Blueprint File Format Metadata

meta.smbpm

A metafile can contain a huge abundance of information about a blueprint. Storage content, position and volume and shop prizes. Also wireless logic connections, transporter, jump drive/inhibitor, scanner, shipyard, warp gates, race gate positions and targets, information about power, shields, display content, some block amounts, AI configurations. Also location and rotation of docked entities and stuff that is yet unknown. The file is written using Big-endian.
A metadata file with of version v0 to v3 is considered to have positions relative to a core at (8, 8, 8). A blueprint might contain Smd files with a core at (16, 16, 16) and still have a metadata of v3 or lower. In that case all positions of the metadata file need to be adjusted for positions to be consistent.

Header of file

Purpose	Data type
Version	int32

Data

After the version comes a tag. There are 7 known tags that indicate how the bytes that come after them are read. The end of a file is reached if tag id '1' is read, or at the end of the tag id '2' data bytes. A version followed by a 1 byte is the shortest possible metadata file.

Purpose	Data type
Tag	byte

Tag	Data
1	End of file
2	A collection of several Information. Is at the end of a metadata file and replaces tag '1'.
3	Position and orientation of entities docked to a Turret Docking Unit or Docking Module
4	Position and orientation of entities docked to a Rail and wireless connections
5	AI configuration, also contained in tag 2
6	Rail Docker position and orientation.
7	Storage/Factory block positions and their volume

Tag 2

A collection of several Information. Is at the end of a metadata file and replaces tag '1'. The tag byte is followed directly by a tag structure. A tag structure is defined by various tags that indicate a specific data structure. For example '-13'/'13' indicates a list of tag payloads.
This is a summary of one possible structure:

       13: 'container'
       {
           -13: {}  // List of storage blocks and their contents
           3: 'shipMan0' 0,  // unknown
           -13: {-6: 50000.0, -6: 0.0, }  // Power, Aux Power
           6: 'sh' 1000.0,  // Shield
           -13: { }  // shop info for stations, an unknown int64 for ships
          -13: 'a' {}  // Unknown
           -13: {}  // position and content of Display Modules 
           -13: {}  //  A short list of block ids and their amount
           -1: 0,  // Warp gate info, unless it is a ship
           -13:
           {
              13: 'ACD' { }  // Wireless logic
              13: 'TR' { }  // Transporter
              13: 'A'  { }  // Turret Docker.        probably outdated since > v0.1867
              13: 'A'  { }  // Entities docked       probably outdated since > v0.1867
              13: 'J'  { }  // Jump Drive
              13: 'JP'  { }  // Jump Inhibitor
              13: 'SC'  { }  // Scanner
              13: 'SYRD' { }  // Shipyard
           }
          13: 'AIConfig1' {}  //  AI configuration, same as in tag '5'
         -13: { }  // unknown
         -1: 0,  // Race gate info, unless it is a ship
         -13: {}  // unknown
         -13: {}  // unknown
       }

Tag 3

This tag is followed by a list of information about docked entities.

Purpose	Data type
Number of docked entities	int32

Entity Position and orientation of entities docked to a Turret Docking Unit or Docking Module

Purpose	Data type
String length	int16
relative folder path	String[length * char]
Position	int32
Size	[float, float, float]
Style	int16
Orientation	byte

Tag 4

Tag 4 starts with 2 vectors of float values. Metadata files with version two or higher will follow that with a list of Wireless_Logic_Module connections. And lastly, every version will have a list of positions and orientations of entities docked to a Rail.

Purpose	Data type
Unknown	[float, float, float]
Unknown	[float, float, float]

Wireless logic

For Metadata version 2 and higher wireless logic connection are listed here. The (x, y, z) positions are encoded into the int64 values. The bits 0-15 are x, 16-31 is y and 32-47 is z. Bit 48 to 63 are always 0.

Purpose	Data type
String length	int16
Entity label	String[length * char]
Number of wireless connection entries	int32

Wireless logic module entry:

Purpose	Data type
String length	int16
Label	String[length * char]
Position (from)	int64
Position (to)	int64

Docked entities

For every version there will be a list of docked entities.

Purpose	Data type
Number of docked entity entries	int32

Docked entity Entry:

Purpose	Data type
String length	int16
Relative folder path	String[length * char]
Tag structure size	int32
Tag structure	[Tag structure[size]]

This is a tag structure example

       -13:  // Main entity
       {
           -1: 0,  // Unknown, meta version 5. Some older v5 do not have it
           -8: 'MAIN_ENTITY_SHIP_Label',  // Label
           -10: (16, 17, 16),  // Position of Rail
           -2: 662,  // Block Id, Rail Basic
           -1: 10,  // Rail Orientation
           -1: 1,  // Rail Orientation
           -1: 100,  // Rail Hitpoints
       }  
       -13:  // Docked entity
       {
           -1: 0,  // Unknown, meta version 5, sometimes
           -8: 'DOCKED_ENTITY_SHIP_Label',
           -10: (16, 15, 16),  // Position of Rail Docker in the coordinate system of the docked entity.
           -2: 663,
           -1: 14, 
           -1: 1,
           -1: 100,
       }  
       -16: [[1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0], [0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0], [0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0], [0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0]],  // Unknown matrix
       -16: [[1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0], [0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0], [0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0], [0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0]],  // Unknown matrix
       -10: (16, 18, 16),  // Position of Rail Docker of docked entity in the main entity coordinate system
       -16: [[1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0], [0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0], [0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0], [0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0]],  // Unknown matrix
       -1: 0,  // Unknown
       -1: 0,  // Unknown
       -1: 0,  // Unknown

Tag 5

AI configuration, also contained in tag 2 This tag is followed by an integer indicating the byte size of the Tag structure after it.

Purpose	Data type
Tag structure size	int32

       13: 'AIConfig1'
       {
           -13:
           {
               -1: 1,
               -8: 'Ship',
           }
           -13:
           {
               -1: 2,
               -8: 'false',
           }
           -13:
           {
               -1: 0,
               -8: 'Any',
           }
       }

The tag structure contains three Tag payload lists. Each list starts with a byte representing:

Byte	Meaning
0	Target
1	AI Type
2	Active

The byte is then followed by a string:
AI types: "Ship", "Turret", "Fleet"
Target: "Any", "Missiles", "Selected Target", "Astronauts"

Tag 6

Rail Docker position and orientation.

Purpose	Data type
Number of Rail Docker entries	int32

Rail Docker Position and orientation of Rail Docker blocks.

Purpose	Data type
Position	[int32, int32, int32]
Block id	int16
Orientation 1	byte
Orientation 2	byte
Hit points	byte

Tag 7

Storage/Factory block positions and their volume

Purpose	Data type
Position	int64
Volume	Double

The (x, y, z) position is encoded into the int64 value. The bits 0-15 are x, 16-31 is y and 32-47 is z. Bit 48 to 63 are always 0.