Benefit of packing mod files?

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hqz
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Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by hqz » Thu, 27. Jan 22, 23:02

I've implemented a few mods where I didn't have to pack my XML files to make it work (mostly scripts and diffs). But I see that most released mods are packed (ext_01.cat). So I'm trying to understand what I might be missing.

What's the benefit of packing the files?

DeadAirRT
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Re: Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by DeadAirRT » Fri, 28. Jan 22, 06:54

The only possible benefit I can think of is the files become case insensitive for Linux.

Other than that it's a waste of time and just makes it more difficult to look at the code

hqz
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Re: Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by hqz » Fri, 28. Jan 22, 11:06

DeadAirRT wrote:
Fri, 28. Jan 22, 06:54
The only possible benefit I can think of is the files become case insensitive for Linux.

Other than that it's a waste of time and just makes it more difficult to look at the code
Ok, thanks for confirming. That's also a big drawback for me, the fact that I have to unpack mods that I am trying to debug or draw inspiration from.

DeadAirRT
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Re: Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by DeadAirRT » Fri, 28. Jan 22, 15:06

hqz wrote:
Fri, 28. Jan 22, 11:06
DeadAirRT wrote:
Fri, 28. Jan 22, 06:54
The only possible benefit I can think of is the files become case insensitive for Linux.

Other than that it's a waste of time and just makes it more difficult to look at the code
Ok, thanks for confirming. That's also a big drawback for me, the fact that I have to unpack mods that I am trying to debug or draw inspiration from.
Completely agree!

Eukatae
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Re: Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by Eukatae » Fri, 28. Jan 22, 18:27

Packed mods seem to have a load priority advantage over unpacked:

I am using VRO.
I made a mod that modified existing ships in VRO.
Everything I tried to get my mod to have precedence over VRO failed, Rename my mods, making my mod dependent on VRO didn't work. Only when I packed my mod did my mod supersede VRO.

Imperial Good
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Re: Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by Imperial Good » Fri, 28. Jan 22, 19:18

In theory packed mods should load faster since loading them requires fewer file system calls (single archive file as opposed to many files) and the archive might compress them meaning less I/O bandwidth needed to read them (I/O is slow, decompression is fast).

|K.O.S.H.
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Re: Benefit of packing mod files?

Post by |K.O.S.H. » Sat, 29. Jan 22, 09:40

Eukatae wrote:
Fri, 28. Jan 22, 18:27
Packed mods seem to have a load priority advantage over unpacked:

I am using VRO.
I made a mod that modified existing ships in VRO.
Everything I tried to get my mod to have precedence over VRO failed, Rename my mods, making my mod dependent on VRO didn't work. Only when I packed my mod did my mod supersede VRO.
Seems like you had the compressed files in the same folder
Wing Commander Mod - German Topic
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