Standalone installer.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 1:52 pm

So I'm looking at NSIS - Nullsoft Install System. If you've installed Winamp recently, that uses NSIS as the installation environment. It looks pretty simple and we can jazz it up with icons, backgrounds, etc... Actually, PR 1.1 uses NSIS so it shouldn't be too hard to get WCU as a standalone.

Two big things that I think need to get resolved first:

We need a WCU splash screen. I remember seeing a Work In Progress but don't know if it's complete.
Do we want/have to use the '.privateer100' directory, or can we modify that to be WCU specific?

We could use an installation/launch icon too, if people think that's fun/useful/interesting.

I see that MamiyaOtaru did a lot of work on the installer.. any tips?[/list]

spiritplumber · Post by **spiritplumber** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 2:10 pm

My eyes are soda, yo.

thanks for the thought, what i did give around at school was a decently scripted rar self extractor.... it did work.

the bit i am not certain about is having to dl 200+ megs of stuff...

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 2:18 pm

Hey, there's nothing wrong with the .rar file. I just have this feeling that having WCU as a standalone executable file will bring more folks in, and that's never a bad thing. More helpers for development, that sort of thing.

I didn't catch the 'eyes are soda' bit, though. Too much Pepsi?

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 3:14 pm

If that NSIS thing gives you the option of downloading extra stuff during the install process, you could have it ask the user whether to download sound files, and if so take them from my server. Right now they are packaged as a tar file, but I can put a zip there, instead, or whatever is most convenient. Tar compresses a bit better, I guess, as it's 37 megs, atm.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 3:23 pm

I'll look into it. There's a way to connect to the Internet, and I'm sure somebody has done a version check or similar. Doing a file grab then untarring might be a bit more advanced, though.

So I've got the PR1.1 files redone as WCU 1.0, so the basic installer is already done. Now I need to grab spirit's update rar file and test that. And then I should probably try pulling out bar + campaign speech and see if the game pukes if they don't exist.

Edit: Removing bar + speech folders does not break game (text works fine), and reduces installer file size by ~40MB. Size is currently 149MB.

Edit2: There is a plugin (Inetload) that will grab files from the Internet. We might need to go with an executable (assuming that some people will not have a program that handles .rar.) A simple zip2sfx should work.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 5:36 pm

Actually, as Mamiya said to you, sound files are already highly compressed, so there's no space-saving reasons for them to be "compressed" in a single tar, rar or zip; I can just untarr the file in the server and you can have the installer download the actual sound files, individually, if that makes it easier. I can organize them in folders same way as in the installed tree.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 5:42 pm

While that would be easier, you'd have to download a large number of files. I would think that one large file would be better than a number of smaller ones, but that can be hashed out later.

I've integrated the latest WCU-base.rar... and we're back up to ~189MB (without bar + campaign sounds). Going to do some tweaking, then start working on the InetLoad aspect.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:02 pm

okeydoc
i'm going to do some high pass filtering on the bar speeches that needed to be done, unless klauss really wants to do it himself, and to set up the files in folders in the servers, so they are easier to update individually, if for no other reason.

Post by **klauss** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:16 pm

I was going to do it. It's easy for me (I've already setup the batch jobs, all I need to do is fix the filter stack and execute again).

I didn't get to it because of a) exams that I forgot about (oops) and b) the other requests from spirit. I'll get to it, shouldn't take long.

I can also upload them as single files. I tarred them since it's easier to upload/download them that way, but it's not that harder, only I'm too lazy.

Besides, I can take the oportunity to try and upload some enhanced FX files (shots, shield hits, etc) - If I get them right, volume issues are killing me.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:27 pm

Allright, how about we split it: You do the bar speeches and all that, and I'll do the comms, since I did it before already. We can do them better later, I'll just do them the way I did them before, with soundforge, for now.
And let's put them in folders, but leave the tar in the server as "master", anyhow. There's plenty of room.

Post by **klauss** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:40 pm

Actually, I have the masters stashed somewhere, but they're ogg files. (the original ones, without processing). And, I have every filter stack I used archived, so I can reconstruct any version you liked (or not). (Interestingly, that's one hell of a way to compress data

).

I can upload the originals, so that even when cvs gets updated, we don't loose them. But I would like, love, and drool in the face of, uncompressed originals. Please, if the one that recorded them from dosbox sees this, and if you have the uncompressed ones, upload them (or tell me, and I'll tell you my gmail account), so that we can do some quality work - compression is a killer each step of the process.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:51 pm

but.. klauss, you cleaned up the originals (removed compression artifacts) and uploaded these files as a tar, so these are better than the originals, so these should be the new "masters", no? Why would you want to upload the lesser originals? Of course I agree about the *uncompressed originals* as being precious, if available.
btw, I have the original privateer somewhere, i think; and i have dosbox, so at some point we could redo the whole thing better.

Post by **klauss** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:59 pm

Why? It wouldn't be the first time if I came up tomorrow with a totally new algorithm for high-frequency reconstruction, or noise reduction, which would make the one I used obsolete. In that case, I want to be able to grab the old files, and redo my work with my new tools. That's why.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 7:02 pm

Guys, can you bump this into the audio discussion thread?

