Cleaning up Plugins Folder

[Dizastrow 4]

Hello all!

Im looking for advice on what to do to simplify and organize my downloads.  Do you make seperate folders for R, C, I?  Once you have moved the files into seperate folders, do you keep them in the main plugins folder?  Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!!

[T Wrecks 10,209]

It really depends on personal taste. Any order is good as long as you can answer the following question with "yes":

If I found out that I don't like a particular download after all, would I find it in my plugins folder in less than two minutes?

Personally, I have sorted by the following categories:

- Dependencies

- Functional Mods

- Terrain (terrain mod, water mod, rock mod, tree mods etc.)

- Residential 1 - single-family homes

- Residential 2 - rowhouses

- Residential 3 - apartment buildings

- Residential 4 - highrises

- Commercial 1 - flat buildings

- Commercial 2 - medium-sized buildings, wall-to-wall

- Commercial 3 - mid-rises

- Commercial 4 - skyscrapers

.

.

.

and so forth.

Inside each folder, I have sub-folders for each and every BAT, named according to a uniform scheme, e.g.:

CO§§_ABC Building (Creator name)

As I said, it doesn't really matter how you do it, what matters is the result. I'm not mentioning my system here because I think it's perfect. It's just an example that represents one of many, many possible ways.

 

I found out that I rather sort by category and building size than by creator, because when you see something in game pop up, you know that it's e.g. a residential apartment building, but you usually don't know who made it. That's why I find it easier to locate it by category, size, name, and wealth than by creator.

Likewise, I get along with flat folder structures better than with deep structures. This means that instead of this:

...\ plugins \ [Team Name] \ [Project Name] \ [Category] \ [Creator name] \ [building name]

...I prefer paths such as:

...\ plugins \ [Category] \ [building name]

That should be enough food for thought - I hope this helped you a bit.

[Dizastrow 4]

That does help somewhat.  But Im still confused on how you organize them with folders.  For example, right now i just have all my downloads in the main plugins folder.  Do I create folders within the main one for organizational purposes?  Do I need to type out and designate each folder e.g. plugins/R$$$/ABCbuilding  for each one?  Im going to mess around with it tonight.  Thanks

[CaptCity 4,671]

Originally posted by: Dizastrow

...For example, right now i just have all my downloads in the main plugins folder.  Do I create folders within the main one for organizational purposes?quote>

Yes, that is an option. The game will read folders and subfolders within the main Plugins folder. It's mainly up to you and how you want to organize things. One note, though, be careful of things that need to load in a certain order. Basically, the folders and files are loaded in alphabetical order.

Do I need to type out and designate each folder e.g. plugins/R$$$/ABCbuilding  for each one?quote>

Except for the load order specific folders mentioned above, it really doesn't matter what you name them. The files within will be read by the game upon loading.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Yes, that list of categories I typed in my first post is really pretty much what my plugins folder looks like. Just imagine you are inside the root plugins folder and all entries in my list are sub-folders.

I influence their order by adding preceding numbers to the folder names. For example, I like to view dependencies as well as functional and visual mods as a kind of "basic kit". RCI buildings are the main content of the game, and since RCI appears in this order in game, I like to sort the folders accordingly: R = 1, C = 2, I =3. The sub-categories can be designated with letters; for example I have folders called:

3a Industry - Agricultural

3b Industry - Dirty

3c Industry - Manufacturing

3d Industry - High-Tech

Civic facilities may be 4 (4a - Police, 4b - Fire, 4c Education), parks and recreation may be 5, supply and disposal facilities 6... you get the idea.

Inside the folder "3b Industry - Dirty" you'd find sub-folders for each I-D building.

This sorting method has another advantage: If you know you are going to play a rural town, you can temporarily move all your skyscrapers and residential highrises out of your active plugins folder easily. On the other hand, when you want to play your downtown areas, you can temporarily throw out everything rural and dirty industry. This way, the game has to load less plugins at startup, which will speed up load times and decrease memory load.

[Dizastrow 4]

What a great tutorial!!!

I know now what I must do.  Thank you all for your excellent help!

[T Wrecks 10,209]

You're welcome - glad to be of assistance.

You wouldn't believe it, but I even have some more hints for you:

1) When you install new stuff into a big and complex plugins folder, things can become difficult.

With ZIPs, you are pretty much in control - you select a destination, and you can be quite sure that the files will end up where they are supposed to be.

However, with installers, you can never be totally sure. Some install additional files in locations you were never even asked for. This is OK if you want to sort everything just like the creator of the installer had in mind. However, if you try to stick to your own system, it can be annoying.

In rare cases, there may also be some kind of error which will result in the installer putting files anywhere but the path you selected.

This is why I recommend building your definite plugins folder by hand in a folder that's not used by the game (yet). You could call this folder something like "Plugins_FINAL" for the time being. Meanwhile,let's imagine that your active plugins folder is empty.

Now, when you install something new, install it into the empty plugins folder. This means that every single file and every single sub-folder that's new must belong to that latest download. This way, you can be sure that you catch all the files that belong to the download - it's really fool-proof. If there are alternatives (e.g. landmark or RCI plop), you can now delete everything you don't want to use, group the files of that download as you see fit, put them into a folder, assign a name to that folder, and move the folder over to "Plugins_FINAL", where you drop it in whatever spot you want it to have.

Proceed this way, and you will hardly ever have a "mysterious" file whose origin and purpose you don't know.

2) As I tried to explain, a well-sorted plugins folder should make it easy to find stuff you don't like. However, you can still go one step further.

Imagine you are about to add a bunch of new downloads to your game: a few rowhosues, a school, some commercial highrises, several apartment buildings...

Of course you could move them all to their respective locations in your system. However, you could also make a "Test" or "Trial" sub-folder and gather all newly added downloads there at first.

Once you have checked a download in game and found that you want to keep it, you can move it to its final position. If you don't like it, you know that all your recent stuff you're still testing is inside that "Test" or "Trial" folder.

[Dizastrow 4]

More excellent advice!  Much thanks!