Here is a trial build of the Qt-tileedit version I've been working on. This should work stand-alone without the need of installing any Qt runtimes. It has all the functionality of the original Matlab version, with a few notable additions:
- It can read from compressed archives as well as the cache (i.e. the individual tile files arranged in the directory tree). Use File | Configure to select read preferences. It has the same options as Orbiter itself.
- It can display 2x2 tile blocks instead of individual tiles, to make it easier to edit across tile boundaries. Again, select in File | Configure.
- It has a few eyecandy options for the elevation display. Select in Elevation | Configure. For Earth, try in particular the topographic colour maps and the "Display water mask" options.
- If you try to edit a non-existent elevation tile (i.e. one that has been synthesised from an ancestor sub-region), tileedit will warn you and give you the option to create that tile.
General usage should be pretty obvious. Load a planet tileset via File | Open, and pick the base directory of the planet's tileset, generally <orbiterroot>/Textures/<planet-name>. Select the layers you want to display via the dropdown lists for each of the three displays. Navigate the quadtree by moving over the images and clicking, or by entering a tile designation directly in the top left field.
There is some elevation editing capability (click the right "Action" button to access it). This is currently still very limited (essentially the same as the Matlab version), but I'll work on that next. If you want to try it, make sure you have a backup of your tileset in case things are going wrong. Changes are always written to the "Elev_mod" layer, so you can undo changes by deleting the relevant tiles in that layer, as long as you remember which ones are from your edit. One exception is if you created a new elevation tile in order to edit. This will create an entry in the "Elev" layer.
Let me know of any problems, and any additional features you would like to see. Even more welcome with code to go along with it. The sources are in
https://github.com/mschweiger/orbiter-tileedit.
I do seem to get the occasional (infrequent) CTD when moving the mouse in and out of a tile display, which looks to be related to an infinite loop in the Qt notification chain. If any Qt-savvy coder can reproduce that and has a solution, I'd be very grateful.