Nice  work Azazello. By the way, just added in an gui-based auto-installer  today for new folks, could you add it in as well? Thanks.

Okay. Do you want the current bullet to stay there, or replace it with the auto-installer link?

Just updated it to auto-download + auto-installer The current link is fine, you can just change the desc

The SMM package with the goal that the player does not have to do any testing or bugfixing in order to get a MegaInstall up and running. Includes an auto-download & auto-installation process.

Also, do you feel the auto-installer is a Beginner tool?

Actually the auto-installer is a generic toolbox i created. It could be used for other custom installations as well simply by changing some values in the config.xml file. Just that I didn't release documentation on it to confuse pple. So rightfully, its not a beginner tool, rather a time-saving tool.

The SMM package is generally more suitable for pple who just want a standard mega-mod installation, and don't really need to customise their installation.

They gave us only one version, and we accepted it didn't we?

Unfortunately, the version number might be the same, but there are slight differences between different editions of the game. For example, BGT-WeiDU doesn't install correctly on the Atari Compilation.

Ah, good point. I suspect though that the actual storyline, npcs, gameplay, kits, quest, dialogs etc probably wouldn't differ much.

Well, it seems to me that the smaller updates are causing the most problems at the moment, FR-RoV breaking Irenicus' Dungeon with BGT-WeiDU being the prime example. As such, the mega-mod is perhaps more focused on ironing out the problems with the smaller mods than the larger ones.

Noted, and will bear this in mind. Hope to ease the problems from the smaller mods by keeping the components consistent between the current installation & the next one. That could be one measure to increase the chances of suppressing conflicts.

Nevertheless, mega-modification compatibility is really a specialisation within itself, and requires someone with proficiency in bug identification and fixing skills, where probably until recently no one has had sufficient expertise, interest, and time, to take that role.

Agree with you, which is why the search is only looking for a usable mega-mod installation that can at least bring a non-modder from start to end without major complications, perhaps with a guide in mind. The strategy here is when two components conflict, the priority is to avoid the component totally rather than fix it with a patch, unless absolutely necessary. The worst thing to happen to a player is him reaching the end of the story, and realise that he cant complete it because of such and such.

The plan looks fine ot me. Be sure to make the auto-installer as flexible as possible so that you don't need any massive re-writes once you update.

Yes, I insist that the installer be configurable even as of today (lessons learnt from the past). In fact, even the message prompting and interfacing with the batch files are independent. I haven't done any technical docs to avoid confusing pple.

Thanks again Ascension64, your points have been really helpful.

Hi SimDing0

Thanks for the update. Actually, the main reason for doing this is to make an assessment of how long I can stretch the time-frame of keeping a consistent versioning of an auto-installation for newbies, ie. before older mods version are lost from authorised mirrors.

Ascension64 has provided a great deal of insight so far in this post http://www.shsforums...showtopic=30979. And I'm considering a couple of practical approaches to deal with the reality of the modding culture, while trying to achieve a simple fuss-free installation.

Note: I'll consolidate the schedule again over this sunday.

Hi Ble, may I suggest you try to seek help from the mega-mod forum http://www.shsforums...p?showforum=193 instead and link back to this post.

Good luck

It can, as you see.


And, erm...So, i've got: Original SoA/TB, SoS, TDD, CtB, TS, Rot,  and two BGT (One with Elminster&sword.)

Which i have to use?
(And i hope this is  correct Setup-GUI.)

It would be good if someone would tell me this step-by-step. In simple English.

Oh ok. Btw, if you don't mind an standard english mega-mod installation, you may wanna try this
http://www.shsforums...showtopic=30695

else if you have custom mods you want, this will be more useful
http://www.shsforums...showtopic=29916

Forgive me if i'm wrong. Are you installing partly in english & partly in polish? Didn't realise that can be done.

Most useful. Thank you the bigg.

Much appreciated. Thank you

(a) Either a more fluid approach to bug reporting is needed, with a proper online bug tracking management system.

The Wiki idea at the Big World Project thread was interesting. It is beneficial in that it centralises bug reports, but I have concerns about whether it will really be of any use if all the installs are different. Additionally, people may experience the same bug but describe in a slightly different way, which could end up a bit messy.

