To support the multiplayer community in their effort to play as teams, like many Arma clans and squads are trying to, it is possible to create a common information file - the "squad.xml" -, which is stored on a personal webspace or on an FTP server and loaded by the Arma game server, if a member of this team is playing on it.
Beside detailed informations about the single player and its team which can be gained by pressing "P" ingame, the feature supports also a common logo, which will be displayed on vehicles, if such team has boarded it.
If you feel unfamiliar with the XML file format itself and/or have questions about basic XML markup, you are advised to consult literature, documentation (http://www.w3.org/XML) or tutorials (http://www.w3schools.com/xml/default.asp) as fundamental questions about the XML technology itself will not be covered here. There are multiple resources on in the World Wide Web that can help you learning XML.
Squad.xml File Content
The file consist of three main parts:
Head
This part defines the doctype. Just leave it as it is!
<?xml version="1.0"?><!DOCTYPE squad SYSTEM "squad.dtd"><?xml-stylesheet href="squad.xsl" type="text/xsl"?>
Squad properties
<squadnick="ESN"><name>Example Squad Name</name><email>email@example.com</email><web>www.example.com</web><picture>logo.paa</picture><title>Use this e.g. for your squads name or your squads URL</title>
Property
Max-Length
Description
nick
64
The clan-tag, is displayed together with players nickname. Attention: Don't use reserved XML tags -> Link
name
64
Squad name
email
64
Your contact email
web
64
Your Website Address
picture
64
Your logo (optional), it has to in the same folder as the "squad.xml" file
title
64
Squad name, displayed on vehicles manned by squad members
⚠
Do not use any characters beside A-Z, a-z, 0-9 and space in the nick attribute inside the squad element of your squad.xml. This may lead to strange behaviour e.g. the information from your member block is displayed but the information from the squad block is not. So, if your Tag is like "=[TAG]=", put the value like "TAG" into the nick attribute of the squad element.
your Player-UID, always the same and irrespective of your selected character
nick
64
your nick, the same as used with your selected character
name
64
your "real" name...
email
64
your personal email
icq
64
your personal ICQ number
remark
128
as the name says it...
⚠
The value in the nick attribute of the member element must represent the exact name of your player's profile name. If your profile is named "=[ESN]= John" then the the correct XML looks like the above code block.
ⓘ
You can leave any field blank, but it is recommended to fill it with a "N/A" instead.
Extend the members list by adding another XML-"Member" block.
How to get your Player-UID
Start ArmA and select the player edit-menu
In the bottom-right corner you will find your 6-digit UID
Arma 2 player profile
Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead player profile
Arma 3 player profile
Logo Creation
To create a logo for the use with "squad.xml" you'll need:
a bitmap manipulating software (aka "Paintprogram") which is able to handle bitmaps in TGA or JPG format.
For a logo without transparency you can use an ordinary JPG without further treatment. To get transparency you'll have to convert a TGA to PAA format. It is recommended to alwayd use PAA and to avoid alpha blending.
Create the TGA
In this tutorial we'll use GIMP - a open source tool - to create our sample-logo.
⚠
All logos must a have resolution of 2^x / 2^y (e.g. 16 / 16, 32 / 32, 64 / 64, 256 /256)
Step1: Create a new file
Step2: Select the appropriate size of image and set background color to transparency
Step3: Draw your logo and save as TGA, uncheck RLE compression checkbox...
Step4: after selecting TGA this window appears...
As this description only covers 'Gimp', here is an old tutorial made for Flashpoint, using Photoshop 6 and explaining how to get an alphachannel working within the TGA-Picture (Note: If you're using Photoshop 7, you'll need to download patch from adobe, since it does not save alphachannel in targa files). You can stick with 'Texview I' as long as those new tools need time to get published. The whole thing is working the same way like it did in Flashpoint, till now. The linked tutorial was part of newsreports by ofp.info.
Convert TGA to PAA
Your logo should be something like this
Start TexView
Open your "logo.tga"
Save it as "logo.paa" (replace *.tga with *.paa in the "save as"-dialog)
ⓘ
Your are absolutely free to name your logo as you like. The filename "logo.tga" etc. is just an example.
