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Mod manager

Started by JM, September 16, 2018, 05:23:20 PM

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brads3

if you type into the desription and then save the profile with a new name,it will keep that info. say you set a mod order for th4e NORTH. type into the description and then save the profile as NORTH. then next time you  want to play the north, you have everything pre-set. i did that to the versions of RK EC.i could reload a prior version with the mods that worked with it before. ABANDONED does it with her stories since she is constanly changing mods from 1 to the other.

MarkAnthony

#91
Sorry brads3, you're misunderstanding what I meant in my last two replies.

That's okay though. When I went to take a screenshot to better describe what I meant I ended up figuring out the answer myself.

-- In order to add a description to each and every mod you (I) have to double-click each mod one by one and type a description for it. When done, I can just hover the mouse over each mod in the list and it's description will show for it.

The description button we discussed earlier is just as I said -- it's a description for the entire profile itself.

EDIT: Now all I need confirmation on is whether or not version .6 is the latest version for use. I'll assume it is until I hear otherwise. It does all I need it to for now, so I'm happy either way.
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

Abandoned

Correction @brads3 I do not use Mod manager.  I have my own special mod order that I have never had a problem with and I never change mod order except when adding a new mod.  I disable all and enable the ones I use on a new map.  Most of the mods I recognize by their icon in the games mod list.  My system works well for me as it is.  :)

MarkAnthony

Greetings Fellow Banis!   :D

This evening I sent @JM a private message asking him if he would consider including a new feature to his great ModMan program.

I asked him if he would give us the ability to right-click each mod in the ModMan profile window and let us choose a text color for it. I asked for red text and green text so that we could indicate which ones appear in game as conflicts and no conflicts.

This could be used in one of two ways:

       
  • (1) We could mark them with red or green text so that they match up exactly as it appears in the mod window in game; just a visual representation of how things truly are as far as the game is concerned. I think this is how most users of ModMan would probably use the new red and green text options.
  • (2) The way I would actually use it though is - mods marked green in the in game mod window I would mark green in ModMan to show "all is well". The ones that are marked red in the in game mod window I would ignore (kind of). The ones that appear in red in the in game mod window I would ONLY mark red in my ModMan profile window if there truly is an actual conflict such as missing features, bonuses, buildings, and etc,. So the ones that appear in red in the in game mod window but have no actual true conflicts, I would keep those in the default black text in the ModMan profile window.
Although I didn't mention it to JM in the private message I actually would like a third color besides red and green. When using Microsoft Excel for my spreadsheets I use the medium or dark orange color to highlight areas or cells in my spreadsheet that need special attention. So I would also like JM to include a medium or dark orange text color as well so that we can indicate which mods in game that we are currently testing to see if there are any actual conflicts. If an actual conflict exists then I would re-mark it from orange text to red text, if all is well and the mod works regardless of what the in game mod window tells me, I'd re-mark it from orange text to green text.

Anyways. I hope you all like the idea of extra text colors for use in ModMan and I hope @JM will not only read this, but also consider putting in the time to include the new text colors.

Thanks again JM.

~MarkAnthony
               
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

theonlywanderer

I don't know how Steam functions, but with my Banished game it's just a directory, don't even need an install.   I have a different banished folder for each system of mods.    Each one only has that particular mod package added to the windata folder and checked in the mods list.   Doesn't require constantly changing mods in and out, you just start the program from whatever directory for the version you want to play and it's ready to go.

Banished Vanilla
Banished CC
Banished Mega
Banished RKEC
Banished North 6
Banished Misc

JM

#95
@MarkAnthony

Coloring could be done.

via right-mouse menu:
[x] Mark this mod red   // check on/off
Mark selected mods red
Mark selected mods green
Mark all mods red
Mark all mods green


.. or I can add a color dialog to the mod decription window, then any mod can have any color

But I can't figure out which mods are truly conflicting. If you want to mark it manually, it will be a terrible effort. Adding a mod or switching on/off can change everything.

edit:

If I understand it correctly:

1. each mod has its global tag color
or
2. color may vary by profile

1 or 2?

Kristahfer

@JM , I like the second option. Sometimes as mods are enabled or disabled the conflict is affected. I also would like to see three colors added, red, green and yellow. Where yellow shows as a conflict however it means some of the internal coding is reused.


Great works Thanks

MarkAnthony

Good morning JM,

That's fantastic that you would consider doing this for me! I appreciate it for sure.  8) :D

I wasn't asking you to make the program decide which mods are conflicting or not; that'd be far too complicated. Nay, nay.  I just wanted a way to manually change the text color for a mod name in the list.

