Open Mod Manager

[sedenion]

Is there a way to have descriptions and pictures in the folders that are not packages/zip files?

 

 

No, for a pretty good reason: folders are to be installed into the destination, if you put something inside, this would be installed as any other file.

[MAXsenna]

No, for a pretty good reason: folders are to be installed into the destination, if you put something inside, this would be installed as any other file.

 

Of course... :doh:

 

But would have been nice! Hehe

[sedenion]

Hi,

 

New 0.9.4 release here.

 

This is a minor release for now, with only few bug fix (some are not listed here):

• Modify Package creation function to add picture file as provided.
• Fix Package creation dialog crash if no Context loaded.
• Fix various typo for "Uninstall".
• Fix Load Contexts At Startup option dialog not saving properly.

Links and infos in the first page of this topic.

Some will maybe notice that Open Mod Man now come with third-party DLLs (curl, ssl, crypto), I slowly  work on the "Network Repositories" feature. Nothing is visble nor enabled in the current release because the feature is at very early development and testing stage, however,  the related libraies are now linked to the binary which now needs these DLLs to launch.

[eric963]

Just got this installed and for what I do its working just fine.  Thanks!!!

[Habu_69]

I like it. Simple, flexible, convenient.

[imacken]

Looks nice.  Is there a way of showing Contexts in the initial drop down list? Seems a little weird to have to go to File>Recent Contexts to do that, whereas it wold be nice to see them in the Library drop down list.

 

EDIT: sorry, just noticed this can be done within Options!

Edited January 15, 2021 by imacken

[Captain Orso]

I've been using this for a while now and am mostly satisfied. There are some things that could be improved though; some with very little work, I believe, but not all.

 

-- When installing a mod from my fairly long list, the list always jumps to the top. This ia a real PITA, because for example if I'm installing mods for a specific module, they are all named like "DCS UH-1H...". After installing the first, I have to scroll all the way back down to find the next, install it and scroll all the way back down to find the next, etc.

If the list stayed put, it would be very helpful.

 

-- Batches: Allow for updating a batch. It would be user very friendlier if instead of having to recreate a new batch, because I've added a single new mod, to simply update the current batch to contain all the currently installed mods. Also, renaming batches from the front page... no need to search for it somewhere else.

 

-- Was the context pull-down menu on the first page not supposed to work before the first context has been loaded? It has never worked for me. Not sure if this is WAD. It would be user friendly to have the last context loaded automatically load on startup, or at least have it in the pull-down, instead of having to go through File -> Recent contexts -> list.

 

-- Emergency Reset:

Here's the situation. I inadvertently updated DCS once, before uninstalling mods. I wasn't sure if an update was available, and expected to have a download of the updater binary as the first step, which would have allowed for me to open OMM and uninstall all my installed mods before the update ran, because there is always a dialog before it runs. This time there was no new updater binary, so the updated blew through, first overwriting all the installed mods and "fixing" them, and then installing the update.

So now OMM thinks the mods are installed, when they are not, and that it has a bunch of files it has to put back into the DCS installation, to remove the not-actually-installed mods. So when I "uninstall" the mods, OMM copies the it had backed up from DCS, overwriting the update (possibly), which means after "uninstalling" all mods to get to a defined situation in OMM, I then had to do a repair in DCS to get that back to a defined situation as well.

Lots of time wasted that might have been avoided... yes I know, if preemptively uninstalled all mods before starting the update process.

And yet, if there were a way to simply tell OMM to drop the status of all installed mods and delete the backed-up files from their repository, it would have saved a lot of time and effort.

 

I hope this isn't too overwhelming and many thanks for all your time and efforts.

[sedenion]

44 minutes ago, Captain Orso said:

-- When installing a mod from my fairly long list, the list always jumps to the top. This ia a real PITA, because for example if I'm installing mods for a specific module, they are all named like "DCS UH-1H...". After installing the first, I have to scroll all the way back down to find the next, install it and scroll all the way back down to find the next, etc.

If the list stayed put, it would be very helpful.

 

I think this happen because you sorted the mod list by "status"... You can sort it by name, by clicking the "name" header, like in explorer. This way the list should act as you expect.

 

45 minutes ago, Captain Orso said:

-- Batches: Allow for updating a batch. It would be user very friendlier if instead of having to recreate a new batch, because I've added a single new mod, to simply update the current batch to contain all the currently installed mods. Also, renaming batches from the front page... no need to search for it somewhere else.

 

Several people are asking for a way to edit batches, I will put this in the to-do list for the next release...

 

46 minutes ago, Captain Orso said:

-- Was the context pull-down menu on the first page not supposed to work before the first context has been loaded? It has never worked for me. Not sure if this is WAD. It would be user friendly to have the last context loaded automatically load on startup, or at least have it in the pull-down, instead of having to go through File -> Recent contexts -> list.

 

No, the Contexts drop box lists only the loaded Contexts. However you already can set a list of Context to be automatically loaded at application startup: 
Go to : Edit > Options > General
Check the "Open Context(s) at startup" checkbox.
Click the Add.. button then select the Context to open, repeat for each context.

