Another tool to organize your MSFS addons easily

[rwilsonlj 7]

2 hours ago, Bad_T said:

yep Martin, the use of preset is certainly not mandatory, they are just a quick way to enable / disable addons with 1 click. And yeah, depending on how your folders, are structured you can pretty much get the same result manually (clicking on the one specific folder will enabled/disable everything below).

it's just a matter of preference i guess 👍

for those interested, i just uploaded the new 'official' version at flightsim.to 🤞

I have a dumb question. In the discussion regarding loading/unloading (of passengers in the white zone, for you AIRPLANE movie lovers, I digress), of addons, is there a penalty for having, using your example, both USA and Europe airport addons loaded all the time? I have not seen unusual MSFS load times when I have every addon I have loaded (probably 50 or so). Unless there is some memory/load time degregation, why unload anything. Just wondering. Thanks for your program!

[Bad_T 581]

@rwilsonlj some people with several GB of addons noticed huge difference in loading time when all addons are enabled so in that case it makes sense to select which addons to select before a session. if you don't suffer from that, you can obviously leave everything enabled and just use the tool to organise your folder.

I'm not really sure about this, but maybe also those suffering from very long loading time when having lots of addons maybe have some 'virus scanner' going in the background that scans all files when the simulator is launched and that will slow things now.

 

@sauviat oops, nothing was changed in the version concerning the launch or the way the programs works (only a few new options added), so the problem must be elsewhere (if you want i can send you back a link to an older version), but do you mean it crashes when you launch with the little 'blue' button at the top but it's ok if you launch via the normal shortcut ? or does it crash all the time ? or only with some particular addons, i'm not 100% sure i understand exactly the problem you are having but the change of version should not cause that. Let me know please if you have more infos.

Edited November 3, 2020 by Bad_T

[sauviat 137]

@Bad_T It crashed when I pressed the little blue button on the top. When I launched with the MSFS.exe it was fine.

Can't test it again until later today then I'll look again.

Martin

Edited November 4, 2020 by sauviat
Spelling

[peroni 541]

What's the consensus on deleting the Content.xml file and SceneryIndexes folder upon a modification of the addons list and before starting the sim?
I've seen somebody suggesting this but I wonder if it is really necessary.

Deleting these two items does not seem to cause any ill effect, they get recreated immediately with little to no impact on MSFS startup time.
Would it be worth adding this optional step in MSFS Addons Linker ?

Edited November 4, 2020 by peroni

[Bad_T 581]

thanks for the clarification  @sauviat, when you click on that button i just call a command to launch the simulator for sure it's called in the exact same way as in the previous version. Maybe there's something like 'windows defender' or another security software on your PC that prevents the program from being called (like seeing an exe calling another exe and flagging that as a thread). Let me know if you have more info maybe the error message that you are getting (if any).

@peroni, to be honest i don't know much more than you 🙊. That content.xml file seems to keep all entries even if the addons are not installed anymore, it's certainly not very 'tidy' but i don't think it will hurt performance, but yeah bit of of strange decision by Asobo to have that file there and not maintained correctly. Same for scenery cache, i don't exactly how it works internally.

The tool could certainly remove unused entry in the content.xml file or delete cache but, for now, i prefered to keep it very simple and not touch any of the core simulator files (thinking that the sim would take care efficiently of its own files). If several users request that i can certainly investigate a bit more and maybe add such a feature.

Edited November 4, 2020 by Bad_T

[patrice_bambou 85]

Hi Bad_T

Yes, it is better no to modify the sim core files. The tool is very powerful as it is now, no need to add more complication and risks of problems with the simulator

Patrice.

 

[sauviat 137]

@Bad_T Just done a test and it's working fine with my usual selection of Addons!

Thanks

Martin

[Kai-Uwe Wei 8]

8 hours ago, peroni said:

What's the consensus on deleting the Content.xml file and SceneryIndexes folder upon a modification of the addons list and before starting the sim?
I've seen somebody suggesting this but I wonder if it is really necessary.

Deleting these two items does not seem to cause any ill effect, they get recreated immediately with little to no impact on MSFS startup time.

I know many simmers who are deleting the content in their shader folder in P3D.x to have it cleared everytime and to prevent having old stuff in it. They are swearing having a better performance after that.

That was my intention when I meant this folder and this file. Nothing will be damaged and I can prevent having stuff written in which I don't use at the moment, especially if I switch a lot amongst presets and addons.

I delete them manually everytime after changing addons. It goes quickly; I have a shortcut of this folder on my desktop. I would like to have this option in the organizer deleting it automatically every time.

 

Kai

Edited November 4, 2020 by Kai-Uwe Wei

[pmb 5,138]

Still pondering if I should go the Addons Organizer route. I watched the video and basic usage is quite straightforward, even more as I am used to profiles from SimStarter.  However, I'm a bit worried on a few special cases.

- FSDT: These are links already. This was discusssed at the beginning of the thread, they should be left in the Community folder as is - right?

- ORBX: These are NOT links in my case, so I could shift them to my personal addon folder. However, I guess I'll be punished by ORBX Central one days. Yes, I can activate the links before running ORBX Central, but does this work properly in the case of updates? And what happens if I forget to activate them before calling ORBX Central?

- ORBX 3rd parties: like Gaya which may not spring into my eye for separate treatment as their folder names are not starting with "ORBX". 

 - The Simaddons Airports: come with Uninstallers which are in the base of the Community folder. I guess I should leave them alone there.

- Aerosoft: is similar to ORBX. It's real folders, but what happens when the AS Updater meets the links? The same applies to more addons with maintenance programs like Flightbeam.

