Backup and restore input files, always a problem

[Lange_666]

There are various topics about backing up and restoring the input files (keyboard and hotas settings).

 

If there is one thing that has "never" worked for me then it is backup and restore the input files when i do a fresh install for some reason. Never!!

 

There are 2 locations where i find them and that is:

 

1: C:\Users\<yourname>\Saved Games\DCS\Config\Input (and then various aircraft)

2: D:\Games\Eagle Dynamics\DSC World\Config\Input (and then the various aircraft)

 

Now i backed both Input dirs up from the previous install and put them back after i re-installed everything from scratch but no joy... my HOTAS setup is always the default one. Other game setup like sounds and graphics are no problem, these are always set back like i backed them up, but my inputs... no joy!!!

 

Today i upgraded to Windows 8 and everything worked fine but after the upgrade i had the UAC shield icon overlay on my DCS World desktop icons. What is weird that these are the only icons that have this overlay, all others that i have on my desktop, including Black Shark, don't have this overlay. So i did some search for this problem and although there are various workarounds to remove the overlays (and they work, i tried them), i could not find decent info on way some icons have it and others don't. The account i'm loggin in with has full admin rights so there should be no UAC overlay.

Then i made the mistake to remove them (also emptied the bin to fast, you know how it goes) only to discover that the DCS entry in the startmenu (workaround again) had gone (the Black Shark and all others where still there though). No problem, i make shortcuts from the exe files in the DCS World bin dir i thought but there i ran into another problem: i don't have a multiplayer icon there and the updater always starts the sim and... when i made shortcuts from these exe's, the UAC shield overlay came along... grrrr.

 

Then i had another brilliant idea. Why don't i repair the stuff. But there was no repair icon anymore in the startmenu so i looked a bit around, added the repair tag to the updater and yes... DCS World updater ran, did some downloading and repaired my stuff. NOT!

 

First, it didn't repair the icons on the desktop.

Secondly, it didn't repair startmenu entry's

and thirth, it replaced my input files with the default layout again!!!!:cry:

 

Now i can live with the first 2 points, starting DCS World is no problem, even with the icons gone.

 

But i can not stand that it put back in the default HOTAS setup.

 

So i tried to place the backup files back, first in saved games, no joy, then in the input dir in the DCS World install location, no joy. Then in both... still no joy.

 

So can anyone tell me... what's the trick to get these back because i ain't gonna configure it all back again. If it was only A-10C then OK, but all the flyables in FC3 and BS again... c'mon. I lost already half a life configuring DCS World time and time again. I'm not in the mood to do it all over again. Not yet!

Edited January 31, 2013 by Lange_666

[Lange_666]

Good, did some testing today (with one aircraft, the A-10C in sim mode) and this is what i have found.

- Modified joystick input files are stored in the C:\Users\<yourname>\Saved Games\DCS\Config\Input\Joystick folder.

- The input files in the installation directory (D:\Games\Eagle Dynamics\DSC World\Config\Input\Joystick\ folder are the default ones.

- If the saved games files are not present (either by a new install or through deleting, the default ones are loaded.

- If a copy of the saved games files are put back into place, everything is working again (copy i made today so the files have a 01/02/2013 timestamp).

 

So far so good (and that is the way i thought it worked).

 

What i can't figure out is why my backup from 27/01/2013 does not work. The backup contains various files with different file dates. I made a last change to A-10C joystick files on 27/01/2013 because i wanted to do some refuel training and wanted a better axis control.

But if i remove the ones from today and put the 27/01/2013 files back in place, it looks like these are default ones. Weird.

 

So i'm still scratching my head on what happened with my backup...:huh:

[Slayer]

I believe it only works if you haven't done a reformat, upgrade or hardware change. If you look at the files they have a number generated with them that represents which controller said profile goes to. So if you upgrade your OS it will usually install all new drivers and redetect the hardware and generate a new hardware ID number for it. thus these GUID numbers are invalid because those hardware ID numbers no longer exist.

 

Edit: I should mention that this is just the way Windows works, not a limitation or fault of DCS

[Lange_666]

I had already pointed my nose in that hardware number direction because i made a backup, removed the profiles so all was set to default again, changed some settings (but not the same as the ones i backed up and removed to see the difference) and when i then wanted to put the originals back in, it wanted to overwrite where as before i just could copy them in alongside the others. Because Windows came up with the overwrite/skip message i took a look at the numbers.

 

Copying the inside of the backup .lau files and then put that into the newly generated might do the job but then you have almost the same amount of work as setting everything up fresh.

[Slayer]

You could try to open the new default file generated with Notepad++, erase everything and copy paste the contents of your old profile into it.

[Lange_666]

That will be my next step.

[JujuMan]

You could try to open the new default file generated with Notepad++, erase everything and copy paste the contents of your old profile into it.

 

I too have recently upgraded some new hardware. I can CONFIRM that this way works 100%.

 

I saved my Users>"Your PC name>Saved Games>DCS>Config>Input>"A10-C" folder and used notepad ++ to copy and paste the seperate .lua files to the fresh install files.

 

All is working 100%.

 

Thank you for this thread.

 

Saved me alot of work.