Hmm. By insisting that the installed components are the same instead of customising it, we could tone down the problem as only versioning conflicts will occur. Back then, Black isle didn't publish variations of their game. They gave us only one version, and we accepted it didn't we?

I really appreciate the clarity in your response. That has straightened out and confirms some issues I had in mind. I'll print this to look over it carefully again. Based on your reply, perhaps its possible to could work another alternative solution for now:

Assuming the current mega-mod v1.21 can last till mid-08. I should be able to almost complete the entire BG1 series testing by then (by basing the installation on erebusant's work, I believe that I shouldn't be encountering unsolvable major glitches). Before I switch over the the BG2 saga, I can target a release after the 'base' mega mods are updated during the mid of the year (or least wait few wks/mths till they update). That way, mega-mod say v1.3 will have a more significant life-span of probably a year, ignoring the smaller updates.

The gist of the support plan would then be as such,

• From now - mid-08: Stick to mega-mod v1.21 - BG1 playable w/ ongoing support - BG2 playable w/ adhoc support
  
• Output now - mid-08: Verify via playing to ensure that the player can go through the entire BG1 with documented hitches (especially for quests). I promise there will be bugs, but as long as we can describe a continuous line/path from start - finish, its sufficient.
  
• From mid-08 - xx : Stick to mega-mod v1.3 - BG1 playable w/ documented support - BG2 playable w/ ongoing support. Documented support as in to have support based on the review of the documented hitches and see if they will be relevant with v1.3, i.e. having the new versions of base mega mods / mods installed. In addition, I should have a more elegant approach to auto-installation by then which would then make it less taxing to switch over to BG2.

Note: I do hope (unless proven necessary) to keep the installed components for v1.3 the same as v1.21. They should differ only because of version updates.

Hopefully, by the end of the year, that is assuming if time permits me, to have a proper documented proof via playing of a mega-mod version that is or at least almost stable.

Wouldn't it be fun if thousands of real players (ie. not modders) had a simple way to install all these wonderful mods. Perhaps this is erebusant's philosophy I'm talking about, not the biggest, but the cleanest fuss-free solution to a mega-mod.

Do let me know if you spot any glaring issues or if such a specific plan has been attempted before, else I'll kindly take it that such a plan is plausible. Thanks again.

You might want to read this.

Help. Is it only me, or is the g3 forum down? Been trying to access it for 2 days now. Thanks.

Hi pple,

Trying to gather some information of mods activity for planning in creating a stable core of mods.

Please see the attached schedule of mods, I tried to fill in the dates of the release and via knowledge of some mods, trying to tie them up to determine whether there will be expected active updates in the next 6-12 months.
Last updated: 6 Jan 08
 ModSchedule_3.html   33.08K   177 downloads  ModSchedule_2.html   32.91K   181 downloads  ModSchedule_1.html   32.69K   216 downloads
The four important columns are:

• File Description - version of mod currently used in an auto-installer
  
• Release Date
  
• Current Version
  
• Expected active updates in the next 6-12 months

What I did was to plough through the readmes of the list of mods, and tried to establish the release date if I could. And, tried to gather some idea of whether there will be expected activity.

• For those without release dates, I have indicated it with "--" in the column called "Release Date"
  
• For those which are rather inactive, even without a release date, I indicated "--" in "Expected Active Update"
  
• For those which I am clueless about, I left it as "??"

Basically, this will help me assess the level of risk of mod versions that may not be available for downloading within the foreseeable future. That will assist in deciding the approach to take in a next possible release of an auto-installation package.

Much appreciated if anyone could provide information about any of the mods listed in there (everything) that is

• highly active
  
• completely inactive,
  
• not expecting new releases,
  
• the modder has retired,
  
• very buggy, expecting releases soon.
  
• know the modding team and their intentions / other commitments not allowing them to mod
  
• etc.