At this point, I don't play with hundreds or thousands (even possible?) of mods with the game. Right now I am toying around with 89 mods. That's just three columns wide in ModMan with the ModMan window size I am using (because the ModMan program window size can be resized if none of you realized that) and I don't see it being a terrible effort at all to change their text colors individually.

As far as which method you choose to use JM go with what you think is best or easiest for you to implement. The behavior I would like to see is that the text-color changes are save-compatible between profile loads. You can treat the chosen text colors as "global values" if you wish, like you do with their "mod descriptions/notes" that we can enter for each mod. I like that you only have to enter their note or description once and no matter how many profiles you create the note for that mod always appears. I would have no problem with you treating their text colors the same way. It'd probably be best actually.

As an example of use: my current group of mods I am playing with started out as 49 mods from @Discrepancy   Now I am trying to add in some of @embx61 and @kid1293  mods too which bring me currently to 89. Since I am using @Discrepancy 's mods as a "base" to build up from, the text colors I choose for those should never change from ModMan profile to profile. Many of those 49 DS mods I use show as conflicts in game with the prescribed mod order @Discrepancy suggests we use. Everything works fine in game regardless of what the in-game mod window tells me.

So the way I would use the new text colors in ModMan is to mark any of those 49 DS mods with green text if they also showed as green in the in-game mod window. The remaining DS mods that show up in red in game, I would keep as the default black text in ModMan because I know there is no conflict because not only does @Discrepancy say there isn't but everything seems to work fine for me in game.

So with those 49 DS mods I'm using as a "base" to build from and marked as I want them to be in ModMan I would then start adding in other mods and try them out in game. If any of THOSE mods truly conflict with my BASE mods then I would mark them in red text within ModMan.

I go on later and play the games I play, load up different ModMan profiles to use and I would be more able to see visually which ModMan profiles have issues such as, "Hmm, I really like playing Banished games with this setup but my previous testing of this ModMan profile shows me I have two mods that have some missing features." -- Maybe I would continue playing it as is with those missing features or I would say, "Now's the time I think to try and replace those mods that are giving me issues, with something else!"

Sorry to have gotten long-winded (that's my thing!) but yeah, saving those mod text colors globally would be best I think especially when you have your BASE mods to start with (that would never change colors) and then add a few new ones here and there to those base mods, which could change colors all the time depending on which BASE mods I try to add them too.

Long answer, short? --- Go with your option #1 and make the text colors save globally like you do their individual notes/descriptions.

You said;
Quote.. or I can add a color dialog to the mod decription window, then any mod can have any color
That'd be fantastic, people do love choice you know! But I'd also be fine with just red, green, and med/dark orange too if that'd be simpler for you.

Dealers choice!  Ermmm... programmers choice!  lol   :P

It's too cool you are even considering this change for me. I know ModMan has been around for a few years already before I came along.

... look at me stirring things up!  (That's also my thing apparently if you look at the two aging mod discussions going on - bleh!)


Thanks again JM, have a great day!
               
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

MarkAnthony

#98
Quote from: Kristahfer on July 15, 2019, 07:03:54 AM
@JM , I like the second option. Sometimes as mods are enabled or disabled the conflict is affected. I also would like to see three colors added, red, green and yellow. Where yellow shows as a conflict however it means some of the internal coding is reused.


Great works Thanks
You chose his 2nd idea, I chose his 1st. -- That's cool. You chose yellow and I chose med/dark orange. -- That's cool.  LOL  :D   

The reason I didn't suggest yellow is because yellow text on light-colored background is often very hard to see because of the contrast.

I also chose his idea #1 because how often would your "Go To" addons change color? So I have my "base" mods for North, my base mods for RK Editor Choice, and my base mods for DS. For me... those would always stay the same color because they are always used. It'd be the miscellaneous mods I throw into the mix that would change color possibly depending on which "BASE" profile I decide to start with. My base profile for DS like I stated in my other reply is 49 mods. I'd dislike having to re-do all 49 of those colors again and again every time I reuse that base profile to create a new profile.

I'm not saying it would take hours to re-color them or anything so there really is no issue with your #2 choice but let's assume you entered notes and descriptions for each mod you use, and you have hundreds of mods you entered notes for. If it was not for the fact that JM made those notes save globally, would you want to re-enter those hundreds of notes all over again, every time you created a new ModMan profile?!  I wouldn't.  ..Just sayin'

Maybe a compromise?  Maybe in addition to JM offering us some new text colors to use, maybe he could also add an extra check-box on the right-side of ModMan -- "Reset Text Colors?"   If we check it, that text-colored profile goes back to the all black default text we always see now in ModMan's current state.

EDIT: If text-colors are saved globally with the addition of the "Reset Text Colors" checkbox, all is good -- but it should be imperative(crucial) that the text colors at the very least are saved into each individual profile itself too.

