Army Transport Planner

This is a utility for planning layouts of trays for Sabol's Army Transport. It allows you to play with different layouts to find the patterns which maximize your use of space.

Installation

System requirements for the ATPlanner are minimal. Your screen should be set to a resolution of at least 1024x768 for best use, however.

To run this application, you will need a Java Runtime Environment v1.4.2 or newer. If you do not currently have a JRE installed, you can download them here:

Windows
Macintosh

Once you have downloaded and installed the JRE, installation of the Army Transport Planner is simple. Download this file:

ATPlanner.jar

...and place it anywhere you like on your system. Once it is there, simply double-click to run. Data and configuration files will be created automatically.

UPDATE:
Some people have reported problems with Windows renaming the JAR file, or otherwise causing problems. The download below is a ZIP file which contains the JAR. If you have problems downloading the JAR directly, download this instead, and unzip the JAR file into the directory of your choice.

ATPlanner.zip

Instructions

Use of the Army Transport planner is very straightforward.

You have to create a tray to work on it. Once you do so, select the boxes in the grid at the right to determine the pattern which will be added. The upper-left corner box will be the one which the mouse points to when you place the cutout on the grid. For ease of use, you should always include the upper-left corner as part of your cutout.

Once you have the pattern you like, give the box a name and press the Add button. Move to the grid, and place the pattern wherever you like. You can press the Add button again to add another identical cutout, and place that one, or use the Reset button to clear the selection grid and create a new pattern. The Reset button only affects the template grid, not the entire tray.

The pattern can be rotated before being placed by using the 'r' (clockwise) and 'e' (counterclockwise) keys. Clicking the mouse will place the cutout where it is currently shown.

Once the cutout is placed, you can hover over it to see the name you gave it. Clicking on a cutout will select it, and you can reposition it at will. Pressing the DELETE key will remove the cutout from the template.

Cutouts can be saved, saved with a new name, and deleted.

It's really that simple!

Key Shortcuts

r : Rotate current cutout clockwise
e : Rotate current cutout counterclockwise
Alt+a : Shortcut for the Add button
DEL : Delete current cutout

Advanced

There are a few advanced tricks you can use in ATPlanner, though none of them are required.

First, you can select multiple areas as part of a single cutout, as seen here:



This will be treated as a single cutout, and can be placed and moved together. This will save some time when you're dealing with a squad you'd like to keep together, for instance.

You can also customize the colors for the display using the Edit Colors... option. Click on the color to change it. Border color is used for the lines between squares. Background is used for standard blocks, where you would still have foam in your tray. Cut squares will be used to show missing foam, while Working and Selected will display cutouts you're currently dealing with.

Comments and Suggestions

The ATPlanner is a program I threw together quickly, for my own use. Still, comments, suggestions, and bug reports are always appreciated. Please feel free to email me at armies.immoren@gmail.com if you have any suggestions or comments.