Please indicate the number beside the mod if you could furnish any info. Thanks

I'm not exactly sure how your program works, but I am quite certain that compatibility of BGT versus other mods won't change (rather, most compatibility changes are the other mod changing to adapt to BGT) and it should be safe to instantly use newer versions without great problem in a mega-install.

Although i'm not a modder per se, but i took a peek at your code. I was very impressed, its very neatly outlined, so I'm sure your newer versions wont have much trouble resolving compatibility issues, if any at all.

What im concerned with is the bug reporting process. ie. it wont be easy to keep track of bugs on a consistent platform. For eg. if this guy A plays SMM v1.21 and the debugger is playing v1.5. It would be hard to manage bugs for that poor non-modding guy A. If I asked him to upgrade to v1.5, I'll have to ensure its compatible with his saved games, which is going to open up another can of worms.

There are three debugging strategies i'm thinking about:

(a) Either a more fluid approach to bug reporting is needed, with a proper online bug tracking management system.

(b) Or accept the fact that perhaps 80% of the reported bugs will commonly affect players regardless of installed versions. While 20% of them may spurious bugs affecting only certain combinations of the game.

© Continue with the current approach assuming that out of the mods used, most are stable and the update cycles have lengthened thus taking the risk that most of the mods will be mirrored somewhere. After say 6 months, then only another mega-mod version will be released.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Keep in mind that there is most likely not going to be a permanent mirror for older versions. BWL will probably update at some stage. Same with the other mirrors.

Hmm. Looks like that will be a challenge. A simple real-time update feature for an auto-installation would solve part of the problem. Having a authorised mirror would really be an issue. Will think abt it. Thanks.

Hi may I know the mirror link for BGT1.05a? Thx

regards

There is a whole stack of them at http://www.shsforums...showtopic=23549. Some are probably outdated and some work only for specific regions, though.

Cool. I found it at http://dragonshoard....load/bgt-weidu/

Thanks 4 ur help

Hi may I know the mirror link for BGT1.05a? Thx

regards

What the bigg said.

He should know, with his WeiDU updates and all.

This is different. Spell50's README doesn't contain legalese (which IIRC under current copyright law means that no redistribution or alteration is allowed). WeiDU is under the GPL (which is designed to forbid people from removing other people's redistribution/alteration rights).

This looks like pretty important stuff. Until you mentioned it, I didn't even realise the differences.
Not sure if I interpret it right, does this mean that:

(a) Under GPL, we can modify and redistribute software but we need to keep the original distribution notes intact?

(b) Depending on the legalese, we can't even mirror the software, let alone modify it? Is it something like the unauthorised mirror issue in the mega-mod help forum?

Are there specific SHS templates for such stuff? Thanks for any clarifications.

regards

Hey again,

I actually followed the first 'fix' (using NI to remove the offending statement) but unfortunately that seems to screw Viconia up as well... indeed, removing the statement allows you to chat with her as normal, but the thing is, is the next time she went to talk to me to continue the 'story', so to speak, it was a bunch of gobbledygook... it seemed like she just said a bunch of random statements in a row, completely unrelated... and then when an "End Dialgoue" box finally did show up, and dialog was closed, a couple seconds later she comes to talk to me again and goes through the same set of dialogues, ad infinitum.

I've restored the original (post mega-mod installation) VICONIJ.DLG file (with the offending "Leave party" statement intact) and I'm hoping that the storyline can continue... all I have to do is not try to inititate dialogue with her myself until one of you gurus figures it out and offers a fix

Daelric

Ok, i'll pay attention to that later if I get to read the g3 fix.

Forgot to ask one more thing... what portrait pack do these portraits from your "Art of Friendship" banner come from? I'm lovin' that Imoen one!

Duno who did that but she's really lovely. Can't remember where i got the portraits from but probably from one of the links below. But, I'll just pack up my set for you.

Update: K'aeloree (lead admin) informed me some of the pics in the pack shouldn't be distributed, so I can't attach it to this post. Wanted to send you a PM for it, but you're not registered. So you gotta PM me later for it ok?

Credits to:
http://www.sorcerers...x_portraits.php
http://www.tgeweb.co...portraits.shtml
http://portraits.cho...net/index2.html
http://www.vaulscast...bgportraits.htm
http://www.scifantas...s/portraits.php

Hi Nazar I'll try to help you as best I can. If you want, just PM me i'll pass you my msn.