So if my favorite mod is red in one profile and green in another than obviously it cannot be saved globally, but it would have to be saved individually in each profile.

So I guess a little bit of both #1 and #2, eh?  :D


EDIT AGAIN: I'm sorry @Kristahfer I guess yellow wouldn't be an issue if JM uses those colored boxes in his sample image. Heck, those colored-boxes may even be preferable afterall vs. colored-text.
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

JM

It might happen that you spend more time managing profiles than playing.  ;)

There will be global settings, and if a profile entry does not have its own values, it will take global values.

I've done a version I've been using for some time. It remembers the description not only for a particular filename but also for its individual versions. I identify them by date and file size. So I can find out the mod version simply.
New ModDesc.ini:

[KidTreeReplacer]
20190428_48237374=small trees
20190616_48410055=bigger trees

.. where 20190428 is file date (yyyymmdd) and 48237374 is file size.

This is useful when I want to replace the mod with another version. For example, KidTreeReplacer - I have two versions, one with smaller trees and the other with large ones. I alternate them depending on whether I use small houses or large ones.
I copy the files manually - for now.



MarkAnthony

Quote from: JM on July 15, 2019, 09:30:18 AM
It might happen that you spend more time managing profiles than playing.  ;)
That's alright by me; I mean it is and it isn't. I do want to play Banished of course but once my spreadsheet for Banished really begins to grow some legs and becomes fun to use - I'll probably enjoy doing that even more which has been the case for me with past games I've played.

I've even seen @RedKetchup write that he hasn't played the game in a very long time himself because he enjoys the modding side of the game and is so much more engrossed in that at the moment. Hopefully he will kick all that to the side from time to time just to play Banished again for fun - if nothing more than to remember why he got involved with Banished in the first place.

I know I will (continue to play Banished).

I said this already, but again JM - thanks for taking the time to do this and for considering my request in the first place. I look forward to MarkAnthony's ModMan   :P   

... ermm I mean... ModMan (the next generation) v.07? v1?   
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

brads3

the game will show conflicts between mods even when there is none. the lines in the coding that set up the community icon button do that. even if the mods work fine together they show red. it is bery difficult to tell what is really conflicted now,unless the mod fails completely or causes a crash. what is hard also is seeing the behind the scenes conflicts like work times 2 mods with water wells and they could affect each other. i am sure there are many of these that i don't see.

     2 mods showing red does not mean they will not work. they have to be tested to be sure and then some of the mod order is personal preferences. the "give and take "rule. if mod A is above, this happens.if mod B is above, that happens which do you prefer?

thankfully,the mod manager makes changing and fixing the mod order super easy and fast.

MarkAnthony

#102
Hi @brads3

If that was directed at me, I already know the red mod color in-game doesn't necessarily mean an actual conflict - it's shared files most likely. But with ModMan soon™ to have a colored option - this is where I will truly be able to indicate for myself which mods really do have an actual conflict of interest.


EDIT TO ADD: Yeah, I added the little ™ symbol -- because "I'm a funny guy!" (An old Steve Martin reference)  :D
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

MarkAnthony

Well, that didn't take long. I tried to take a nap before my work shift but it's so stupid hot out today (111 F)  I couldn't fall asleep (no A/C).   :'(

So while I was laying there another two small ideas popped into my head for a ModMan inclusion: bold text and separator lines.

@JM if you would, could you please also add the right-click ability like you mentioned before but this time to bold text? Me personally I would use bold text to indicate which mods in the ModMan profile are my main mods/base mods. I suppose other Banished players would use it to highlight their favorite/must-have mods.

I also think that while you're at it maybe also the inclusion of separator lines like in browser bookmark folders so that people could separate mods in the list however they wish too? Because mod orders can change at any time I can see separator lines not being used too often.

But there is one way for sure that I would use separator lines: I would create one master profile list of every Banished mod I have and then I would group them according to purpose such as: Terrain Mods, Climate Mods, Starting Condition Mods, Themed Mods (North, RKEC, Colonial Charter Journey, MegaMod etc,.), Real-time Aging mods, User Interface Mods, Supporting Mods, and so on. I'd separate them like I would bookmarks for example.

I just wanted to add this before you wrapped things up in case it isn't too late. And I'll tell you now, I cannot think of any other way to tweak ModMan so that's it for me. If anything else does pop into my head, I'll keep it to myself so as to not bother you further.  ;)

Thanks... again.

MarkAnthony

               
Sometimes it's the very people who no one imagines anything of
        who do the things no one can imagine.

Zou

This is exactly what I was looking for for a long time! Really helpful when playing with DS mods. Thank you!