Thanks.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 7:09 pm

@klauss: I get you.

@crouton: No problem, sorry.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 11:12 pm

So.

I've got the installer created, with a nice fade-in splash screen and everything. It's 188MB (without the bar + campaign folders) so it's a bit hefty. It needs work (new splash screen, trim some stuff, etc) but it installs, plays, etc...

As for availability...I can get this up on Sourceforge CVS and one of the admins can probably mark it as a downloadable file. Unless there's a better way.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 11:54 pm

Did you get the download to work, for sound files?

Here's the tar file:
new_wcu_sounds.tar

And here's the individual files' root folder:
http://www.deeplayer.com/claudio/wcuniverse/sounds

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 12:15 am

Damn. Forgot that entirely.

I'll work on it some more tonight and tomorrow and get that working.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 1:37 am

Ok, so I got a test version working... now to see if I can make it a user-selection to download sounds.

spiritplumber · Post by **spiritplumber** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 2:36 am

wow ()_()

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 2:57 am

So I can get individual files... which means I would have to download each file individually - I'm not crazy about that (lots of typing). I'm asking around if grabbing directories works, possibly some switch I'm not aware of.

What can be done at the moment (rather easily, actually) is downloading the one file, then executing that file while still in the installer. We can keep the structure of .wav files currently in place, and just create a 'wcu-sounds.exe' file that gets updated whenever source files are. That way the installer script doesn't need to change filenames.

I really need a good splash screen though... Using the PR file doesn't match WCU very well

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 3:26 am

Don't forget mac and linux users. I'll set up an ftp account for you so you can upload whatever you need. I'll send you a pm in a few minutes with the details.
(Actually, when I untarr the file remotely in the server, it gives me a log of all the files untarred. I could send you a copy and all you'd have to do is paste the download command in front, if you wish.)
Here we go:
http://www.deeplayer.com/claudio/wcuniv ... tfile.html
In fact, each line starts with "sounds", so you could do

Code: Select all

Search: "sounds"
Replace: "<download command> http://www.deeplayer.com/claudio/wcuniverse/sounds"

, and let it rip.
Okay, I set up an ftp account for you, and sent you a pm.

You need to create all these folders, if the installer doesn't yet,

sounds/
sounds/sales/
sounds/guilds/
sounds/communications/
sounds/communications/toth/
sounds/communications/toth/male/
sounds/communications/steltek/
sounds/communications/steltek/male/
sounds/communications/seelig/
sounds/communications/seelig/male/
sounds/communications/riordian/
sounds/communications/riordian/male/
sounds/communications/retro/
sounds/communications/retro/male/
sounds/communications/retro/female/
sounds/communications/reismann/
sounds/communications/reismann/male/
sounds/communications/pirates/
sounds/communications/pirates/male02/
sounds/communications/pirates/male01/
sounds/communications/pirates/female/
sounds/communications/militia/
sounds/communications/militia/male/
sounds/communications/militia/female/
sounds/communications/miggs/
sounds/communications/miggs/male/
sounds/communications/merchant/
sounds/communications/merchant/male/
sounds/communications/merchant/female/
sounds/communications/kroiz/
sounds/communications/kroiz/male/
sounds/communications/kilrathi/
sounds/communications/kilrathi/male/
sounds/communications/hunter/
sounds/communications/hunter/male/
sounds/communications/hunter/female/
sounds/communications/garrovick/
sounds/communications/garrovick/male/
sounds/communications/confed/
sounds/communications/confed/male/
sounds/communications/confed/female/
sounds/communications/awacs/
sounds/communications/awacs/male/
sounds/communications/awacs/female/
sounds/barspeech/
sounds/barspeech/campaign/
sounds/barspeech/bartenders/

And download the files into appropriate folders.
If you want I can create the file for you; just give me an example
of a download line.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 3:50 am

The command goes like this:

Code: Select all

InetLoad::load /BANNER "" "Download in progress..." "http://www.deeplayer.com/claudio/wcuniverse/sounds/barspeech/bartenders/anylocalnews.wav" "$INSTDIR\sounds\barspeech\bartenders\anylocalnews.wav"

I tried to get the sounds\barspeech\ directory but it didn't get anything, so this command may be limited to getting an individual file at a time. I can repeat the command as many times as necessary... but I'd rather just get one file than one hundred.

As for linux and mac, I can try to make a new linux .bz2 file but that'll have to wait a bit. I don't have a Mac or access to one, so that may be a bit harder.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 4:11 am

okeydoc, you got the ftp, it's all yours now.
We'll probably be done with the final sound files in a day or two, so
please wait for us if you're done too early.
The bar speeches and all that need high pass filtering, and klauss is
already doing them; and I'm almost done with the comm processing
program to make them sound like they come from a little speaker on the dashboard; I'll email the code to klauss tonight.

crouton · Post by **crouton** » Sun Jun 26, 2005 4:28 am

So everything under the sounds folder has been redone by you and klauss?

Hmm.. should probably check this into CVS when you guys are done. I'll hold off on the installer until we get everything squared away.