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[Maklak]

> continuous, large memory structures are problematic.
Yeah, memory gets fragmented over time and there may not be sth that big available, even though there is more than enough memory.
That said, AFAIK C# garbage collector can compact the heap by relocating memory chunks and changing the addresses of all references to that chunk, so it should work.

The only things I can recommend are to buy more RAM and compile for 64 bits.

[Skyrunner]

16 GB of RAM and 64 bit compilation with optimization, still no dice. I think that there is a certain cutoff size in Bitmap() where it automatically throws an argument exception to prevent the allocation issues in the first place...

edit: Actually it randomly worked again. ._. Kinda annoying.

[Telgin]

While I wouldn't discount it, I am a bit surprised that heap fragmentation would matter for even a ~1 GB allocation in a 64-bit application.  The C# / .NET memory allocator might place extra restrictions that prevent allocations like that, but using virtual addressing and a 64-bit memory range (technically something like 48-bits due to processor limitations) should allow for plenty of huge memory ranges.  I was going to suggest turning your page file back on if you had it disabled, but honestly, with 16 GB of physical memory I seriously doubt that would make any difference.

I'm not really sure what you should try at this point.  In C++ I might would suggest manually allocating your memory by allocating a very, very large memory block up front in the application (say, 3 GB) and then parceling out the memory yourself.  I think you can do some scary stuff with pointers in C# somehow, but is definitely getting outside of normal usage of the language, and is probably not going to really help.

It could also be that the data structure is reserving a lot more space than it's using.  I know the STL containers in C++ can do this, and have member functions that allow the programmer to manage that to an extent.  Maybe you can find something useful there?

[Skyrunner]

Oh well, it just means that I'll have to actually make custom bezier functions instead of letting a graphics library do the work for me

[Vattic]

Oh well, it just means that I'll have to actually make custom bezier functions instead of letting a graphics library do the work for me

Curved rivers?

[Skyrunner]

Oh well, it just means that I'll have to actually make custom bezier functions instead of letting a graphics library do the work for me

Curved rivers?

Curved rivers.

[Gatleos]

Are feelings of megalomania normal after learning regular expressions, or is it just me?

[MagmaMcFry]

Are feelings of megalomania normal after learning regular expressions, or is it just me?

Neither; regular expressions are just that awesome.

[Orange Wizard]

Are feelings of megalomania normal after learning regular expressions, or is it just me?

Neither; regular expressions are just that awesome.

And despite their usefulness, I don't recall using them for any reason since learning them...

[Putnam]

Try DF raw modding. You'll have to get used to them.

[Telgin]

Regular expressions come up all the time for me with web development, for many different reasons.  The most recent example would be a bit unrelated though: adjusting a JavaScript 'compiler' script I wrote to package our in house JavaScript library.  I had to add in something like C preprocessor commands, such as 'INCLUDE file.js'.  Regular expressions make it so easy to grab file.js out of that.

Of course, regular expressiosn are also some of the more maddening things I've had to work with.  Case in point: Apache .htaccess rewrite rules.  The problem is kind of compounded by the fact that you're potentially upsetting a web server with only minimal ability to give you feedback if you get it wrong, but I really hate writing rewrite rules that rely on regular expressions.

There's a saying about regular expressions.  "If you've got a problem, and solve it with regular expressions, now you've got two problems."  It's true pretty often. 

[Maklak]

Regexps come up pretty often in text processing, like reading DF RAWs or something to do with the web or what have you. Another common application is searching text files for expressions. Plus you can do things like re-format phone numbers, hacky xml processing and so on.

Regexes are one of great strengths of scripting languages, like Perl, Python, Ruby, Lua, etc.

They can get quite arcane and messy pretty quick and a good syntax-highlighting and brace-matching text editor can only help so far, so they can get unpleasant.

There is a book called "Mastering Regular Expressions" and I've heard it's good, but haven't read it yet.

Anyway, I think it is OK to feel good because you know regexps

Now my question is about users more than programming. I wrote some scripts to make a subset of RAWs into tables and wrote manuals for that. The surprisingly problematic parts come down to things like:

Code: [Select]

To do this, execute it with these parameters:
$ perl -w ../armour.pl --bbcode --sort=LAYER *.txt > ../armour_bb.txt
To which the users respond with:
1) I'm afraid to use the console.
2) I don't have perl.
3) When I write "$ ..." the console says it's an error, but it works without it. 
4) My console doesn't understand the *, but it works after I fed it a list of files manually. 

These things keep coming up, despite me writing that:
1) Like any power tool, it is only dangerous when misused. Watch where you're re-directing that standard output and you'll be OK.
2) A bunch of install links.
3) What? The "$" is just the prompt sign, that means more or less "write the things after this in the console". This convention is used by so many tutorials and howtos that I'm surprised you know how to use a console, but not to omit the dollar.
4) Usually a case of putting the whole command in quotes or pointing to the wrong directory.

Number 3 is especially weird. Is there some other convention for this that I'm not aware of? Or maybe something to put in the manual to make users less frustrated and me less confused about it?

[Sheb]

Actually I wasn't aware of this convention until right now.

[miauw62]

Windows console doesn't have the dollar, it may be that.

[da_nang]

Is there a particular need to point out the $ when writing out what to type into the console?
Most of the console related commands I've seen on webpages are usually typed without the initial $ (or > in Windows).

For instance, random code pulled out of the Bash manual:

Code: [Select]

echo -n "Enter the name of an animal: "
read ANIMAL
echo -n "The $ANIMAL has "
case $ANIMAL in
  horse | dog | cat) echo -n "four";;
  man | kangaroo ) echo -n "two";;
  *) echo -n "an unknown number of";;
esac
echo " legs."