Hi there,
I recently wrote some code to validate race files in exactly the same way that the game does, and realised how easily it could be expanded upon to be able to validate areas in the same way.
What I'm looking for is a volunteer (or maybe a couple of volunteers?) who would be prepared to do the bulk of the work of extending the race file validator to validate area files. The code is written in python and is pretty simplistic, to be able to assist with this you would need access to python (can be downloaded from www.python.org) and a few area files which you know are valid to check it against.
Anyone who is able to help, send me a PM and let me know what kind of experience you have with both python and with area files. A really expert offline builder should be able to assist alot even with little or no python experience.
Thanks!
Mask