Be aware, this feature is broken in previous versions, but work properly in the latest available 0.9.4 release.
 

58 minutes ago, Captain Orso said:

-- Emergency Reset:

Here's the situation. I inadvertently updated DCS once, before uninstalling mods. I wasn't sure if an update was available, and expected to have a download of the updater binary as the first step, which would have allowed for me to open OMM and uninstall all my installed mods before the update ran, because there is always a dialog before it runs. This time there was no new updater binary, so the updated blew through, first overwriting all the installed mods and "fixing" them, and then installing the update.

So now OMM thinks the mods are installed, when they are not, and that it has a bunch of files it has to put back into the DCS installation, to remove the not-actually-installed mods. So when I "uninstall" the mods, OMM copies the it had backed up from DCS, overwriting the update (possibly), which means after "uninstalling" all mods to get to a defined situation in OMM, I then had to do a repair in DCS to get that back to a defined situation as well.

Lots of time wasted that might have been avoided... yes I know, if preemptively uninstalled all mods before starting the update process.

And yet, if there were a way to simply tell OMM to drop the status of all installed mods and delete the backed-up files from their repository, it would have saved a lot of time and effort.

 

Okay, I understand the problem. You should have ask me here when you faced this problem, there is no "magic button" but there is a pretty easy way to achieve what you needed: manually deleting all content of the "backup" folder within the Location folder... 

 

I developped Open Mod Man to be way more flexible and "open" than OVGME, you can even edit the configuration files (and batches files) manually using a text editor. If you follow the syntax, it works, this is intented to work.

 

Anyway, I can implement a "reset" function that empty the backup folder, maybe this is more rasuring than manually delete all backups.

[Captain Orso]

13 minutes ago, sedenion said:

 

I think this happen because you sorted the mod list by "status"... You can sort it by name, by clicking the "name" header, like in explorer. This way the list should act as you expect.

 

Nope, unfortunately not. I'm always sorted by mod-name. Changing to Status and back to Name changes nothing. The list still jumps to the top when installing or uninstalling a mod.

 

13 minutes ago, sedenion said:

 

 

Several people are asking for a way to edit batches, I will put this in the to-do list for the next release...

 

Kewl, that will be nice 

 

13 minutes ago, sedenion said:

 

 

No, the Contexts drop box lists only the loaded Contexts. However you already can set a list of Context to be automatically loaded at application startup: 
Go to : Edit > Options > General
Check the "Open Context(s) at startup" checkbox.
Click the Add.. button then select the Context to open, repeat for each context.

Be aware, this feature is broken in previous versions, but work properly in the latest available 0.9.4 release.

 

I just tried this. Works well, so I guess that's fixed 

 

13 minutes ago, sedenion said:

Okay, I understand the problem. You should have ask me here when you faced this problem, there is no "magic button" but there is a pretty easy way to achieve what you needed: manually deleting all content of the "backup" folder within the Location folder... 

 

I developped Open Mod Man to be way more flexible and "open" than OVGME, you can even edit the configuration files (and batches files) manually using a text editor. If you follow the syntax, it works, this is intented to work.

 

Anyway, I can implement a "reset" function that empty the backup folder, maybe this is more rasuring than manually delete all backups.

 

I was kind of wondering back then if that might work, but at the time I was trying to avoid messing things up any more that they already were. I guess it would be nice if there were a button to "reset after update", but I'm not shy about laying hands on if I'm sure I won't make things worse, so if I ever screw up again I now know what I can do to help myself out. Thanks! 

[sedenion]

2 hours ago, Captain Orso said:

Nope, unfortunately not. I'm always sorted by mod-name. Changing to Status and back to Name changes nothing. The list still jumps to the top when installing or uninstalling a mod.

 

Ok, my bad, I misunderstood what you said before... I now understand you were speaking about the scroll position. That is a real issue, I never face it, I do not have enough mod for that  Thank for report.

[davidp57]

Hi @sedenion!

Any news on the "network repository" feature ?

We're (at VEAF) eager to switch to your new tool, but without these repositories we're stuck with the old (socket coded) repositories in OvGME...

[sedenion]

17 hours ago, davidp57 said:

Hi @sedenion!

Any news on the "network repository" feature ?

We're (at VEAF) eager to switch to your new tool, but without these repositories we're stuck with the old (socket coded) repositories in OvGME...

I am sorry to say that currently developpement is stopped. I don't don't when I will restart to work on it.

[davidp57]

Ah shoot !
Well, I may fork OvGME then, to try and correct its few flaws.
But porting it to VS or VS Code is a complex endeavour, and I'd prefer someone else to do it

Anyone ?

[sedenion]

New 0.9.5 release is out.

 

Some new little features :

•  Fix Library list-view scroll position reset to top on refresh.
•  New buttons and dialogs for Batches edition
•  New Discard backups data feature for emergency situations
•  Edit menu modified for quicker access properties

Links and infos in the first page of this topic.

Now I will focus on Network Repository feature, but, be patient and do not hope for it for near future, I will take my time.

[sedenion]

Oups ! 

 

Just after published the post above, I saw I made a mistake in the Batch edition dialog window that prevent the "uninstall" list box to be properly filled in some case...  The thing was very quick to correct, so I made a new build of the same version with the fix.