.. Auto install/figured out that it did not like names of certain mods (i.e. 2.[1]2 type names) fix that ...

I dont quite get this " (i.e. 2.[1]2 type names)", but I sense that the missing mods kicked in?
Or you meant you changed the names in the BG2\MOD_SOURCE directory?

Just to confirm, here's how your BG2, MOD_SOURCE & SMM-Patch directory should look like:

.. paths for BG1 and winRAR are not being accepted ...

You have to edit your BG1/winrar paths. There's a settings tab when you open MegaMoshi.exe just make sure that that you input the path to BG1 directory & winrar to the executable. ie.
BG1 - E:\Program Files\Black Isle\Baldur's Gate
Winrar - C:\Program Files\WinRAR\WinRAR.exe

And you have to click on "Apply Settings" after that in case you missed it.

Updates: added auto-download & summary sections. Plus, reformatted the entire post to improve readability.

Hi Daelric, okay I could duplicate your error. She leaves saying "A welcome release ...". I've got a fix for it, but I want to read the gibberlings post that Chevalier pointed out before releasing it in case I miss out anything. But the g3 forum seems to be down (some IPS error).

Anyway, for now, you can expel Vicky using the traditional reform party method & she won't disappear. Bye for now!

Note: The issue is included in section 3 of the SMM installation. By the way, in case you misunderstand, "standard" installation meant consistent in this case. ie. common (not custom). So that errors are duplicable. Cheers

Updates: added in a configurable auto-installer. Try not to tweak the xml file too much, unless you know what components to install. Thanks.

Nice work Azazello. By the way, just added in an gui-based auto-installer today for new folks, could you add it in as well? Thanks.

Hi there, sorry I was busy working on something ytd! Ok thanks, I'll take a look at it, and see if I can upload a patch tonight.

Hello,

I goofed up.

When installing the BGT + BP for the first time, I wanted to install the kitpack along with some other mods. Well everything went well and I was playing through candlekeep, when I remembered I forgot to install the kitpack and a refinements mods (I realized this upon meeting Imoen).

So I F4'd and looked at the kitpack install. However, something didn't seem right. The Setup-BGT-NPCKitpack file was not an executable, and the file that should be a .tp2 file was a .COMMAND file--so being the ignorant man I am, I just added the appropriate .exe and .tp2 to the end of the files, hoping I was geniously solving my problem.

Well, It didnt work.

Now the Setup-BGT-NPCKitpack file is permanently querried in Weidu, so I cannot uninstall BGT (Which is, I am afraid, what I must do.) as I keep getting an error about (pid = -1) or somesuch. I cannot delete the setup file, because windows thinks it is in use.

Any Ideas?

Secondly, I installed worldmap (the "huge" map), and as such, whenever I tried to access the wm my game crashed, so I uninstalled it--now when I access the worldmap, Candlekeep is not eve in the map, and it is essentially the bg2 map with the city of baldurs gate in the middle. None of the area's are accecible.


I dont have a problem doing a complete uninstall--but because of the querry problem, I cannot get weidu to begin its unistall scripts.

Thanks,

v

Hi V, sounds like the installation corrupted quite badly. Have you tried doing a clean installation? It may save you more time that way. Else, mayhaps you can post your weidu log and see if someone comes along with a similar issue.

I would like to announce the resurrection of the well known spell50 mod.

The new version updates spell descriptions of few spells affected by the mod to make the spell descriptions consistent and introduces new component modifying few other spells.

It can be downloaded at
http://www.kovarex.c...d/spell50-v8.7z
http://www.kovarex.c.../spell50-v8.zip

I will most probably continue in enhancing of this mod later (changing more spells even these from mods, implementing the save penalty for higher levels for spells affected by this mod etc.)

Any suggestions or bug reports are welcomed.

Hi Kovarex, I thot this was weidu's work? Did ya get permission from him to continue on this project?
Tks for the updates though. See http://weidu.org/spell50.html