Maybe there are even more loopholes I don't see yet. I just want to avoid screwing up my perfectly working setup. (Well, perfectly working except that loading gets longer and longer.😉)

What are your experiences? Thanks for any hints on these points.

Kind regards, Michael

[cavaricooper 2,615]

Michael- 

I have a sort of hybrid approach.  With developers with their own updater programs - FlightBeam, FSDT, LVFR, Orbx I just leave those sceneries in COMMUNITY.  Everything else goes in a MSFS Addon Folder and I use this program to select what I want to install.  The Bryce Canyon and Zion and Yosemite folders are HUGE and so I'm glad I adopted this.  I do typically leave all my Florida addons and Robert's TN Bonanza mod in all the time as well.

This requires forethought and decision re. what and where to fly, and a sim restart if that changes... NOT IDEAL.  I would like to see a workable SMART alternative, but I don't know what that is. Everything streaming through MS servers would be the answer- but the approval and update process as well as bandwidth costs would be staggering.

This is one part of the MSFS ecosystem that has not had a lot of thought from Asobo- and is NOT elegant whatsoever.

C

[pmb 5,138]

16 minutes ago, cavaricooper said:

Michael- 

I have a sort of hybrid approach.  With developers with their own updater programs - FlightBeam, FSDT, LVFR, Orbx I just leave those sceneries in COMMUNITY.  Everything else goes in a MSFS Addon Folder and I use this program to select what I want to install. 

Thanks Carl, this sounds like a plan I will think about. 

And I agree, I had high hopes for a smart MSFS addon administration, something like this tool built in and cooperating with the developers' administration tools. Perhaps Asobo didn't foresee the amount of Freeware we have alreay now?

Anyway, I doubt we will get something from Asobo soon, they certainly have bigger fish to frie like VR, X-Box, and SDK right now. 

Kind regards, Michael

[Bad_T 581]

@patrice_bambou and @Kai-Uwe Wei thanks for your inputs, i'm really undecided about that for now, if implemented, it will be an option people would be able to choose if they want to use it or not, just need to investigate a bit to understand exactly what i should do/not_do with those files/folders if i decide to include that feature.

@sauviatoh cool if all is ok now 👍

@cavaricooper i wrote all this below before seeing your reply (took me too long to type all this 🙊), so thanks for sharing your experience, yeah maybe for him too it's best to start without touching the 'payware addons'. Now that all is already written i just post my message below 'as is' without editing 🤪

Hello @pmb,

Thank you for your interest in the tool. There is no real 'one way to do it', it's mostly personal preference. You can also have a mix of 'links' managed by the tool and real folders for your payware stuff straight in the community folder if you prefer to keep them there. In the tool, real folders or links created by other programs will be rendered in a different colors to help identify them.

It's important to understand that links are seen by Windows like if the real folder was really there, there should be absolutely no difference. So let's say you have this situation :
- you install your payware airport -> it creates a normal folder in the community folder
- you copy that folder into another 'addons' folder so that it's managed by the tool, you then delete the original folder in community
- you enable that addon in the tool so the link will be created in the community folder with the same name as your original folder (unless you change the name of the folder but you shouldn't do that for paywares)
- when you update your payware addons, the updater will look for that folder with that specific name in the community folder, it won't see any difference if it's a link or a real folder and so it will update the files in your addons folder. For you, it's gonna be completely 'transparent' and everything should work just fine

As explained above it should be fine but i can think of maybe 2 possibles problems depending on how the updater was programmed :
- if the updater erases the folder and recreate a new one during the update process -> it will erase the link and will recreate a new real folder in community (so then you would have to move it again if you want to use it with the tool)
- if you update your payware addons when your addon is not activated with the tool, there will be no link and no folder in the community folder so the update might either fail (because it doesn't find the folder he was looking for) or just create a new folder in community with the new version (and then you would have to move it again)

so to sum up and reply directly to your questions :
- FSDT : yeah i would leave them there (in community) if they are already links
- Others vendors if they create real folders : you can probably move them because their installer/uninstaller will see the link as a real folder but i would start without moving them until you understand precisely how everything works
- your point about 'what if the addon is not active' is indeed important. if it's not active, the updater/uninstaller might have problem because it will not find the folder that it's looking for. It will probably recreate a new one or throw some kind of error.

Just start small maybe, install the tool, add only a few freeware addons, play with it until you are confident enough and then you can see if it's worth keeping it for you or not. At first leave all your paywares in the community folder, then once you gain confidence maybe move only one ORBX and try to update it to see what happens (should not break anything, worst that can happen is that it will reinstall it from scratch).

Maybe other users who use the tool and have lots of payware addons and use the tool will be kind enough to chime in and add their experiences and way to do it properly. I haven't bought anything for MSFS yet (amazing default scenery compared to p3d made it a bit easier to resist FOR NOW), so my knowledge is a bit limited on how those payware installers work.

Sorry for the long boring reply 🙃 😋.. hopefully it's not too confusing, feel free to ask if you have more questions.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bad_T
spelling / spelling / ....

[pmb 5,138]

Thank you so much Bad_T. I think some payware makers can learn a lesson on support from you.

I think I'll give the tool a spin but will start with probably freeware only. (As Carls says, there are some really fat addons on that branch.) 

Best regards, Michael

[Noooch 1,084]

Hi, if I move my Addons folder on a larger HDD instead of my SSD where MSFS is installed, will I lose performance with this addon?

Edited November 5, 2020 by Noooch

[cavaricooper 2,615]

The Community Folder move to a slower drive may cause minimal performance issues- but certainly not this addon with its Symbolic Links.

C