If you downloaded the 0.9.5 installer before this present post was published, you should redownload and install again to get advantage of the fix.

Sorry

[Captain Orso]

Thanks for the Library list-view... scroll..... position..... thingy..... works great!! and it's not even Christmas 

 

And thanks in general for all your work 

[speed-of-heat]

how do you get version numbers to populate ?

[imacken]

You have to name the mod with a v number. For example, if your mod was 'VR Sharpen', and you wanted to call it v1.1, then the zip name and the internal folder name would have to be 'VR Sharpen v1.1'.

It will then show up as 'VR Sharpen' on the list with a version number 1.1 in the Version column.

Edited May 23, 2021 by imacken

[sedenion]

1 hour ago, speed-of-heat said:

how do you get version numbers to populate ?

The version number is parser directly from the file name. To be properly parsed, the version number must be at the end of the file name, preceded by the "v" letter, either upper or lower case, directly followed by one, two or three versions numbers separated by dots. Also know that the manager automatically parse underscores "_" as spaces in displayed name. 

Examples:
My_Mod_with_Major_Version_v1.zip => Parsed as My Mod with Major Version - Version 1
My_Mod_with_Major_and_Minor_v1.2.zip => Parsed as My Mod with Major and Minor - Version 1.2
My_Mod_with_Revision_number_V1.2.3.zip > Parsed as My Mod with Revision number - Version 1.2.3

Edited May 23, 2021 by sedenion

[speed-of-heat]

got it, sorry i was looking for a variable in the UI!

[Aviators]

Thanks!

[Lazerhawk]

This is a really cool project, thank you very much!

Any chance there will be a release as a portable zip, i.e. without installer?

 

Or can I just unpack the setup.exe file and use OpenModMan.exe and its three DLLs just as a portable app?

Does it modify any Windows registry entries or create user specific folders in %APPDATA%?

Edited May 26, 2021 by Lazerhawk

[sedenion]

Just now, Lazerhawk said:

This is a really cool project, thank you very much!

Any chance there will be a release as a portable zip, i.e. without installer?

 

Or can I just unpack the setup.exe file and use OpenModMan.exe and its three DLLs just as a portable app?

Does it modify any Windows registry entries or create user specific folders in %APPDATA%?

 

This can be possible to create a full portable version, but I do not see the interest right now. The software create a small config file for global options and write the log in "%APPDATA%/Open Mod Manager" (using CSIDL_APPDATA constant to be precise, but this is the same as %APPDATA%).

 

I confirm that you can simply unpack the setup, you'll need the executable, the three DLLs and, the CREDIT.TXT file is also used to display the credits in the "about" dialog... The softwate can run without, but if the file is not here you will just have blank area instead of credits...

Except the global config file (which hold global options, last opened context and such things) all other parameters (Contexts, Locations, etc... ) are independent and ca be located anywhere.

Why exactly do want a portable version ?

[Lazerhawk]

1 hour ago, sedenion said:

This can be possible to create a full portable version, but I do not see the interest right now. The software create a small config file for global options and write the log in "%APPDATA%/Open Mod Manager" (using CSIDL_APPDATA constant to be precise, but this is the same as %APPDATA%).

 

I confirm that you can simply unpack the setup, you'll need the executable, the three DLLs and, the CREDIT.TXT file is also used to display the credits in the "about" dialog... The softwate can run without, but if the file is not here you will just have blank area instead of credits...

Except the global config file (which hold global options, last opened context and such things) all other parameters (Contexts, Locations, etc... ) are independent and ca be located anywhere.

Why exactly do want a portable version ?

 

Thanks for the answer!

 

I have some good experience with all sorts of portable software. Not only does it allow me to use a pre-made config on multiple systems, it usually also makes it very easy to completely separate different configs. For example in this case I could imagine having a OpenModManager package exclusively for DCS and another for a completely different game without interfering.

A portable version (where all the config files are stored inside the program directory) makes it also very easy to do backups of all the necessary files: just zip the program folder and you're done.

 

I know this surely isn't a top priority issue but I would be very glad if portable mode would be supported as an option in the future.

 

Cheers!

[sedenion]

2 hours ago, Lazerhawk said:

For example in this case I could imagine having a OpenModManager package exclusively for DCS and another for a completely different game without interfering.

 

You allready can do that, the "Context" paradigam, which is totaly independant config file and folder tree, was designed for that. You can even move what is called a "Location" from a context to another simply by moving the subfolder from one "Context" folder to another... The config files are all in XML, editable through text editor, this was designed to be really open and versatile... Please try the software, check out how that work, and tell me what do you need in addition...
 

2 hours ago, Lazerhawk said:

A portable version (where all the config files are stored inside the program directory) makes it also very easy to do backups of all the necessary files: just zip the program folder and you're done.

As i said, you already can do that, except for some global parameters saved in %APPDATA%, which are the options you can see in the menu "Edit > Manager options"... Tell me if you really need these options to be "portable"... We may imagine transfert some of theses options to the Context config...

Edited May 26, 2021 by sedenion