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Database
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« Last Edit: 2006 July 09, 17:12:28 by Database »
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ElfPuddle
Stupid-to-English Translator
Uncouth Undesirable
Posts: 3169
"Darn! That's the end!"
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I feel like I'm wandering around just agreeing with everyone today. I'm with HelloKit, Database, when your to-dos are dones (  ), this will be cool. Thanks for the thought, "it was great!"  |
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I haven't died. I moved to the American South. Rumors to the contrary are highly exaggerated.
Member 960. Admitted to the MATY Senate by a 10-0 vote: 2006 August 10. Expelled by a 15-12 vote: 2008 May 30.
Should that mean anything?
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Database
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I'll get at least some of the lesser ones done in the next release. The important ones, however, have an ETA of 2010 the way things are going.  |
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Mirelly
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I look forward to seeing a more alpha-ized version, db. JM's enthusiasm for cataloguing appears to be somewhat underdeveloped.
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Database
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Well, that's why I'm doing this And you really want to wait for a beta at least  |
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Mirelly
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LOL Isn't SimPE routinely released as an alpha? Might just arse covering but I can cope with the sight of a few hairy cheeks. Alpha don't scare me. Pre-alpha, on the other hand, has me running for the nearest handy bunker  |
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Database
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ROFL. As soon a a few suckers ahem, volenteers test it for me I'll bump it to Alpha status. And this isn't that bad in terms of bugs, it just seems to fall over when a directory doesn't exist... and I'm too short on time to fix it at present. Some day...some day...  |
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J. M. Pescado
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It has to do with the practice of early releases. In the beginning, you only got release products. Then impatient people, and developers short on testers, started putting out "betas". Beta came to imply a finished, functional state in spite of possible bugs (And official releases became ever more buggy themselves), and then in ongoing attempts to get things out into the field EVEN EARLIER, people started making the "alpha" available". This then took on the connotation of "usable", and so, having run out of Greek letters to use due to the lack of foresight in designating the original early test release as a "Beta", as opposed to an Omega, or perhaps something more centered, like an Omicron, giving us room to go both ways, we're stuck.
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Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I cannot accept, and the wisdom to hide the bodies of those I had to kill because they pissed me off.
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Mirelly
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It's often occurred to me wonder if the greater collective of geekery got the wrong end of the stick with the whole beta thing. To my mind A/alpha is top grade/export quality and B/beta is second grade/lsightly faulty product. Although inconsistent with software development where, theroretically, product quality improves through testing and revision, the logical precursor to a beta release ought to be gamma, which would make db's pre-alpha MATY Auto-Updater a delta release. But as far as software is concerned the whole alpha/beta thing is so much muddy water that will never clear. Like JMP says, we're stuck with a dumb naming convention.
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ElfPuddle
Stupid-to-English Translator
Uncouth Undesirable
Posts: 3169
"Darn! That's the end!"
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Oh, I don't know if we're stuck with anything. This is MATY. Go ahead, Database, name the next version anything you want. (the Zed release, the Dark Helmet release...anything!)
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I haven't died. I moved to the American South. Rumors to the contrary are highly exaggerated.
Member 960. Admitted to the MATY Senate by a 10-0 vote: 2006 August 10. Expelled by a 15-12 vote: 2008 May 30.
Should that mean anything?
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Database
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You're right Elf. I'm gonna break the norm and call it something completely different |
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Database
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New version on the road! Please give constrictive critisism and feedback! |
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Mirelly
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Downloaded. Tested. Did what it was supposed to. Excellent job I then deleted the folder because I prefer to maintain my own Any chance that the user can choose their own name for the destination folder? eg I use '_hacks_FFS' and '_hacks_other'. That keeps them at the top of my Downloads folder cos that's where I most want to look when things are not going according to plan ... though it has to be admitted that the problem is invariably found in the _hacks_other folder |
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Database
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Any chance that the user can choose their own name for the destination folder? Yup. Just use the dialog box you get before you install (After the hack selection). Although it defaults to this: <documents folder>/EA Games/The Sims 2/Downloads/J.M. Pescado You can easily change it to: <documents folder>/EA Games/The Sims 2/Downloads/_hacks_FFS Just bear in mind: It creates a new folder for each of the hacks, and extracts the hack and it's RTFM to that folder. The folder is always named the same as the zip file. I really should write a full-featured tutorial on how to use this thing Downloaded. Tested. Did what it was supposed to. Excellent job Awesomeness. Thank you for your time  |
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Mirelly
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I suspected the directory name thing almost as soon as I'd typed it. I didn't try to change the name because I was only testing, but your answer is encouraging.
It certainly seemed robust for the one use I made of it.
Supplementary question. How is it generating its list of installable hacks?
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Database
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It doesn't. I manually hard-code each hack into the installer. It took a bloody long time But that gives me an idea - store each hack description in an external file... I'll keep it in mind because it would be useful for other stuff too. Sidenote: I've found a command to make my installer read "modified" tags. This is a small but promising step forward to make my installer do what I actually want it to do - only update the hacks that it needs to. |
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Mirelly
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It doesn't. I manually hard-code each hack into the installer. It took a bloody long time But that gives me an idea - store each hack description in an external file... I'll keep it in mind because it would be useful for other stuff too. Sidenote: I've found a command to make my installer read "modified" tags. This is a small but promising step forward to make my installer do what I actually want it to do - only update the hacks that it needs to. I suspected as much cos the list seemed to appear too quickly Suggestion: Have the opening screen offer checklist of installed EPs and then the prog can download the correct list before proceeding to the hack-listing stage. A secondary refinement would be to groups hacks by category: Critical/Annoyance/Feature etc. |
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Database
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I've pondered both those ideas. as of right now neither are possible, but when I make the core selection/installation routines less stupid, then yes, they will be very possible.
Oh, and I can't go poking code right now as I'm at school... I must go trawl through some NSIS documentation to see what I can do.
Edit: Aha. Found a whole selection of INI handling commands. I must kick some around when I get home in about 3 hours.
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« Last Edit: 2006 May 05, 14:03:40 by Database »
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dadditude
Dimwitted Dunce
Posts: 154
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Do you think you could at least get #4 on the to do list done? Then I at least wouldn't have to remember what I've installed...
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"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend;
Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read." - Groucho Marx
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Database
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You could lust go look in the folder, but all the To-Dos (should) all be done at some point.
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« Last Edit: 2006 May 21, 09:38:53 by Database »
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ElfPuddle
Stupid-to-English Translator
Uncouth Undesirable
Posts: 3169
"Darn! That's the end!"
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*completely off-topic, but non-random question*
Database, why don't you have TS2 installed anymore?
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I haven't died. I moved to the American South. Rumors to the contrary are highly exaggerated.
Member 960. Admitted to the MATY Senate by a 10-0 vote: 2006 August 10. Expelled by a 15-12 vote: 2008 May 30.
Should that mean anything?
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Database
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You had to ask I got bored, needed the space, and became pissed off with it. |
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ElfPuddle
Stupid-to-English Translator
Uncouth Undesirable
Posts: 3169
"Darn! That's the end!"
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And yet, you're still helping us with our games!  *puts on tiara* I dub thee, Knight of Shining Keyboards! Rise, sir, and continue your quest in faith and goodwill! |
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Logged
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I haven't died. I moved to the American South. Rumors to the contrary are highly exaggerated.
Member 960. Admitted to the MATY Senate by a 10-0 vote: 2006 August 10. Expelled by a 15-12 vote: 2008 May 30.
Should that mean anything?
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Author