Publish your Squad data
To use the "squad.xml" you'll have to upload the following files to a webspace:
squad.xml (mandatory)
squad.dtd (mandatory)
squad.xsl (optional), needed to show the "squad.xml" in a webbrowser, but isn't needed by the Arma gameserver
logo.paa (optional)
All files will have to be in the same directory!
⚠
.PAA files will not load on IIS 6.0+ without manually adding a custom paa MIME type in the IIS Manager: 'application/octet-stream'
See Microsoft Support: IIS 6.0 does not serve unknown MIME types.
How to use it as a team-member
You have to have your own member-block in the "squad.xml" file
Additionally you have to put the full URL of the "squad.xml" of your team into the "Clanpage" field in the player edit-menu (e.g https://www.example.com/squad.xml). As reference see the picture "Arma UID 2" in section How to get your Player-UID.
<?xml version="1.0"?><!DOCTYPE squad SYSTEM "squad.dtd"><?xml-stylesheet href="squad.xsl" type="text/xsl"?><squadnick=""><name></name><email></email><web></web><picture></picture><title></title><memberid=""nick=""><name></name><email></email><icq></icq><remark></remark></member></squad>
squad.dtd
<!ELEMENT squad (name, email, web?, picture?, title?, member+)><!ATTLIST squad nick CDATA #REQUIRED><!ELEMENT member (name, email, icq?, remark?)><!ATTLIST member id CDATA #REQUIRED nick CDATA #REQUIRED><!ELEMENT name (#PCDATA)><!ELEMENT email (#PCDATA)><!ELEMENT icq (#PCDATA)><!ELEMENT web (#PCDATA)><!ELEMENT picture (#PCDATA)><!ELEMENT title (#PCDATA)><!ELEMENT remark (#PCDATA)>
squad.xsl
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?><xsl:stylesheetversion="1.0"xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"><xsl:templatematch="text()"><xsl:value-ofselect="."/></xsl:template><xsl:templatematch="*"><xsl:apply-templates/></xsl:template><xsl:templatematch="/"><HTML><HEAD><TITLE><xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/name"/></TITLE><LINKREL="stylesheet"TYPE="text/css"HREF="squad.css"></LINK></HEAD><!-- XSL template for "squad.xml", used in "Armed Assault" (Ref: "http://www.armedassault.com") and "{{arma2}}" (Ref: "http://www.arma2.com") See also the Arma-Wiki page: "http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/squad.xml" Created by TomNedry, 26.Jan07 Reviewed by TomNedry, 15.Jul09 License: Creative Common (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/deed.de) To have a squad logo in the HTML output, just put a "sqd_logo.png" in the same folder... --><BODY><!--Main TABLE --><TABLEclass="main"><TR><TDclass="left_row"valign="top"><!-- Squad Info Table --><TABLEclass="sqd_info"><TRheight="30"><TDclass="one"><DIVclass="sqd_name"><xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/name"/></DIV></TD></TR><TRheight="30"><TDclass="two"><DIVclass="sqd_title"><xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/title"/></DIV></TD></TR><TRheight="100%"><TDwidth="100%"height="100%"valign="top"><DIVclass="sqd_logo"><TRheight="100%"><TDwidth="100%"height="100%"valign="top"><DIVclass="sqd_logo"><imgalt="Picture: Squad Logo"><xsl:attributename="src"><xsl:value-ofselect="concat(substring-before(/squad/picture,'.paa'),'.png')"/></xsl:attribute></img></DIV></TD></TR></DIV></TD></TR><TRheight="10"><TDclass="sqd_website">
Web site:
<A><xsl:attributename="href">
http://<xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/web"/></xsl:attribute><xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/web"/></A></TD></TR><TR><TDclass="sqd_email">
e-mail:
<A><xsl:attributename="href">
