In a burst of free time I didn't really have, a couple of years ago I actually implemented ship design, character generation (basic and advanced), and UWP data for every mainworld from Stiatlchepr to Mikhail.
For the mainworld data, I looked all over the web... and discovered that there was no one reliable source. A lot of sectors had no canon data that I could discover anywhere on the web (especially up in Vargr and K'Kree space); a lot of data was post-Rebellion (where I wanted the
ante bellum data); and the data on several sites occasionally conflicted.
So I did the best I could, rationalizing disagreements as seemed to make the most sense, converting unexplained (presumably IMTU) codes to reasonable canon options, and filling in unavailable sector data with my own data (using a sector data generator I had to write). Putting all this data into my regularized version of the semi-standard .sec format and cleaning up various forms of weirdness, I then used yet another Java application to convert all the UWP data to XML files (one per sector with an additional XML file as a master sector information file)
Doing this allows me to read those XML files directly in the UWP browser part of my overall program. All except for the initial dot-map page, that is -- that has to be generated as a static .PNG image since it would take several minutes to read all the XML files to get a dot for each mainworld. The sector and world data displays are dynamic, though.
(Those who know XML will no doubt be rolling their eyes and complaining that of course performance blows; XML is a data interchange spec, not a database... and they're absolutely right. Two reasons persuaded me to use XML: 1) No additional software other than Java would be needed for someone else to run this program since it includes XML-reading capability natively, as opposed to requiring people to obtain and set up MySQL or some other database. 2) I thought that some day I might want to post or distribute my version of the Traveller sector data, in which case storing it in XML might make it relatively easy for others to import it. OK, maybe not great reasons, but between them XML seemed like a reasonable choice among a bunch of less-than-stellar options available to me at the time.)
There are still a lot of features I'd like to add some day to the sector map code: a trade and xboat routes overlay, fully-populated star systems rather than just mainworlds (I also implemented the MT World Builder's Guide as a standalone Java application long ago), icosahedral world maps, text-mode library data for interesting worlds, user-definable colors for representing the political allegiance of mainworlds, and so on. And ultimately my goal was to include all these systems as support tools in an actual game. Of course the time required to accomplish
that bit is, shall we say, troublesome to come by, what with remaining gainfully employed and all.
At any rate, getting good, complete, and reasonably canonical mainworld data for all the named sectors of known Traveller space can be done... but if my experience is any guide, it will take time and effort.
But hey, if you enjoy rationalizing systems of complex data the way I do, maybe you'll have fun accumulating and straightening out the Traveller data, too.
Good luck!
--Flatfingers
