just enter a workorder (or a workshop job, either way) for, say, bronze helms, and if you ran out of bronze, the job would go on hold and the Manager would request some more.