mailto:<xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/email"/></xsl:attribute><xsl:value-ofselect="/squad/email"/></A></TD></TR></TABLE><!-- Squad Info Table --></TD><TDclass="right_row"valign="top"><!-- Member-Info Table --><TABLEclass="member_info"><Tr><Th>Members</Th><Th>e-mail</Th><Th>ICQ</Th></Tr><xsl:for-eachselect="/squad/member"><TR><xsl:attributename="class"><xsl:choose><xsl:whentest="position() mod 2 = 0">one</xsl:when><xsl:otherwise>two</xsl:otherwise></xsl:choose></xsl:attribute><TDclass="member_name"rowspan="2"><xsl:value-ofselect="name"/></TD><TDclass="member_email"><A><xsl:attributename="href">
mailto:<xsl:value-ofselect="email"/></xsl:attribute><xsl:value-ofselect="email"/></A></TD><TDclass="member_icq"><xsl:value-ofselect="icq"/></TD></TR><TR><xsl:attributename="class"><xsl:choose><xsl:whentest="position() mod 2 = 0">one</xsl:when><xsl:otherwise>two</xsl:otherwise></xsl:choose></xsl:attribute><TDclass="member_remark"colspan="2"valign="top"><xsl:value-ofselect="remark"/></TD></TR></xsl:for-each></TABLE><!-- Member Info Table --><!--Main TABLE --></TD></TR></TABLE><pstyle="font-family:verdana;font-size:7pt;color:darkgrey;text-align:center;padding:10px;">
"squad.xsl" by <strong>TomNedry</strong>, last change: 15.Jul09
</p></BODY></HTML></xsl:template></xsl:stylesheet>
/* CSS template for "squad.xml", used in "Armed Assault" (Ref: "http://www.armedassault.com") and "{{arma2}}" (Ref: "http://www.arma2.com") See also the Arma-Wiki page: "http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/squad.xml" Created by TomNedry, 26.Jan07 Reviewed by TomNedry, 15.Jul09 License: Creative Common (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/deed.de)*/body{font-family:Arial;background-color:#eaece5;margin:0;}a:link{text-decoration:none;color:#800000;}a:visited{text-decoration:none;color:#800000;}a:hover{text-decoration:none;color:#ffffff;}a:active{text-decoration:none;}a:focus{text-decoration:none;}th{background-color:#aeb399;font-family:Arial;font-size:10pt;font-weight:bold;padding:4px;}tr.one{background-color:#dde4c3;width:100%;padding:4px;}tr.two{background-color:#d2d9b8;width:100%;padding:4px;}td.one{background-color:#aeb399;width:100%;}td.two{background-color:#e2e9c7;width:100%;}.main{text-align:center;width:100%;border:0solid#333333;}div.sqd_name{text-align:center;font-family:Arial;font-size:12pt;font-weight:bold;}div.sqd_title{text-align:center;font-family:Arial;font-size:10pt;}div.sqd_logo{text-align:center;font-size:8pt;padding:5px;}.sqd_info{border:1pxdotteddarkgrey;width:100%;padding:0;border-spacing:0;}.sqd_website{font-family:Arial;font-size:10pt;text-align:center;background-color:#aeb399;width:100%;padding:4px;border-spacing:0;}.sqd_email{font-family:Arial;font-size:10pt;text-align:center;background-color:#aeb399;width:100%;padding:4px;border-spacing:0;}.left-row{vertical-align:top;height:100%;}.right-row{vertical-align:top;height:100%;}.member_info{border:1pxdotteddarkgrey;width:100%;padding:0;border-spacing:0;}.member_name{font-family:Arial;color:black;font-size:10pt;padding:4px;}.member_email{font-family:Arial;color:black;font-size:8pt;padding:4px;}.member_icq{font-family:Arial;color:black;font-size:8pt;padding:4px;}.member_remark{font-family:Arial;color:black;font-size:8pt;text-align:center;}
These hosters allow you to create and edit Arma 3 squad.xml files directly online and you will be provided with a unique link to your squad.xml to put into your game profile.
Arma Squads XML Hoster/Editor Support all image formats and online image to PAA conversion for transparent squad logos