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Site: S-Plan
slot racing software for the masses |
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Site: S-Plan
slot racing software for the masses |
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| How and when did I become interested in slot racing? |
| I guess from about 8 or 9 I was aware of slot racing in the form of
Scalextric. A neighbour had a set with some Formula 1 cars, stock cars and
a lap counter. I was occasionally invited in to have a go but I never managed
to get a set myself. I had inherited a train set from my cousin but was never
particularly interested; it always seemed to be that you either had a Scalextric
set or a train set as a youngster, never both... and I had a train set!
Then during the run up to Christmas 1993 my wife was stuck for inspiration for my present that year so she asked what I would like. For some unknown reason and right out of the blue I immediately answered "A Scalextric set". I don't think she took me seriously because she asked the same question a few days later - I still gave the same answer! Come Christmas day she produced a rather large box which could only be one thing - a Formula 1 set with a respectable amount of track, well more than just an oval anyway! The two cars were the blue and white Tyrell and the B189 Benetton. We had no time to play with it on Christmas Day what with listening to the Queen's speech and all, but that was remedied on Boxing Day when I raced with my Brother-In-Law, nephew and nieces for a few hours (or so)! Within a few months I'd bought some more cars and discovered that
there was a thriving second hand market for Scalextric track, making it possible
to build much more challenging circuits without too much expense. But there
still seemed to be something missing... |
| Early Lap Timing Programs |
| I soon found that I became bored just driving round and round a circuit,
particularly as most of the time I was on my own. I needed someone or something
to compete against. This was when I decided to write my first lap timing
program. At the time I had a BBC computer with a limited amount of memory
but I still managed to write a reasonable lap timer program that could retain
the best lap times for each car - slot racing then entered the realm of being
like a computer game with a best score that had to be beaten. Suddenly slot
racing became addictive rather than mundane and boring - it was then that
I realised the true potential of lap timing.
In November 1994 I bought a PC and very soon after a copy of Visual Basic. I immediately started re-writing my lap timing program to run on the PC. If nothing else it would be a good way of learning to program in Visual Basic - something that I have never regretted, nor my current employers for that matter! At that time my wife was still a school teacher and I was invited
to bring my Scalextric set and lap timer along as one of the attractions for
the Christmas Bazaar. I had just about got a preliminary version of the PC
lap timer up and running by that time, but during setup it became obvious
that it wasn't going to be reliable enough so I had to dash home to get
the trusty BBC. The event went very well and became a regular attraction
over the next 3 years with all subsequent events using gradually improving
versions of the Visual Basic software on 4 lane circuits. It was good to
see the same people coming back each year trying to settle old scores!
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| How did S-Plan come about? |
| Very early on with my lap timing programs I realised I needed a way
of accurately recording what a circuit looked like so that it could be rebuilt
exactly when I wanted to try and beat my best lap times at a later date. Recording
on paper was the only way at the time but I knew that a computer program
would be much better - albeit very difficult and challenging to write.
At the time, January 1997, I was subscribing to a magazine called
Slot Car Monthly (does anyone remember SCM?) and the editor asked the readership
if anyone was aware of any good track design programs - that was all the
encouragement I needed. I decided to shelve development work on the lap timer
software and start work on a track design program. |
| S-Plan Development |
| I knew writing a track design program was going to be difficult, particularly
as I had no experience in the graphical aspects of Visual Basic programming
but it still took at lot longer than expected - about 20 months in all (approx.
500 man hours of programming).
S-Plan was finally launched at the NSCC Evesham swopmeet on 20th September 1998. To say it was tight to meet that deadline would be an understatement - I had many late nights in the final week before launch culminating in me still programming, printing instructions and copying onto discs at 3am on the morning of the swopmeet. I then had to get up at 6am for a 100 mile plus drive from Camberley to Evesham - but I made it and the product was launched. The swopmeet itself was very quiet but I still managed to sell 4 copies. I also went to the Bishops Stortford NSCC swopmeet in November where I sold another 4 copies. But the turning point was when Alan Slade reviewed S-Plan in the January 1999 issue of the NSCC newsletter - I received anything upto 3 orders each night for the succeeding 3 weeks after the review. I went to the Milton Keynes NSCC swopmeet in February and sold a further 5 copies. It was at Milton Keynes that I launched S-Plan Viewer , giving it away free to anyone who had stopped to see a demo but had not decided to buy - generally due to the fact that they'd spent all their swopmeet budget on all the latest cars or rare collectors items! I continued to make minor improvements to S-Plan during 1999 but the year 2000 heralded the start of development work on what was to be known as S-Plan V2. What was initially envisaged to be a 3 month project ended up taking almost the whole year. S-Plan V2 was finally completed on 24 November 2000. Version 1 sold almost 200 hundred copies. S-Plan V2 with it's much improved interface had the potential to sell a whole lot more - and it did. In January 2001 a total of 31 copies were sold with a similar number sold in February giving a "one-sale-a-day" average. For the Milton Keynes NSCC swapmeet in February 2001 a few minor enhancements were made (version 2.01) including the addition of the much requested and long awaited Goodwood chicane and pit stop sections. Support for a third track system, Carrera 1/24th scale, was also added. I then took a bit of a break from software development on S-Plan. By mid 2002 Scalextric had already released their new Sport track system which was by then starting to sell very well. Naturally many S-Plan customers were asking when S-Plan would be supporting the new track system. With renewed enthusiasm work was started on version 3. This took longer than expected because in supporting the new track system I also wanted to make it possible to connect different track systems together - not as easy to implement as I first thought. The work took well over 6 months with the eventual release being at the NSCC Milton Keynes swapmeet on 9th February 2003. Rest assured that S-Plan development will continue. I already have a customer wish list just waiting to be programmed in! |
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